These are the current policies of Brevard Outlook. They are subject to change. In fact, we expect them to change. In fact, why don’t you try to encourage us to change them? We are probably a little old-school and could use some assistance, especially if you have great ideas.

If we do change a policy that affects you in some way, whether you are a writer, ex-writer, commenter, or reader, we will try to notify you if possible, especially if we think it might have an adverse effect on your view of us. However, we can’t guarantee we will notify you - or that you will be given enough time to do much about it. Thus, it is possible you could be surprised by a sudden change. If it is a significant change, or if we didn’t think it was a significant change, but apparently people disagreed and sent us lots of hate mail, we’ll post about it in the “Brevard Outlook” category. Feel free to comment and carry on a public discussion about it there.

Commenting

We try to approve every comment received. That being said, we will not approve comments that contain the following:

• Comments containing vulgar or crude language (*unless necessary to the story at hand).
• Comments that make no sense, or are so poorly written as to be unintelligible to most people. In other words, on a story about a Girl Scout Bake Sale, a comment that says only “Woot. Woot!”, will not be approved. Say something to everyone - not just your online gaming buddies.
• Comments that could, in our best opinion (not being lawyers and all) be considered libelous. Libel is typically defined as publishing something you know to be not true. So, if you don’t like the mayor of your town, fine. Say so. If you think he has bad breath (and you’ve smelled it), say so. If you think he is so dumb that he probably wears women’s pantyhose, don’t say it unless you know so - and preferably can send us a picture to prove it.
• Comments that are overly insensitive. On a story about a tragic death of a child, a comment saying “I hate little children anyway”, will be deleted. Heck, that one is so bad, we might forward it over to some football players to pay you a special visit.
• Comments that are completely off-topic. We’ll try to be liberal about this, but help us out. Try to comment on the story at hand. On a story about a new Easter Seals expansion, writing “Easter is a religious holiday that should be banned!!!” will get your comment deleted. After we’ve laughed at you, of course. Read the article.

Brevard Blogger Listings

We will post a link to your blog and a brief description of it under the following conditions. We hope this seems fair to everyone.

1. You must be a Brevard County blogger. If you don’t presently live in Brevard (i.e. snowbird), your blog must occasionally address Brevard County in some way. In other words, we believe our readers would like to visit your blog only if it relates to Brevard County somehow.
2. While your blog does not have to be about Brevard County per se, it must, from time to time, cover things in Brevard County. This can be as simple as you talking about going to Wickham Park with your family for July 4, or how you dislike the weather. In other words, it can be a personal or business-related blog, as long as it gives readers, on occasion, a feel for life (or your life) in Brevard. Thus, a Brevard County blogger who, for instance, only covers tips and tricks on using iPods would not be acceptable.
3. Your blog must be current. While this is subjective, we would like to see a post within the past month. Blogs submitted with posts older than 3 months will not be accepted. Blogs that are no longer active may be dropped (although you can resubmit it later). If you have to “shut down” for a while, we suggest posting a blurb on your blog saying you are busy (or on vacation, or grieving, etc) so that we don’t unfairly or prematurely drop you while you are restructuring.
4. Lastly, your blog must be reasonably family-oriented. While we don’t want to get into a war over free speech with you - or your armies of friends and family - please understand that we’d rather not be responsible for directing someone to a website or blog that uses incendiary or crude language frequently, has indecent or risque photos, or contributes little to intelligent discussion. In other words, it’s okay if your blog is all about hating conservatives (or liberals), but if every post is the equivalent of “Death to *@*!&#*! Republicans” (or “!$#!@&% Democrats”), we might pass on the opportunity to promote it here. Yes, we expect to be flamed for this regrettable decision on our part.

Writer Guidelines

Interested in being a writer for Brevard Outlook?

We are currently accepting applications for writers who wish to write about Brevard County. In particular, we’d like local people to write about these five geographic areas: Suntree/Viera, Melbourne, Palm Bay/Malabar, Cocoa/Rockledge, and Titusville/Mims. We’d also like some beachside writers to give us the real scoop on Merritt Island, Cape Canaveral, Satellite Beach, Indialantic, and Melbourne Beach.

We are also looking for topical writers who might want to cover the following topics county-wide:

• Real Estate Growth and Development (Residential and Commercial)
• Crime Prevention and Trends - community policing, particular
• Chamber of Commerce Developments - growth, divisions, developments
• Financial and Investment Advice - local events, banking, seminars, guru advice
• Entrepreneur Activity (Successes and Failures) in Brevard - workshops, trends
• Medical Services Expansion in Brevard - new technologies in Brevard, Senior care
• Government Taxation (State and Local)
• Manufacturing and Industry Markets in Brevard
• Educational Trends - Private and public school growth, home school - future expansion
• Community Development - Updates on key growth areas (Viera, W-520, South Titusville)
• Retail Outlook - Changes impacting our local retailers - regulations, etc.
• Sports and Recreation - Trends, growth, and development
• Insurance - Particularly home insurance (unique in Brevard); catastrophe preparation
• Church and Religious Happenings - Growth issues and struggles, strategies.

