The Book of Humanity

"All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated...As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon, calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come: so this bell calls us all: but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness....No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."

John Donne

Wellcome to The Book of Humanity

What is the Book of Humanity?

The Book of Humanity is a non profit, academic project that intends to coil up ambitious writers from all over the world. Its goal: The first novel ever to be written through global human collaboration. The participation is both free but also extremely vital. This is because each step the book takes depends on the wish of majority, so the more the participants, the greater the possibility of a good result. The text will be in the English language due to our will for globality. We would be extremely happy if any human being from any inch of our world participates. The time has arrived for a new attempt. So, let inspiration flow through our computers and fill the blank pages of the "The Book of Humanity".




Register Now

Please if you are interested in participating REGISTER NOW by filling in the form below. It is vital for the success of the project. If you want to use our forum, you have to register again in the 'forum' section. Please, when you get there, choose the same username that you choosed in this registration. This would help us a lot.

Username:

Password:

Confirm Password:

E-mail:



Important Rules, Definitions and Recommendations

  1. The book has to be a novel.
  2. The writing procedure is divided into rounds.
  3. Each round is further divided into two periods, the pulishing and the reviewing period.
  4. During the publishing period, any member (registered user) can publish his/her proposal for the current part of the novel.
  5. This publishing proposal should not exceed 8000 characters (approximately 108 lines).
  6. If a user publishes a text during the publishing period of a round he/she won't be allowed to vote for other people's publications during the reviewing/grading period of the same round.
  7. The publising period of each round ends either when 2 days have passed from the moment it started or when the 50% + 1 of the active users has published something.
  8. An active user is a user that has participated (published or reviewed something) at least until two rounds before current round.
  9. Similarly a user is being automatically deactivated when they have not participated for two successive rounds.
  10. Deactivation has no effect on a user's account because a user is automatically reactivated when they take part in a period (by publishing or reviewing something).
  11. During the publishing period of a round, users can read what has been published up to that point in time but they will be able to grade publications only after the termination of publishing period and only if they haven't published something during this round.
  12. When the reviewing/grading period starts (immediately after the publishing period ends) reviewers (users that haven't published during this round) can start grading each publication.
  13. Reviewers of each round are allowed to grade any number of publications but they can grade each publication only once.
  14. The publshing period of a round ends when 2 days have passed from the moment it started.
  15. The system presupposes user's liability so if a user publishes a text he/she will not be able to modify it and if a user grades a publication he/she can not change that grade.
  16. A percentage of 70% of the decision of a round best publication depends on the average of gradings for each publication and 30% on how good writer the system thinks a user is.
  17. The average of gradings for each publication is not exactly an average because each grade is multiplied by a factor (CR_points) tha shows how good reviewer the system thinks a user is.
  18. Similarly WR_points is a factor that reflects how good writer the system thinks a user is.
  19. Both CR_points and WR_points are updated based on the will of majority. The better grades a user's publication gets the more will be his/her WR_points increased. On the other hand CR_points become the more your grades agree with the opinion of majority for a particular publication. So, for example if a user grades a publication with 0 but the majority has graded it with 5, his/her CR_points will become a lot worse.
  20. Of course users will neither be able to see how other people reviewed the publications nor other user's CR_points and WR_points. Each user has to grade only depending on the quality of each publication.
  21. The subject/story won't be predefined.
  22. The only way for writers to keep a common line throughout the book writting procedure is by discussing in the forum threads.
  23. Of course anyone is allowed to write whatever he/she thinks as an appropriate way of continuing the book. The majority can then decide if agrees through the process of reviewing.
  24. There will be special topics/threads in the forum where users that are not able to write well in English but have written something promising in their language, will be able to post their text for other people that know both languages well to translate it for him/her.
  25. At any point of the whole procedure any human can register and start publishing and grading simply by reading what has been written so far via the "Read Book" section, where The Book of Humanity will be stored in order to be available for anybody (visitor or participant).
  26. The novel ends when one a user proposes an ending publication simply by declaring it in his publication and the majority agrees.
  27. No personal data will be stored. To register you simply have to choose a username, a password and provide a valid e-mail address.
  28. To use the forum you will have to register in the forum section even if you have allready registered succesfully to The Book of Humanity. For your and other people convenience it is strongly recommended that you choose the same username in both registrations although you are allowed to choose different in each registration.

Keep all this in mind and enjoy the project.




When will the whole thing start?

The web page will remain open for registrations, and use of the forums approximately until March. After this pre-processing period all registered users will be informed via e-mail, through forum and web-page announcements for the exact date the first round starts. If you are interested in participating, you are kindly advised to register during this pre-processing period. It is important for us to know the approximate number of participants and this is the best way for you to be promptly imformed about the exact starting date.




Help us

If you found our attempt interesting or if you think that people you know may find it interesting please help us, by informing these people about the content of this project or by adding a link to The Book of Humanity webpage in your webpage.

 

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