Hey, I'm new to this website, but an idea occurred to me just now while I was looking at the forum! I have a lot of experience using LULU.com and I have a lot of spare time right now, so it occured to me that I could easily put together a collection of poems by the poets here. As the editor, I wouldn't change the poems in any way, except to point out spelling and/or punctuation errors, but I would be in charge of choosing which poems would be included in the final product. Photos and artwork would also be fun to include in this collection! I created the first issue of a magazine called Chaplin's Magazine this year using LULU.com, and it turned out great! The magazine included poetry written by my friends from various open mics around Chester County, PA, as well as portrait shots that I took of them. The link is: http://www.lulu.com/content/1546905
Would any of you be interested in being part of a project like this? At this point, I'd just like to see if there's any interest out there. Ask your poet friends about it, too!

you have mail

..sure

Some people might be slightly offended having someone "edit" their work. I personally know of quite a few writers on here who do not spell or grammar check their work because standard checking doesn't allow for different meanings/spellings/interpretations.

Well, I would be (am) anyway.

There's a big difference between careless spelling mistakes and purposeful spelling liberties. I feel that careless spelling mistakes shouldn't make it into print - that's just me though. I hope that makes sense...

But who are you to judge that?

Are you not the same guy that warned people about posting their work on the net? Now you want to collect it? Or am I misunderstanding something here. If so please enlighten me.

<<-----DELIBERATELY uses no punctuation and would be severely pissed if somebody gratuitiously felt they were qualified to "edit" my work knowing absolutely nothing about me, my writing or what I'm actually trying to express.

My own editors dont even try that mistake with me.

And what are your qualifications?

And I agree with kc. You were advising against posting work online and now YOU feel entitled to "edit" our work?

I think not.

lol shes trying to do a good thing, so both you people if it offends you in the way its done then dont supply any poems WTF!!!!

I had a novel published in April, and my second book is coming out next month. It's mostly short stories, some of which tie into the first book, but there are also some poems in it. Some of the poems have even been posted on this site. I'm a little adverse to the idea of someone tinkering with my work, though....it's the whole "creative control" issue....

Thank you for that crystal clear observation. I think however that we made it fairly clear that we dont plan on "supplying" any poems. Good lord talk about stating the obvious......

you forget that you are not the "We" or in this case the majority, like i said if you dont want to post your poems, dont !

I do believe that there are at least three of us and while I'm none too good at counting, I do believe that qualifies us as "we". But thank you once again for pointing out the obvious~I dont know whatever I would have done with myself if you hadn't clarified that for me ... blink blink blink

let me note that SHE is, in fact, a HE.

also, how often do you post your work here? that's what i thought. when your creativity is threatened, please feel free to speak up.

Oh thank god. I thought I was the only one that recognized it was a 'he'. Whew!

LOL Wiz! "it"...

Yes, I posted an ad here about how some magazines will not publish previously published poetry. The overwhelming response to that ad was that most people don't care about being published in magazines. As far as editing goes, correct me if I'm wrong, but spelling typos are annoying! When I said I was going to edit the poems, what I meant was that I would choose which ones to include in the collection and I'd put them in some kind of order. And, I'd correct any typos (with permission of course!). I would NOT change the content of the work! For instance, some poets choose not to add punctuation to their work. I would not add punctuation to it! But if somebody spelled "too" like "to" when it should have been "too" I would make them aware of their mistake, and with their permission, I'd publish the corrected version. As far as my qualifications go, I have a lot of experience self publishing with Lulu.com, and I self published a collection of poetry this year called Chaplin's Magazine, which I mentioned above. You can download the magazine for free and see for yourself what my "editing" work is like. I have a few poems in Chaplin's Magazine, but the majority of the poems were written by friends of mine at various open mics around Chester County. All of the photos are mine except for the portrait of me (which is also my portrait on this site). When I posted the idea for a collection here yesterday I just wanted to see if there would be any interest in it. I didn't expect a flame war. I like doing creative projects, and I thought that helping Mingle poets showcase their poetry in print would be a worthwhile cause. If I go forward with this project, there would be no monetary reward for me - just the satisfaction of being part of a fun project. I didn't mean to offend anyone by insinuating that bad spellers are bad poets or something like that. If your honest opinion is that I'm being judgemental, then I'm glad that you're being honest. Maybe you won't judge me so harshly next time...

