For comments and diaries, Raising Kaine editors reserve the right to delete any objectionable content and to ban repeat violators.  Such content includes (but is not limited to) abusive statements, ad homonyms, spamming with the same content, and unoriginal work (especially if over copying trademarked or copyrighted materials).

Don't just dump links all over your diary. Make links look neat by embedding them in the text.  The easiest way to do this is surround the text you want linked followed by the URL with brackets:


[CNN http://www.cnn.com] will result in the following link: CNN.

Use HTML code to emphasize key phrases. To bold text, use <b> before the text and </b> at the end of the text. To italicize text use <i> before the text and </i> at the end of the text. Don't underline text - readers confuse that with links.

When quoting a long excerpt of another source, always use the blockquote function by using the blockquote tag. 

<blockquote> Text you want in the blockquote </blockquote>

This would look like:

Text you want in the blockquote

Raising Kaine diaries look best with a picture. To do a picture embedded in the upper left of the diary, use this code:

<img align="left" src="URL location of picture">

The URL location of the picture can be determined by right clicking on the picture, selecting "properties," and cutting & pasting the location info. Usually, such a location ends with a "jpg" or "gif" tag.

Some pictures found on the Internet are too big for Raising Kaine. You can adjust their size like this:

<img align="left" src="URL location of picture" height="XXX" width="YYY">

The XXX and YYY values are the pixel height and width of the image.  Do your best to avoid (or resize) images that are wider than 500 pixels.  For most diaries, the upper left image should be around 250 pixels, give or take a bit.

To determine the image's original dimensions, right click the picture and select "Properties" from the menu - a window will pop up that includes the image's height and width. To resize the picture without distorting the proportions, cut the height and width in half or some other ratio to keep the correct proportions.  (A quick "cheat" with resizing: only include the width (leave out the height part).  Almost all browsers will resize the height in proportion to the width you set.)

Categories are a way of classifying diaries which serve as a search tool. When drafting a diary, don't forget to chose the relevant category from the drop-down menu. If you think we're missing a category, let us know!

Always reread your published post to check for errors. Using the Google Toolbar's spelling function is a good way to spellcheck you work.

Try to avoid posts that simply link to an interesting article or site somewhere on the web without providing substantive commentary or analysis.  It's always better to write something about what you're linking to - even if it's just personal stories and/or your strong feelings on the matter (provided you elaborate).   Another consideration here is not to copy too much from another site as there may be copyright issues.  Smaller quotes are fine, but larger chunks should be avoided for this reason.

Whether you have the power to promote diaries to the front page or hope your diary will be promoted, take a critical look at what you write and what other people write and consider if it should be on the front page or not. There is no hard and fast rule here, but consider the pointers above for good format and originality. A good rule of thumb would be to ask yourself if the diary is of a quality (including content and formatting) that a hypothetical reader should see first and foremost when visiting the Raising Kaine homepage.