Righting a wrong

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Wed, 2001-10-03 17:50

Lisa_Mangan-(un...

Righting a wrong

Dear ABCtalers,

Thanks for your heartfelt responses to the inaccuracies of the Telegraph's Arts and Books supplement on Saturday.

We too were a bit upset that they got us all wrong in their review of finalists for the yell.com awards.

Here is our response, let's hope it results in a correction / reappraisal of our worth.

Dear Editor,

I am writing in response to this Saturday’s books in space column, The Telegraph 29th September 2001. Toby Clements refers to the website www.ABCtales.com as one of the sites short-listed for the yell.com awards. Though his piece was brief he made a number of errors, the most concerning of which was the statement ‘Unlike The Big Issue, it [ABCtales.com] has no charitable aim’.

I would like to point out that ABCtales, whilst not a charity, is a social venture whose main aim is to effect change by providing a website that empowers people to write and express themselves. We believe that everyone has as story to tell and therefore publish everyone’s writing for free online. We send tale-catchers out to sections of the community that we feel are under-represented and publish their stories on the site and we provide a further publishing opportunity in our free national print magazine ABCtales, for which the writer gets paid.

In addition, ABCtales has had a commitment from the outset to donate 20 per cent of its profits to The Big Issue’s Social Development Fund which aims to help homeless people move on from homelessness and into mainstream employment. We also sponsor Street Lights the section of The Big Issue that publishes homeless people’s creative writing.

What’s more, ABCtales seeks to provide employment opportunities to homeless people wherever possible. We are a small team but so far a third of our staff have been former Big Issue vendors, one of whom has since moved on to permanent employment.

Finally, I would also like to draw Mr Clement's attention to the lively discussion forums that exist on the website. I felt that his piece did ABCtales.com a further disservice when he stated that another site on the shortlist was ‘much better’ citing as his reasons that ‘you can join the discussion, and you can vote for a book you want to discuss in the coming weeks’. Did he miss this central aspect of our site where people are invited to discuss and critique not only published authors works but each other’s original writing as well?

In conclusion, I would ask you to ask Mr Clements to revisit our site and request that you rectify the errors made by him about the social ethics of ABCtales - so central to our business – for your readers, many of whom are writers on our site.

Yours sincerely,

Lisa Mangan
Communications Director

Fri, 2001-10-05 23:14

funky_seagull

Man sometimes I can't half write long messages... I feel a bit embarrassed about myself sometimes... soz man... I meant what I said like.. abctales is cool but I kind of went out of my way...hehe it looks like I'am on amphetamines or something... Will definately try and shorten my messages in future.. its one of my goals in life.. to write short messages... the thang is once you press the 'send' button then its too late... maybe I will regret sending this too cos I'll look like an even bigger prat..hehe R

Fri, 2001-10-05 23:59

Albert Ross

are you toby clements making amends?

Sat, 2001-10-06 00:06

Linsi

"All hail....Funky Seagull!"

Sat, 2001-10-06 12:51

Toby Clements

I resent the insinuation that I would choose such a ridiculous name as funky_seagull. I mean funky what does that mean anyway? And to insinuate that a seagull can actually be funky well that just shows the intelligence of the person concerned. It is laughable that people with such names can call themselves writers. I have much better things to do with my time, like write articles for the Telegraph's arts and books supplement.

Tue, 2001-10-09 13:31

toby clements

I only have a hundred and fifity words a week so I can't do justice to all the ins and outs of the issues raised by your website. But it would have been a lie to say you were a charity, since you are not a registered charity and the stories you print are mixed. Some are good, some are bad. That's all I said, that's all I say. I thought whatamIgoingtoead.com better and while I still do, I know you to be much more ambitious. You won the Yell award after all, so well done but save all the self-righteousness for the pub.

Tue, 2001-10-09 13:36

victoria.lane

I "work" with Toby Clements and I can confirm that he don't know beans.

Tue, 2001-10-09 13:38

victoria lane

that victoria lane is an imposter. i do work with toby clements and it is true that he doesn't know beans but most importantly HE SHOULD NOT GO ABOUT PRETENDING TO BE OTHER PEOPLE

Tue, 2001-10-09 13:43

stormy

"the site has no charitable aims" is what you actually said. this is entirely different to ' the site is not a charrity'. if you only have 150 words then perhaps they would have been better employed discussing the content of the site than in issuing mis-leading statements about charity. baked or half baked victoria?

