There should be an editor on at least 12 hours every day. New messages typed into the chat box will cause a sound alert for the editor, and when they hear it, they will come in and assist you if they are available. They may not respond immediately; if no one responds within a minute, and something is pressing, feel free to try again.
Simple rules:
1. Always use your full name (or pen name if you use a pen name at The Speaker) for chat and comments.
2. Be brief.
3. If you are taking a story, say so, then complete that story.
What you can do here:
1. Request story ideas. Be as specific in what you are looking to write about as possible. If you want to write any Science news, type “Science.” If you want something more specific than any Science suggestion, say so. If there are several things you could write on, you may list them.
Examples:
- “Biology, particularly Neurobiology”
- “Tibet or Xinjiang”
- “Argentina”
- “Human rights”
- “Something BREAKING”
- “Human rights law, international trials, the UN, the UNSC, Vietnam, or noise art”
If you are taking a suggestion, say you are on it in chat, then say the same thing in the comments section below: the subject and that you are on it. That way the editor does not need to spend more time finding stories and other writers will know that story is taken, even when they look later. If you take a story, you should always complete writing it.
2. Ask for help with something you have already decided to write. Write a brief message explaining what you need. It may be a direction to go, a headline, who to contact as a source, or anything else needed.
3. Editors will also be posting suggestions in the chat box and the comments. If you take one of these suggestions, say so in both the chat and comments sections.
Others should also feel free to post suggestions, particularly if you find a BREAKING story (a story that has just broke within the last hour, but more particularly if it has just broken in the last few minutes). Make sure it really is breaking before suggesting it — sometimes on Twitter and other sources of breaking news, users post news as breaking that is definitely not.
4. Notify others about a post you have published, so they can share that post on social media if they are interested. Proceedure:
- Compose a perfect Tweet for your post and Tweet that Tweet from your Twitter account.
- Either a) copy that Tweet and paste it in chat or b) copy the link of your Tweeted Tweet and paste that in chat like this: “Tweet: https://twitter.com/TheSpeakerMedia/status/629556366022156288”
The reason we use the perfect Tweet is because Twitter allows the shortest social media text. The text of a Tweet can also be copied and pasted if people want to share the post on Facebook, G+, Linkedin, or another platform. Twitter also uses hashtags, which are beneficial on G+ and, to some degree, Facebook.