Let me clarify that the advice I offered was simply my own personal advice, because those are my personal opinions. I am not casting aspersions on anyone's publications, submissions or desire to submit whatever, wherever they want. For me personally, I start at the toughest market I have a desire to be in and work my way down, and I get much more satisfaction if the story is accepted more quickly before I get too far down the list. I get more satisfaction out of being in a journal that's more selective than I do one that takes close to everything. And I would never list a journal that takes close to everything in a cover letter, so that's something I consider when planning submissions. I give advice based on that. I realize that everyone's goals are not mine.
I approached the two Twitter submissions I made in the same way I do the others, but again, that's just me.
Soapdish, networking is important. The first writing job I ever had as a freelancer, a column for high-end hobbyist magazine, became mine simply because I was in the right place at the right time. The conversation went like this:
"Want to consider doing this?"
"But I don't know anything about the topic."
"You'll learn."
"But I've never written professionally before."
"You'll learn."
"Mmm, okay."
Best decision I ever made, and a huge opportunity that came from simply having a passing association with the person who had an opportunity open up. But then, most importantly, I didn't suck. Had I taken the opportunity and then sucked, all the networking in the world wouldn't have helped.
I would submit to a publication that took everything it was given, even if I read it and thought most of it was awful, if the editor of that magazine was someone I wanted to forge a connection with, absolutely. Seedpod is a publishing company, so someone who wants to forge that connection might have a great incentive to submit there first. And you can't always judge based on now, either, I'll admit. It's a micro-publisher, currently asking for donations to pay for ISBN numbers. It's not somewhere I would submit a novel. Yet, in five years, who knows where the owner/editor might be and how that connection could pay off.
It's wise to make friends where you can and never burn bridges, in writing or any business. In that context, everything is valuable.
I won't name names, but a prolific and well-published short story writer I know, one I've appeared alongside a time or two, submits anywhere. It can be a blogspot blog that just started that has truly dreadful stuff up. But if he can say, "Yay, I got a new publication," he sends them something. I've never understood it, and I could never do it. But it has served him well. I think he's been nominationed for the Pushcart four or five times, and has I don't how many hundreds of stories published, usually, though, for no pay and little recognition. But his goal is hearing the 'yes,' so he's wildly successful. He's been in some really good publications, too. And a lot of the reason for that, and I'm not criticizing his stories by saying this, is networking.
When I see him announcing another publication to a new blogspot blog or a website that just looks so awful and unprofessional that's filled with stories and poems that I think are truly dreadful, I shake my head and wonder why he didn't try somewhere else first. To each his own.
Shelley