Where trade unionists start their day on the net.
Thanks for agreeing to help out as a LabourStart correspondent. You now have an account at LabourStart. This is an important document; it contains information that you will need in order to work as a LabourStart correspondent. I suggest that you read it to the end and print out a copy. To log in and begin working, simply go to:
http://www.labourstart.org/cgi-bin/dbman/db.cgi
Sign in with the user name and password you were provided with.
You can add stories and modify or delete the stories you've added, but you cannot delete or modify stories others have added. Simply click on "Add" to add a news story. Stories you add must exist on the web somewhere. If not, post them to your website and link to that. If you don't have a website, create one at one of the free website providers (such as Geocities and Tripod). Alternately, you can write up a story (but don't use one which appeared on a copyrighted site) on the Labour News Network site -- see http://www.labourstart.org/lnn_about.shtml for details. If you need to change a story you have posted, don't forget that you can use the Modify and Delete links to change or throw away a story. Don't hesitate to use them.
Don't change the date nor the priority of a story you've posted. If you feel the story is really important and should be boosted to the top of the page, send me a note.
Give a good descriptive title, e.g., Train drivers strike against privatization. Keep the title as brief as possible. (Only the first 99 characters are picked up by our Labour News Wire, so we don't want titles being cut off.) Shorten government to gov't and use acronyms where these are easily understood, such as well known acronyms for unions (e.g., TUC, AFL-CIO).
Don't repeat the name of the country in the title. If the story is about a general strike in Fredonia, don't make the headline: "General strike in Fredonia". On LabourStart, that would appear as "Fredonia: General strike in Fredonia". Use instead something like "General strike breaks out", and in the country field insert "Fredonia".
We spell "labour" the British way, but everything else tends to be spelt the American way. You choose.
Where possible, shorten the name of the source. For example, don't write "Associated Press". Write "AP".
If registration is required to see the item, as in the New York Times, indicate this by clicking on the appropriate button.
When using the various press release services, such as PR Newswire, indicate the source as coming from the union which issued the press release, and not PR Newswire itself.
Make sure not to use publications which are on trade union boycott lists, including newspapers currently on strike.
Avoid redundant postings; the best way to do this is to keep open two browser windows, and in one look at today's LabourStart to make sure that what you're about to post isn't yet in the database.
Use the full web address, e.g., http://www.cnn.com/article1.html including the http://
Check to make sure that this link works before adding it to the database.
Also, if you've logged on to some site in order to see the news story, the URL might be special to your session. Be careful about this.
If the site you're linking to uses frames, try to link only to the frame with the relevant news story.
When more than one country is involved, use as per this example: USA/South? Africa/Brazil? But you can't do this for more than two countries; in those cases, use "Global" or regional names (names of continents and regions like Caribbean). Remember that country name is important because this is the way the site delivers up news through Labour NewsWire? and on the national pages. For now, we are using only the standard English names of countries though it is possible that in the future we will move over to using the names by which countries are called locally, e.g., Deutschland, Italia, and so on.
When in doubt, see LabourStart -- http://www.labourstart.org -- for examples of how the links should work. Consistency of style is a good thing.
Please keep focussed on workers in your country, their unions and their struggles (strikes, etc.).
Avoid stories about political groups or stories merely exposing how bad capitalism is. There are loads of places on the web to talk about environmental issues, for example. Use LabourStart to publish labour news and nothing else.
Where possible, link to trade union sources. Otherwise, use mainstream media sources that appear to be objective. Never link to stories that simply bash unions from a right-wing point of view -- those people have enough places on the net and off to spread their poison around.
You're also now signed up for the private forum for LabourStart correspondents, or soon will be (you'll get a separate message about that). Use this as a way of sharing information, solving problems, etc. with LabourStart correspondents around the globe. Access this at:
http://www.labourstart.org/cgi-bin/UltraBoard/UltraBoard.pl?Action=Sho wBoard&Board=lscorrespondents
I will add your name and email address to our Correspondents page -- see http://www.labourstart.org/correspondents.shtml If you would like to add more details (such as a brief biography and your website address) please send these to me.
If you have any questions, please let me know. Also -- please email me the first time you add a link.
Thanks very much. Looking forward to working with you.
Eric Lee
Texts appearing here are often press releases sent to us by unions and other organizations which do not appear elsewhere on the web. LabourStart takes no responsibility for their content.