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NEW! Doing It By The Letter
"Doing It By The Letter" is a BrightsOnline action initiative to get a Bright perspective heard in national newspapers and online news sources.
Sign up now to join the "Doing It By The Letter" action list.
What is Doing It By The Letter?
When one person writes a letter to a newspaper it may get published, or it may not.
Newspaper editors often respond better to lots of people voicing a similar opinion.
If a number of brights respond in a similar way to a particular article or opinion piece, then the editorial balance of a Letters Page may be tipped: through the collective weight of opinion, at least one of our letters is more likely to get widely published.
Of course, just because we are brights, doesn't mean we will agree at all on some issues. But we are coming from a shared "worldview" so we are likely to be in tune with each other with regards to the articles included in this initiative.
What do I have to do?
All you have to do is sign up to join the project. You will receive:
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a very brief email
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at most a couple of times a week, normally less
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notifying you of interesting news coverage of relevance to the Brights movement's aims
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It will contain nothing but a link to the selected article online
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and a very brief description of the event or opinion that we're responding to
(We
don't want to say too much in the email, or it might bias how you write and
make our letters too similar. After all, this is a chance to express
your opinion in parallel with other Brights, not to parrot what
someone is telling you!)
Newspapers like you to respond to their coverage, so it's a good idea to cite the specific article or opinion, not to just write a letter about "the Iraq War" or "education".
There's obviously no obligation for you to write and you can remove yourself from the email list at any time. Your email address will of course not be shared or sold and nor will it be used for any other purpose.
Who decides which articles are worthy?
It is "Doing It By The Letter" members themselves who suggest the news articles and opinion pieces for inclusion in the bulletin. BrightsOnline can't read every newspaper! (Ideally, they should be suggested on the day of publication and replied to within twenty-four hours.)
In order to keep "Doing It By The Letter" working, however, we can only respond to so many news stories. There is something we could write about every single day -- but you can't write a letter to a newspaper every day. So in order to ensure that enough of us reply to a single article for it to make a difference, we do have to limit what we can cover. (And no one wants an inbox full of this stuff!)
Which regions are covered by these lists?
On the sign up page, all you have to do in addition to entering your email address and so on, is to select your country from the dropdown box. But if you want more information on how the list works, then read the rest of this section.
Many of the issues covered will be specific to one country or region. It makes sense not to send you articles about domestic issues if you don't live in the area of origin. Due to the current geographical spread of active Brights around the world, we are beginning the project based on three lists:
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United Kingdom (optional)
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North America (US and Canada) (optional)
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International (everyone)
Everyone receives international notifications. "International" stories are found in publications with a very wide reach, for example international magazines or solely online newspapers, and cover topics of a more global reach. Articles that are highly specific to the UK or to North American go to people who live in those areas, only. All you have to do is select your country. You should select your country even if you do not live in the UK or North America, so that when enough people in your area have joined the project we can begin to include more places.
What do I do again?
Sign up now to start Doing It By The Letter!
