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Next Step for Pamphlets (my bad!)


AVENguy

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After the intervention of some graphic designers and some more edits, here's the final version of the pamphlets. Please voice serious objections only, it would sure we awesome to get these off to print...

http://www.asexuality.org/images/pamphlets...NSIDE_final.pdf

http://www.asexuality.org/images/pamphlets...ure_OUTSIDE.pdf

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I would like to voice serious objections. In fact, I would like to return from a long absence to voice objections. For the moment, I withdraw permission to use my two photos and quote. The brochure has improved visually, and some of the objectionable lines have come out, but it still contains numerous errors, unprofessional writing, and contentious 'we' statements, and it's going to need a lot of reworking (in which I'm happy to participate) before I will want to be associated with it.

Seriously, send me the editable document and I'll have a go at it. We need to pass this around a few more times. We can do so much better.

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I agree: it's much better (both informationally and visually), but there is still a way to go.

Give me until Monday and I will rewrite some parts to what I think will be a clearer explanation.

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I will echo the better.

However, with all due respect DJ, this kind of unilateral finalization of projects was precisely the kind of thing we were attempting to avoid in opening up the PT to everyone.

The PT have been considering the idea of completely re-doing the pamphlets, actually -- and if these are, indeed, the "final" ones, then ... well ... it just wouldn't be very good.

And, in all honesty, these aren't very good. At least, they aren't as good as they could be. The discussion and the design need to be open to everyone before finalization, and once again, we don't seem to have been given a say as to how we are to be represented to the rest of the world. Feels disenfranchising, to say the least.

And, not to put too fine a point on it, it contains photos of people who are no longer members of the site. I would think that those people wouldn't want to be included in such a pamphlet, correct?

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For the moment, I withdraw permission to use my two photos and quote.

as the other person in those photos, i back that motion.

they do look better, but they still aren't as professional looking as the original pamphlets. and honestly, no disrespect intended, deej, but there was a lot of fuss with the last round of pamphlet designs and then we didn't see anything for works in progress.

i really appreciate that you put the effort into this, but the copy on this is quite bad. i, too, would be willing to work on rewrites (i believe i've offered this in past phone conversations), because there errors in editing that we really can't allow to slip by if we want AVEN to be taken seriously.

Yes, sexuality is only one way of expressing love.

this is an incomplete clause. in another passage, "asexuality" is mispelled! these aren't even the most egregious.

please, make editable files available in the PT forum so everyone can have a go at this.

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also, i find it necessary to point out (and double post) that one of the outside photos features someone banned from the organization. i really don't think we should represent ourselves with photos of people who aren't permitted to access the site, not to mention the potential legal ramifications of featuring a person who may no longer wish to have her image used.

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One more typo - Heartily's quote "Later I realized it's just no something I needd to be happy."

I second winter's suggestion that the banned person's photo should not be included, not because we don't like her but because of the political ramifications if she decides to do something drastic.

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I've been lurking for a few months (mostly because of a very severe case of carpal tunnel syndrome which interferes greatly with many daily tasks, such as typing and writing), but I felt a strong need to respond about this pamphlet which would be representing me and others identifying as asexual.

If I had no inkling of the existence of asexuality and were to read this pamphlet, I would probably think it was a joke website, like Bonsai Cats or some other such thing. The pamphlet has hardly changed from its most recent overhaul, and I recall there being many of the same objections voiced in its thread as there are in this one.

I usually try to be polite, but I don't want any part of my message to be misunderstood. I often spread the word about asexuality when the chance arises, but I would never distribute this pamphlet as it stands. If I had a quote or a photograph and it were distributed in this pamphlet, I would be horrified and feel terribly misrepresented.

This pamphlet does not look professional, and while using somebody's AVEN name means a great deal to an AVENite who has grown to respect and understand exactly what the AVEN username represents, using only first names or usernames from an internet forum grossly destroys the credibility of the pamphlet. To be frank, unless the quote is from somebody widely known -- such as a celebrity or DJ himself -- attributing a name to a quote is pointless. Sadly, nobody cares if my best friend Sammy McGee has a great thought about an important issue. Sammy's other friends and I might think he's the greatest thing since sliced bread, but what does the opinion of a relatively small group mean to the masses? Crumbs.

The glaring typographical errors and layout are not ready for amateur distribution -- much less to be sent to the printers. I would like to make it very clear that this pamphlet needs a lot of work, because we want something clean, professional, and organized to represent all the wonderful members and admods here at AVEN. If we want people to care about the pamphlets they're reading, we have to care about the pamphlets we're creating.