Ok here is the issue as I see it. You are basing your opinion that you are qualified to edit the work of other writers based on the fact that you are self published. Interestingly enough, unless you pay for that particular option (and this is true of ALL the self publishing sites and houses) you have done your own editing; i.e. You have done your own spell and grammar checking. Again, this doesn't really qualify you to do something any of us on this site can do via a good Thesaurous or dictionary. What you may not realize is that a good many of us are published and are probably pretty qualified to do our own editing. The fact of the matter is that ANYBODY can self publish if they have enough money. It simply doesn't make that person qualified to do any kind of editing on anybody else's work. Case in point, I took two years of law. Does that entitle me to call myself an attorney? I believe it was terribly presumptuous to think that because you've self published that qualifies you to play editor. That's the bottom line. Sorry.

In addition, you would use your own opinion as to what would go into this collection. Yes, I said opinion. Something we all have along with ... well you get the picture. A good and professional editor with the experience and an objective eye does not necessarily use their "opinion" as you have so graciously offered to do. Have you ever heard the phrase "One man's garbage is another man's treasure?" You may personally like a real piece of trash and toss a real treasure but then again that's all in the eye of the beholder is it not? That being said, your opinion would hold absolutely no water here.

Lastly, the truth is also that while Lulu is definitely an option for anyone wanting to publish (and come on now, who are we kidding? If we're posting on THIS site, it's probably safe to assume that the writer in ALL of us wants to be published )it is also a higly overpriced self publishing company that withholds the fine print which simply states that a person wanting to be self published would find that IF (and let's face it, there's not a big market for poetry in the writing field), IF the book that is being self published happens to make a few dollars, the author gets VERY little of the cash and in fact could end up waiting 20 years just to break even on their initial investment. There are far more less expensive, yet very effective self publishing houses that offer not only the pleasure of seeing one's work in print, but also dont leave such a huge hole in somebody's wallet. Chapbooks would be at the top of that list. In closing I'd like to "honestly" state that while I dont believe you to be judgemental, primarily because I wouldn't really care what your opinion is of my work, I do find your grandiose opinion that you are fit to edit anybody's work presumptuous. Honestly.

I see what you're saying. I may not be the right person to edit this collection. Do you have anybody else in mind who you feel would do a better job? My last collection of poetry cost $8.68 per unit and was 127 pages long. That price was set at the minimum printing cost. I could have marked the price up to any amount of money that I wanted to, but because it was essentially a chapbook (albeit a high quality chapbook), and the goal wasn't to make money, I opted to put the printed magazine for sale at cost. It is also free for download, even though I could have set that price at anything, too. My Mom did the final spell-checking for it, because maybe you haven't noticed yet (because I've been improving), but I'm definitely not the best speller out there. If by your logic we were to look at peoples experience in the publishing field as the only qualifying characteristic when choosing "editors", then my Mom shouldn't have spell checked the magazine. But, if we were to evaluate her on her top-notch spelling, then she was a great candidate to do the job. I appreciate your honesty that you think that my attitude is presumptuous. To be blunt, I'm open to using a more qualified editor for this project! There's no argument that I'm not a seasoned veteran when it comes to publishing. At the same time, I do have a little experience, which I am glad to share with anybody who wants it. I do think it's a good idea to put together a collection of poetry written by the poets at this site (with their permission of course). I like to be involved in projects like this, because I get a good feeling of seeing projects through from start to finish. And, I have a fair amount of time on my hands,so it just makes sense that I suggested that I could do the "editing". It didn't occur to me that anybody would call me presumptuous for offering to put together a collection of poetry here (or ever). It may seem kind of stupid to you since you've been published, but I truly feel that a lot of poets would jump at the chance to be published in a collection like this, because it would look good on their resume. ha ha. Well, maybe not, but I still think they would be happy to contribute.

If you or someone else that you know would prefer to do the editing and you (or they) are more qualified than I am (and are willing to work for free like I was planning on doing), and if you feel like this project has potential, then I hope you won't hesitate to come on board and help make this happen. I'd like to be a part of the project in some way, even if it's just to set up the finished document on Lulu.com or to help seek out potentially publishable poetry to be included in the collection. I like the name: The Mingle Poetry Collection. But, names can be changed. And, so can attitudes.

I wish you would look at Chaplin's Magazine, because don't think you would be so critical of my "editing" if you did. The fact that we could put together a quality collection of Mingle poetry seems really neat to me, and I hope that you aren't too mad at me for having even brought it up :(