Become a Designing Sound Correspondent

Back in April, we put out an open call for new contributing editors. Holy crap, were we overwhelmed by the response! Over 50 people stepped forward and threw their names into the hat. Going through all of that data wasn’t easy, and we didn’t have the opportunity to sit down and speak directly with all of you. We’ve selected our new “staff” and are busy getting them up to speed, but we don’t want the fact that you may not have been selected to discourage you from participating. So, we’re creating a new role here on Designing Sound to get the rest of you involved: the Correspondent!

So what is this role?

The correspondent role is a way for you to get involved on your own time and at your own pace. You can’t directly publish on your own, but you also don’t have the regular responsibilities and requirements that we ask of the contributing editors. You’ll be given a login for the site, which will allow you to come here and write your article, upload and link to media, and generally get your article formatted and prepped for release. You’ll submit those articles to the editorial team for review, and we’ll get them into our schedule for posting. You can write about the monthly themes, or go off in your own direction…preferably not more than once a month. What you choose to share with the community (within reason) is up to you.

How do you become a correspondent?

The steps are pretty simple. You have to go through the process of submitting and publishing two guest contributions here on the site. For those of you who haven’t submitted one before, here’s how it works:

• You contact us through the site, here, with a proposal. [note: the contact form is currently broken, so you’ll find a direct e-mail contact on the page.]
• One of our editors will work with you to refine the idea (only if necessary), and you’ll submit a draft to that person.
• The editor will ask for any number of revisions they feel are necessary to both make the article of value to the community and help present yourself and the idea in the best way possible.
• Once that is completed, the editor will prep the contribution for posting and schedule it.

When that process has been completed two times, and you’re ready to submit a third, you just let us know that you’re interested in becoming a correspondent. We’ll get you set up with an account, and you can prep the post yourself…no need to send us a proposal anymore. The rest of the process will be similar. An editor will review your submission and suggest revisions. The more you do this, the more of a quick “formality” it will become—you’re just getting another set of eyes on it before it lands in front of the community.

We’ve always encouraged people within the community to contribute here on the site. We’re just trying to make it a little easier for you to do it on a more regular basis, and we are looking forward to what you all have to share!

Please note: This obviously has the potential to blow up in our faces. If it does, we’ll be giving priority to those who recently applied to our call for volunteers. Thanks for understanding!