Greetings if you’re arriving via the one and only Boing Boing. You’re probably here to check out our graphic novel SHOOTING WAR, the story of blogging journalist Jimmy Burns, set in Iraq circa 2011. Writer Anthony Lappé and artist Dan Goldman have bled to make this story sizzle. And it does.
We’re on chapter 4 now, but I’d say start with video then move into chapter 1 and you’ll be caught up before your second cup of caffeine.

What else is it all about? Think of SMITH as a MAKE or ReadyMade of storytelling—what you see, read and feel on the site now comes largely from readers, some we know, many we don’t.
Keep reading for more on how this site works—and how to contribute.

• In this column we offer our blog, a rolling conversation about the personal media explosion and the making of a magazine about this golden age of storytelling.
• The middle column is all yours. This is your space, where you share your stories—about your ex, your Brushes With Fame, your brushes with the Emergency Room. We slap a coat of design on some of your stories and slide them into features found above and then into our rich and messy archive. With luck, and a little bit more money, we’ll create a print version of this online magazine featuring the best of the Web and a bunch of special projects.
• The SMITH Diaries are weekly journals kept by people in the middle of moments of personal transition. Cree has moved back to New Orleans. Brad’s beaten a path out of the city for the ‘burbs. Jason’s an Englishman teaching his first year at a high school in Oakland. And Frida’s looking for love in Chicago. What’s your story? We want to know.

Above all, we want SMITH to be a conversation among readers, writers and editors—more backyard BBQ than velvet rope cocktail party. We say it over and over, we mean it: Everyone has a story. At least one good one. Maybe more.