Frequently Asked Questions

By Chris Clarke | Posted on April 20, 2008

Some questions and answers for potential contributors to The Clade

This FAQ is an evolving document. Feel free to ask additional questions in comments.

How do I sign up?
Go here, select a user name with no spaces (underscores are fine instead of spaces, or just run the words together) and whatever screen name you’d like to appear as a byline for posts. (We encourage you to use your real name but you don’t have to if you don’t want to.)

How do I post?
You’ll find instructions here. It’s pretty easy, especially if you’ve used blogging software before. (We use ExpressionEngine, so if you’ve used that particular software before, you may need no instruction at all!)

I already have a blog website or other venue. Why should I join The Clade?
Posting at The Clade will bring you readers who might not have found your other site. With each post you can include a biography with a link to your other site(s), generating readership and increasing your search engine ranking. And if you send readers from your site to The Clade, The Clade’s other contributors will reap the benefit as well. How often do you find a win-win solution like this?

Can I crosspost material from my other sites?
Absolutely, as long as you’re not violating someone else’s intellectual property rights. We’ll even let you put a prominent link to the original site at the top of the post, thus sending more traffic your way.

What can I post about?
If it seems environmental to you, go ahead. Possible topics include (but aren’t limited to) endangered species, ecotourism, outdoor recreation, gardening, birding and other wildlife viewing, mining, logging, ranching, fishing both recreational and commercial, urban toxic issues, climate change, displacement of traditional people from their native lands, land use conflicts, conservation of energy, water, and other resources, art, education, and well you get the idea.

Can I just post a quick link to the material on another site?
Sure! That’s what blogging’s all about, a lot of the time. But your posts will be much more interesting if you add some information about what you’re linking to, and even more so if you have an opinion you can share.

What about if it’s just a quick link to my other site?
Sure. Of course we’d prefer that not be the only thing you ever do on The Clade, and if too many people do single-line self-linking all the time, we’ll probably clamp down. But as long as it’s a valid link to an environmental post, not spam, and you don’t barrage The Clade with quick posts — as long as you’re adding value to The Clade — feel free.

I’m interested in contributing but don’t want to commit to a regular gig because I’m buried - is that workable?
Sign up and post every day, or once a year: whatever works for you. At some point soon we’ll work out a way to make sure less-frequent contributors don’t get buried by people who post several times a day, but both kinds of posters are welcome.

Do you expect to make money off this, and can I have some of it?
The Clade would like very much to meet expenses at some point. That isn’t likely to happen any time soon, given the collapse of the web advertising economy. If The Clade does at some point show a positive balance sheet through donations or advertising or some other unforeseen income stream, we will be open to suggestions for how to begin to reimburse participants, possibly involving an environmental investigative journalism fund or some other mechanism. There will be community input at that point.

I’m not a journalist.
You don’t have to be a journalist to be welcome at The Clade. You just need to have something to say about the environment: stories, opinion, sharing information, or long-form expert investigative journalism are equally welcome.

I’m not really a writer, but I do read a lot of environmental stories online. Can you use my help?
Sure! Sign up and post link roundups! Just take your links to good stories , add some explanation about the topics involved, and post away!

I’m a photographer or other artist. What about me?
We absolutely want visual and audio arts represented at The Clade. If you have paintings, photos, videography, podcasts, or other non-typed artistic expression, sign on up and share it. It may take us a couple weeks after launch to perfect our video and podcast sharing functionalities, but they’ll both be up by the end of May 2009: sooner if there’s enough demand. In the meantime, sharing images is ready to go.

I’m not an expert.
You don’t need to be.

What rights do you claim to my work if I post it here?
By posting your material here, you grant us the right to have it on the site until you take it down. We may also use a short sentence or two fair-use style to promote the site, for example by spreading the word about a great essay you’ve posted.

Can I remove my material from the site if I decide it’s not working out?
You can remove anything you post here at any time, and by removing it you end our rights specified above. Of course we don’t have any control over third-party caches or archives like Google or the Wayback Machine, so we can’t promise your work will disappear from such places.

Who’s behind all this?
The Clade was founded by Chris Clarke, an environmental journalist of two decades’ tenure. He proposed the idea and a whole lot of people signed on in a hurry. He is writing this FAQ item in the third person.

Do you edit pieces at The Clade?
Not routinely, except our own. If you would like an extra pair of eyeballs to look something over, drop a line to theclade@faultline.org, and if we don’t have anything else to do, we’ll hunt typoes and logical errors and such for you.

If a contributor posts something that conflicts with our Code o’ Conduct (in development as of 4/20/2009) we may close his or her post without notice. If the contributor agrees with our criticism of the specific problems, he/she can edit the post and we’ll put it back up. If not, or if the whole post is irredemably problematic, we reserve the right to delete the post without notice. Contributors who habitually make us go through this process, or who exhibit apparent intent to disrupt, troll, or inflame, will be banned. The decisions of The Clade’s management on banning and post deletion are final.

What’s in this “Code o’ Conduct”?
Contributors agree to refrain from posting slurs against any person or group based on race, ethnicity, gender status, sexual preference, religion, culture, disability, age and probably a couple of other markers.

(Note that the agreement not to slur people based on religious belief in no way precludes a critical analysis of the environmental effects of religious beliefs. If a religion indulges in destructive policies or practices, opine away. Just hate the game, not the player.)

Other types of material not welcome on The Clade are blatant antienvironmental pseudoscience such as climate change denialism. Roundly debunked issues such as the vaccine-thimerosal-autism issue or chemtrails are likewise not welcome. We recognize that there’s a gray area here. A few environmental issues such as EMFs are widely considered pseudoscientific, and other issues such as the precautionary principle have been condemned as pseudoscientific by people confusing science with their own political biases. We urge contributors to cast a skeptical eye on questionable and unusual claims, and will tend toward discussion rather than banning in most cases.

We also assume you have basic environmental sensibilities. If you join up just to post stuff about how clearcutting and Off-Road-Vehicle use and stripmining are actually good for the planet, or if you’re claiming that activities being bad for the planet doesn’t matter, we will decide you’re better off posting elsewhere.

This all sounds harsh, but much of it is worst-case scenario thinking, and won’t apply to 99.9% of potential contributors. If you’re friendly and kind you’ll be fine, generally, and we’ll try to work out conflicts with an open mind.

Can I control comments on my pieces?
The standards above apply to commenters as well, and we encourage you to implement the Code o’ Conduct. You’ll have a button by each comment to allow you to close it.

What’s the comment policy at The Clade?
A comment policy is in development. It will substantially resemble the Code o’ Conduct. We prize discussion but not jerkery and shouting.

This FAQ is an evolving document. Feel free to ask additional questions in comments.