As much as it goes against the modern grain, I would honestly recommend having your readers pay for the content they read. Ad-supported publications generally do very poorly online, in my experience. By all means offer free content, but either solicit donations or put some of your content behind a paywall. I've yet to see anyone make it work any other way.
Another option, of course, is to start up a separate money-making venture and funnel the profits from it into support of Scalpel; then it's still out of pocket, but as your "pocket" has increased by $850 or however much, there's no net loss to you other than your time and effort. Running two startups at once is pretty hectic, though.
I certainly wish you the best with it. Roberts's column was terrific and I'd love to see more like it. I hope you can encourage your reviewers to really let loose, not be so shy with their I-statements and opinions (speaking as a reviewer, I am so tired of reading and writing reviews where the reader is referred to as "one" and the reviewer's voice is buried beneath equivocations), and have a good time telling people what they think. I'd be willing to take a bit of a pay cut for a venue that encouraged that sort of writing--or make a donation to it, or pay to read it--and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
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Date: 2007-05-15 03:40 pm (UTC)Another option, of course, is to start up a separate money-making venture and funnel the profits from it into support of Scalpel; then it's still out of pocket, but as your "pocket" has increased by $850 or however much, there's no net loss to you other than your time and effort. Running two startups at once is pretty hectic, though.
I certainly wish you the best with it. Roberts's column was terrific and I'd love to see more like it. I hope you can encourage your reviewers to really let loose, not be so shy with their I-statements and opinions (speaking as a reviewer, I am so tired of reading and writing reviews where the reader is referred to as "one" and the reviewer's voice is buried beneath equivocations), and have a good time telling people what they think. I'd be willing to take a bit of a pay cut for a venue that encouraged that sort of writing--or make a donation to it, or pay to read it--and I'm sure I'm not the only one.