Words can Hurt.

Dear RMI, it has been brought to our attention that some authors have used the term "a gay" to describe homosexual individuals. While they did not do so to be intentionally malicious, the use of the word with that particular phrasing has very real repercussions, which can include making an author feel unhappy or unsafe within our community, causing them to feel disenfranchised, or even leave. It also reflects badly on the site.

Calling someone “a gay” can be seen as offensive.The term can be seen to dehumanize everyone who is sexuality-variant by taking away everything that makes them a person and defining them by just their sexuality.

“A gay” is also grammatically incorrect. Gay is an adjective, not a noun so it is acceptable to say that “Riley is a gay guy” because there’s a noun attached to it. It wouldn’t be appropriate to say “Riley is a gay”.

In accordance to the rules of RMI please refrain from using this term future forward. Further use of this term to describe homosexual individuals will result in the post being deleted. If it should occur a second time the post will be deleted and there will be a 24 hour ban on posting for that author. If there is a third offence the author will have a meeting with the whole Admin team and will be banned for the rest of the term. Thank you all for your consideration in this matter and for respecting the safety of the community.

- Ryan

December Writing Month Challenge!

Well everyone, today is December 1^st and NaNoWriMo has officially ended. Many of us bravely took on the challenge, and we are happy to announce that three of our authors succeeded in completing it! Congratulations to the authors of Chord McAlbin, Lyubov Kovalchuk, and the Blackburns!

Now just because November has ended doesn’t mean that it’s time to give our keyboards a break. Term is about to end, and we all know that means Orientation will be starting soon as we welcome in the newbies with gusto. This time around, we’re asking all of you to come up with a poem about the houses, much like the Sorting Hat’s song. The Admin will select one of the poems, and it will be recited at the Opening Feast. The poem should be submitted to the Admin email (theheads@rmimagic.com) by December 15^th. That gives you two weeks!

But who will recite this poem, you ask? Allow me to introduce you to a new character, never before written at RMI: Philip the Punctilious Poet of Portsmouth. He’s a portrait. Painted in the late 16^th century by an unknown artist, Philip believes Shakespeare had him bumped off for being too brilliant. Found in an old attic, he eventually got passed down to RMI’s retired headmaster, Tobias Morgan, who then brought him to the school. Now he hangs in the auditorium, and more often than not can be heard reciting poetry and critiquing the students as they practice performances. He is honored that Headmaster Munro has listened to his incessant requests to speak at the Opening Feast. 

National Novel Writing Month

So as I'm sure most of you know, it's that time of the year again. That's right: National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). It is only a short 24 hours away!

But psh, who needs to write 50,000 words of a novel to celebrate? Novels require planning...and new characters...and not being on the RMI Author Cafe while you're writing so we don't distract you.

Instead of being boring and writing a novel, we at RMI are challenging YOU to write more posts in this month of November. Take this opportunity to improve your characterization, lengthen your posts, and have an awesome month of intense writing with your favorite people ever. Moreover, if you DO choose to accept this challenge and succeed, your accomplishment will be forever recorded in our up-and-coming trophy hall.

What exactly are the rules of this challenge? Well, here we go: (Pay attention we've changed some rules this year!)

• To be eligible, Authors must save their posts in a word processing document that will count their words, and this document must be e-mailed to us (theheads at rmimagic dotcom) at the end of the month to confirm your wordcount.

• For each student character you have at RMI, you must write 7,500 words this month to meet our challenge. If you have more than 5 characters, you still only have to write 37,500 words; we'll take pity on you.

• All posts are eligible for consideration, but please don't spam one board with a gajillion posts just to meet word count. Threads are your friends!

• By the same token, ORMIs will count towards your word count...but don't be lame and have all of your words come from ORMIs.

• BUT - caveat - posts done for non-student characters (for example, a younger sibling or parent) will only count for HALF words.
• Only posts from November 1st to November 30th count. So be prepared for tomorrow the flood gates open! 

Admin Changes!

Hey guys!

 It’s that time again, yet another blog post from the old man! Since my take over of RMI I’ve been taking it all in. So I thank you for your patience in my slow understanding of the way things were run by my unforgettable predecessor, who left the biggest shoes to fill ever. Yet as we moved through term I’ve begun to change small things, a few new rules on the Quidditch list, a few tweaks here and there but nothing major.

I’ve finally took a step into the major changes. I’ve asked Marina to step down from Admin. She had been a huge part of the site, and will continue to be a huge part of the site. She helped form RMI into what it is today and we are all thankful for that. Marina has done nothing wrong; I’m just a nervous nelly and asked her to step down because of her college course load. So please when you all see Marina hanging around thank her for helping RMI to become one of the best role playing sites around.

