What about for long titles? I've noticed one site recommended using keywords of the title and not the whole title, but with the WOTF stating that, should the entire title be used?
The following was a working title, which I've changed for the 100th time, but let's take something like: "Green Is The Color Of Time", would subsequent headers say, "Green/Time"? Or the whole title?
Posted by Silver3 (Member # 2174) on :
Why not ask WOTF? The administrator is nice, and it's not like you'd be bothering her.
Although, FYI, I tend to put the complete title. Unless, of course, we are talking about something that no longer fits in the header, such as "The magnificent adventures of a little man from Germany, his best friend, his dog and his pet green parrot"...
Posted by pooka (Member # 1738) on :
... and her lover.
Posted by trousercuit (Member # 3235) on :
... and the gender-confused fascist evil robot monkey that trailed them...
(I mean, let's not stop now. It was just getting good.)
[This message has been edited by trousercuit (edited June 06, 2006).]
Posted by Ray (Member # 2415) on :
...and his radioactive cat
Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :
I suppose it's a legacy of printed manuscripts. You were supposed to put your name and address on the first page, upper left corner...then the title, more-or-less centered in the middle of the page...then on subsequent pages you were supposed to type your last name / the title or a keyword from a long title / the page number. (I was ten years or more catching on to doing this.)
Manuscripts get lost and mislaid and the pages get separated. Suppose you're an editor who has to sort through a pile of papers that fell over. It'd be easier if they were all identified by name, title, and number.
In the olden days, it would've been difficult to type out a separate manuscript without your name in the headers---I don't think the Writers of the Future rules would've been workable if a writer intended to submit elsewhere. In these days of word processors, new manuscripts, to their specifications, is just a few clicks away.
I always assumed the Writers of the Future want to pass the stories on to their judges in complete anonymity, so they don't see who it is they're judging, just the story itself. (I remember that when I got my printed manuscripts back from them, the pages with my name and address were always missing. I assumed they were compiling a mailing list.)
Posted by Pyre Dynasty (Member # 1947) on :
...named Sven...
Posted by Silver3 (Member # 2174) on :
WOTF puts somewhere (I don't remember where exactly) that the reason they ask for a cover page with every possible information about you is so they can remove it from the manuscript, and forward the anonymous ms to the Coordinating Judge.
Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :
Ordinarily, I'd say that "Color of Time" would be the best choice for key words for a story with "Green Is the Color of Time" as the title (since "Green" is too ambiguous).
A little common sense would indicate that for a very long title, a key phrase would work. (In fact, a key phrase might be better as the title itself.)
