About.com?

Hi Vonnie--
To answer your question, it seems to vary. I've gotten rejections in time frames from 1 week to a month or so. When I did finally get accepted into Prep, I think it was a week or week & a half from the time I applied. Good luck!!!

I understand how frustrating it is Von. I have never gotten a confirmation for any of the times I applied. In fact, this last time when I applied, I suddenly got the rejection on one I had applied for months ago.

I wish they were able to communicate better. I'd like to know if I am being considered for the bread baking guide or if they have started prep or what. I am terrible at waiting.

Elizabeth,

As a freelancer you will have to pay for the photo up front and then invoice About.com.

If you go to someplace like Sears, which does business photos, they will put it on a CD for you. They don't print it.

What Nancy said -- go someplace that does business-style photography. Just get it as a digital image on a disc, instead of printed pics (that's why you need to make sure you go to someone who can give you an image as a 300 dpi jpg). Actually, what I did was I called my friend who's a realtor and asked who did the photo she has on her business card, and then went to that studio. You're responsible for paying for the photo, and then you invoice About.com. There's a form you print out to send in, which you can find in the Lounge.

Thanks for your responses, folks. At least, I know there's others out there waiting too. Maybe if we send positive vibes to about.com we'll all hear good things soon.

von62653 said:

Maybe if we send positive vibes to about.com we'll all hear good things soon.

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Yes, positive vibes all around!

KM

Elizabeth, although we are generally responsible for our own costs, About will compensate you once for a professional photograph, up to $75. I think it's important to get a professional shot done, because a lot of people will be looking at that picture for a long time! There is also information about what the picture needs to include on the Lounge. Print it out and bring it with you when you go for the picture.

I had a good-quality passport picture, but I had trouble scanning it with a high enough resolution, so I went ahead and got the digital picture done by a professional. I'm really glad I did because I think a good picture makes a great first impression.

Second review tomorrow

How's it going, art nerd?

Well, the holidays really knocked me out of whack, as far as working. I had to get back on track in a hurry these past couple of days. I have a couple of links to input tonight before second review tomorrow; even though I've been checking everything over and over, I'm going to make sure it's all typo-free before I go to bed and then just hope for the best.

I have about 10 pieces of content and 5 blog posts, plus several links. I really don't feel like that's enough, though I've used several document templates and not only the article one (the poll flat out didn't work for me and instead of frustrating myself with it, I just gave up). I know I have several more days to add content, but besides links, I don't think I'm going to be able to have as much as originally planned. Oh well...any and all good vibes are appreciated!

Hey Del,

I'm still chugging along. Your post made me laugh because I have *exactly* 10 pieces of original content and 5 blog posts. Plus a few outside links here and there. A few of my required pieces are image galleries, so those took some time to organize and upload.

I don't know if I have enough content for now, but I like what I've created so far. I had a minor freak-out moment over the holidays because I was stressing out about quantity vs. quality. After relaxing (errr...I mean, partying) on NYE, I feel much better. If I get this, great. If I don't, it's not the end of the world.

Anyway good luck with 2nd review. I'm finishing up everything tonight, and then I'm talking a break from the computer tomorrow.

@art nerd, so we're on the same track! LOL. That's good to know. I also had the freakout over quantity vs. quality (especially when thinking about...was it Elizabeth or Courtney who had 40 original pieces??? plus a buch of links!), but like you, if I get it, great; if not...oh well.

Thanks, Elizabeth, for the well wishes! I'm in Petite Fashion...it's weird to me that no one else here (or at least no one who's posting) is in prep for the same topic.

For my domain name and site, I went with Bravenet, mainly because I wanted to build my site myself and if I need to make changes, I can do it without having to rely on a designer. They have simple templates (not a big selection there) as well as more complex ones, but I don't have the skill to design one of those.

The domain name is around $9/year (I often see cheaper ones advertised, but I like having the name and site hosted in one place) and a year of hosting is about $90 (you can pay in quarterly installments). I previously had hosting with HostMySite and their customer service is incredible--I just couldn't understand all the FTP stuff/jargon to successfully upload a site with them.

I'm prepping for Sneakers. When I'm done with final review, I'm rewarding myself with...guess what...a new pair of sneakers.

