Posts Tagged ‘kidlit’

23
Nov

Children’s Book Authors and Online Privacy Law

   Posted by: rettstatt    in kidlitosphere, Uncategorized

Children’s book authors,

Do you have a website where you collect email addresses from kids?

Are you familiar with United States federal law regarding commercial websites that collect personal information from children? It’s called the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule, and a single violation can have a civil penalty of up to $11,000.

Even if you aren’t making money from your author website, it’s a commercial site if you are using it to promote your books. Because of this, you have to be careful how you collect personal information from children.

The best resource for learning about this is the FTC website, but it’s a lot of data and more than most of you need. And this is where I make it clear that I’m not a lawyer (IANAL). But I am familiar with the legislation and best practices that protect children online.

So here are a few basic tips.

The easiest thing is not to collect email addresses from kids at all, which means deleting them from your inbox, address book, and anywhere else they might be hiding.

But you wouldn’t be an author if you had any interest in the easy path. And you want to be able to collect those email addresses and send out announcements.

So, let’s take a look at what’s second easiest.

  1. Post a privacy statement on your website, in a prominent place on the main page and on any page where you collect email addresses.  There are specific things you should include in the statement, so check them out:
    • Your name, address, telephone number and email address. You may want to use a P.O. Box and create a separate email address. Just be sure to check it regularly
    • The type of personal info you are collecting (in this case, names and email addresses), and how you are collecting it
    • How the info is going to be used (in this case, to send email announcements)
    • The fact that you won’t disclose this info to third parties
    • That the parent can review what info you’ve collected from their child and ask you to delete it
    • And that you aren’t allowed to condition a child’s participation in an activity on the disclosure of more information than is reasonably necessary to participate. That means you should only require email addresses for activities that need it, such as a newsletter or forum notifications.
  2. Make sure your sign-up gizmo has an age-screening mechanism:
    • This is generally just a drop-down menu that asks for date of birth.
    • If the signer-upper is under 13, they should be prompted to include a parent’s email address as part of the sign-up process.
  3. A notice should automatically be emailed to the parent’s email address. This notice should state the obvious:
    • that you have collected the child’s name and email address.
    • that the parent can respond to the email and tell you to delete the child’s info.
    • and that if the parent doesn’t respond, it means you have permission to use the child’s email address to send announcements.

    Note: this method is only good for collecting email address. If you are collecting home addresses and such, that will require additional steps, which we won’t get into here.

  4. Don’t allow children to post freely on your site. If you have a blog or forum open to children, screen everything and remove any personal information, including email addresses.
  5. And while it might not be required as part of this particular law, you should remove any other information, such as school or teacher names, that might help a predator track down the child. Best to be safe.
  6. If you have a section to display fan mail, fan art, fan fiction, etc., be sure to strip away any personal information. First name and city should be sufficient to give credit.
  7. Most importantly, don’t let this scare you into shutting down communication. These few steps will allow you to stay in direct contact with your fans, which is the steady breath of fresh air any children’s book author needs.

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3
Nov

Mock Newbery Shortlist

   Posted by: rettstatt    in children's literature, kaimira, kidlitosphere

I posted a while ago that my first book, The Sky Village, had made the shortlist for the Eva Perry Mock Newbery Book Club. Then it made the second shortlist. And now I’m delighted that it’s on the third shortlist.

Here are a couple of nice things the Committee had to say about The Sky Village:

“Well-formed writing style that impeccably blended two plot sequences… and it had demons fighting!” – T.
“I experienced sensations that at times made me feel like saying ‘Don’t do that or you will get hurt!‘” – J.

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30
Nov

Carnival of Children’s Literature

   Posted by: rettstatt    in children's literature, kidlitosphere

Be sure to check out the fantastic blog posts at the November Carnival of Children’s Literature, hosted by MotherReader. There are tips for reviewers, bloggers, parents, teachers, librarians, writers, readers, and lifelong learners. Surely anyone reading this blog fits into at least one of those categories.

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20
Oct

Book Bloggers Kick Off Kidlit Awards’ Second Year

   Posted by: rettstatt    in kidlitosphere

Cybils2007white BOOK BLOGGERS KICK OFF KIDLIT AWARDS’ SECOND YEAR CHICAGO – Will Harry Potter triumph among critical bloggers? Will novels banned in some school districts find favor online?

With 90 volunteers poised to sift through hundreds of new books, the second annual Children’s and Young Adult Bloggers’ Literary Awards launched on Oct. 1 at www.cybils.com. Known as the Cybils, it’s the only literary contest that combines both the spontaneity of the Web with the thoughtful debate of a book club.

