Well, I like your journal, boxy layout and all. My basic complaint about it is that you've got a lot of white, er, beige space. Which makes for a lot of scrolling, frankly.

And as for your biblio, my chief observation is that it needs to be updated: got my September copy of Asimov's with "The Third Party" (very cool read, btw), so you need to pull that down to the Published category.

Not to entirely avoid the question you posed, but... they don't think your home page is identifiable as an author's site? And, even more disturbing... SFWA has guidelines for authors' personal sites?

...

I could be catty and point out that their own looks more like a neglected Word export from 1995 than a representation of a lively professional organization, but I'll content myself with the observation that most SF authors have execrable websites -- a quick trip down the page you linked yields some depressing examples -- and SFWA would do far better to guide their members toward some training in web design and promoting their work online than to impose a vague design guideline as a requirement for their member list.

Which is a long way of saying that your site is by far one of the better ones around, and that every time I think I've plumbed the depth of SFWA's collective folly, I find a new instance to admire.

Onward. One way to redo the home page would be to add a second column, like the one on the blog, to move the writerly info closer to the top of the page. Or you could move some things off the home page, since all the sections are neatly labeled, self-contained boxes that would probably work just as well if they were separate pages. That might allow you to put the rest into one larger box, if you prefer. As for the bibliography... well, it depends on what sort of complaints you've received.

In any case, the conceit of the site is charming, and I hope you keep it.

I think I see what SFWA is on about. They don't want people putting links on their "author pages" list that are p0rn sites or ads for V|agra or what have you, so they have decided that to be listed a page needs to be recognizable as an author's page.

I'm afraid your current home page *isn't* recognizable as an author's personal page. It's too distant, too third-person, too anonymous -- the *only* indication that this is David Moles' home page is your name, in small italic type, at the very bottom of the page, beneath a GIF of the words "Beware of the Leopard".

Looking at your front page as though I didn't know you, I see that the major content of each section consists of:

* A quote about Cervantes. This tells me nothing about the purpose of this page, and provides only a subtle hint as to the personality of the author of the page.
* A definition of the word "log". There's no clear indication that the word "log" or the word "instanter" above it link to the author's weblog.
* An announcement of an upcoming anthology. Why is this here? There's no visible indication that the author of the page is one of the editors of this book.
* A list of "works cited." There is no visible indication that these works have anything in common at all, never mind that they were written by the author of this page.
* A list of "times gone by." It's not clear what these are. Are they more quotations about Cervantes?

Now, since I *do* know you, I find the page a charming expression of your delightfully reserved personality. But as an author's personal page it is so subtle, so indirect, that it fails to get any message across to a casual reader. As a personal page (for a person who wishes the work to take precedence over the author), it is a success. As a publicity page for an author, it fails.

Your challenge is to make it more obvious that this is, indeed, David Moles' page, without losing the charm. I'd say that the simple addition of descriptive titles -- clever, perhaps, but not so clever as to be opaque -- would go a long way. For example: "Chasing After the Future - the Personal Page of David Moles" at the top of the page, "Divers Musings" for the weblog, "Other Works by the Same Author" for the bibliography. All in somewhat larger type than you have now.

I'd also reduce the beige space, and perhaps reorder the sections, in an attempt to get more clickable content onto the first screenful or two. The suggestion of moving the bibliography to a column on the right is a good one.

This is a delightful page, really. I hope these suggestions are taken as they were meant -- as suggestions to improve the page in a direction that will make it more acceptable to SFWA.