Fanfiction Challenge

[-Jade-]

Ok, that sounds good to me. I think most people do want a no winners competition, but I dunno, I just think that voting adds a bit of spark. I mean, of course it's not like people are desperate to out do people or anything, but I do find it gives me a bit more of an incentive. Maybe that's just because I'm a naturally competitive person - well against myself mostly, because I always want to improve and better my previous efforts. But if no voting is what everyone wants then that's great. and I do agree, that voting would probably make the challenge more accesible to newbies.

I'd prefer no winners at all. And see its not called a FanFic Competition... its called a FanFic Challenge. Its all about being challenged, challenging ourselves to improve our stories, and challenging the readers to improve their feedback/constructive criticism. I love the feeling I get when Ive finished the story, and feel proud of myself. And then to get people who love the story, and say how great a story it is. That's what Im in this challenge for. Thats why I come back again and again. I write for me and me alone. Its all about the challenge.

Im not saying its wrong to have winners. I'd just prefer not to have then.

Also Im glad you liked my christmas idea. I'd be happy to host, as long as I get to write a story too. I love christmas.

Yep, you can of course enter and host, looking forward to seeing your ideas!

I think that maybe it'd be a good idea for NO winners in the Christmas one, just for Christmas spirit and everything, but maybe a winner for the other one?

I personally agree with this. I like winners. Like SfanS said, it's not that we're all desperate to out do one and another and win, but I think friendly competition is good. I mean imagine an avatar competition with no winners. I dunno, that's just my opinion. And I find it personally challenging to see how many votes or in what place I get. Not because I want to beat the people above me, but because I want to see if I can better that position for myself. And I love reviews, in my opinion they're the most important thing about the competition, but they don't exactly give you a completely clear idea of who's fic was enjoyed most, because obviously no one's totally mean to anyone (which is a good thing, don't get me wrong - constructive critisicm is best, no one wants people to be horrible) But I just find the reviews and the votes combined help you to get an accurate representation of how much your fic was liked. So, say I got good reviews for a fic but hardly anyone voted, then I could look at it and think, ok what was it missing? But it does look as if the majority think no voting. Which is probably a good thing for me actually, because I'm gonna be so busy next year because I've got exams and stuff, so it hopefully will mean I won't enter as much - so there a bright side to everything!

[Skykat]

I like reviews and I'd hate for reviews to stop, I'd just prefer the reviews to be for information only rather then have them decide anything but that's just my view.

This is from the other thread but I've copied it into here aswell.

Wait a minute Skykat is the answer for this going to decide the system for the current challenge as well? Cos as I said, we could just leave it all to be reinvented for 2007.... And since it's practically certain that there'll be no voting from now on, can we please just have voting in the current challenge for one last time?

Hmmm maybe we should vote on it?

I don't have any problems with that Jade...you did win the challenge fair and square so its only right you run it your way.

So say if we have this challenge, your one, decided in the usual way but the person who wins it HAS to set their challenge in line with the majority vote?

If after your challenge has ended they wait until 2007 to post their challenge that'll mean it's reinvented for the new year and will also give Anna a chance to run her christmas challenge as an aside.

Edit: that means if she wants Anna can get cracking on the christmas challenge now and host it as she likes because it'll be a one off and will run alongside the current challenges, the break will merely be to give people the opportunity to enter rather than having to worry about more than one story at once...if that makes sense.

[sevenpuddings]

Wow, this thread is going off with debate and discussion.

Firstly, I do believe that the Christmas thing is going to simply be a fun thing, and SfanS, furrylogic never mentioned it needing a winner, more for it to be a fun, end of year thing, & I think thats just what we need.

Secondly, having read everything, I can see where everyone is coming from. And I honestly think, the only compromise that we can come to is to have a winner decided by reviewers rather than a poll. This way, everyone is getting at least half of what they want. And also, if you just happen to win, and would rather not host the next challenge, you're always able to decline.

I know in my heart of hearts, I'd rather a challenge with no voting, because when I vote, even though I don't intend to be, I become biased by whichever story I happened to click with the most, and that's basically going off my own personal peference, rather than what was ideally the best story, and I think along the line everyone has gone down that track. Some stories have been looked over because of pairings, others because of the characters written about... the setting or the time frame... anything and everything. I hope I'm making sense here, but thats just where I'm coming from when I say I'd rather no voting and no winner.

However, I do empathise with those who like the voting system, and as a way to figure out who hosts the next challenge, I think its very effective. I guess, they just like the challenge that it brings, and if thats important to them, can we really say "Nope, not going to happen." just because a majority may disagree? I know in a democracy it would be different, but we're honestly talking a minimal number of accomodating people here, really, I think we can all agree to disagree, and compromise with the final result?

[emmasi]

I would like to enter the next challenge but I'm very VERY confused about what I'm supposed to do. What's all this talk of hosting? If, by some miracle, I were to "win" the next challenge, what exactly would I be expected to do? I'm just trying to work out what I'm getting myself into.

