Okay, you know what? I'm demystifying the [livejournal.com profile] spnnewsletter. For anyone interested, or uninterested because it won't help their cause of getting AS MUCH ATTENTION AS POSSIBLE, this is what each of the seven coders does once a week.

1. We go to [livejournal.com profile] spn_watcher's friends list - this is the list of communities and private journals we watch. There's 533 communities and individual livejournals friended there. And you think they're ALL our friends? I don't know most of the people I link to every week. Most of the most prolific Supernatural posters are not on my friends list.
2. We go back to the page where the last newsletter lives. For me, the lowest number of skips I've had to do was skip=300, and the most was skip=450.
3. We open an Update Journal page (or a Word document, or something to type in anyway) and using this format we separate the links into categories.

WHAT LINKING ENTAILS:
For each fic link (the ones that take the longest) we have to copy the link and the title, find the rating, find the pairing, and figure out how to spell the person's username (because they usually don't write it out again so we can just copy-paste. To those who do, THANKYOU.) We also have to figure out which category it goes in - if there's even a whiff of Wincest I put it in Sam/Dean, if there's a crossover or unusual pairing it has to go in Other, etc. etc. For non-fic links, we have to figure out what it is we're linking to, figure where it goes in the newsletter (not always easy) and we don't link off-LJ, so we have to link to the person's LiveJournal and say who posted it. Sometimes we post repeats.

4. If the link does NOT have any of the information we use - for instance in fanfic if it doesn't have a recognised rating, a link to the fic, or a pairing - we DON'T LINK IT. You know what? Because there's already about skip=350 OTHER posts to look at and we're not going to spend an extra five minutes figuring out the rating and pairing of that one fic, especially since some of us don't like to read certain pairings or ratings.
5. I imagine others may do this earlier, but about 2 or 3 hours later when I've finished wading through all those pages, I go to the comments to the previous newsletter and add all those links in the appropriate category. At this stage I'm usually pretty tired and interesting in doing ANYTHING but coding, so again if your comment has no link or pairing or description or rating, I DON'T LINK IT.
6. I fix whatever myriad mistakes in the coding I've made this time - usually I try to preview the post, but sometimes I don't remember and it goes out into the world with a bad tag. THIS IS AN ACCIDENT, not an intentional ploy to destroy your friends list. Have patience, I will fix it.

All of that is just what I do on Wednesday afternoons, as one coder. The mods have a harder job in terms of decided what to add to the [livejournal.com profile] spn_watcher friends list, take care of the badly behaved commenters, and generally keep things in order. It's a huge job. Some nutters even do it twice a week because they don't want you lot to miss out!

Unsurprisingly, sometimes we miss a post, or make mistakes. We're only humans doing the Supernatural fandom a FREAKING HUGE FAVOUR, after all. I don't mind doing it, I find all sorts of interesting things and it keeps me involved and active, but quit being whiny bitches when it doesn't go your way. One politely-worded, correctly linked comment in the post will do wonders for you.

It's not like journal readers can't go to the userinfo to find out what our rules are, and it's not like the rules are hard to follow, either. You can also see exactly how many people OTHER THAN YOU are enjoying the newsletter (2938, for those of you not willing to click a link). We have to worry about making sure everybody's happy, and included, and getting out of it a comprehensive list of the goings-on the in Supernatural fandom. Look at how many people have put so many hours into keeping that going for you (and I swear, the newsletter gets longer every week) and then complain about your one fic not being included because your header was wrong.

To quote [livejournal.com profile] kroki_refur, the recent wank gets the

Cap by [livejournal.com profile] kroki_refur.

ETA: on a happier note, OMG DIRECTOR'S CUTS! Very cute. Glad they're over that whole Sam killing a girl thing. Focus on the present and not the werewolf you had sex with then put a bullet in, that's what I always say.

ETA2: You're all really sweet, but I didn't really do this for attention for me, not half because that would make me as bad as the person I'm complaining about. I figure if people know how much effort we all put in (including [livejournal.com profile] truffle_shuffle, [livejournal.com profile] monkiedude, [livejournal.com profile] marishna, [livejournal.com profile] bunnymcfoo, [livejournal.com profile] clex_monkie89, [livejournal.com profile] innide_darling, [livejournal.com profile] researchgrrrl, [livejournal.com profile] vylit, [livejournal.com profile] winterlive, and [livejournal.com profile] estrella30) they would at least understand the process, see that it isn't elitist and see how much work we put in.
Also, A"LKHAFLKJHSD:FKJHSDF CHRIS LOWELL HOLY PIZ. WOOOOOOW.

Green Queen

From: [identity profile] frances-veritas.livejournal.com


Uh oh. There's some recent wank going on that involves the newsletter? :-(

God, people are such whiny, unappreciative bitches. Whenever I see a [livejournal.com profile] spnnewsletter update I shake my head. But out of amazement because I can never imagine doing that much html coding let alone going through all the information to find every link, story, news, art, pairings, etc.

YOU GUYS TOTALLY ROCK!


From: [identity profile] jfc013.livejournal.com


I am consistently impressed with the newsletter, recommend it often to my friends, and though I am way behind with my reading, completely intend to go back and get caught up one of these days through the newsletter alone--I trust it to be there and to give me everything I will be seeking! You guys do AMAZING work!

From: [identity profile] rosamundeb.livejournal.com


Jeez... did we ever have anything like this for LOTR? Because I had no idea anybody ever attempted to try to do such a thing! And, if they did, I figured the list would be generated by collecting what people submitted, NOT by having to monitor 533 communities and friends (whew!). You guys really have your work cut out for you.

Sadly, still hearing rumors of SPN being cancelled, which I find hard to beleive, considering how much I hear about it on my f-list. As I've said before, I don't watch it (I'm betting it's on Thursday nights in the States, because I never notice it being on, and I have a regular commitment on Thursday nights), but I'm crossing my fingers for you guys.

From: [identity profile] green-queen.livejournal.com


Well there's [livejournal.com profile] nothing_to_say, and there was a psuedo-newsletter that I ascribed to once upon a time, so yeah we've had something like it. Not quite the same.

Ugh, I wouldn't believe the rumours. There's pretty much NO indication that Supernatural is going to be cancelled, I think people are overreacting a lot.

From: [identity profile] rosamundeb.livejournal.com


The strangest thing is that I think I know nothing_to_say... and yet, that can't be her! Hmmmmm... never belonged to that group.

Thanks!

From: [identity profile] truffle-shuffle.livejournal.com


WORD.

I was just going to bitch about whiny attention whores in my journal, but this is better.
ext_24105: jackie and hyde, that 70's show (supernatural)

From: [identity profile] miss-universe93.livejournal.com


I think this post is a very good thing as it's probably similar to what all newsletter coders in general have to go through just to get this stuff out to us fangirls. I have such huge respect for how much time it takes you and other coders to sort through all this stuff, not to mention the crap you must get sometimes from people. Such a huuuge job but from the looks of it, you're great at it ;D

From: [identity profile] alanna-zero.livejournal.com


I think you guys do an amazing job with the newsletter. Don't let it get to you if some people can't appreciate that ;)

From: [identity profile] blondiusmaximus.livejournal.com


The SPN newsletter is amazing, srsly, I consider it one of the best parts of fandom (at least for me). You guys all do an amazing job.

From: [identity profile] waterofthemoon.livejournal.com


God, thank you so much for this. You all do an amazing thing for SPN fandom, and people need to understand that it's not a fucking personal offense when their stuff accidentally doesn't get included or whatever. >.<
.

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