Sun, 2001-10-07 00:22

#10

Dave Randall

I think that "Funky Seagull is actually a FAB name. The impression I get is of white gulls soaring, wearing mini walkman earphones, tuned into some kickin' massive attack TOONS You ROCK Funky Seagull my man :-)))

Wed, 2001-10-03 18:30

#11

Linsi

Well said!!!! we, the writers and readers of Abc tales would be lost without this valuable site (well I know I would anyway!) I'm glad you put the record straight!! Linsi :o)

Wed, 2001-10-10 00:34

#12

Tim Walton

That Toby Clements stirred up some kind of hornets nest. He should never have said the site has no charitable aims. He's a lazy journalist. Sloppy, I would call him. He should read right to the bottom of every page. I worked on a paper in Korea and we had to read right to the end of every page. Of course we put the important bit at the top, and then worked down so that the least important bit was at the bottom, but we were trained journalists. No excuse. Lazy, man, lazy. Still, his little piece wasn't that bad about us. some of the stories are bad. That's what I thought he was trying to say. I went to the other site he recomended and it is so boring. We should defintely try to find out where he lives and put dog @!#$ through his door. Whadyasay?

Wed, 2001-10-03 19:55

#13

andrea

Well said, Lisa. An excellent response.

Wed, 2001-10-03 19:59

#14

andrew pack

I've got to say, it says on the Front Page that abc gives 20% of its profits to the Big Issue and has said that as long as I can remember being here. I wouldn't write a book review if I hadn't read the first page. Surely the same courtesy should extend to websites. I'd be hacked off with this even if I wasn't staff. (And I am never, never, going to upset Lisa. )

Wed, 2001-10-17 09:09

#15

andrew pack

To be fair, at least Toby had the guts to enter the lion's den and say why he'd said what he did. As a reviewer, of course he is entitled to prefer one site to another. That wasn't what people here were objecting too - it is not an 'our site is better than theirs' - it was, the basis of the review was factually flawed. And of course the quality of stories here is going to be mixed - it is an inevitable consequence of giving everyone a voice. The quality of stories in Waterstone's is mixed, and the publishers do have quality control. The quality of stories in the Booker shortlist is mixed. Speaking as a writer, I feel much the same as Funky Seagull. Having somewhere to expose my writing has made me more confident and more prolific - that may not be a good thing for the world at large, but it has been a very good thing for me.

Thu, 2001-10-04 10:19

#16

Lisa Mangan

Ah yes, there's nothing like a bit of injustice to get me going! Thanks Andrew, Andrea and Linsi for your responses. We only flippin won the award to boot!!

Fri, 2001-10-05 00:23

#17

funky_seagull

I've e-mailed the link to this web-site to my friends and they love it. In fact it has inspired some of them to have a go at writing. And maybe soon they will post some of their stuff on here, I know my Mum already has. And anything that does that gets people into writing is great! I tell you man I am a poverty stricken individual who can't and doesn't even want to get a credit card. Yet here I have an opportunity to get my writing published for free. Without all that corporate stuff that asks for your credit card no. Since joining this web-site.. I haven't stopped writing it has just totally fuelled my fire man... Because I've now got somewhere to display my work like a gallery or something, and it gives me a buzz to see it up there on the screen. This web-site it has become like a cornerstone for my writing. A real inspiration for me. I think of it as being like a gift from God. I tell you man I am blown away by the amount of talented writers there are on this site whom I would never have read or heard of if it hadn't been for abctales.com... some of the writing I've read on here has brought tears to my eyes and there are images and visuals people have written that will stay with me for the rest of my life I think... This is definately a huge ever-growing pulsating brain of writers, with so many varied and rich stories to tell. Jack Keroauc would love this! Abctales is the story tree man and we writers we are the leaves of that story tree. so man I jus wanna say massive respect and God let you win that award cos you deserved it... Theos bless Richie

Fri, 2001-10-05 11:31

#18

Andrea

Strewth!

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