This is a critical time for this website and I am not talking about the addition of a new editor.

 

We have lost a lot of readership and several of our best writers in the past six months and if we are to survive as a viable website, there needs to be attention paid to what qualities define a great literary forum.  I submit those assets as the following:

 

The title, "Useless Knowledge" is a great one for a humor site. But, less than 30% of our articles as a group reflect humor. Politics, human interest stories, geography, religion and technical explanations far outweigh comedic pieces. If writers are not going to come to mecca, then lets bring mecca to them. Change the title to reflect the writing because the original intent of this place is not being served. The title has very little connection to its writers and writing a la the Utah Jazz. (formerly the New Orleans Jazz) With all the creativity in this place, a name contest would be fun and effective.

 

Any championship team, whether it be in athletics, entertainment, business or publishing needs talent at its core. The fundamental problem here is that this site encourages everyone and anyone to write about anything. This automatically defines it not as a classy literary resource for search engines but a blog made up of more than one author. While this is charming in its premise, it is not survivable in its outcome. There are far too many articles that are simply not good enough to hold most readers here. Once people realize that there is ongoing mediocrity by too many amateur writers, they are going to go where the articles are far more articulate. This is exactly what they have done evidence by a whopping total of twenty votes in our jr. high production, "Columnist of the Year." The answer is not to just get better writers. That is only half the solution. The other half is to eliminate the poorer ones. The first step is to have two sections of writers chosen by the Editor. The main section of writers and the beginning ones. If readers want to read the tyros, fine. The top comedy clubs in Los Angeles have an, "open mike night" for beginning comedians. Of course, there are less than a handful in the audience compared to the weekend sell out crowds, but that is the point, isn't it? The same weeding out process needs to be exercised here.

 

This is not a beginner's class of Writing 101, it is a website that wants to be on the cutting edge of literary journalism. If so, the first step in the direction of the right cross road is to start turning down most of the articles submitted if they lack good content, intriguing personal interest, entertainment value, controversy or any other "hook" guaranteed to seduce readers. When you see book titles, jacket summaries and magazine teasers I guarantee you they are carefully screened for value. If they are not good enough to make people want to immediately read them, they do not make the final cut from the editor. That is not the case in here. Any title, concept or story line gets accepted. Say hello to shabby acceptance. Say goodbye to readership.

 

Any author wants to see his or her work in public. It is the reason most people write articles. We like our writing to be validated beyond a localized website. Although UK gets more readers than our own email address it is not nearly enough to be called a true literary forum. There is a reason why Yahoo, Google and the other search engines are not picking up our material and spreading them widely over the internet. That reason has been confusing and debated since I joined over a year ago. I am not sure why we are not being taken seriously by the search engines but I can assure you that if that does not change, good writers will not stay in or join this website. It is folly to argue the various possibilities. That is tantamount to arguing how to arrange the office furniture in the World Trade Center building as the airplanes approached on 9/11. The key thing here is how to change the problem, not who or what is to blame. Simply put, if someone does not pick us up and start giving us a forum beyond UK, we are going to die.

 

The "Columnist of the Year" competition was intended to be a positive stroke to honor the most voted writer. It has had the opposite effect the two years I have been a part of it. Instead of promoting good will among the various writers it has become a bloodbath of jealousy and pettiness. It has also been embarrassing because of its lack of voters which made it a prime candidate for immediate cancellation. Instead, it has dragged on for all to

see like literary road kill. It is ugly to look at and has no redeeming value. Even the winner is going to feel embarrassed because very few people voted for him. It is like a city council race in Dancer, Texas . A small, intimate gathering of people at a cocktail party laughing at the inside joke. It did not unify the writers in here. It repulsed them. It is not worth the trouble it caused because the writers need to encourage each other instead of emasculate those who serve as their peers. As has been suggested before, it would be far more beneficial to select best articles instead of the most popular person, which is what the competition is revealing now.

 

The playground off the main forum where the children go to act out.  There are several problems with this place. First of all, it makes most of the main writers lazy. When we are bored, instead of working on a new concept and developing it into a good story, we cruise into the rebuttal area and either start an argument or jump into one. Therefore, there are a lot more arguments than new articles. A huge waste of time, energy and talent. Secondly, there are too many threads opened up that have nothing to do with an article being written in the first place. They are usually begun because someone does not like the original writer and they want to personally embarrass him or her. A good rebuttal section should take the argument of the article seriously and stick to that concept in a classy and direct way. The moderators were instructed to delete comments that were vulgar or in poor taste. I wish we could also add, "stupid arguments that have little do with the main article," as well. This would make the rebuttal section far more effective and valid.

 

It is my hope that the writers in here, including myself, focus on the issues of the world and not on each other. We have many talented wordsmiths in here that all can make positive contributions if we can get past our own pettiness. Shakespeare wrote, "The problem my dear Brutus is not in our stars, but in ourselves." How true that is in here. I have been very fond of my contemporaries and I have also been angered by them. I hate to admit that my focus has been distracted by personal comments and relationships instead of writing from my heart and using my talent to make this world a better place. I am going to go back to that passion from now on and stay out of the rebuttal section as much as I can unless someone has directly refuted something I have written. Even then, I am going to be very selective to engage the debate. I am not here to defend myself or my ideas, I am here to express them. If most people do not like them, including other writers, that is something I am going to have to live with. I encourage the other writers to quit making so many pit stops in the rebuttal area just because you have too much time on your hands or you want to make a clever comment. It just demeans the place when we do that.

 

As I said, we are at a crossroads. If we can find a few more good writers, build up the ones we have, keep them focused on issues outside UK, separate the beginners into a new category, be much more selective on submitted articles, hook up with an outside search engine, stop the divisive contests as to who the best writer is and maybe go with best articles instead and make the rebuttal section a little more classy and less populated comment-wise, I think we have a shot at making this work. But, it needs to become a positive place for writing and a safe place for articulation. Right now it is not and that is why people have left and are reluctant to express themselves. I would like to see 50% less articles if that made the site better. It means we would all have to work harder than ever before. There is nothing wrong with that.