FAQs

Read about how to pitch us, and consider joining our Discord server to talk more with the editors and other contributors about what the process looks like. The most important things to think about up front are:

1. What you want to say,
2. Who you want to say it to, and
3. What you want/need from an editor and publishing venue

Much of what we publish could be considered scholarship, some of it might not be. It is not OTL's role to be the arbiter of what counts, but as a publishing venue, we aim to make it possible for our contributor's works to count in ways that are meaningful to them. We are working towards offering DOI registration and support for ORCID, and will continue to explore more ways to make OTL content legible to the scholarly content machine.

(See this question in meme form)

Outside The Lines is an independent publication from an independent press. That means we have no institutional support or ongoing funding. Radish Press is covering start up costs through a project pool funded via consulting work. We plan to pursue partnerships, grant funding, donations and any other ways we can think of to cover the publication's costs, and we hope our readers will see enough value in what we're doing to support us directly, like you would via Patreon. At the end of the day, the expectation is not for OTL to be a money maker, but covering costs (including labour!) would be ideal.

If your organisation interested in donating to or funding the project and/or discussing a partnership, please reach out to [email protected].

Short version: no. Longer version: not right now, but it's the goal we're working towards. It is definitely ethically dubious to rely on volunteer labour, and we don't love it [Editor's note: hi, hello, I am a human doing work that I would ideally like to be paid for because rent, bills, existing under capitalism etc.]. If there was a clear way to get funding up front that would pay everyone who works on OTL, we would do it. But right now, we've chosen to direct the energy of our tiny but willing team towards getting things off the ground, so we have some proof of concept to show to potential funders. Over time, as we develop revenue streams (or don't!), we will evolve how we deploy our funds. If you want to help us get there, there are many ways to support us!

Think of it like Patreon. Most of what we publish will be free to everyone, with a few extra perks for paying members. We've seen great things made possible via crowdfunding support, and hope we can have similar success. Honestly, we would have used Patreon for this exact purpose, but the platform OTL runs on (Ghost) has a built in system that allows us to do the same and only pay one piper (Stripe, in this case).

We've chosen to limit commenting on posts to paying members in order to help reduce the moderation overhead for our (tiny) team. The internet can be a dark place without some boundaries around how we interact, and we want to minimise the risk to our team and contributors. That said, paid members must still abide by our member guidelines, and failure to do so can result in their membership being cancelled, and them being booted from the site.

Our publisher might be able to help! Radish Press is an experimental independent publishing press that supports creators to get their work in the hands of their audiences in ways that make sense for them. Check out more about their publishing offerings.