Of course, with Marina being asked to step down I’ve asked another member of our staff to step up. I’d like you all to welcome Robin to Admin. She has been a valuable part of the RMI community, and has brilliant ideas while on staff as well as running our writing center very proficiently.  I’ll expect you all to treat her just like any Admin on the site! On that note I’d like you all to welcome Robin to Admin as you all embraced me as headmaster.

Thanks!
Ryan

Contact Information Update

Here at RMI we strive to be a safe, and secure community for all. Thus is the reason we have the PG guidelines for RMI, and the PG-13 guidelines for the Chatzy and ORMI.  In our rules, the sharing of personal information is
forbidden but I wish to make it known that from now the Administrators will no longer allow minors; e-mail addresses to be released to anyone without written parental consent.

This means anyone under sixteen years old will not be able to give out their e-mails through the Admins of RMI or in Chatzy. This is to protect both RMI as a whole, but the Administrators. We could be held liable by your parents if we release your personal information to other authors. Under COPPA (Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act) we must have consent from a parent to release the e-mail address or other information.

If you have any questions please feel free to contact us via the appropriate form, as always. Thank you.

-Ryan.

Author of the Month Theme, September 2012

“There was a little girl, who had a little curl

Right in the middle of her forehead,

And when she was good, she was very, very good,

But when she was bad she was horrid.”
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Poem #835

Everyone has those habits. The ones that seem harmless - or maybe not - but that eventually drive everyone around them to madness. You know when your sister chews her gum just too loud or your brother plays Call of Duty with the sound on loud enough to wake the dead? What about when your best friend keeps borrowing your pens without asking and chewing on the caps before you get them back? When your favorite teacher pauses in the middle of a sentence for just a second too long? When you spend time on Chatzy instead of doing your summer reading or take the last chocolate chip cookie even though it’s just before dinner?

These little things are what make us human. These are our vices. And these are the sort of things that make our characters human too. They give other people fodder for their posts in response to us and help us develop our characters more completely.

That’s why this month’s Author of the Month themes is Vices. The author we honor next month will be one who, throughout the month, goes out of their way to highlight the small, human aspects of their character. The little things that make their roommate(s) want to stab them or drive their siblings crazy.

So what are you waiting for? Get writing! And don’t forget to nominate someone you think deserves the title!

Author of the Month, August 2012

This month, our Author of the Month theme is "Challenge Yourself".

It's the beginning of a new term, and there's no better time than to sit down and think about why you write what you write. With the final testing of the Mary Sue Litmus Test just behind us, the Writing Center staff have really been discussing why people write what they do. And it's quite simple: most authors write what they know.

Most authors, especially at the very beginning of their time here at RMI, will write characters very similar to themselves. They often only write within their race and gender, picking hobbies for their character that they find it easy to sympathise with. It makes writing easier, and it's a lot less scary to know that you can't be called out for doing something wrong because you are writing a part of your life into your character. And your life is real.

But as people become more confident in their writing, they often slip into what's comfortable. It's something we've all done, because it's an easy thing to do. How many of us have found ourselves only writing characters who share our likes and dislikes? Who have the same interests and hobbies? Who are the same gender or race, or who come from the same socioeconomic level as we do?

So this month, we honor one of our youngest authors who never ceases to seek out a challenge. This author not only consistently write characters of a different gender, but truly strives to represent the characters with a sense of reality that other, more experienced authors may gloss over or lack. The characters written by this author are diverse, and this author strives on a daily basis to make them even more so. Moreover, after over a year of being on edits - and not giving up, even though it was very frustrating at times - this author has finally been given the go-ahead to post without assistance.

That's right. Our author of the month for August, 2012 is the author of Alice Beastly!

Congratulations, and write on Alice :)

An Announcement

Unfortunately, we at RMI will have to start our thirteenth term off with some sad news: for the first time in five and a half years, we have been forced to remove an author from the site. Consequently, the Carter twins, Amity Tristan, Lyrical McBride, and Haven Heilman will not be returning to RMI next term.

In the interest of preserving privacy, we will not be releasing the specific details of the removal. However, following a couple of recent events, the Administrative Team has been faced with this very difficult decision. As some of you may know, we have worked with several authors over the past few years in order to help them improve their abilities to contribute positively to our community. The removal of this particular author has nothing to do with her writing or characterization skills. As always, the Admin team remains ready and willing to work with authors dedicated to their improvement. For more information, please visit our writing center.

The decision to remove this author from RMI was a unanimous one and all four admin team members were given the opportunity to contribute to the discussion that preceded the decision. If you have any questions, concerns, or complaints about this decision, or if you hear any rumours that you would like us to address, please fill out this completely confidential form. Although we will do everything we can to protect the privacy of the author in question, we also understand that we have a duty to be as transparent and open as possible in the aftermath of this unprecedented removal and will do everything possible to allay any worries or concerns that arise as our community adjusts.