The public’s invited to nominate books in eight categories, from picture books up to young adult fiction, so long as the book was first published in 2007 in English (bilingual books are okay too). Once nominations close on Nov. 21, the books go through two rounds of judging, first to select the finalists and then the winners, to be announced on Valentine’s Day 2008.

Judges come from the burgeoning ranks of book bloggers in the cozy corner of the Internet called the kidlitosphere. They represent parents, homeschoolers, authors, illustrators, librarians and even teens.

The contest began last year after blogger Kelly Herold (http://kidslitinformation.blogspot.com)  expressed dismay that while some literary awards were too snooty – rewarding books kids would seldom read – others were too populist and didn’t acknowledge the breadth and depth of what’s being published today.

“It didn’t have to be brussel sprouts versus gummy bears,” said Anne Boles Levy, who started Cybils with Herold. “There are books that fill both needs, to be fun and profound.”

Last year’s awards prompted more than 480 nominations, and this year’s contest will likely dwarf that. As with last year’s awards, visitors to the Cybils blog (http://dadtalk.typepad.com/cybils) can leave their nominations as comments. There is no nomination form, only the blog, to keep in the spirit of the blogosphere that started it all.

For further info:

Anne Boles Levy

anne (at) bookbuds (dot) net

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6
Oct

Kidlitosphere Conference Schedule

   Posted by: rettstatt    in kidlitosphere, writing

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 5: Very informal pizza or other dinner for whomever is in town hanging around. Meet around 6:30-ish.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 6: Conference.

7:45-8:00: Check in. Pay your registration fees if you haven’t already, get your name tags and your Who’s Who cheat sheet. (We’ll have coffee and continental breakfast.)

8:00-8:10: Intro to the conference.

8:10-9:00: Kidlit Blogging, Part 1 (led by Tasha Saeker and others): How to get started, how to get ARCs, how to do reviews, how to do author interviews, what blog formats seem to work best, etc. There’s a lot of experience in this group, and I’m hoping many of you will have tips to offer.

9:10-9:45: Podcasting 101 (led by Mark Blevis and Andrea Ross): The how-to’s (and why-to’s) of creating and posting podcasts on your site. I just did a podcast interview on Friday–it’s the wave of the future, baby!

10:00-11:00 (room #1): Cybils Forum.

10:00-11:00 (room #2) Blogging for Authors (led by Robin Brande, Gregory K, Barry Lyga): websites, blogs, MySpace, why to, how to, the different philosophies thereof (sales & promotion, connection with readers, daily writing exercise, can’t stop talking, etc.).

11:10-12:00: Promotion Ideas for the Kidlitosphere (led by Jen Robinson): Brainstorming ideas for increased promotion of the
kidlitosphere as a whole, as a resource for readers/parents/ authors.

12:00-1:00: Lunch on your own (not alone on your own–you can find friends).

1:10-2:00: Kidlit Blogging, Part 2–the business side (led by Pam Coughlan): Brainstorming tips to improve your blog, attract more
traffic and links, keep your blog (and yourself) fresh, and generally kick it up a notch.

2:10-3:00: Kidlit Blogging, Part 3–the creative side (led by Anne Levy): How to establish your “voice,” how to maintain your writing quality, what makes for a good review, how to hone your reviewing skills.

3:10-4:00: The Ethics of Reviewing (led by Liz Burns): What do we do about personal relationships/potential conflicts of interest, “bad” reviews, copyright, and other ethical issues?

4:00-5:00: Meet the Authors (hosted by Esme Raji Codell of PlanetEsme). A chance to have a little one-on-one with some of the authors–a time to chat, interview, question, inspect.

5:00-6:00: Go away. Relax in your room. Brush your teeth, spiffy up.

6:00-7:00: Cocktails/mingle.

7:00-9:00: Dinner! Prize giveaways! Fun!

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 9: Brunch off-site (directions to be provided Saturday night), hosted by Esme, for anyone not leaving at the butt-crack of dawn. 8:30-11:30 AM–come for all or part.

For more info and RSVPs…

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30
Sep

1st Annual Kidlitosphere Conference

   Posted by: rettstatt    in storytelling, writing

Check out where I’m going next weekend (wanna go, Izzy?):

For writers, readers, and independent thinkers–book and story reviews by writers and readers, writers’ motivational articles, war stories from the publishing trenches, literary trends, religious controversies, free chocolate, and more.

Read more  

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