# The Weekly Top Five Contest!



## Friday (Aug 10, 2013)

EDIT: The competition is now BI-MONTHLY and TOP ONE, until we gather more interest.

Hey guys! Since there was interest, I decided to go ahead and get the ball rolling on this. Basically, the idea is to create a bi-monthly showcase of some of the top furry fiction stories on FA. Why? Because the FA system isn't ideal for showcasing written works. I want to create a resource for people looking to read quality fiction containing anthropomorphic animals. This system benefits both potential readers AND the authors who can then use the visibility.

RULES:
-All submissions must contain anthropomorphic animals of some sort as part of the story. Stories that require furry content for the story to be told for maximum effect will be looked upon more favorably than stories that seem to have furry characters just to meet this requirement.
-All submissions cannot be longer than 10,000 words.
-Writers who have won cannot enter the competition again for one month. That is, if they win one week, they cannot enter again in the same calender month.
-All submissions must be stories submitted IN THOSE TWO WEEKS on FA (or another site, but FA is very much preferable). Submissions of stories posted months ago will not be accepted.
-You may submit a story written by someone else, since the point of the competition is to create a compilation of good furry fiction. If you do submit another writer's piece, please make that clear in your entry. Plagiarism or taking credit for someone else's work will be taken very poorly. Please also check with them that it is okay for you to submit it.
-Stories will be judged based on their artistic merit, prose, proper use of English, and effectiveness at telling a story and following the rules of 'good' fiction.
-Please submit a short, one or two sentence synopsis of your story with your entry.
-Mature content is allowed, but should be marked as such (NSFW). Be wary of adult content in your story though, as it automatically attracts a harsher standard than non-adult content. For example, a sex scene that serves no purpose for the story will be looked upon much more negatively than a PG-13 scene that serves no purpose for the story.
-Submissions can be private messaged here or via my FA page: (https://www.furaffinity.net/user/dandin/)

Questions can also be asked via the above address. For the next day or two, this thread will be open for discussions regarding the rules. After that, it will be closed to all except the judges, posting the top five.

Good luck everyone, and have fun reading and writing!


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## Aleu (Aug 10, 2013)

I would like to add that I'll be a judge in this.

I have to say that these rules are pretty fair. The only thing I have to add is at least mark NSFW for mature content so we at least know a bit of what we're getting in to.


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## Friday (Aug 11, 2013)

Great point, added.


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## M. LeRenard (Aug 11, 2013)

You should also add that, if someone wants to submit someone else's story, they need to get permission first from the author.  Sometimes someone may not wish to take part, for whatever reason, and that should be respected.


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## Conker (Aug 11, 2013)

Perhaps an odd question, but must stories be posted to FA? In case I wind up with an idea and want to take part in this, I don't have an FA account and have no plans of making one. I've a blog no one reads and a dA account though, so I'd wind up posting on one of those venues.


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## Friday (Aug 11, 2013)

To M. LeRenard: Fair enough.

To Conker: I don't really care, personally. On the one hand, the purpose of this is to showcase good furry fiction on FA. But then, it's also really to raise awareness that there is good furry fiction. Unless anyone has any objections I'm going to add that.


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## BRN (Aug 11, 2013)

I'd like to point out @Conker that making an FA account carries no obligations or responsibilities, and doesn't force you to join its community. Just my two cents.

My other two cents is that a weekly contest with a 10,000 word limit is expecting even more than NaNoWriMo if you want good writers to consistently re-enter, especially if they can't submit historical works!

I'm interested, however. If this gains momentum, you can probably count me in.


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## Nikolinni (Aug 11, 2013)

Now how about a larger series like Perri's Spectral Shadows? Out of 34 planned serials, so far they have only 3 that actually have any progress to them, with Serial 1 being completed, Serial 2 on indefinite hold, and serial 11 currently in progress (and currently up to and past 125 episodes).


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## Friday (Aug 11, 2013)

What exactly is your question? Are they able to be entered? If that's the question, I would say that the individual works will be considered as individual stories and not as parts of a larger component.

@SIX, I may start out with top one if we don't get enough entrants, and move to five if we get a lot of entries. That being said, if we can get people to write journals for this, that would be awesome. Getting some more publicity wouldn't be bad. I'm going to be messaging some people, myself.

EDIT: Additionally, as a possible draw, I'm willing to talk to people about their entries and give feedback. I won't offer it unless asked, but I'd be willing.


