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The Signaller's Editorial Policy​

The Signaller’s Publishing Rationale:

The Signaller seeks to publish high-quality, informative articles, podcasts and multimedia content aimed towards the Australian Signals community, with the purpose of enhancing community engagement and providing a current source of information to serving members, past and present.  

What will and won’t be published:

  • Contributions must NOT contain content or information classified as Official:Sensitive (O:S) or above.
  • Content must adhere to the Defence Values. No submissions that directly attack, belittle or criticise individuals will be published. In keeping with the contest of ideas, current policy or decisions may be critiqued, and all such critiques should be rooted in facts and logical arguments.
  • Author attribution. All submissions must be attributed – i.e have an author. The Signaller does not publish content submitted anonymously. Where authors believe they have a compelling reason for their contribution to be published without attribution, (for example, personnel with Protected Identity [PID] status), the Author Known attribution may be employed by The Signaller pending agreement by editorial staff. Authors must still provide attribution to the Signaller staff in this instance.

What The Signaller accepts:

  • Submissions – Contributions submitted for publication must conform to one of the defined types of submissions (see Submission Guidelines below).
  • Contributors – The Signaller’s preference is for contributions to come from a position of expertise or experience. To meaningfully contribute to the community, you should hold a level of SME knowledge or personal experience in the topic you are discussing. This can be via qualification, training, or current knowledge; or some form of personal experience (first-hand involvement with the matter at hand).

Submission Guidelines

To make a submission, follow this process

  1. Read these Submission Guidelines.
  2. Peer review your submission. Find a close friend, respected peer, or an Education Officer.
  3. Content Submission. Make your full submission via our Submission Portal. Your submission will be reviewed in detail and edited as required by one of the editors. The edited version with any suggested amendments will be returned to you for clearance prior to progressing; upon detailed review of your submission if the final version is not deemed suitable you will be informed as per Step 2.
  4. Consider providing a copyright-free cover image to be published with your article. The Defence Image Gallery is our go-to site. Alternatively, look for material which is ‘Public Domain’ or Creative Common 0 ‘CC0’ classified. If using a google search, select Settings > Advanced Search > Usage Rights > Creative Commons Licence. Provide the URL of the location from where the image was sourced. If using an image from elsewhere, provide information to attribute credit to the originator. If in doubt, leave it out, or contact us for further guidance.
  5. Include a short 2 – 4 sentence biography. Keep it professional, as we will not publish personal or family information to protect your personal privacy.
  6. Publication. Following acceptance of any suggested edits, your submission will be prepared and scheduled for publication, following this it will be published on The Signaller website.

Submission Types:

Articles. The Signaller accepts the following types of written article:

News Article.

  • Length: Short-form.
  • Style: Informal. News articles can be related to unit events, awards, notable achievements, or anything that may be of notable interest to the Signals Community. 
    Referencing: References should be provided for original information sources and for images if not the Author’s original work.

Op-Ed: An op-ed piece is a short-form article that represents the strong, informed, and focused opinion of a writer on an issue of relevance to a targeted audience. It is a written prose piece which expresses the opinion of the author with no affiliation with the publication’s editorial board, or enterprise/organisational policy (‘the party line’). Articles submitted to The Signaller under the Op-Ed category must meet the following requirements:

  • Length: Short-form (500 – 1000 words)
  • Style: The writing should advance an opinion or thesis on a current topic relevant to the profession of arms and/or the Australian national defence in a very tightly argued format. Your opinion should be informed by facts and figures but does not need to expound upon them as you would in an academic essay. Op-Eds are not a rant, ‘letter to the editor’-style diatribe or a chance to simply complain, but should offer some form of recommendation or solution. While Op-Eds are a form of personal opinion, that opinion should derive from a solid grounding in expertise or experience. That is, to advance your original opinion on a specialist topic, you should argue from a position of expertise (such as being a subject matter expert via qualification, training, or current knowledge) or experience (first-hand involvement with the matter at hand). Referring to the author in the first-person is permitted and appropriate.
  • Referencing: Not essential but encouraged to support central argument. Academic-style referencing is not required, in-text hyperlinking or use of diagrams etc is suitable for an Op-Ed.

Review: Book, Podcast, Film, or other

  • Length: Short-form
  • Style: Informal. Reviews may be discussed in the first person and can adopt a more relaxed tone. A review should focus on the relevance of the reviewed material to the Signals Community.
  • Referencing: Only the work being reviewed is required to be referenced.

Videos. Video content is welcomed. To contribute video content, please contact The Signaller at submissions@rasigs.org to discuss further.

Tips for Contributors:

How should you write?

Submissions need to be suitable for our website, or a mobile device, which is why we recommend:

  • Write in an active voice. This will help keep your word count down.
  • Know your intended audience.
  • Keep sentences and paragraphs short. Approximately 20 words per sentence and 80 words per paragraph.
  • Where appropriate, use clear and meaningful headings and sub headings. Only if this helps the flow of your work.
  • Avoid jargon and acronyms – try to appeal to a general audience who may not be experts in your field.
  • Format: MS word, 12 font. We have limited formatting on our webpage – sorry! We can include 1 level of sub-paragraphs
    1. Like this is ok.
      • This extra numbered sub-list is problematic.
  • If you intend to use images in the body of your article, indicate the location in text (i.e. ‘Image 1 here’). Then, name and submit the jpeg as separate files during your submission. This will result in better quality resolution upon publication.

Some extra tips:

  • Try to include reliable (unlikely to change) web hyperlinks (if required).
  • Our website and your biography is viewable to a broad audience; therefore, we recommend checking your social media privacy settings are secure.
  • We accept a range of contributions to create a rich and varied offering to our participants; however, we will not publish any work that does not uphold Defence values. 
  • If you are submitting a media file all sound FX, music and supporting imagery must be ‘Public Domain’ or Creative Common 0 ‘CC0’ classified. It is the author’s responsibility to obtain permission to use any copyrighted material that is not their own in their submission. Proof of these permissions will need to be supplied and appropriate acknowledgement given in the submission.
  • The Signaller Team will keep you informed as your submission progresses through the editorial process. 

If you have any questions, or need assistance, please contact us at submissions@rasigs.org.

We look forward to receiving and publishing your submission. Thanks again for contributing to The Signaller.