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*mocks childish high-pitched voice* In your AN please put 'I like bananas and sticker-doodles' or explain some sort of poetry, or your favorite movie, or your nickname -
I hate this with a passion. What is the deal? If someone doesn't read the rules, they don't follow them, well you can DQ them. I think it's unprofessional and degrading. What about you? -
I agree. And I disagree.
Yes, it's annoying but unprofessional...this entire site is unprofessional.
I think some people must use the computer standing up because they surely can not sit with such a large stick shoved up their ...
Copy and Paste something into your AN's, oh the horror! Tedious? yes. Idiotic? Absolutely. Reason to not enter a contest? No, not really.
It annoys me when people enter these contest and then comment on the contest itself with things like 'I'm not editing my story so here -I like bananas and sticker-doodles- for my story gogo-dodo'. It's also easy to check the AN's to see if they can follow one simple instruction, if they can't then there's really no reason to read the story.
It annoys me even more when they put these rules in contests but don't care if people follow them or not.
Honestly it's a writing site, full of people claiming to be creative. They will get creative with their stories, threads, groups and yes even contests. Try not to lose any sleep over it.
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I wouldn't call this 'creativity'. I have a different dictionary, maybe? *raises eyebrows*
More often than not, people DON'T follow their own rules. That's another annoying point. I simply think it's rather egotistical, like you're putting self-importance on yourself and taking advantage of other people's hard work, just because you're a judge?
Just a thought ....
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The only problem that i have with the contests is when i do enter and the contest is over the host doesn't bother to get back to you. Sometimes, you can see if you've won at least honorable mention or nothing at all which is fine but, when the contest has passed it final day and time goes by and....nothing happens.
Then you IM the host and he claims that he didn't have time and will get to it sometime that week or something. Why host a contest you're not going to be present at? You might as well not bother at all.
(this isn't really related but, it is a bit annoying). -
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You mean like not judging on time, right? If so, that can be equally if not more so, annoying!
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So, that happened to me once. I wrote this awesome new story for a contest about comical vampire stories, and the guy took so long that I even tried contacting him a couple times.
Finally it got to the point where a mod had to judge it. This was weeks later, maybe a month or two.
But, hey, I won gold. I'm not complaining.
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Exactly. And what about KISS? Keep It Simple Stupid. Alot of contests have prompts with prompts and you have to jump off the site and then get back in---jeez, not for anything but, I don't enter the contest to jump hurdles--this is not the olympics, man.
contests should be simple and the rules concise. Simple enough to allow even the most unsavvy computer person like me can enter but, interesting enough so that I could actually use my brain--so many new contests are about people wanting to find new names or names for their characters...and what about help me edit my novel? What is all that?
A contest should be about writing something...a story or poem or even something about politics or the fate of the world but, not about silly stuff.
I don't want to help someone edit their novels and if I do sign a petition for a good cause I want my points promised, or a gold star.
This forum has become a chaotic place with people writing their character's bios and calling t it a story.
It's like high school all over again and I thought I had left that behind...I guess, I will enter the contests again when I find one that's centered on writing and the host is willing to stay in the game, so to speak. Otherwise, there's no point to them at all. -
I don't care for the "put X in your A/N" rules, but if I have a story for the contest, I'll do it. Except user names. Because that's against site policy to ask for it. And then they can't read it anyway because it's been altered to "Anonymized". Silly contest makers.
I also shake my head at the contests made for topics that aren't about writing things. Sometimes I actually enter them, but I would rather they weren't made in the first place. Those sound like topics better made for IMing your friends about. -
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That is why they ask people to space the name out so it will not be a n o n y m i z e d.
Is it actually a violation of site policy to ask people to do that? It doesnt seem like it would be since gold and silver members can turn off the anonymous contest feature at will. It is usually only free members who utilize name in AN thing. Seems a little unfair to only limit them as long as they are clear about what they are doing in the contest write up. -
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Only gold members can check the box to allow contests to be not-anonymous, actually. The contests always say "User info hidden for fair judgement" otherwise, when the contest owner looks where an entrant's name would be on their entry. If they hide it for fair judgement, why are people trying to get around that? Either it's ignorance of the purpose of anonymity, or it's on purpose.
I guess I just like to hang out with people who actually read, know, and follow the rules of the site they're on at the time. Call me an elitist pig, I guess.
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Still I cannot find where it is a violation of site policy in the actual site policy. Undesirable in most circumstance perhaps, but not an official breaking of the rules. In reality, it is no safer to have a gold member turn off the anonymous contest feature than it is for a free member to get around it. People are either going to judge fairly or they are not regardless of whether they pay for their account or not.
I generally prefer to judge things anonymously unless there is some specific qualification that the contestant needs to meet like being a member of a specific group, or something. Fortunately I am a gold member so I have the option.
No, you cannot be an elitist pig--that is reserved for those folks who repeatedly specify "don't suck" in the midst of a contest write up littered with typos, chat speak and incomplete sentences
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You're right; it's not listed with the other rules; it's on the pages of your contest entries. The fact that each contest mentions anonymity "for fair judgment" and the fact that the site recently made all entrant-names "Anonymized" tells me that the site doesn't approve of getting around the rules by asking for the name.
Me, I just don't enter those contests, and sometimes I tell them why.
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I generally don't enter them either, but I don't tell them why. First off they probably don't care and my time is better spent writing for a contest that I would enter.
It still leaves me wondering why we trust gold members to be fair though. Anyone living in the real world knows that money rarely buys honesty.
