Reject due to file type

[LadyVer]

http://jp29.org/itbasics.htm

I can see why it's easier to underline words when handwriting.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I know I didn't upload a .zip because there's a place on that page to download the file, and it's giving me back a .odt.

Behind the scenes, .odt (and indeed recent MS Word files) are actually zipped XML with the extension renamed, so that's probably why it identified it as a zip.

For uploading I like RTF; just about anything will read it, and it supports most of the formatting you need for Lit unless you're doing something fancy.

 

[WishItsTrue_TG]

Learning

I don't think the Literotica story site accepts a whole lot of coding just because you can do it elsewhere. There's a reason for that beyond the technical capabilities. The story file here is essentially a continuously running anthology. Anthologies have basic, across-the-board, design controls so that there's a uniformity of product (to serve the need of uniformity of read). I think Literotica has basic, restrictive presentation design parameters to keep it simple and the product uniform.

So I wouldn't go zipping off on all of the neat coding you might want to do to a Literotica story. Presentation design is the purview of the publisher, not the author, and your otherwise nifty story could get sent to rejection hell. (And the Web site would be doing the readers a favor.)

"Anthologies have basic, across-the-board, design controls so that there's a uniformity of product (to serve the need of uniformity of read). I think Literotica has basic, restrictive presentation design parameters to keep it simple and the product uniform."

Thank you very much, sr71plt. I'm just a newbie here and an amateur at that. I'm learning as I read these posts on threads. Uniformity of product is something that never occurred to me, and it makes sense. I used underlining for my story title and chapter headings, and two or three times for emphasis in hundreds of pages of text. Is title underlining verboten? An unnecessary, self-indulgent extravagance? Just superfluous?

I've also used different font faces, colors and sizes to indicate subtle inflections of voice in dialog, to highlight issues of importance to the speaker. It seemed to me the different fonts, sizes, etc. added a third dimension to flat 2 dimensional text, altering the flat text with subtleties of importance and implied emotions. Like a speaker using a monotone voice who switches to a style of speaking rich with inflection and timbre to express specific emotions. For example, people are more likely to buy a stock offering if it's presented on a green background. Color influences the emotions of the viewer.

I won't mind being taken to school, if I'm being a smart-assed newbie trying to fiddle with accepted procedures and long established traditions and standards.

I do enjoy using code to add drama to dialog, and I'd like to continue it. But I would also like to hear good reasons to reconsider a position that's simply amateurish. So far what you've said is cogent and made me realize there are points I've never considered before.

Thanks again for what you said. I've learned something from it.

 

[sr71plt]

I don't know whether the underlining will be accepted. I suspect so, as the code is accepted. I'm sure you aren't the only one who has underlined subheads and it's gone through. It will be a rare usage, though, and thus will be distracting to a lesser or greater extent to the readers. It's the least used subtitling method in publishing, after larger font (not acceptable here), bolding and italics (both of which apparently are acceptable--publishing sometimes uses bolding in subtitles, but it doesn't like using it in text).

To provide emphasis to words in the text, underlining is just incorrect (and therefore should be distracting to a reader). That's what italics are for and italics are permitted in Literotica text.

I'm pretty sure the color coding isn't permitted. I've never seen it in a story here. I can say it would be extremely distracting--and your intent probably wouldn't even be understood by the reader.

 

[Bramblethorn]

"Anthologies have basic, across-the-board, design controls so that there's a uniformity of product (to serve the need of uniformity of read). I think Literotica has basic, restrictive presentation design parameters to keep it simple and the product uniform."

Thank you very much, sr71plt. I'm just a newbie here and an amateur at that. I'm learning as I read these posts on threads. Uniformity of product is something that never occurred to me, and it makes sense. I used underlining for my story title and chapter headings, and two or three times for emphasis in hundreds of pages of text. Is title underlining verboten? An unnecessary, self-indulgent extravagance? Just superfluous?

I've also used different font faces, colors and sizes to indicate subtle inflections of voice in dialog, to highlight issues of importance to the speaker. It seemed to me the different fonts, sizes, etc. added a third dimension to flat 2 dimensional text, altering the flat text with subtleties of importance and implied emotions. Like a speaker using a monotone voice who switches to a style of speaking rich with inflection and timbre to express specific emotions. For example, people are more likely to buy a stock offering if it's presented on a green background. Color influences the emotions of the viewer.

Keep in mind that not everybody reads Lit stories in the same way.

Some read via the standard site on default settings. (Probably about 5% of those people have some form of colour-blindness.) Some readers customise fonts at their end for better readability according to their personal needs or preferences. Some read through the mobile app (not sure how much customisation makes it through that?) Some like to print them out and read offline. And some use text reader software to read the story out aloud for them.

