Yes, more news. This is the first of a couple new features.  For site members who are logged in, you'll see a new option in the listing of stories and on the page that shows the story.  This is a link to "Track this Story".  This does not replace your favorites.  To get updates about stories and authors, you still need to mark them as favorites.  

The story tracker module will mark when you last read a story, and mark the story as "New!" if it's been updated since you read it last.  When logged in you'll also be able to go to Your Tracked Stories and browse the stories you're tracking.   

Try it out and let me know what you think! 

Lots of news lately I know.  This one is a request.  If you're an author, please go through your stories and make sure your story notes are not in the text of the story, but are instead in the notes fields provided.  Please don't include the summary in the text of the story...or the disclaimer or spoilers.  All that should go in the notes fields.  Also, your summary doesn't need to start with the word "Summary"...we've got that covered.  Ditto, if you've selected the category and characters, you don't need to state it again in the summary.  Please check over all the information about your story and make sure it's correct.  Next month, time permitting, I plan to start going through and fixing all this stuff, but your help would be appreciated greatly.

If you're not an author, you can help too.  Use those "report this" links to let us know about items that need some house cleaning. 

Watch for a new feature in the next couple weeks that will let members recommend off-site stories.  These recommendations will appear in the "Other Results" lists in the browse pages and search results.  Meaning you'll be able to search and sort these recommendations just like stories listed on the site. You'll also be able to leave reviews for these recommendations and list them among your favorites.   I'm doing a bit more bug testing on this new feature before releasing it to the site. 

So be thinking about what stories you'll recommend!

With 40% of the vote AFBlue is once again the site's default skin. A couple of the skins that didn't get any votes may come down to be replaced with something else.  If you haven't changed your skin choice since the upgrade, you'll still have SurpriseMe as your default until you change it through the Edit Preferences option in your Account Info page. 

The Browse pages have undergone a small update. Instead of listing the series in front of the stories in the list, you'll now find the number of series listed under as "Other Results" at the top of the page. Click on that link will take you to the listing of series. Also listed as "Other Results" are the challenges that match. More "Other Results" are coming sometime soon. You'll also see these "Other Results" when you use the search feature.

Do you have favorite stories, series, or authors? If so, you can now leave a comment about why they're among your favorites. This comment will be displayed in your member profile in your favorites.

Also check out the additions to the "Top Tens" lists.  

There are a lot of new features in addtion to the ones described in the previous news story.

Stories can now have co-authors! If you've co-authored a story with another author, add the story under your account then click on the name of your co-author(s) to add them to the story. Co-authors have all the same privileges to edit and delete the story and it's chapters as the main author.

You'll now see a "Report This" option with stories, reviews, challenges, and authors. If you find something on the site that violates the rules, is missing, or has some other problem please use the "Report This" link to let us know.

At the end of every story you'll see some new information. If the author has more stories in the archive, you'll now see a count of the author's other stories and a link to their profile to see them. If the story is marked complete you'll see "The End". If it's not complete you'll see "The End...Maybe?". If the story has been marked as a favorite by other members you'll see a count of how many people liked that story and a link to other stories those same people also liked.

Another new addition is the "Table of Contents" link you'll find in the story information.  This link will take you to an information page about the story including a list of chapters.  In your site preferences you can choose to have this "Table of Contents" displayed first rather than going directly to the first chapter. 

More new features coming soon.

As you've hopefully noticed by now, the site has a new look. In addition to all new skins, there are a slew of new features. First up, you'll notice the new browse page in the menu. With these new upgrades, you can now browse by more than just title and category. You can browse by:

• categories
• titles
• series
• ratings
• warnings
• spoilers (more on this later)
• genres

What are spoilers? Originally, we had warnings for spoilers for each season. With this upgrade, the spoiler warnings have been moved to their own grouping to make things clearer for everyone. We've also added SG-1 Season 10 and SG:A Season 3 to the options.

You'll also notice that each of the genres, warnings, spoilers, and characters are now links just like categories were previously. Clicking on these links will take you to the browse page for that item. So for instance, if you just wanted to see the stories with Jack O'Neill in them, you could click on the name in the story information block to see all the stories with Jack listed as a character.

In your Account Info area, the Edit Bio area has been split into Edit Bio and Edit Preferences. The Edit Bio area consists of the items displayed in your profile. We've added a few new options there. In the Edit Preferences, area are the items that let you control your account. There are a few new options there as well. You can now choose the default way stories are sorted for you on the site, either alphabetically or most recent first. You can also choose whether or not to use the tinyMCE editor when entering the text of stories, reviews, etc.

For those who like to save their favorite stories to disk, you'll now find an MS Word icon next to the printer at the top of the story.  Click on this icon to open the story in MS Word format for you to save to your computer.

Please post a comment, and tell us what you think. Or if you're feeling shy, answer the poll question!

The problems reading stories have been reported. I'm working on it as we speak.

Comment here if you want me to send you an e-mail when things are fixed.

Update: The web host has changed some settings on the server that have caused problems in the archive. Until I get this fixed, do not submit new stories or chapters. They will not be saved.  I have submitted a support request, and now we're at their mercy.  If things aren't fixed in a day or so, I'll look for other options.

I've added some new categories in the last couple days.

 In Television, you'll find these new sub-categories:

• The 4400
• Bones
  
• Diagnosis Murder
  

In Movies, we added:

• National Treasure
• Pitch Black

And in Comics:

• Superman
  

I'm instituting a slight amendment to the Submission Rules.  When you add a story, please put your story in the bottom-most category in which it fits. 

 In other words, if your story is a crossover with Buffy: the Vampire Slayer it belongs only in the category Buffy: the Vampire Slayer.  Not Television and not in both.

 If your story currently violates this, please correct it.

Well, I'm a little behind, but today I've added the new regular and semi-regular characters for SG-1 and SG: Atlantis for the current season. 

 For Atlantis, Ronon Dex and Steven Caldwell have been added.

 For SG-1, Vala, Dr. Lam, Cam Mitchell, and Hank Landry join the list.