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I'm afraid I agree with the posts above. AVENites have done a great job explaining asexuality in the media where it is so hard to avoid being misrepresented. However, with these pamphlets you seem to have let yourselves down. Given that you are in total control and have no deadline, there can't be any excuses for anything less that first class, so I hope some further improvements can be made.

The point about typos has already been made. My main concern is the sections "What is asexuality?" and "Am I asexual?". I think these will only perpetuate the confusion about asexuality. Asexuality is not simply about being content to live without sex so this should not be the first sentence after the title question. The AVEN definition, quoted in the second section, says asexuals do not experience sexual attraction, but in the first section it says "many asexual people still experience attraction...". I suppose whoever wrote this was thinking of the distinction between romantic and sexual attraction, but that is definitely not clear here.

I think these two paragraphs are trying to cover a lot of ideas: definition of asexuality, other aspects of relationships, diversity amongst asexuals, the issue of 'labelling' people, things that may or may not be causes of asexuality etc. Explaining all these in a few paragraphs requires really careful writing, especially given that people will being coming to the pamphlets with differing (mis)understandings of the issues. There is a risk of doing more harm than good if the principal voice of asexuals (i.e. AVEN) seems not to know what it is talking about.

I do wonder if the section "Am I asexual" is necessary at all. Obviously the pamphlet can't really answer that and, as it is, it seems very 'wishy washy' - everyone can call themselves whatever they want. Surely the point is to inform people about asexuality and then just by reading the facts they can decide for themselves whether they relate to the idea or not.

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I apologize at my push for finality, the language was inappropriate. I guess I was just trying to find a way to push these through, it seems like we don't have a clear process to decide when these should be taken to print (given that they will never be perfect.) I didn't mean to imply IN ANY WAY that I was subsuming people's right to provide input, just that we need to start approaching a point where we can close that dialog and get these out there.

That being said, I hear and concur with some of the objections that people raise. (I've been working so closely with this that I've gotten to the point where I miss obvious stuff, sorry.)

It seems like the objections are around:

-Trip's photo (which we can easily remove.)

-Design (I agree, it's not perfect, it's just a question of how not perfect we're ok with.)

A few people have offered alternative design ideas. Would you all be ok with setting a deadline for people to submit design suggestions and then have the PT choose between them?

-Language

This is going to be really tricky, there's no language that sums up asexuality in a few paragraphs that everyone on the forum, or even on the PT, will be completely happy with. I'm in no way trying to make a decision here, but in all of my experience with group organizing collective writing on things like this doesn't work. It just results in a lot of frustration and fighting over small symantics that our end readers probably won't even care about. ("Asexuality exists! Golly gee!") I propose that someone be nominated (maybe Kez?) to make a final round of language changes and that we say we'll be ok with whatever imperfect-but-functional text comes out of them.(Whoever's in charge of this would be free to pull in whoever else they wanted.)

I realize that I'm coming in from nowhere with a whole routine to follow, and that that's not really my place. I feel like I sort of inherited this project and I just want to make sure that it gets through. If the PT has a plan to take the reigns and get these to print in time for the fall lecture circuit I'm totally happy to play a different role.

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I really liked the GLT article. Maybe we could write something a little like that, building up to the idea of asexuality? Or talk about other sexualities and explaining where we fit? And why other people should care and so forth?

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I totally understand your wanting to put some fire under this one, DJ, considering how long it's been sitting around. I also agree with echidna that it would be a shame to publish something that elicits a more negative response than much of our media publicity where the control is out of our hands. There are the finer points of language, where everybody will never be happy, and then there is simple professionalism. I think this outcry is coming from a lack of the latter.

I propose that someone be nominated (maybe Kez?) to make a final round of language changes and that we say we'll be ok with whatever imperfect-but-functional text comes out of them.(Whoever's in charge of this would be free to pull in whoever else they wanted.)

This sounds like a great compromise to me, and Kez sounds like the perfect nomination, not least because she's a professional linguist. These are the kinds of community resources we should be making use of. I vote Kez.

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DJ, I appreciate that you want to get these out asap, but I'd rather not put anything out unless I feel it will reflect well on asexuals on and off AVEN, so no slapdash things. To start, I'd be happy with Kez and/or winter editing (or rewriting) the text as offered.

I think it also has some serious design problems, in spite of your graphic designer friends' assistance. For instance, this pamphlet wouldn't open the conventional way--a typical pamphlet's leaves open left and right--meaning that on this one, the cover is on the back. If the cover image stays where it is, the pamphlet would sit 'backward' in a rack and be awkward to open, or the cover would be the "What is Asexuality" leaf. I think opening up design to AVENites, several of whom I know are graphic designers or artists, would be a good plan. This would be much easier if you made a word version available for us to tweak and repost.