The more you customise visual elements of the story at your end, the less likely it is to be compatible with reader preferences at their end.

 

[WishItsTrue_TG]

This is changing my whole outlook.

Keep in mind that not everybody reads Lit stories in the same way.

Thank you very much, sr71plt. I only considered the positive side of the procedure, and none of it's negative impact. Distracting readers attention is something I never considered. I only thought of it as evoking and capturing a readers attention, and provoking an emotional response. Apparently, there's a down side to that.

Thanks, Bramblethorn. I assumed if my settings were incompatible to a readers app, my settings would revert to the default and display as plain text in the format used by the reader. Like all coding in an .rtf file reverts to plain text when the file is converted to .txt. But I never considered readers preferences, and whether or not my settings interfered with them. For example, I never realized the use of color could leave a color blind reader with confusing gaps in the text.

I write swords and sandals action stories in the novel and novella categories. Think "Xena, The Warrior Princess" meets "Buffy, The Vampire Killer." Scattered around are battle scenes with warriors saying very angry and unfaltering things about each other. "Kill the bastard," seemed appropriate in red with italics, as the heroine galloped across the scene waving a sword around.

In my mind I pictured something like going to a web site. The screen would display HTML coding using color and size and font to attract visitors to one link, while other coding attracted attention to site descriptions and options. A wealth of color and variety to attract and capture visitors attention and provoke emotional responses to different elements on the page. I imagined using HTML coding to do on a story page what it does on a web page. It seemed appropriate for warriors running around like they were in an action film.

Is this just a bad idea for the medium used here? I'm sure I'm not the first person to think such a thing. Unfortunately, I've notice none of them made it into print. Am I being just a naive newcomer acting in ignorance of existing realities and traditions, with substantive reasons behind them.

Is this just a bad, naive idea or does it have a place in action stories? What freedoms of expression are available for characters involved in life and death conflicts? Emotions run hot and intense in the situations my characters live in. Friends and loved ones lives are at stake. Loved ones die. Loved ones must be saved!

I would consider giving it up, especially considering the cogent reasons presented here. But I like my characters speaking in red with italics when their friends are in danger. It's what I would do in real life.

 

[PennLady]

Is this just a bad idea for the medium used here? I'm sure I'm not the first person to think such a thing. Unfortunately, I've notice none of them made it into print. Am I being just a naive newcomer acting in ignorance of existing realities and traditions, with substantive reasons behind them.

Is this just a bad, naive idea or does it have a place in action stories? What freedoms of expression are available for characters involved in life and death conflicts? Emotions run hot and intense in the situations my characters live in. Friends and loved ones lives are at stake. Loved ones die. Loved ones must be saved!

I would consider giving it up, especially considering the cogent reasons presented here. But I like my characters speaking in red with italics when their friends are in danger. It's what I would do in real life.

If you had your own site or page, you could write however you see fit, and format it however you like. There's no right or wrong about stuff like that.

However, you do need to consider, as others have mentioned, the reader. If I went to a page that was full of various size words in different colors, I'd likely click off because it would be hard to read. Too much variation in text size, color, bold, etc., would be hard on the eyes. First this would attract my eye, then that would, then the next thing, and essentially I'd be unable to read it because there would be so many things to catch my eye.

It would, as they say, junk it up.

It also sounds to me like the kind of thing people experimented with when the web and HTML were first there and accessible and I don't think it took long to determine it didn't work as well as hoped.

If you check story sites, or news sites, I think you'll find that most of them have a format that they stick to, and it's rather plain, so to speak. The font is usually Times New Roman or Arial/Helvetica; italics are used for emphasis, as in print; links are provided and usually underlined, but are not a huge change from the regular text. It's probably still developing, but these standards (such as they are) have come about because they are, at the moment, what work best for readers.

 

[WishItsTrue_TG]

junking it up

Thanks PennLady. "If you had your own site or page, you could write however you see fit, and format it however you like. There's no right or wrong about stuff like that.....However, you do need to consider, as others have mentioned, the reader. " This is true and important.

I go to news sites, and I enjoy formatting in easy to read designs that I've become accustomed to using and depend upon. In my personal life, I don't like "wise asses" fiddling around with practices that have practical reasons for their existence. Personally, I like a Sarah Brightman singing an aria as the author wrote it, rather than innovating changes on her own. Once upon a time in the distant past, I use to be a dance skater. That involved rigid, inflexible stylized methods of executing prescribed movements. People were scored by how faithfully they replicated established standards. I like standards and appreciate precedents established because they work.

I am looking for reasons to do one thing or another. My analogy of a web page was hyperbole. There is linear organization as text precedes line after line down the page.

