MOD NOTE: Messages up to March 5/6 were originally posted in "TheAnvil's Harmonian of the Month" thread. Click on the quote box's arrow below to see it. If you'd like to volunteer for the Spotlight project, please don't hesitate to say so here!
-Bec (Harry/Hermione 4 eva), Pen (gal-texter) and Adam, 2009








I wish that would start up again *sigh* HoM was Awesome!

I really enjoyed that.

Also I need to get myself back in contact with that woman 'Accio Harry!', its been way too long since ive last spoken to her

Maybe we could borrow the HOTM concept and make it PK-er of the month or something. We'd need volunteer interviewers though, hahahaha! Or maybe interviewees can be picked at random.



Yeah, we miss her too. I assume she's busy with RL and we certainly don't begrudge her for going on PK break. Lately when I need to tell her something, I leave messages on her YouTube channel.

Oh, that would be really fun! Hmmm *thinks about all the possibilities* The concept is fantastic! Hm, PK-er of the month. That would definitely be nice

actually I really like that idea!!!!

and Pen what's Mally's youtube channel?

But I LOVE that idea Pen! I had a mind to suggest it myself, but I was weary about being the only one to do it :/





Oh she has a YT channel?!

I sent her a PK PM because throughout all the years it took me to write AtE, no one had more genuine interest and dedication to the story than she did! It's breaking my heart not knowing if she knows it's been finished!

Heehee, I have no journalistic talents whatsoever, but some of our PK-mates have formal training in that so maybe they'd be interested in the PK-er of the month thing.




Yep, she does ... *searches* here. My last message to her was about AtE, but I'm not sure she has read it or the other ones I've left in there. Or maybe she has but simply doesn't have the time or love for HP atm -- that happens to everyone. Nonetheless, it wouldn't hurt for you guys to say hello to her over there.

I like the sound of a PK-er of the month.

~Salamon2

I also like the idea of a PK-er of the month.

All we need now are volunteer interviewers!

As a courtesy, I'll go email myrhlyn if she wouldn't mind us borrowing their concept.

thats a awesome idea!!!!

I can do it if you really want

Okay, gimme until Monday to post an update. I've been exhausted handling tax issues all month, so in my weird way, I relax by nagging people to help me in editing our forum skins. Haven't had the energy yet to compose an email for the Anvil peeps or a message for the mods.

take your time, there is no rush

Oh, Pen! Take a break sweetie *goes into Days Of Our Lives mood* Remember to rest, relax and get a lot of sleep! You've already done SO much for us, Tax? *shudders* Not fun. At all.

*raises hand* I'll do it, if you need someone ... feel free to take someone more experienced If you need help with anything I can do, don't be afraid to bug me

Days Of Our Lives - thread in the Hermione's Bag forum where PK-ers talk about random RL stuff

It's a go then. Hana, any help would be welcome.

I'd suggest randomly selecting interviewees: pick any author who's posted a chapter recently, any reviewer whose email address you could see, or any member who's logged in the forums lately, any artist who'd posted something in the gallery or in the fanart help desk; or any PK-er who's been blogging or posting somewhere else.

You guys get the interviews; I can help set up the mechanics of posting them here in PK. Either Bec, Adam or I would make an announcement shortly.

I've heard from myrhlyn (I always have trouble spelling her name ). She gave very good advice, so I'm copying our emails here:


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sun, Mar 1, 2009 at 1:32 AM
Subject: Re: The Anvil


Hi myrhlyn,

While talking about the HOTM interviews, some of us PK-mates got the idea of making a PK-er of the month. http://talk.portkey.org/index.php?act=find...&pid=410625

Would you mind if we borrow that concept in PK? Or would you be interested in putting up in the Anvil any interviews that we gather? Posting in the forums would be so much easier though.

Everything's tentative at this point, but it does sound like fun. We've recently heard from some of the people you've featured before, hence we could interview them again to ask for updated views.

Please let me know of any question / misgiving / wild objections / counter-suggestions you might have.

- Pen


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sun, Mar 1, 2009 at 12:41 PM
Subject: RE: The Anvil



Hi Pen!

Sounds like fun. I have no qualms with PK borrowing the idea. I'm sure you guys will turn out some great stuff. It'd probably be best to post everything in the forums, since I don't intend to update The Anvil at all.

