Guidelines for Writers

Violinist.com is an independent source of news and information about violinists and classical music. When you submit information to this site, you grant Violinist.com a perpetual right to publish that information, in all media, and under your name. Information submitted to the site may deleted at the discretion of the site's owner. To maintain a high quality of information on the site, we ask people who submit information to Violinist.com to respect the following basic principles of journalism:

No plagiarism; respect copyrights

Attribute all information you get from other sources to those sources, whether they be a person, a website or another publication.

If you want to tell people about a webpage or file elsewhere, please provide a hyperlink, rather than copying and pasting the entire piece. Anyone who publishes someone else's copyrighted material on the site may be suspended or banned from the site and is subject to legal action by both Violinist.com and the copyright owner.

To hyperlink an article, use the following code in your post,
<a href="Web_Site_Address">Web_Site_Address</a>

Here's an example:
<a href="http://www.violinist.com">http://www.violinist.com</a>

which will display as: http://www.violinist.com

Or:
<a href="http://www.violinist.com">this is a cool website</a>

which will display as: this is a cool website

Accuracy

No one should pass off information as accurate if he or she knows it to be wrong, or even suspects that it is wrong. If you see something on the site that you know to be wrong, please post the corrected information, or e-mail the editor so she can correct it.

No obscenity, profanity or hate speech

Please respect others on the site, and conduct yourself as if you were speaking in public. Which you are. Attempts to harass or intimidate others are grounds for expulsion from the site. If you see something on the site that violates this policy, please e-mail the editor so she can remove it. The editor retains sole discretion in determining violations.

No solicitations

We do not accept or allow classified advertising or commercial solicitations on the Violinist.com discussion board or on members' blogs. (But feel free to promote your upcoming concerts or CD releases.)

In addition, your postings to Violinist.com may not include incentives of any kind for other users to click on ads which are displayed on the site. This includes encouraging other readers to click on the ads or to visit the advertisers' sites, as well as drawing any undue attention to the ads. This activity is strictly prohibited in order to avoid potential inflation of advertiser costs.

Linkbacks

Readers are welcomed to post links to their other websites on their personal pages or blog and discussion entries. However, if you do, we insist that you follow good netiquette and return the link by linking to Violinist.com from those other sites (e.g. a MySpace page, personal blog, student homepage, other music site, etc.).

Clear, precise writing

Need help spelling a word? Go to http://www.dictionary.com.

Want to know the source of a famous quote or saying? Go to http://www.bartleby.com.

Improve your writing by revisiting that English class standard, Strunk & White’s "The Elements of Style".

Looking for facts or data to bolster an argument? Try Finding Data on the Internet or Power Reporting.