Another issue with the images, brought up in earilier iterations of the pamphlet discussion, is that Lady Heartilly's photo (and others from previous versions) appears to be a senior picture, which means the photographer most likely owns exclusive rights to reprinting, adding to the "legal ramifications" brought up by winter above.

As I've said before, we should take a cue from (if not directly lift from, if they don't mind) the asexuality pamphlet the New Zealand AVEN group has made up, available as a word file at the AANZ site (link). It is pretty no-frills, but comes off as clear, intelligent, informative and doesn't have any of the recent pamphlet drafts' air of coming from an amateur website. You're right that we'll never get something that pleases everyone, but we should be aiming for professionalism nonetheless. What it boils down to is that the literature should be about asexuality and AVEN, not about the AVEN forums. This is a distinction I see people increasingly failing to make.

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I agree with spinneret; a pamphlet modeled around the New Zealand one would look very good. It is concise and informative. I personally find photos really tacky in pamphlets in general, unless they are diagrams. (But we don't need diagrams either). Leaving out images will cut down on a great deal of possible complications, and I believe it will allow the readers to take the thing more seriously.

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Seems like it would best to not have any photos of actual members, but instead use realistic stock photos. Because otherwise I'm quite certain you'll never get a version that everyone pictured is happy to have their picture on, and pictures are a crucial point to getting out that asexuality is a serious matter

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Hallucigenia

Hey... that ANZ pamphlet is neat.

Why don't we just take that, maybe replace the New Zealand section with something or other, and distribute it that way (with the ANZ site's permission, of course)? Instead of having 50 zillion more writing meetings. It even has the AVEN logo on it.

(though I also wouldn't be opposed to Kez doing her thing, as described above)

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It could still use some work though. First it comes off as being very difficult on the eyes, though that could be do to its squashed down square format. THen it has the biggest journalism "no no" of all text being close together, the same size, with no lines or approrpiate white space to make for good readibility.

the variety in font size for titles makes it confusing - its like "Wait, is this important? Nope can't be, thats a bigger title there, and an even bigger one over there. This could be taken care of by adding the appropriate white space, or lines, though.

Some of the passages under the text start in the same column as the title, while others are a few spaces off to the side which further increases the initial difficult of quickly determining if text is a main heading or a subheading.

Then there are the lack of headings, and the continuation of an answer on two pages _ if someone doesn't peruse the pamphlet exactly as expected,

they're going to come across the middle of an answer with nothing being stated to indicate where it came from - thats very unprofessional

Furthermoe if you expect the viewer to read from the page that this text is continued on directly to this page, than the columns are also "out of order." In this format, You could go from A) Title Page B) Open flyleaf of "Simply put" and "some asexual thoughts" - causing the viewer to read "Nonsexual relationships can be just as SOME ASEXUAL THOUGHTS." C - the headingless column and "Am I asexual" which creates confusion again as the "Simply put" column has already been read but is not the last panel that was read

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Formatting aside (and zoes ken's comments are relevant there), the New Zealand pamphlets are rather beautiful. Beyond permission issues, there's an even bigger undeniable advantage in the simple black and white images over photos and colors: they lend themselves much more to a grassroots cause such as ours. They can be printed anywhere by anyone at much lower cost, on any color of paper (I believe we used, ahem, purple in the past).

Photos and colors can add professionalism and credibility, but only if the design, the photos, and the printing are all sufficiently professional-- if you're only halfway there, the result is just the opposite. To look professional, a full color photo pamphlet would have to be printed as a professional batch, on relatively expensive paper, and distributed to those who want them. A design like the AANZ one can be printed and used by anyone, and it doesn't say, "we're amateurs," it says, "we aren't investing all our money in expensive papers and inks because we want to print LOTS of these." Of course, if anyone did ever want to run some off a high resolution printer on glossy stock, I bet they'd look damn sharp.

For the record, if Kez or someone is going to have a go at polishing up a pamphlet this weekend, I for one would rather see her using the AANZ one as a starting point. She could internationalize the text and maybe mix in some of the quotes from the other pamphlet, though Kiwi quotes are just as legitimate, of course.

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i think as far as informational copy goes, the original aven pamphlets were quite good. the new zealand pamphlets are also very good -- simple, clean, informative.

we also do need to decide if this is about asexuality or aven. i agree with spins that the pamphlet should more reflect "this is asexuality. go here if you want to learn more." on that note, i would be supportive of ghosts idea of getting rid of quote and photos if it will make things simpler.

if we keep quotes and photos (or just quotes) we should get rid of names because, as cerhi said, aside from DJ, no one really cares what any of us are. the comments may be comforting, but no one is going to care who said them.

