Sounds interesting. Keep us posted.




Again, interesting.

You may want to add in a bit more information for prospective contributors, e.g.:

Whether the magazine will only accept first-publication pieces, or whether it will consider works that have appeared elsewhere either online or in p[rint.

How long the magazine expects to have "exclusive" rights to publish the piece (e.g, 1 year, 2 years; if you want sole perpetual rights then you need to let the author know - that will chase off a lot of potential contributors though.

Some more detail on limits of contents. Is swearing allowed? What about explicit sex, or explicit torture, or abuse of animals? Are the stories meant to be PG13 or hard 18 or what? What's your policy on characters in the stories (as opposed to the authorial voice) using words like "nigger" or "faggot".

What the deadlines are. When do you expect the magazine to be out there? Some authors contribute free short stories to promote some book they have coming out. For example before Vinnie De Soth, Jobbing Occultist I gave away a coupl;e of shorts featuring him to a couple of anthologies just for readership character awarenesss; but that depended on knowing that the mags were out before my book was due.

When you will let people know if their contribution is accepted(so they can peddle it elsewhere if it isn't) and how you will contact them. Will you give specific feedback on the stories you;ve accepted or rejected, or will it be a polite form letter?

With a new mag you can't report the circulation (how many downloads or subscribers) but you can estimate it based on how you intend to market it. Writers wanting to find new readers will be more likely to contribute if they know a free publication will reach a wide audience.

You might also want to describe the intended size and frequency of the magazine (e.g. 25,000 words quarterly).

IW

_____


If it helps, here's a copy of submission call I received recently:

Big Picture Stuff
-----------------
1. First and foremost, be advised that this invitation to submit is no guarantee that your story will be included. [Company] has a reputation for setting the bar for indie fiction pretty high, and this anthology series continues that tradition.

2. The purpose of the anthology is two-fold: to showcase the breadth and quality of what indie authors are doing in fantasy and science fiction; and to introduce participating authors to as wide an audience of new potential readers as possible.

3. We will give away ebooks of the work for free. Authors may purchase at-cost print copies for resale at live events.

4. Theme/Genre: The only theme is good stories, well told. But to keep our audience focused, we are once again limiting the genre to science fiction, fantasy, and their related sub-genres. For example, time travel, paranormal, space opera, supernatural horror, urban fantasy and steam punk are all perfectly acceptable sub-genres. But stories that seem to be romances, westerns, spy thrillers, murder mysteries etc. are not, unless they contain obvious elements of a fantastic or speculative nature.


Story Content Requirements
--------------------------
Genre: Science fiction, fantasy, or related sub-genres
Length: Min 2000 words. Max 15,000 words.
File Format: MS Word or Markdown
Sexual content: racy is fine, pornographic is not
Coarse language: is fine, so long as it is organic to the story
Reprints: welcome (we want your best, even if it's not your most recent)
Marketing content: none (We will ask you later about your bio, your awards, your first kiss, and any other info relevant to the marketing of the story/collection.)

Submitting
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Deadline: Friday, Sep 30, 2016.
Method: email as an attachment to [address]

Marketing
---------
Throughout the production process, we'll be sending a web form to each author where you can enter your bio, previous publication information, web address, etc. All of these materials will be included with your story in the final book.

When we get closer to launch day, we'll begin discussing a launch plan with the authors and alumni, to ensure that we get the word out, both loudly and often.


Distribution
------------
The ebooks will be available on Amazon, Kobo, Nook, Apple, and Google Play.

We ask authors NOT to send ebook copies directly to their readers or friends. Instead, we ask you to send them a link to the book page on one of the ebook vendor sites. By doing it this way, we can still give the ebooks away for free, but each and every download helps to raise the ranking of the book, which makes it more visible on the vendor sites and gets us even more exposure. (If we allowed copies to be sent out by email, we would lose all of that potential momentum.)

Contracts
---------
Amazon requires the publisher to have a contract of some kind, granting publishing permission for the stories in the collection. We'll be using the same agreement we used last time, which will be sent around once we've made the final selections, but the contract essentially restates the details described in this email.

Sales/Revenue
-------------
E-books will be distributed free and do not generate revenue.

The print version will be available at cost to authors for in-person sales at the set cover price; authors retain the profit from any copies they sell.

The print version will also be available on Amazon and CreateSpace, under my account. Proceeds from that source will be used to reimburse the production costs and maybe pay for some advertising. If we accumulate more than that, the excess will be accounted annually and distributed to all authors equally. (To date, we've made about $50US from print sales of [previous publication].)

Of you have concerns about something I've outlined, feel free to contact me.

Other than that, I look forward to seeing your submissions.