AJnet is officially accepting guest submissions again!
That’s right readers, you (yes, YOU!) can now submit your own articles to AJnet and have them published to an audience of hundreds a month!
We originally did this in the earliest days of the site, pre-2010. I’ve long since removed those articles, and have no intention of republishing them unless the authors themselves contact me and ask me to do so.
Allowing guest submissions was also something I wanted to do with Rantlister. The idea was to give a voice to people who wanted to rant but didn’t have their own website. While Rantlister is dead and gone (aside from the Rantlister Archives), the AJnet Organization is happy to keep this concept alive by providing an unbiased and censorship-free (within reason; read the guidelines) outlet for aspiring writers to not only get their writing published, but also read by an audience.
All submissions must be sent to [email protected]. Submissions sent to any other address are unlikely to be accepted.
The current guidelines for submitting a guest article are as follows:
Articles should be between 500 and 2,000 words.
Articles should be a minimum length of 500 words, and a maximum length of 2,000 words. A few words over or under is fine, but don’t get too carried away. We’re not looking for a novel, but we’re looking for more than a quick blurb.
Exceptions may be granted for high quality submissions.
No racism, homophobia, or other hate speech.
Submissions can’t have any racial or homophobic slurs, nor can they be racist or homophobic in nature. AJnet is not down with white supremacy, and we have no problem with gay or trans people. There will be no exceptions to this rule.
Articles on controversial or sensitive subjects are acceptable, but will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis to ensure they’re not just thinly-veiled hate speech.
Let us know if it’s time-sensitive.
We have a publishing schedule that sometimes extends several months in advance, so if your article is about something very current and needs to be posted sooner rather than later let us know and we’ll make the necessary arrangements to ensure it’s posted in a timely manner.
Make sure you have the rights to any images you’re using.
If you’re grabbing stock images from Google, make sure they have a free non-commercial license. We don’t want to get sued by some overzealous copyright holder. See our recent battle with Copytrack. Rights holders are getting more and more aggressive, and we have better things to do than fight avoidable legal battles.
Spelling, grammar, and punctuation are important.
Submissions should be readable. That means reasonably accurate spelling and grammar, and proper use of punctuation. We’re not looking for perfection, just readability.
The editor reserves the right to make minor edits to guest submissions for the aforementioned things, as well as other readability issues like sentence structure. We’ll usually notify you before publishing if we choose to do this.
That doesn’t mean we’re going to proofread for you and fix all of your mistakes. Low-effort submissions won’t be accepted.
Include the name you want credited.
Guest submissions are usually posted through the Guest Writer account, with the person who submitted it receiving credit in the body of the article itself. Submissions should include whatever name you want us to credit you as. It can be an alias, a username, your real name (though we don’t suggest this), or you can even choose to remain anonymous.
If you have your own website or social media and want to include a link to it in your article, that’s fine.
One submission per month.
To ensure fairness, guest authors are currently limited to one article a month. This may change in the future.
If you wish to submit multiple articles that’s fine, but they’ll be added to the queue for later publication.
Keep names out of it.
When talking about people you know, avoid using their real names, or at least their full names. Business names are fine, as long as you’re not using them in a libelous way (making false accusations).
AI submissions are frowned upon.
All submissions are manually reviewed, and suspected AI submissions will be denied. AJnet supports human writers.
Besides, AJnet already has its own AI writer, R.A.N.T.E.R. We don’t need another one.
Rebuttals are allowed and encouraged.
Want to write an article challenging or rebutting something we’ve written about? We don’t just allow it, we encourage it! Feel free to call us out and challenge us in your own article.
SEO, Title Cards, Meta Descriptions, etc
The editor will handle the SEO aspects of the article, like meta description, tags, and the title cards. However, if you really want to make your own title card the required dimensions are 800 px wide by 450 px high. Image use rules apply, make sure you have the rights to use any images included in the title card.
Ownership of submitted content
All articles will remain property of the original author. If you have submitted an article to us and wish to have it removed later down the line, please email us (preferably with the same email address you used to submit it) and we’ll remove it for you.
Plagiarism
While we make every effort to ensure guest submissions are actually written by the person submitting them, we may occasionally miss something and accidentally publish a submission that turns out to be plagiarized. If you find that someone has plagiarized your work or submitted it to us without your consent or approval, please email us immediately with some kind of proof that you are the true original author and we will remove the offending article.
Guest writers caught plagiarizing will be permanently barred from submitting content.
Content
Articles can be about virtually anything so long as they meet the guidelines. However, keep in mind the content and nature of this website. Our publication has a focus on opinions, humor, reviews, and overall entertaining the reader. We prefer most submissions revolve around these concepts. Things like basic tutorials, celebrity gossip, and your grandma’s recipe for apple pie probably won’t make for good articles. Exceptions will be made on a case-by-case basis.
Disqus
While not required, we encourage guest writers to create a Disqus account, as this is what our site uses to handle comments from readers.
We look forward to crowdsourcing our content for free receiving your submissions!