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I agree with various views expressed above:

- the purpose should primarily be to provide information about asexuality but the pamphlets can also invite people to come to AVEN for more info/to participate in the forums

- it would be better to remove the pictures and some of the quotes. The quotes must make sense on their own (e.g. I think AJay's one about identifying as straight is confusing) and they should actually convey something meaningful about being asexual.

(I think there has already been extensive discussion about the pictures but I'm just throwing my views in with what has been said in this round)

- the leaflets are much more likely to look professional if they are black text on coloured paper than coloured printing. Cheap colour printing can look very bad and AVEN won't be able to control how people print them.

- the AANZ leaflet is better than the AVEN one in some ways but it does have quite a lot of text so perhaps a shorter, more spacious version could be prepared. Perhaps the logo could be incorporated into the centre page somehow just to break up the text a bit

I don't see the same problems as Zoes ken with 'square format', inconsistent spacing of text under the columns - I wonder if there is a problem with incompatible software for viewing it? As for paragraphs going over several columns and how the pages are organised, I would open up the leaflet and see the whole page, start in the top left hand corner of the page and work down one column and then on to the next. I'd then turn to the 'asexual thoughts' bit. The order is very natural for me and I don't really think many people would read "nonsexual relationshop can be just as... some asexual thoughts". I think AANZ is much more logical than AVEN in this respect. Obviously a totally flexible layout would be ideal, but that might not be possible if it means forcing paragraphs to be much shorter/longer than they should be to get the message across in the best way. Perhaps this is something Kez (or whoever) could bear in mind.

"Thanks very much" to the people who are prepared to keep working on these!

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I agree- they should be about asexuality and should present AVEN as a resource to learn more and connect with asexual people (since one of the big targets for these is closeted asexual folk.)

(Thought it's also a little tricky because most of what we know about asexuality comes from the community on AVEN. We're sort of putting forward our idea of things, but I think that that's ok.)

If people are into a sparser AANZ format I'm cool with that, but I think we should add a design element or two so it's not JUST text (interesting formatting, something more to distinguish headers and body text, maybe a line on top and/or bottom or dividing the columns.)

Keep in mind- we have money to prin tup nice-lookin' glossy ones (though getting them distributed around the planet can be tricky, there's a lot to be said for something photocopyable.)

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I also like the AANZ format; it's clear and simple. I also agree that we should get rid of the names and photos for the sake of professionalism. If we have the funds for glossy pamphlets, as DJ mentioned, then we could do that, but we should probably keep the colors to two, maximum. Maybe print the pamphlets in black and purple on white glossy paper? (I do realize this may pose a problem for people who print the pamphlets on their own without high-quality color printers.)

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I assumed these leaflets would be available for people to download and print anywhere in the country/world. Are they actually intended for 'official printing' and central distribution only?

If the latter, the risk of unprofessional-looking leaflets produced by cheap colour printing is not an issue. However, I think the former would be better simply because a wider audience can be reached that way.

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Bootstrap Bill

Hey, I don't mean to quibble, but after the bit about identifying bi, gay, and straight-A, could we add a sentence saying something like, "Others do not so identify?"

Something about aromantics would be nice. I'm not too wrapped up about it, though.

And I like the NZ pamphlet.

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Easy solution. Once we have a black-and-white "home version" together with a few simple graphics and frills, it would be no big thing to adapt it to color for the ones we're printing professionally. We could even swap in a photo or two instead of the black-and-white graphics.

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Omnes et Nihil

I'd like to add (because no-one has mentioned it) that calling on nebulous (or any) professional authorities (eg. "most therapists agree") could lead to some serious problems. Especially as leaves AVEN open to (unfounded) accusations of trying to represent or replace professional authorities. Besides, can that particular claim be substantiated? I am sceptical about the idea that most therapists have any personal opinion about asexuality, let alone have come to any collective agreement about it. I would suggest leaving therapists out of it.

Also, framing asexuality such that it's relevant to comment about the need or lack of need to be "medically treated" takes the focus away from people and identities, and moves it to bodies and disorders... I personally don't think that's beneficial.

==============

I would also like to point out that a lot of lesbians don't identify as gay, so it would be more inclusive to add "lesbian" next to "gay" ... (eg. "gay/lesbian" or perhaps "gay & lesbian"). I know it's a longer word, but I think it's worth it.

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I don't mind the quotes, but I think it's essential that we use real names instead of usernames...wouldn't want it to look like the people quoted were somehow embarrassed about their quotes.

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