My advice would be to use an instant messenger; and to try to avoid round-tables. While they are certainly fascinating, they also wind up quite draining in the editing room. But when you guys get started, please let me know of the first issue. I'd love to read it; and I wouldn't mind spreading a link around (I have a new fandom blog started, called Fandom S!ut.)

Good luck with everything!




---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sun, Mar 1, 2009 at 1:48 PM
Subject: Re: The Anvil


Okay, thanks! Your advice is much appreciated. We'll give you a heads up IF we ever come up with anything. I'll have to look around for others to take charge of this as II have no interviewing skills whatsoever, but I'll be around to offer admin support.

- Pen

That's just fabulous!!! <3

This is a most wonderful idea!

Well, if no one else says yes to the interview, I wouldn't mind interviewing people, I'm not *that* bad at English + it would be interesting! I get off next week so I'll be able to help a lot then *now too* because all the stress and pressure of the exams are finished *cheers* Well ... sort of I have one left but ... Sorry.

Could we could also interview any prominent *such as big posters, theorists and of the sort who are active* members of PK? But I do love the random idea! It's fun

If you need me to do something drop me a PM When would you like interviews to begin ... ? And, should the interviewer send a PM to the interviewee asking if they could interview them (wow that was a lot of "interviews" )

I'm actually excited to read some of these new interviews of members

This sounds really fun. I can't wait to start reading the interviews.

Bec will take charge of this guys; she'd do better at interviewing than I ever could. She's just busy with uni but she'll be free in 3 weeks.

--I'd suggest that you guys spend more time gathering interviews than worrying about whom to interview. (That's not a dig at the Anvil staff; they did great.) Pick anybody who's been visiting PK lately or a PK-er who could be contacted outside PK, including those who've been HOTMs before. We have a lot of oldbie lurkers who have fewer than 10 forum posts in all the months or years they've been here. I suppose they come for the fics or the fanart. It'd be nice to hear from them.

--Also, don't worry too much about making pro-level interviews. What's important is that we get to know our PK-mates better and we find out how they're doing now whether they're active in the fandom or not.

--Besides, we can use the forums' interactive nature to our advantage. Once you've posted the interview here, any PK forum member could post reactions and follow up questions, which the interviewee could answer at their convenience.

--We can put up a hidden forum for the interviewers to put up their drafts and talk about this project and a public forum where all PK members and guests could see the final outputs. I suppose when you've got at least 4 interviews ready, we could start showing them.

--Also, we don't have to release them on a monthly basis. "POTM" could mean "PK-er of the moment" depending on how many interviews there are.

lol i like it month because it gives us something to look forward to each month

Hey guys!
Well as Pen said, I'm going to be heading this one so if you have any questons or anything please direct them to me

Now, on top of what Pen said I've had an idea or two about this.

- First things first, me taking charge of this doesn't mean that I'll be closed to any suggestions- the more the better I say!
At the end of the day this isn't for me, this is for Portkey and you guys should have maximnum input on it. If you have any suggestions please let me know either here or via PM because I'll be more than happy to discuss them.

- Now to the interviews themselves. I think the questions don't necessarily always have to be about HP- they could be completely unrelated to HP like favourite bands? Favourite TV shows etc...
Saying that I think there should definitely be some questions about HP- we are a HP site after all! You could ask about what they did to be selected for PK-er of the month (if they were selected for a fic- ask them about it. That sort of thing), ask them how they feel about being PK-er of the month, how long they've been HP fans etc.

- A staff for the project is a must I think.
Having guest interviewers could be an idea if someone were to express an interest in interviewing but other than that I think a staff of interviewers (one or two- maybe more if we can get people interested in taking part) would be a good idea.
Perhaps we could have specialists on different subject areas? I'm kind of stretching it now so that's just a random idea of mine..
Also, if we have a staff rather than one person, if something comes up in our interviewers RL then it wont cause a problem/hold back the release of the monthly issue.

- If this goes well, would anyone be willing to write articles? They would only have to be short but I think if we do an interview and articles each month we could send out an email to all PK-ers (old and new) with a news page and try to bring some of the people we lost back into the fold... again, that's a stretch but it was just an idea..
We could put any announcements in this email- hot topics, key thoughts, new essays etc.