I am wondering, in action stories where characters are dealing with life and death issues, whether new technologies would best express the issues. My character are really dealing with important issues. To band together to support one another, or act selfishly and only be concerned with their own interests? How much does the individual sacrifice for the welfare of others? What emotions run through my characters when they are placed in such situations?

Ink and print restrictions have disappeared. Variety and drama in multiple mediums are at the fingertips of writers at their keyboards. Would red and italics and bold font faces let me express subtleties in what my characters feel and experience. Could I reinforce the pain a character feels at the loss of a loved one using a different color?

What are the reasons to ignore the new opportunities of technology? As you say, "It would, as they say, junk it up." This could be very true, decisive and compelling.
I do not know if this question just involves just me and my action stories. All over, people are asking how to use the new technologies, and what of the past should continue, or what of the new is not worthy of use.

So far, what is posted is thought provoking. Intelligent and practical reasons to continue established procedures. I feel an attraction to the new. I have characters that are crying, and I want to give them the best voice I can. In one of my scenes, a young girl is injured. A concerned man asks her companion if she is breathing. Her companion answered in a small, reedy, thin font., "I don't think so." Than man moans in darkest blue, and exclaims to the heavens in bold face, "For what? A few lousy sheep?" The young girl and her companions were fighting to avoid starvation over the coming winter. Facing starvation, the young girl in the scene was (almost) killed because she was fighting over a few lousy sheep. I want to pump as much emotion into that scene as I can, and use the voice of my characters to express the emotions involved as expressively as I can.

 

[sr71plt]

Another reason to follow established standards in posting at Literotica might be that they are going to be posted within the Literotica constraints, whatever Literotica choses them to be, regardless. It's Literotica doing the actual entry into the story file. If you want embellishments, you can try to submit them and see what gets through, of course.

 

[WishItsTrue_TG]

That is an available option.

That seems just a willful act of trying to achieve something. I would rather find good reasons to do things one way or another.

I do like precedent and the good reasons behind their establishment. I look around and I see many changes I don't like. I do like the standards of dress that have disappeared. I miss standards of politeness and respect which are gone. And all around the world changes, and people must choose which is best and what should be pursued.

As PennLady saids, it just junks it up. As you say, standardization enables construction of anthologies, and formating that promotes ease of reading. Is there anything in a changing world that would enhance things for readers?

I remember reading a book on population genetics. It was dealing with the math behind a species evolving a new characteristic that enhance it's life. Something around the order of 99.999% of changes to an existing species were detrimental and resulted in the death of individual which exhibited the changes.

I would guess bucking existing procedure is not a highly productive way to do things. I would still like to take a reasoned look at options.

 

[sr71plt]

Are we still talking about clearing stories for the Literotica file? I think I got lost back at the pass.

 

[WishItsTrue_TG]

???

Are we still talking about clearing stories for the Literotica file? I think I got lost back at the pass.

Yeah, I think so. I think the conversation is about any useful changes in the world of publishing or whether changes are just junk.

 

[sr71plt]

That would sort of be more of a monologue, though, wouldn't it? This thread was about getting a story posted at Literotica--you know, sort of the practical meeting the Web site requirements discussion? Maybe it's just me, but I don't see the utility of discussing world peace when, as I posted, to get a story at Literotica, you just basically have to meet their acceptance regulations. It's not something that we are voting on--or that they are asking us to.

If you'd like to discuss this with the only ones who can/will do anything about your views on this, you might go directly to the site owners Laurel, the editor, or Manu, the tech guy, via the Private Message system (upper right on this page). Good luck with that.

(Or you could start up a discussion with LadyVer; she loves to talk in circles here.)

 

[WishItsTrue_TG]

Appropriate places

You're right. It has devolved into a question of world peace. Or rather a general topic of dealing with changes in the world of publishing.

That is a question I wish would be discussed. Just like newspapers have changed recently, I wonder how online writing will change. I wonder if any good changes could be made, or if any changes are just self-indulgent junk.

I did submit a story with font face and size used to dramatize dialog. An editor is kindly going over it for quotation formating, and any other changes she deems necessary. I am dealing with the practical realities of getting a story posted, not because of file type, but because of the use of different types of fonts.

I'm not here to challenge the powers that be, but to see what they will permit. But I would like to try some changes, and see if they work. Not for shock value. The example I used above of a young girl trying to carve a life for herself and her loved ones in a dangerous and brutal world is a serious topic. Real life refugees are facing the same problems my characters faced. What would be the best way to give them an expressive voice?

Rather than challenged the powers that be, I'd love a reasoned discussion of what might be good uses of changes in technology and their value in the practical realities of posting stories online.