Drop us a line in the comments if you think you might be interested. No pay, but we may have some other benefits that could help you. First, we link to your business and/or personal websites in your bio. Second, you will have a static page that will constantly display the archive of all your stories. Even if you stop writing, this page will still be there. It will be roughly in the format of http://www.brevardoutlook.com/author/yourname. You can use this as a representation of your work, or as a mini-portfolio. Lastly, you have to have the heart to want to benefit the community in some way. What goes around comes around. This is a great way to get your name out there and get some recognition, as well as giving back to the community and making Brevard a better place for all of us to live.

Be sure to submit a brief bio (as you would like it to appear on Brevard Outlook) along with your first submission. You can also attach a photo (headshot) as well, but it isn’t required.

Here are a few of our guidelines to help you get started:

1. Keep it central to Brevard. The chief focus of Brevard Outlook is, surprise!, about Brevard County. So, although we’d all love to discuss (fill in the blank) professional sports, the presidential election, the war in Iraq, and Google’s dominance of the internet, we have to keep it local. If a Miami Dolphin is visiting Brevard, write about it. If a presidential candidate if visiting Brevard, here’s your chance. If you want to do an interview story with a Brevard soldier just back from Iraq, go for it. If you know of a local company in Brevard that has banned Google from its employees, we’d love to hear about it. Hopefully, you get the point.

2. Make sure you read the rules for making commenting above. Then multiply by five. We like our writers to be at least a little careful in what you say. You don’t have to hold to some fleeting standard of journalistic integrity (whatever that means), but we’d like you to take a second to make sure your facts are straight.

3. Along those lines, be careful how you refer to various groups. You don’t have to stick to newspaper standards. In fact, please don’t. But don’t use conversational language, either. Keep in mind that people from all different walks of life read Brevard Outlook. For instance, it’s okay to refer to environmentalists as “greenies”. It makes your story interesting. But please refrain from calling them “enviro-nuts”. Conversely, if you must refer to anti-abortion (or pro-life) people, calling them “fundamentalist Bible-thumping chauvinists” isn’t helpful, either. We expect to such rhetoric in the comments, not in our articles.

4. Avoid jargon and uncommon acronyms. Not everyone knows what IEEE, ASPCA, OCD, or NORAD is. If you are just mentioning it in passing, and it is not central to the story, spell it out during its first use and link to its website, or a Wikipedia article explaining what it is. Like this: IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) or OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder). If your entire story is about the term in question, you might want to also take a moment and explain it to your readers in your own words.

5. If you quote or paraphrase someone, make sure it is accurate. You might want to email or call them first to make sure you heard them correctly. If you can’t verify it, or provide verifiable information (such as meeting minutes, etc), then you should avoid the quote altogether.

6. Link, link, link. One thing the major media fails to do is provide quality links to related information. We’d like to do just the opposite. Feel free to clutter your story with links to help those hearing about it for the first time get up to speed. Be aware that deep links to newspaper articles will often disappear within weeks. As that happens, the editors here at Brevard Outlook remove those links to keep our site from linking to dead pages. So, if possible, use primary source links instead. For instance, if Britney Spears came to Brevard County and her tour bus crashed into a tree, and this somehow (!) was a salient point in your article, you might be tempted to link to a newspaper story covering the mess. That’s okay, but also see if Britney talked about the incident on her own website and link to that. Or see if a celebrity blog out there also covered it and link to that. In other words, we don’t just want to point people to the local newspapers. But other than that, link away!

7. Avoid ending your article with calls to action. Sometimes this is necessary, so we try to be flexible. However, each article already has a “What Do You Think?” invitation for readers to comment, so including a similar statement in your article is redundant. Additionally, even though you are free to take sides (and we encourage it), try to avoid “dares” and “challenges”. If you write well, it will be challenging enough on its own. In other words, avoid saying things like, “If anyone can think of a better way, I invite them to come meet me at the new Starbucks”, or “I highly doubt this group will ever get more than five people to show up at a city council meeting”. You can see where this sort of thing could lead, and thus, we’d like to avoid it.

8. While it is okay with us if you resubmit material you’ve written for others, please make sure it is okay with them. You are responsible for making sure. Thus, if you wrote an interesting piece for your Rotary Club newsletter, make sure they are okay with you republishing it elsewhere. You may have, knowingly or not, signed over the rights once you submitted it to them. We’d like not to get sued. At least not for that.

9. Please make sure your piece is timely, either through events it covers, or the interest it generates. In other words, although a history of Peace Corps activity in Brevard would be fascinating (seriously!), we’d ask that you hold onto it until such a time as it might be relevant to a current event (i.e. if the Brevard County Commissioners banned all Peace Corps activity in Brevard). Something like that.

10. Last of all, have fun. We love serious, in-depth, analytical articles that blow the doors off people’s comfort zones. But we also love down-to-earth, good-natured, general “what’s happening” articles, as well. And so do our readers. You are writing for them. Not us. Well, mostly not us.