EJBorer said:

I was wondering who you went through to get your domain name and what is a reasonable price per year to pay for one. I have searched around and can't seem to get a straight answer. I would really like to set up a site with my name before someone else gets it - there is another Elizabeth Borer that is a professor in oregon and who knows who else is out there just waiting to snatch it I would like the site to be just myname.com and not have a bunch of weird stuff in it.

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There's at least one thread in Tech Help about this - I'd suggest checking there.

Second review update-Wow, not so bad. Just minor issues about adding images to some list items and making a working link in a blog post; plus, placing photo credits on a separate line in the blogs. None of the issues from the first review, so *whew*. I'm relieved, but I'll also be so glad when all of this is over on the 7th. From now until then, I'll add more content and add the images and after that, it's out of my hands.

Del, congrats on passing second review! I had pretty much the same comments/issues. I just need to make a few changes...nothing too major.

In the last few days I plan to add 2-3 more pieces of original content, add some links, and that's it.

Good luck on the home stretch!

Hey novelette and art nerd! Congrats on making it through your second reviews! I have to say...it definitely was not me who had 40 original content pieces. That was Elizabeth all the way!

I did, however only have about 10 -15 pieces upon my final review, though, and I got my spot. I was sure I wouldn't get it because of lack of content, but I did, so don't freak out. Just make sure it's all well-written and stuff you'd like to read. Between quality and quantity, I think quality wins out (though having both would be fabulous ))

Now that I'm graduated though, I have so many ideas running through my head that it's still overwhelming trying to create content sometimes! I think I really need to develop a subject writing schedule of sorts.

Hi to everyone else! Hope you all had a great holiday season!

I actually came in here to vent about a tool not working. Darn that Step by Step! I had my document just the way I want it and I keep getting this ridiculous error message. All it says at the top of my Step by Step page is 'Add StepbyStep.' (Yes, that's verbatim!) Anyway, I thought I'd whine for a little in here since I already sent an email to tech support. If anyone knows a quick fix to this problem though, I'd welcome it with open arms!

Ok. I think I'm done now. Hope you all have a great Friday!

Courtney, check to see if maybe some of your fields are too long inside the document tool. Usually, it will give you an error message of some sort, but once this happened to me too -- I had a title field that was empty, forgot to fill it in, so it kept punting it back to me.

For those of you new to About.com, I should point out that this is why you always create your content in a word processing program and then c&p it into the doc templates

Thanks for your help Patti!

So it finally freaking worked. Thanks to Patti's advice, I went through meticulously looking for anything and everything that could be wrong. Luckily, that helped me discover a link that was input incorrectly, and even though that wasn't the real problem, I'm glad to have caught it.

For anyone else who might experience this problem in the future (probably newbies like myself), the problem was in the 'filename_ro' space, which is the second field you can enter words into. It doesn't specify no spaces allowed like the 'legacy_ro' field does, but as I just discovered, you most certainly can NOT. Maybe that's totally obvious to everyone but me, but yeah, that's what the problem was. I guess that's what I get for getting cocky with the tools

Anyway, thanks again for your help Patti!

No problem -- been there, done it. Just FYI, you also can't end a filename with a number -- for example, if you wanted to title a file "Toasters_101" it would reject it. Instead, you'd have to call it something like "Toasters_Intro" or "Toasters4Dorks".

I applied for the Web Logs section. Keeping my fingers crossed....

Strange thing is that they said I should receive an e-mail immediately with a confirmation that my application was in (like an auto-responder). I never got that e-mail. So now I'm freaking out thinking that it is bouncing and there is nothing I can do about it. EEEK! I checked my spam folders and it isn't there. That would be horrible if I got accepted to prep and never knew about it!

Did anyone else NOT get an auto-response when they applied?

@Kat, loads of times. I think I only got the auto-response the first or second time I applied; after that, I never did. Good luck on hearing something back!

Kat Frass said:

I applied for the Web Logs section. Keeping my fingers crossed....

Strange thing is that they said I should receive an e-mail immediately with a confirmation that my application was in (like an auto-responder). I never got that e-mail. So now I'm freaking out thinking that it is bouncing and there is nothing I can do about it. EEEK! I checked my spam folders and it isn't there. That would be horrible if I got accepted to prep and never knew about it!

Did anyone else NOT get an auto-response when they applied?

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Web Logs is already in prep. Just thought I'd let people know. I know some people here at this thread are wondering because they applied.

~ Jennifer

I didn't receive an auto responder when I applied two weeks ago.

On edit: I applied for a different category.