You've made other posts on this thread that were reasoned and compelling, and I find this last post the same. But I wish there was a general topic discussing using new technologies to give characters the best voice, or whether what is already extent is the best option.

PS. That was a low blow about discussing things in circles. Shame on you.

 

[sr71plt]

The Author's Hangout is probably the best place to the discussion you wish to have. It has evolved into something that isn't really an editorial matter, especially one relevant to editing stories for Literotica.

 

[Bramblethorn]

In my mind I pictured something like going to a web site. The screen would display HTML coding using color and size and font to attract visitors to one link, while other coding attracted attention to site descriptions and options. A wealth of color and variety to attract and capture visitors attention and provoke emotional responses to different elements on the page. I imagined using HTML coding to do on a story page what it does on a web page. It seemed appropriate for warriors running around like they were in an action film.

I think there's an important difference between the two. In most cases, webpages are designed on the assumption that you DON'T want to read everything that's on the page, and visual distinction between elements helps readers find the part they're looking for. If I want to read the story on a Lit page, I'll look for content in the middle of the page in Times New Roman and filter out the other stuff; if I want to find a link to the author profile or something, I'll look around the edges of the page for text that's underlined or otherwise distinct from the main content.

A text story usually assumes that readers are going to read the whole thing in a fixed order. Visual emphasis from fonts/colour/etc risks distracting from that, dragging your eye around the page and making you read out of order like you're probably doing now.

Also, heavy use of fonts and colours always reminds me of sites like TimeCube. Or Demonbuster. Or... you get the idea.

Is this just a bad idea for the medium used here? I'm sure I'm not the first person to think such a thing. Unfortunately, I've notice none of them made it into print. Am I being just a naive newcomer acting in ignorance of existing realities and traditions, with substantive reasons behind them.

I'm not saying it should never be done. There are major authors who use font tweaks here and there for effect. For instance, in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, Death "talks" in unquoted small caps to signify that he's speaking directly to the mind, not out loud. Pratchett has sold almost a hundred million books so it can't be offending his readership too badly. (I suspect the use of small caps is a deliberate choice to make the text distinct without adding too much emphasis; other characters in the same book shout in regular caps.)

But I think it's best used sparingly. Otherwise there's a risk that your readers will be focusing more on your visual design than on the story you're trying to tell, and for a lot of them that's just not what they're looking for here. When I want visual stimulus I'll read a graphic novel or pull up a video; on this site, I want to see an author convey that stuff through choice of words.

 

[i_would]

I use LibreOffice, which uses the .odt file format, so I was pretty happy to see it listed there. I filled in all the information, uploaded the .odt file, and submitted the story (if yu have access to that sort of thing, the story ID is 809192).

Site is technically correct in saying it's a zip file, as an odt file is a zip compressed archive, containing a whole bunch of human-readable files (you can try this easily by opening a odt file in your favourite unzip software).

That notwithstanding if they say they accept odt they should not send back such a rejection notice of course.

 

[Privates1stClass]

I also use LibreOffice (it's free) for my writing. Although the default file extension is '.odt,' there are options to save your file in other formats, including MS Word.

I'd suggest you save your file as a Word file and submit your story that way. Insure you don't use features which Literotica doesn't permit. Use 'Help' to learn more about various file formats which LibreOffice supports.

 

[robertreams]

I had much trouble until i started submitting everything a an rtf file upon the advice of laurel, since then i have had 40 successes

 

[PennLady]

I had much trouble until i started submitting everything a an rtf file upon the advice of laurel, since then i have had 40 successes

RTFs are handy, but to me, still the easiest way to submit is to copy and paste into the submissions box. That does mean you'll need to include HTML code if you want italics, but that's simple enough. If I wasn't doing that, though, I'd go with RTF.

 

[robertreams]

Many writers who have asked me to edit their work, use underlining, serial exclamation points (!!!) and question marks and exclamation points in tandem. Many use Caps, bold and underlining to stress certain words I try to gently explain to them that emphasis is accomplished by word choice and sentence structure. A question mark does not create a question. An exclamation point does not supply emphasis. These punctuation marks are employed by the author AFTER !!! he or she decides to make an exclamatory sentence or a question.

 

[elfin_odalisque]

I know this is all getting a bit off topic, but I definitely think that while the right way to emphasize in a hand written note is italics, underlining is pretty common. Having said that, it's just as possible that a character in the story could be examining a book other printed material that someone had underlines passages in.

Having said that, so far I haven't had the need to anything but the rare italics (in my submitted story or in the other two that I'm nearly done with).

Italics and/or block quotes seem more effective than underlining.