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I am happy to announce the creation and opening of The Review Cafe.
Newsvine does many things right. It's entertaining, it's educational, it's fun. It encourages and discusses citizen journalism. (More on that front in a minute)
But I noticed a few things that seemed to be missing and decided to be proactive. I didn't see any fiction writing exercises so I started some and created a fiction writers group. I saw a movies group but I was interested specifically in documentaries so I started a group about documentaries.
I wanted to find a way to shine the spotlight on other great writers here and since there is no editor's picks - nor editors for that matter, although we do have Edit Me - I set up Newsviners Picks.
My biggest pet peeve - besides Cash not really being related to Johnny Cash - was how reviews and interviews are handled. Not only do we not have the ability to edit our comments and it's hard to know the proper category for a fictional story about a hangover or about my Newsvine addiction but I think reviews should be grouped in some way.
As it is now if I want to see movie reviews written by Newsviners I go to the Movies, Etc. group and even then that only works if they are in the group or it's clipped to the group. Same with book reviews and I dont' know that we have any group appropriate for my appreciations of the Daily Show.
Scott? Yeah? You're babbling again.. Cut to the chase.
Right. So wouldn't it be great if there was one place you can go to find Mykola's review of Haruki's new book, and Sue's Movie Reviews, and my interview with Stewart Copeland of the Police... and find it all in one place?
Well, now you can and it's called The Review Cafe.
The guidelines are so simple that even the Gettysburg Address looks wordy in comparison. But then they now think Lincoln may have had smallpox when he wrote and delivered it so I'll cut him some slack.
Anyway here are guidelines
There is one thing I do not want: Seeds. This is for articles only.
Wanted: Reviews, written by Newsviners, of works of art or entertainment. I am defining arts and entertainment as music, books, movies, television programs, operas, etc.
Wanted: Interviews conducted by Newsviners with someone associated with a piece of art or entertainment. See above for definition
If you are not sure if a piece belongs here, email me. If you have a question about the group, email me. If you have forgotten your
This group, like the Personal Narratives group, is intended to encourage and inspire Newsviners to write articles of their own. This group is then a way to publicize those pieces as well as read others' pieces.
This group is intended as a one-stop shop for reviews, by Newsviners, of various works of art.
After my ten years of journalism I went into education, particularly special education, but I still love to read and write as you may have noticed. So I'm reading an average of 100 books a year and watching 100 movies a year.
After writing at least 100 book reviews I was getting a bit bored with the form and decided to ask publicists if I could instead interview the authors directly. Soon I was able to ask whatever weird, rude or - to me - fun question I wanted. And they answered.
Thus, I started tagging things as sbutki-interview and sbutki-reviewfor those writers like ChristopherBuckley who won't let me interview them. I think these authors are just scared!
I tried indexing them all but that way just did not make a lot of sense.
So in addition to the altruistic reasons for the group - helping other writers gain exposure, clipping writers, reading and comment on other reviews, etc - there's also the selfish one that now I can point people - readers, publicists, authors - to the group as a place where my reviews and interviews are collected.
But... as penance for that selfish did I plan to do three things:
1) I'm going to write articles on how to write reviews and interviews, though I'll probably wait until my summer classes end first. In the meantime here is my first writing advice piece.
2) I am letting you guys suggest questions and/or help me choose questions for author interviews. Have a great question you want me to ask James Lee Burke or Donald Westlake? Great because I've published part one of the interview and if you give me some good questions I'll include those in part two.
(That would be the citizen journalism twist on all this)
3) Within reason I'll help others write reviews and plan interviews.
Anyway, that's the idea.
If you see some good reviews clip them this way or join the group. If you have any questions just email me.
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