If you have been reading the Beyond Calligraphy e-magazine, you may have noticed that we have added an Author box at the bottom of every post. The team felt that having only the name of the writer or translator at the top of the article was not sufficient to tell our readers about each person and to highlight their work. By implementing the Author box, the author is promoted, and the reader can learn more fully about the person, giving a richer picture of each contributor.

Using the following post as an example of what we are doing and why, please click on the link below.

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Figure 1. Author box

Example : Sumi-e from the perspective of a traditional academically-trained European artist

    • The Author box visually draws your attention right away as compared to the simple “by author” at the top of the post. It allows the readers to learn more about the author and allows the author to choose more to share in order to connect with the readers.
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Figure 2. Author profile
    • The profile photo allows readers to further connect with the author as people feel more informed when they can see someone’s face.
    • You may have also noticed that we have included some small icons under the profile photo and description. These icons allow the reader to follow the author throughout the web. Under the previous system, we could not promote authors’ other social networks, rather we asked that people choose one. We know from experience that having a full picture of each contributor is very important if one wants to become known, to sell one’s work, to let people know about translating abilities, overall, to be found on the web. Of course, this is only useful if you wish to be found.
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Figure 3. Profile photo
  • Additionally, this helps the web crawlers, spiders, and bots to find and promote you more easily. If you are wondering what I am talking about, let me give you a simple overview. Web crawlers, spiders, and bots are computer programs that are used by Google, Yahoo, MSN and other search engines that follow links on a web site and gather information.
  • These programs take the links, information, and photos, and then try to associate these with any given topic for which people may do a search. In simple terms, if a person were searching for someone who sold Sumi-e or Calligraphy, it would go thru all of the data in its databanks. If you have the most relevant information/links on that topic, it would place your links within the top of any search list. This is extremely helpful for an artist to promote themselves.
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Figure 4. Social networks links

Now that you understand the positives, you will also need to do more work in order to achieve the goal of becoming better known and give a rich overview of yourself. Below is what you will need to do.

  • We will ask/require our authors to create a Gravatar account in order to have your photograph on the site. The gravatar name may not be familiar, but the principle is quite simple. You will have a central location for your image.
  • When you send to us your article, you will also need to send to us your other social network information such as your personal website, Google Plus account, Facebook, twitter, anywhere you have a presence on the web.
  • Perhaps you do not have any networks other than Facebook. If so, that is fine. It makes things easy for us. However, if we wanted things to be easy, we would not be undertaking such a broad mission and collaboration. Simple is Zen, the internet is not.
  • In sum, if you want to be found and perhaps sell your work or get more students for your classes or become more recognized or a myriad of possibilities, it is very wise to join other networks, then list them for our large readership. In this way, everyone can grow.

The Beyond Calligraphy Team

Beyond Calligraphy