As for entering, will there be a thread that we post our completed fics in, or will we just post them as usual in the forum, or PM them... or is all that still being worked out?

I'm a bit slow when it comes to long and complicated explanations

[Skykat]

I would like to enter the next challenge but I'm very VERY confused about what I'm supposed to do. What's all this talk of hosting? If, by some miracle, I were to "win" the next challenge, what exactly would I be expected to do? I'm just trying to work out what I'm getting myself into.

As for entering, will there be a thread that we post our completed fics in, or will we just post them as usual in the forum, or PM them... or is all that still being worked out?

I'm a bit slow when it comes to long and complicated explanations

The way it has been working is that people who want to enter will PM their entries to the hoster (the person who set the challenge). When the deadline has passed the hoster will open a thread and post all the entries in the one thread for people to read and review.

What has been happening is that we have been running a poll and a winner has been chosen from both the poll and the review comments. The winner then had the option to host the next challenge.

The hosting is not mandatory, if you were to win and didn't want to host you could merely pass it over to someone else of your choice, as Nicole's done in the past, or you could ask for a volonteer to host it.

With regards to what hosting entails: Thinking up and setting a challenge, providing guidelines and a deadline. The hoster has also been acting as a proof reader just because that way everyone has the same chance but again that's not necessary. If you wanted to host but not proof read you could suggest that each author sends their entries to someone they trust for proofing or with the challenge I set, I forwarded the entries onto I love music, who helped me proof them.

The only other job of the hoster is to put the completed entries in a thread and set a deadline for voting to end and then announce a winner at the end of the deadline.

that's what has been happening but we've been debating whether to continue running them like this or to not have a winner and just let people volonteer to host. That debate is still ongoing.

Jade - jackandmartha!!! has posted a challenge, a page or so back if you want to enter. I wouldn't worry about hosting at the moment because even if you were to win the challenge and we keep the current system you can still pass the hosting job over to someone else. It's all a bit up in the air at the moment but I hope some of that made sense.

If you want to enter the current challenge, PM your entries to jackandmartha!!!.

[-Jade-]

Ok so where we are standing right now is:

1) The current challenge will include voting.

2) The xmas challenge will not include voting, because it will just be good casual fun. Also, since furrylogic is hosting the xmas challenge, it is her choice as to whether there will be voting or not, and I'm sure she would say no voting.

3) We're still undecided on the format of the new challenges for 2007. As Skykat says, that debate could go on forever so are we all agreed that the poll will decide? Obviously, I have my opinions, as does everyone else, but wow isn't this hard to decide?

I do agree with everything sevenpudd's said above about a compromise with just the votes at the end of reviews...

I think we can be pretty certain that the majority will want no voting. So I guess I should ask:

Are we basing the new format on the poll or a compromise?

[SfanS]

Maybe we could do a system for each challenge?

Sure, that would be confusing, but depending on the topic, maybe some should have reviews and voting, some shouldn't, etc, depending on the topic...?

Just a weird idea...

[sevenpuddings]

I think we can be pretty certain that the majority will want no voting. So I guess I should ask:

Are we basing the new format on the poll or a compromise?

I think, because its like, forever until another challenge has begun, we can maybe wait it out a bit, and see what the general concensus is after the new year? I mean, I know everyone has their opinions, but surely we can all agree on something in the end.

Maybe we could do a system for each challenge?

Sure, that would be confusing, but depending on the topic, maybe some should have reviews and voting, some shouldn't, etc, depending on the topic...?

Just a weird idea...

That would be quite confusing, but it may also work. I mean, if the hoster wants to use the voting system, then who are we to say no? After all, it's their challenge, so they have the right to decide how it's run? The only suggestion I'd make concerning this one is no poll, simply reviews and votes, because that way we can ensure nothing happens that would put an unfair spin on the comp.

But again, it can all wait until after Xmas.

[kase]

Hope you don't mind me poking my nose in but I noticed there was a suggestion (in the Comments and Suggestions forum) for a Sub-Forum for the Fan Fiction challenges. If that were to end up going ahead, you could always have one big challenge which people vote on and just other smalls ones which are just for fun. Like the Christmas theme. I'm sure people could come up with other ones like Easter or New Years if you get my drift.

But then that could get really really complicated! It just seems like a messy idea at the moment, but with a whole Sub-Forum (if it goes ahead), there'll be lots of space. And also, if that were to go ahead then there may be too many challenges and it might take the fun out of having one set every couple of months. Just an idea anyway.

As for the voting deal...I'm just a happy reader and I love reading what people come up with. Whether or not there's a winner needing to pick isn't too big a deal. But I can see how it simplifies things as to who hosts next. Either way it'll work. What Jess said about seeing what people want in the new year sounds like a good idea because by then we would have had another voting challenge (the current one) and the Christmas non-voting one. So then both options have been tried and it could just be based on which one was the best one.

[emmasi]

These fics will be one-shots, won't they? So that will mean that once they're posted, they'll be complete. So... what if they were posted and pinned in the library? Just a suggestion. I really have no business being in here. It's all way over my head