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To prevent headaches on my part, please ensure that ANY submission to Smarks DVD follows these guidelines. Consider these to be in order of importance, with the first three over-riding everything else.

The Big Ones:

- Send ALL submissions as an attached word processor document. For the sake my sanity, PLEASE type it up in Microsoft Word, or Notepad, or Wordpad, or any other compatible word processor. E-mail editors are pretty much the worst choice available for formatting documents (ESPECIALLY Outlook Express, which happens to be the most popular). Using a word processor will allow you time to read over your column and make any changes you might need, as well as provide an easier way to organize your work. All Windows 95 or higher PCs have Wordpad installed automatically, and placed in a very easy to reach spot. If nothing else, use that. If you are on WebTV or another service that doesn’t allow attachments, at the very least make sure to follow these guidelines:

• Set your margin to no more than 80 lines and no less than 60. This is the internet standard and makes for the easiest viewing by us. If you don’t know how to set this up, LEARN. We hate to sound harsh, but learning to use your own e-mail program is a necessary step to doing any kind of writing on the internet, so the sooner you know this stuff, the better.
• Do not change the default font size or color. Just send them as "plain text" (be sure to select this option in Outlook Express if you're using that program), as they’re intended to be read. Assume you’re sending to someone with a black and white monitor that only does 640x480.
• Check your spelling. Most e-mail programs (and word processors) include some kind of spelling checker. USE IT. At the very least, read over your work twice to catch any major errors.
• Space out your paragraphs. Make sure to include a blank line in between paragraphs – as in, hit "return" twice. A little white space never killed anyone. As a rule of thumb, don’t make a paragraph any more than about 5 sentences long. This isn’t a rule as much as it is a style suggestion to keep your readers from getting eyestrain.

- ONE submission, per person, per day.

- If you want to have your text formatted, please do the formatting within Word and do not include a plethora of HTML tags.  In other words, if you want to make a section of bold text, make it bold within Word so it looks like this, don't make it <b>look like this</b>.  HTML tags really slow down the formatting of articles.  One or two in an article is alright (since there is some stuff in HTML you can't do in Word), but more than that and it becomes more of a hassle than is worth our time.  If you want to send something formatted with HTML, please make sure to make the ENTIRE file HTML and send it that way -- don't mix. 

The lesser ones:

- Please include the title of your column, along with the name you want to be billed under, at the top of your e-mail.  As in, the body of the e-mail, not the attached submission.  Do this with every submission. 

- Send columns from the e-mail address you want feedback directed to. 

Style guidelines:

- We do NOT allow image files in columns.  Period.

- The following HTML formatting is not allowed: changing the background colour, different fonts, font sizes larger than the default (what you are reading now), garish colours, blink tags, Java, ActiveX, inline scripting, nested tables.