I’m looking for a particular shop in Manila where i can buy the softwares found advertised in my magazine but it’s only available abroad and can only be bought through online payment- it’s about creative writing. There are decent shops here like National Book store but they only sell limited variety of softwares (mostly games and encyclopedia). I think it is cheaper and safer to buy licensed software in the shop than order it online.
- Ernesto S

Article directories receive hundreds of articles daily – but why do some articles perform better than others? In this article we examine some of the reasons.

Article writing, for a competent writer, is a fairly easy discipline. The task is to write an informative and interesting piece of work in the range of some 400-1200 words. Yet many articles that I, as an article directory editor, have seen are just not up to the mark. Why is that? Let’s leave aside for the moment the ones that are grammatically poor or have been obviously assembled by cherry-picking several sources of information.

The function of an article written with the express intent of being reproduced throughout the internet on blogs, ezines and the like is to sell a product – indirectly. It should be written in such a fashion that the reader’s interest is piqued and then held until the article’s conclusion, resulting in a level of interest that stimulates the reader to click through to the author’s site, link or whatever.

Poor articles do not achieve this goal for a variety of reasons and most of these can be summarised by the following points:

1. The article is a blatant advertisment with little or no interesting content.

2. The article rambles on vaguely with no focus or simply has no point to make.

3. The article may have a theme but that theme does not relate very well to either the title or introductory paragraph.

An article, no matter how short, is a story – and all stories have a beginning, a middle and an end. In an article that is written for promotional purposes, these ‘anchors’ can also be called question, development and answering conclusion. So what are they and how do they work?

1. The ‘question’ should be in embedded in the title – ‘Green Cheese: Is The Moon Really Made From It?’ is humorous but effective. It defines the question that the article will answer.

2. The development discusses if indeed the moon is made out of green cheese and, if possible, offers some counter-arguments to this – ’so what then was Neil Armstrong stood upon back in 1969?’ This phase encourages the reader to think and consider what you, the author, are saying – and here you must write with authority, being sure of your facts as you can be. Any signs of insincerity at this point and the reader will realise this. Your authority has then been lost together with the credibility of the article.

3. Answering conclusion: this can either confirm or refute the theory of the moon’s status as green cheese – it depends on how the author wishes to answer his or her own title question. In this fun example we could wind up with something like ’so it appears the moon is not made of green cheese – but there are those who think it still is. Are you one of them?’ and go on in the authors box to promote telescopes, conspiracy theory books or a host of other things.

The last question is important. It performs the same function as the ‘if you want more information…’ endings but, I think, has a better ring to it as it asks the reader to consider their stance on the subject.

Articles written to the above formula – and article writing is formulaic – will usually perform well. Now let’s consider the badly written and the cut-and-paste sector.

Not everyone speaks English as their first language yet English is the language of choice for article writing. Right or wrong, it’s fact. So I would suggest to those people who write articles and whose first language is not English – get some help. Why? Simple. It doesn’t matter if you are intelligent, well-educated and successful – poorly-written English makes your article look amateurish. Get a copywriter or at least get a fluent (and I do mean fluent) English speaker to vet it for you. You might be surprised at the improvement in reception your articles receive.

For those who (and it really is so apparent) just cut and paste blocks of text from who knows where to make up an article, or for those who simply re-arrange their articles so as to make ten from one, my advice is – give it up. I see these every day. One may get posted to my directory, the rest will be binned. Realise that there is NOT a lot of really high quality content on the internet and write instead just one version of the article – but make it the best you can. That will get you noticed and you will gain the respect of your readers.

If you have got this far in this article then perhaps I’ve proved my point!


- Steve Dempster

Alright, so I’ve never really been an avid fan of the mystery genre. I have only ever read two mysteries: And Then There Were None and Death Comes as the End, both by Agatha Christie.

Suddenly, however, I feel compelled to read some sort of mystery fiction sometime soon.

SEX IS OKAY.

VIOLENCE AND GORY DESCRIPTIONS ARE OKAY (both when explaining the murder and examining the body)!

BOOKS THAT BASICALLY CENTER ENTIRELY AROUND BOTH THESE THINGS ARE NOT OKAY. I am looking for something in the mystery genre, because I am interested in reading a mystery. I don’t want to pick something up that is basically about the sex life of a detective who happens to be solving a crime during the time of the plot.

I would especially like books that allow you to guess what happened before the end of the story, but this is not a requirement. Consider this while suggesting novels or authors, but don’t let it be your only concern. I’d like some variety, anyway.

Other than that, anything goes, really. :] Like I said, though, variety is good, so try not to recommend a bunch of the same thing.
A side note: Technical, legal stuff is okay up to a certain point. I don’t mind having to look a definition up now and then. However, I also do not wish to be forced to have entire pages translated online, if you understand what I’m saying.
- Thoth Incarnate

It’s sometimes quite difficult for me to focus on the minor scenes that establish a backgroud for the more action-packed portions of my story. I basically need to find a way to take myself away from my intense approach and develop the characters more. I am writing a fantasy based novel that contains a variety of creatures, monsters, and races of characters. Should i try to identify with just one main charater and express my thoughts through him/her or try to get into the minds of all characters which may or may not be intelligent enough to come across as portrayed. Thanks for the help and God bless!
- Bugbilly