Hello, guys and gals.

First, on behalf of those who have been unable to do so yet, I extend a warm welcome to you new members who’ve joined us since Update 5 – 2016.

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We were all sorry to hear of the demise of Booktrope, but we were, of course, pleased to welcome some of the members to our fold. If you casualties of the Booktrope collapse haven’t realised it yet, you are in safe hands here, and we’re supportive both publicly and privately. (Wink, Wink …)

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Friends

As other writing and review groups do, we like to accept our fellow scribes and readers with open arms; however, a few alarm bells have been ringing around Facebook recently.

– To every individual, I would suggest you consider Friend Requests carefully.

– If the person making the request isn’t known to you, be particularly cautious.

– If the person making the request isn’t known to you but has mutual friends listed and you recognise the name from the IASD – contact the IASD member first to confirm the acquaintance.

I’m not scaremongering – I’ve had a couple of dodgy requests over the recent weeks.

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Membership

However long you’ve been a member of the IASD (and I mean days or months), please pass on the names of any proposed members to a member of the Admin team. At least two of us will ensure we’re not all being duped.

Yes, it’s a fact – there are some unsavoury characters out there. It might be somebody purporting to be a writer or reviewer to help gain access to a respectable group, purely so they can poison the membership’s hard work.

I’ve learned in life there are occasions to err on the side of caution. This is one such occasion.

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Is there any good news?

Of course, there is – this is the IASD.

If you’re a recent member and haven’t yet had a look at earlier updates or the website/blog, please take the time to do so. There is something for everybody in this group. It might be help or exposure for your efforts.

Melanie Smith, one of our Admin team is also the brains behind Connections eMagazine, and if you haven’t seen her handiwork, check it out.

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Okay, now to appease the numbers people among you.

Our group membership is presently easing over the 300 mark. This is nothing new, because we’ve been there before (when we had 600+), but now we have no time-wasters. As a group we thrive because our members are pro-active.

When our founder, Paul Ruddock, handed over this blog for conversion to a blog/website in October 2015, we had 1,780 followers.

At the time of writing (10^th May 2016), we have 2,344 followers.

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No matter how long you’ve been with us, please remember to acquaint yourself with this website, the Facebook page, and our ongoing efforts for charity. We produce anthologies, but if you’d like to know more, you’ll have to ask. Your work could be in one of the next anthologies.

If there is something you don’t know about us, or our activities as a group, please ask. In the meantime, it might be worth taking a look around …

In the IASD, we don’t do embarrassment – we only do support and discussion.

Thank you for reading.

Tom

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