The Proposed Journal Thread - suggestions, thoughts here

[Wilson]

I am moving discussion of the proposed journal to this thread, as it deserves a proper thread of its own. I've been chewing the matter over, and here's a preliminary sales pitch of sorts. I'll be finalizing it and posting it on Wellesnet proper as well, once I have it more sharpened up. In the meantime, tell me what you think, and any further suggestions you have...

I've given it some thought, and it seemed like a great name for the journal would be The Orson Welles Almanac, both because of the previous Welles projects with that name, and because it seems an appopriate name given the journal's aim and scope.

Here are my thoughts: The Orson Welles Almanac will be a twice yearly journal looking at the life and works of Orson Welles. As long as it relates to Welles in some way, no topic (probably) is too broad. Articles of all stripes are welcomed, be they academic or generalist in nature. Articles can be as long or short as they need be, since this is electronic in origin and we don't have a page count to meet or exceed. Perhaps one issue of each "volume" or year could be a theme issue, focusing on a given topic/film/issue. Coverage of recent events in Welles matters will be included also, such as reports on important screenings, book reviews, new video reviews, letters and so on.

The journal is, initially, to be a free electronic publication made available in a printable PDF format. Maybe if I or someone else someday has the inclination, and people want to pay for it, it could move to actual print format, but that is getting WAY ahead of things. Each issue will be archived on Wellesnet for newcomers. An electronic mailing list will otherwise be established in order to send each issue to those who sign up when it is ready. The list would be used for nothing other than mailing the journal out, so no worries about spam.

Submission guidelines: all suggestions, queries or submissions should be sent to towa@wellesnet.com (this email won't be active until 6/24, so don't use it till then). Preferred file format is MS Word, and the Chicago Manual of Style is the preferred writing style guide. Works of all kinds will be welcome, as long as they have relation to Welles, his career, or his work. Obviously, we want to cover some new ground in looking at Welles' work, and readers are presumed to be fairly familiar with said work, so keep that in mind when writing. Biographical works are probably not the best choice, as this ground has been covered several times already, but as with anything, if it is presented in a new and/or interesting light, we will certainly consider it. Naturally, please provide citations for all sources cited. All rights would be retained by the author; there is no payment for articles, obviously, as this is done solely out of interest in Welles work.

[Wilson]

Given that there has been absolutely zero response to this idea, I am shelving it for the time being. Frankly, having thought it over, I don't see how doing an online journal is any different from doing it as part of the site. Which means doing it as a hard copy journal, and that isn't something I want to invest the time and effort in right now.

[mteal]

Jeff, your Almanac idea is interesting, but it does sound like alot of work, and I would suggest that the Wellesnet site already is a kind of Orson Welles Almanac. What might be nice is to have a yearly round-up of important links that have been compiled in the course of all our discussions here on the message board. Sometimes good ones get lost in the shuffle if I forget to bookmark them. If we had a special "links" section here, organized by different media, each one of us wouldn't have to bookmark so much stuff individually.

Also, this may be premature or even pipedreaming, but I was thinking recently of Beatrice's plans for an Orson Welles "museum" or institute, which now appear to be defunct. I don't know where she was planning to build it, but I can't think of a better place then online, where everyone could access it no matter where they were. It would be great, for example, to have some of Welles' TV appearances online, and since they are usually less then 30 minutes, and sometimes only 5-10 minutes, they would'nt take that long to download. Someone mentioned recently that those old Mercury Theatre radio shows take forever to download these days. That didn't use to be the case.

The Orson Welles museum could even be a subscription site, with members paying a monthly or yearly fee to have access to it. I know David Lynch has been expirementing with that sort of thing for his own art. I've never seen it, but some people say it's an interesting website.