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Style Guide
This page gives an indication to what sort of articles we wish to receive. There are no hard and fast rules and we are open to new ways of doing things, but you should be aware of the following:Written style
If your article is reporting a news event, it should be in the style of a news report. We don't strictly follow the laws of journalism, but it should be to a good standard of English, correctly punctuated and paragraphed, and leave the reader with some idea of what the article was about. Good spelling and grammar is essential - you have a spell checker, use it!What to write about
DeadBrain is a UK web site and as such we cover British issues. However, we do cover international events and have a large international readership, so as long as a British audience (or, more specifically, DeadBrain's British editor) can understand what an article is about it stands a chance of getting published. For example, a story about President Bush falling off a Segway is good, a story about the intricacies of the rules of baseball is not.Be topical. Don't write about something that happened last year, it's too late. If you base your article on something that is in the news at the moment then you'll be off to a good start. We publish daily - take advantage of that.
Names
Use the real names of people if you are writing about them. If you're writing about the Transport Secretary or the Chief Executive of a corporation, take the trouble to find out who they are.Our stock names are Douglas Ramsbottom and Gregory T Mullet. If you need made-up names in your article then use them, or variations of them. "Funny" names are discouraged, except where they are related to one of these names.
The names and titles of some people who are mentioned regularly in DeadBrain can become corrupted. For example, you can call Donald Rumsfeld the Secretary of Offence, Jack Straw the Assistant Foreign Secretary or Iain Duncan Smith the alleged leader of the Conservative Party. Variations on these are encouraged.