I like the option to run anonymous contests personally. I wish that there was a function that would keep you anonymized when you applaud a comment before the contest is judged. Since I 5 star all comments on my stuff as a show of appreciation, it really stinks to get DQ'd if you accidently rate a judges comment. And if you wait until the contest is over it is often too late for the comment to be rated.
Ooo there is one for the suggestions board. -
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Lol, good points again. Maybe the gold members get it as a reward for buying/commenting their way to the top. Corruption is like cream, I guess.
I think you can still go to the story and click on the stars beneath the judge's pic on his/her comment, even if the comment itself fell off the back end of the notes list. But yeah, who has that sort of memory? The anonymizing during replies would be excellent. If the reply is made directly to the judge's comment, it seems it would be easier somehow. *clueless about coding, though* -
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I'm a gold site member, and I rarely ever have my contests anonymized. To me, that's assuming that I wouldn't judge fairly. People who are going to cheat will find a way around the anonymous feature, and cheat anyway.
Moderators can make someone's contest non-anonymous, but we have to have a reason to do it... not just a request. If it's a round-robin contest, invite only, or some other thing that might need names shown... and even then, it will be on a contest by contest basis... since it defeats the purpose of someone maybe buying a gold membership to get that perk.
History of the anonymous... few years back, there was a big issue with people giving trophies away to friends, and cheating with each other to swap points and trophies. Groups were created with 'honest' contest holders, and they were promoted. This caused other site members to be ticked off, since the automatic assumption would be that if one wasn't in this group, then their contest wasn't fair. So, to ease tension, all contests were made anonymous, but one could change that with a gold membership. (a perk, much like the ability to post unlimited stories/poems a day, or create groups).
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I find that really, really annoying, actually. Because I don't particularly enjoy changing my A/N repeatedly. Most of the time I'll just post it in the contest comments to weasel out of it.
Also: have you ever gotten the feeling the person judging the contest might not have read your story, because maybe they thought it was too long or boring?
Perhaps they skimmed it, but left a comment lacking feedback, merely "Thanks for entering", whereas other entries get more attention?
How curious. -
I made people to the hokey-pokey once for a contest requirment... I took their word for it that they actually 'put their left hand in' ....
There's no rule agaisnt it, but it is annoying to see a grocery list of 'if you read the rules' in the AN... right above that long list of other contests the story is also in.
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Has anyone else noticed that most contests are exclusively against gay or lesbian entries? Why?
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Not that I've seen. In fact, most I've seen request them. If they don't, then it's probably not what the contest host wants to read... after all, you're entering their contest, so they get to pick the topic.
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Actually, I have noticed that. Not most, I wouldn't say, but quite a few that I see. Well, maybe it is most.
You know, I'm not sure why. -
I haven't seen that most are against. I see several for, several against, and several that say they're allowed but not preferred. That still leaves a whole bunch that don't say one way or the other.
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I suppose you guys are right. For the most part, I've probably just clicked the contests that didn't allow--it just happened to look that way from what I've seen. Ah, well.
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Just a hunch, but contests that allow it might be more romance-geared in nature.
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good point. for any other genre, the character(s) sexual orientation seems irrelevant, kinda like their zodiac sign.
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In contests where the owner says that GLBT, erotica, etc is allowed, those contests seem to fill rapidly with those stories, to the near-exclusion of any other allowed genre. It's as if when an owner says "allowed", it's taken to mean "preferred". Do you think that's actually the case, or are writers of these stories just more on the ball?
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A lot of people who don't specify are for it, while if they're against it... they'll say so. Because of this, it seems like a lot of people are against it.
A while ago, I came across a contest that actually said "No gays or lesbians allowed," so I left the page and didn't enter I felt it discriminatory, even though it was probably just a wrongly phrased rule. Still, if you're going to say you don't want something, target the stories, not the authors.
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You know what confuses me? I can never tell if they mean no homosexual 'pornography' or no homosexual 'characters' in general.
Because they'll be like, 'No guy on guy'. Well, does it count if I have a guy character who likes guys, but doesn't actually do anything sexual throughout the story?
It's annoying because they never specify. -
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I would like to think it means it's cool if the guy is gay as long as there isn't gratuitous sex and stuff in the story.
Just because someone doesn't want something in their contests doesn't mean they're against it. I don't really want any kind of erotica in stories I read, nothing against it, I just don't care for it (plus I think it's written pretty poorly).
Unless what you're asking for in a contest entry can somehow incorporate some man on man love, why even bother saying you don't want it?
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Maybe we need to start coming up with different ways to say stuff then. How about: "No sex or romance of any kind. I get too much of it at home."
I'll agree with Jack on the poorly-written erotica. But then, plot points aren't really what readers are looking for, are they?
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I hate it but mostly because I don't understand it. What really gets me is when someone makes a demand like that for their contest but then they take pre-writes. Sure I could edit it and put it in there but its a hoop I'd have to jump and I have no idea why it needs to be there.
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Totally agree. It annoys me to no end, in particular when I want to submit prewrites. Granted, I also think prewrites being entered into contests is pure laziness (I know it is for me) but that's a whole different issue...
If they're asking you a genuine question or something related to the contest then sure I don't mind adding something to the AN but putting something totally silly and random is absurd in my opinion. I prefer to use that space for more relevant things.
Also, how can you be taken seriously if you've got something like that in your AN? -
I don't A/N Anything for a contest. It's not worth my time or bother and only enter contests that the host is serious about actually hosting, and isn't a slacker.
As for money, corrupting/promoting dishonesty?
I only have one thing to say as a Gold member: yea capitalism!
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Asfand
Jul 7 7:47 AM
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