So, whose wacky/dumb/brilliant idea was Critters Workshop?

That would be me, Dr. Andrew Burt:

I'm a computer science professor at the University of Denver, where I do research and teach in the areas of computer security, networking & Internet'ing, operating systems, the social impacts of computing, and an unusual branch of AI. Before that I was CEO of an Internet company that provided the local news channels to major Internet portals hundreds of newspapers and TV stations. Before that, I was doing the CS prof. thing at DU again. Additionally, I'm the founder of the world's first free Internet service (Nyx.net).

Some of my science fictional areas of interest are...

• Critters, obviously
• Being Vice President of SFWA (Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, Inc.)
• Ed Bryant's Northern Colorado Writers' Workshop (www.ncww.org) of which I'm a past president; the NCWW has launched the careers of notables such as Connie Willis, Dan Simmons, Wil McCarthy, P.D. Cacek, and its past and present membership averages approximately one major award win or nomination per person (Connie obviously raising that bar!)
• Being Chairman of SFWA's e-piracy committee (info at www.sfwa.org/epiracy)
• The SFWA Bulletin, of which I'm the webmaster, and which you should subscribe to!
• The Black Holes response time tracker and market information site I maintain at www.critique.org/blackholes (and associated sites for saying nice things about editors and tracking dead markets)
• The CritFinder, a site for writers to find or announce an in-person workshop, at www.critique.org/critfinder
• CritSpace, free, passworded web pages for workshops, at www.critique.org/critspace, for those already involved in a workshop and who would like a site to help augment workshop manuscript transfers and so forth (used by Geoff Landis's Cajun Sushi Hamsters, John Stith's CSWW, etc.)
• David Brin/Analog's Webs of Wonder contest, www.analogsf.com/wow, for which I was a judge and copyright liaison
• Preditors & Editors (www.sfwa.org/prededitors) writing info site, for whom I run the big annual best-of voting

My publication credits include dozens of short fiction tales, one cyberwarfare novel, the profits of which were donated to the Red Cross, and a wide assortment of non-fiction. I've made numerous media appearances (including being allegedly mentioned in dialog in the forthcoming movie Takedown from Miramax) and enjoy being a frequent con panelist. For a hobby, I construct solutions to all the world's problems. Fortunately -- nobody listens.

My homepage, with details of my other nutty projects and a "find Aburt" picture, is here.

My SF writing bio (aka my Critters bio page) is here.

The story behind why I founded Critters, as memorialized in my original call-for-members netnews article, is here.

Presumably like yourself (else why are you looking at a science fiction writing workshop?), I one day hope to be a household name like 'Asimov'... I believe I have all the right tools for that: The discipline to write, ideas, maybe some insight into the human psyche, stamps and envelopes to submit manuscripts with, and a legal change of name form with "Andrew Asimov" on it. :-)

Critters and/or I have been profiled in various places on the net. Some I know of are...

• Salon.com
• Fiction Factor

But you don't really want to know about me, you want to know about Critters. So head back, look around, and join us if you're up to the challenge!