As we all know the internet has a mind of its own. Yesterday the mind inside this site decided to tell everyone it could about something we'd been working on for a few weeks: our new membership directory. Sorry if that caused some confusion - we weren't expecting it either, honest.
But for those of you who are curious, this is a pretty complex operation, handled by a team that includes Joe Moore in Florida, Becky Cantrell in Hawaii, our wonderful web developer Ray in Estonia, Shirley Kennett running the Thrillerfest section from St Louis, Kelli Stanley handling news from San Francisco, and yours truly in rural England. It's amazing we don't get more slip-ups of this nature.
Still, the secret is out, so let me tell you a little more about what exactly it entails...
If you go to
http://www.thrillerwriters.org/connect/ you will see the home page for the new directory. Members should by now have logins to this part of the site. If you haven't, type your email into the login form and ask to be reminded of your password, then the site should send you one. If that doesn't work please get in touch through the contact form for The Big Thrill above.
Once you log in you can add a photo, bio, agent and business details. It's dead easy - just use the Profile (edit) option you will see at the top of the page when you log in. Hit save, and you're done. You can come back any time to change the details here, as often as you like.
Running membership directories is very difficult - which is why most author organizations don't bother much beyond a simple list of names. We want to deliver you more because that's what readers tell us they want. Lots of libraries, for example, have asked if there's some way to see authors who live in their area - which you can do in a very general basis using this system. Also we feel this kind of directory makes authors look a little more human than just a list of names. And we are people anyway, I think.
The observant among you will have noticed this directory looks more than a little like Facebook. This isn't a complete coincidence. It is based on similar technology, and will allow us to add more features from time to time. But this does take time and money so we need to be convinced they will be used first. We don't think, for example, there's much point in offering you the point to blog through these pages. If lots of you feel differently, do let us know.
And even if you don't use this facility to put up much in the way of a bio, please, please get a mugshot up there. It will make ITW seem a more friendly place once we have all, or most, of those blank photo frames filled in.
