This is of special interest to the N'Stadt community, because The Democrat has a special focus on democratically-governed sims (and will be covering the upcoming election quite a bit!)
The Democrat is published weekly on Tuesdays and is an independent, notecard-based, subscription journal of events and places in Second Life. Why subscriptions? Because ad-based newspapers belong to the advertisers, not the readers. The Democrat gives honest analysis of the Second Life universe, and includes critical reviews of places, events, and products.
The initial vision for the paper is to include the following sections each week:
News - focusing on democratically governed areas like Neufreistadt
Special Feature - Nonfiction features by contributing writers
Funnies - Jokes and anecdotes submitted by readers
Esperanto - with lessons for beginners and information for proficient speakers
Reviews - Places, products, and events rated by contributors
Editorials - Opinions by our editor and letters from readers
The proposed cost for each issue is L$25, with subscription plans available. This money pays our reviewers, our writers, advertising, and eventually office space. New issues will be distributed each Tuesday to members of the group "The Democrat" who have up-to-date accounts with the newspaper.
Help wanted! We are looking for reporters, writers, reviewers, and contributors to The Democrat. All jobs are on a per-assignment basis. Freelance work will be considered. Currently we are looking for all contributions to be either in English or Esperanto, or both.
Contributions to The Democrat are compensated on the following scale:
News stories not less than 50 words including dateline - L$25
Feature story not less than 400 words - L$250
Jokes, anecdotes, or comics - L$25
Reviewers - L$25 per survey completed (no use of multiple accounts allowed)
Letters to the editor - not compensated
Would you like something special to you to be reviewed in The Democrat? You can put a product, event or place on the fast track to appearing in The Democrat by paying L$100. There can not be any cost involved for our team of reviewers in order to review your product, event, or place. Products submitted for review will be destroyed on completion of the review. Remember, you are paying for a guaranteed review, not necessarily a positive review. Our team of reviewers uses a set of criteria for each review and are encouraged to be brutally honest.
Questions? Ideas? Complaints? Drop a notecard on Redaktisto Noble or send an IM.