- Aslo, is there anyone that would be willing to create graphics for this? Perhaps a badge that could be added onto a PKers post when they are PKer of the month. Similar to the badges we have now, perhaps not as big as the admin/mod badges but a little bigger than the emoticons... Something that would say "PK-er of the month!". We could also send them an 'Official PK-er of the month: <INSERT MONTH>' logo thing that they could keep?
Kind of like a trophy/award plaque thing..
My photoshop knowledge is kind of limited so if there's anyone that could do that please let me know.

Who would be interested in taking part in this project? Hands up please

~Bec

I'll be happy to help in any way I can, but I'm not good at interviewing, and horrible at writing.
Other than that, feel free to use me.

Hi everybody, we'd like to borrow TheAnvil Ezine.com's "Harmonian of the Month" concept. We got their (myrhlyn's) permission for that. Our Portkey-er of the Month interviews would be posted in a new forum positioned on top or near the top of the board's main page. Our goal would be to get to know the interviewees better.


EDIT MAY 2009:

We've decided to call this the "Portkey Spotlight" project. We'd interview Portkey shipmates but we could also talk to HP fans from outside Portkey every once in a while. We can't promise to do this at regular intervals as plenty of factors come into play. Look at this as another means of getting to know the people behind our favorite fics, art, forum messages or reviews. It'd also be nice to get to know the lurkers among us.

Volunteers are always welcome, esp people who could do one or more of the following:

a. come up with interview questions - we're not aiming for pro quality; rather we're shooting for deepening our friendships with our shipmates; OR

b. provide background info about prospect interviewees - fandom oldbies, including retired PK mods, much welcome here; OR

c. IPB knowhow to help search for prospects' past forum messages, fics, reviews - although we've pretty much got this covered; OR

d. Google search savvy to track down writers or artists who've been absent from the fandom.


Feel free to sign up here. This need not be a permanent commitment. If you could only work with us on one issue, that's fine with us esp if you could do a or b above.


-gal-texter on behalf of the teams behind Portkey and Spotlight

how do we get to choose the PK-er of the month

If you need some help just ask

IMO, pick any PK shipper who visits PK fairly regularly. Someone who's posted a new chapter lately, reviewed a story, logged into the forums, replied to a challenge, commented on or (tried to) upload fanart. When the POTM team gets the hang of things, others could be interviewed too.

Methinks if we do it by slower means (survey), we run the risk of getting bogged down in the planning stage. When it comes to harmless projects like this, I'd suggest erring on the side of getting things done.

fair enough I suppose...

If you need any help, Bec just bug me

Now, I don't have Photoshop so I can't help with that. However, I do like dabbling in other things, so I'm game for the articles/interviewing. So, would you like to have an article and an interview?

That's great guys! Thanks for your offers
I'll probably be in touch with you via PM in the next couple of days. Asking specifics if you haven't already mentioned them.

Hana- *feels like DooL * Do you want to handle a few of the interviews?
For now I think the interview thing should be first, I think the articles/other ideas could come into the project if it's successful. Would you be interested in the article writing too? Like I said I dont think that's going to be for a few months- after the first few interviews have gone out- we can see how they're recieved then
Like Pen said before don't worry about getting them professional quality, this is for fun more than anything.
I'll be around to help a heck of a lot more in about a months time because my dissertation will have been handed in and I'll only have to study for 2 exams...

Anyway, like I said I'll be in touch over the next couple of days.

Thanks again guys

~Bec

Hi everyone,

For almost two months now, we've been working on this "Portkey Spotlight" project. We're pleased to say that we've already convinced some interviewees for our first few issues and we expect to release our first issue within 3 weeks. Watch this section!

I like it!

Oooh, I'm so excited for the Spotlight project!

Marcella & our dear co-staffers - go vote for which icon to show below the interviewee's forum avatar.

<---- click on the images below in between my member # and above my mod hats. That's where we vote.

Slight delay with Spotlight's first issue but we'd definitely have it out by mid-June at the latest. It could be out as soon as next week. Interview's done; we're only polishing the intro. Many H/H fandom-ers would recognize our first interviewee, trust me.

Gotta go. Watch this space (thread or forum) for announcements on how you could help advertise this project as well as the ROR heeheehee!


EDITING THIS SOMETIME LATER FOR CLOSURE:

First "PK Spotlight" issue's here featuring Gwendy, the fanartist!

To advertise this project and the ROR, please scroll down this message.