These instructions have been superseded. Responses will be ignored. Submission guidelines are now here: JOIN IN.

Everything you [used to] need to know to get started

Chalkboard is the home of what we’ve taken to calling asynchronous collaboration: any form of writing that calls for working with multiple people, but not all at the same time.

That’s a pretty broad definition, and that’s how we intend to keep it, because Chalkboard is an open, community-driven writing channel for everyone and every kind of writing. Every project works a little differently:

• Sometimes, Chalkboard writers take turns adding lines or stanzas to a poem…or even whole chapters to a fiction story.
• Sometimes we’ll erase parts of someone else’s story to find new ones.
• Sometimes we’ll build a chain of poems, borrowing a line or two off the writers who played before us or other stories on Medium.
• Sometimes we’ll pair our words with another artistic medium.
• Sometimes we’ll write a one-line poem or tribute in response to an open prompt. (Actually, this one happens on about a weekly basis.)

And sometimes we’ll do something completely different — it all depends on the projects our community comes up with.

The way we publish our projects varies, too. When we’re building a collection, we often feature all the submitted stories in one part of our publication. But if we’re creating a single poem from many contributions, we usually invite participants to publish their poems elsewhere on Medium.

The one thing that all our projects have in common is that we clearly state their rules of engagement in a kick-off post or call for collaborators.

For open projects, this post will be easy to access from the home page or top navigation bar. For past projects, you’ll find them in the archive.

Rules

We’d rather be collaborating than writing a big list of rules, so let’s sum it up as succinctly as we can:

Chalkboard hopes to continue to foster the community spirit of creative writing on Medium. We ask that you always write and interact with other participants in a way that respects us as writers and humans.

Hate speech and other non-constructive writings are not permitted here. If the editors deem anything that we see as hate speech, spam, or the like, we will not publish it.

We ask that if you commit to a project, you participate to the best of your ability. If you need to withdraw for any reason, please let your project host know, so they can find another writer to take your place.

We also ask that you respect other creators by ensuring that all images in your submissions are free from copyright restrictions and are appropriately attributed to the artist, with a link.

Submissions

Chalkboard welcomes all submissions that are either

• a contribution to an existing and currently open project: please be sure to follow all the instructions in the call for collaborators or kick-off post; or
• a kick-off story for a new project that you’re proposing: please work off an example from another project, to make sure you cover all the relevant details.

Chalkboard doesn’t accept general submissions that don’t fit one of the above-listed criteria.

If you’d like to be added as a Chalkboard writer so you can submit a story, please read the new guidelines.

Like a bit of history?

Here’s our archive of past projects on Chalkboard:

And here are our original posts about how to join in on Chalkboard:

Need more information?

Let us know if we haven’t answered all your questions — just reply to this story and we’ll be in touch.