Nick,

You always have a choice. If there is something that is too far out of your comfort zone, or for whatever reason does not feel right for you to do, then don't do it. One size does not fit all. It was mentioned to the writers that it's a good idea to post at Nifty, no matter where else they post. But that doesn't mean it's going to be the best choice for everyone all of the time.

I want to say that I REALLY appreciate you being honest and saying what you're feeling. Most people don't do that. They either suffer in silence or leave. (That's a big lesson in customer service that businesses have to learn if they want to stay in business.) So the things you are saying, without a doubt, represent what other people here are thinking, too.

There are changes going on here, that affect the readers as well as the writers, and I can see that the people in charge of doing them may not have communicated enough to everyone about what is going on. Part of that is because we're doing this voluntarily in addition to the other things we do in life, and also because there is so much going on here. We've been so busy doing things, that we haven't said anything about it.

About the changes going on, they are still in process. That means that they are still being worked on and still changing. We're having to discover what works (and what doesn't work) by trying things. We're doing something at GA that hasn't been done before, as far as I can tell. It's a story site, but also a community (a unique one, I might add), and a place where people can stretch their "writing wings", hopefully in an environment that is supportive of them doing that. So we're having to learn as we go along. There really aren't any models out there to go by. We're having to forge our own trail, so to speak.

When you (or anyone else) make a comment or suggestion, I can tell you that it is being listened to. Even if it's something someone posts that they don't even intend as a suggestion.

There are going to be a lot of good things happening here (they're already starting). Change can be pretty uncomfortable while it's going on. My own experience is that part of the creative process is learning to be OK with that kind of discomfort. Easier said than done, I know.

Anyway, thanks. Replying to your post made me sit down and put into words some things that probably need to be communicated to everyone here.

Kitty

We have all heard the stories of course- kids taken, tricked* or worse by internet predators. If you were to believe what the media and the alarmists were saying, there was a freak hiding behind every virtual bush.

That's what the media and politicians do- hype, fear monger and grandstand. It gets viewers for the media and allows politicians to appear progressive as they pass more and more quasi-unconstutional do-nothing laws.

YES- internet predators exist. NO- you don't have to live in fear of them.

Think about it this way: how many people have MySpace pages vs how many people have actually had a problem with some wack-job looking them up? 6, 12, 24? Truthfully this crap is becoming something of an urban legend hyped up by people with their own agendas- like companies that make content monitering and filtering software.

I won't name names but last year a consortium of six of these companies paid 1.2 M$ to a lobbying firm and 5.5 M$ to a Madison Avenue firm for a public awareness campaign. You can bet your farm that they didn't do this out of the goodness of their hearts. They have conveniently created an atmosphere of fear and now they are profiting from it.

The TRUTH is that sex crimes as a function of population have been remarkably stable after exploding exponentially in the late 70s- early 80s. That spike was because of mandatory reporting laws started kicking in. Statistically, you are much less likely to be sexually assaulted via the internet than you would be in school or at church.

The world is no more rotten today than it was 10, 20 or 30 years ago. In fact a lot of things are a lot better in many respects. For instance, police departments can't look the other way in the case of hate-crimes or sexual assaults. They are required by law to investigate them and the liability that they face if they don't is astronomical.

My point is that these things are, thankfully, relatively rare. If you take a few common-sense precautions, the threat is almost non-existant.

*- tricked as in fooled