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## Nikolinni (Aug 11, 2013)

Friday said:


> What exactly is your question? Are they able to be entered? If that's the question, I would say that the individual works will be considered as individual stories and not as parts of a larger component.
> 
> @SIX, I may start out with top one if we don't get enough entrants, and move to five if we get a lot of entries. That being said, if we can get people to write journals for this, that would be awesome. Getting some more publicity wouldn't be bad. I'm going to be messaging some people, myself.
> 
> EDIT: Additionally, as a possible draw, I'm willing to talk to people about their entries and give feedback. I won't offer it unless asked, but I'd be willing.



Alright, that seems to work out, entering the stories as separate entries. What about completion? Can they be in progress, or almost completed?


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## Friday (Aug 11, 2013)

Nikolinni said:


> Alright, that seems to work out, entering the stories as separate entries. What about completion? Can they be in progress, or almost completed?



The stories submitted should be finished products. I'm not going to reject entries unless they were uploaded more than a week ago. It is up to the submitter to make sure their story is in a finished and presentable form. If it's not, it will not place.


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## Conker (Aug 11, 2013)

SIX said:


> I'd like to point out @Conker that making an FA account carries no obligations or responsibilities, and doesn't force you to join its community. Just my two cents.


Aye true enough. I suppose if the muse slaps me upside the head with his cock and I write something, taking a minute to make an account won't mean much.


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## M. LeRenard (Aug 11, 2013)

I'm going ahead and making this a sticky for now.  If it turns out to be popular, it shall remain as such.


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## Friday (Aug 12, 2013)

Alright. Competition is officially OPEN. Submit your entries to myself or Aleu, who will be judging as well. If we don't get enough entries, we'll only put out the top one. Additionally, feel free to contact me after the winners are announced if you want to hear feedback on why your story was or wasn't chosen.


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## Icky (Aug 12, 2013)

So...You want people to write a decent-length story to submit to you for the competition, and every week five people won't be eligible because they've been chosen the previous week. Even if you attracted the attention of the writer's groups on FA, that's expecting a lot of people to participate, and you've already said that writing isn't that popular here.

I'll see how this goes anyhow, maybe I'll throw a glove in the ring later.


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## Nikolinni (Aug 12, 2013)

I was going to throw the gauntlet with Perri's Spectral Shadows...but seeing as even if I were to split Serial 1 into a submission, Serial 2 into another, and see if I could break Serial 11 into multiple parts (that beast is HUGE)...nothing over a week old can be submitted (Which I didn't know how anyone didn't catch it; I have a friggin link to the serial in my signature, but also fault on me for not noticing this rule). 

I think you should allow people to submit stories older than a week old. I mean what if they had posted a new story like last week? Sucks, tough luck, drum up another one?


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## Aleu (Aug 12, 2013)

Pretty sure the reason for the week rule is to show active writers and it's kinda pointless to say "hey this is the story of this week" from something that was submitted a year ago or something.

By the way, you advertise her and that damn story nearly every chance you get now. Enough. Jesus shit. She doesn't need any more attention.


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## Nikolinni (Aug 12, 2013)

Aleu said:


> Pretty sure the reason for the week rule is to show active writers and it's kinda pointless to say "hey this is the story of this week" from something that was submitted a year ago or something.
> 
> By the way, you advertise her and that damn story nearly every chance you get now. Enough. Jesus shit. She doesn't need any more attention.



Well, as The Heavy would say, "You there! Cry some more!"

And no I don't. You don't see me forcing references or whatever into every little post I make. I mean if I make a 'Shadows reference, I make a 'Shadows reference. I mean I can easily do the same thing with song references too. Sure I talk about it a lot, but I'm just trying to support something that I like and think deserves more attention than it's getting.


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## Friday (Aug 12, 2013)

To address the two concerns:

Icky: That's why it may only be the top one. I know there are enough good writers on here to get a top five every week, the issue is reaching them. Until that point where we have a good amount of awareness, we may only have top one.

Nikolinni: Yes, the point is to get current writers working and posting. It's not a huge deal for it to be older goal-wise, but that makes a huge amount of material eligible and doesn't really encourage active participation in the competition. I feel like in the long run, that will be less healthy, as it would be throwing all the fuel on the fire at once and discouraging those who would participate continually. On a side note, you'd have to get permission from any author whose work you submit.

The rules are subject to change if these don't seem to work as well as intended; there's no need to be alarmed.

I'd appreciate if any further concerns were sent to me via PM, so we can leave the thread open for the actual content to be posted. Thanks


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## Nikolinni (Aug 12, 2013)

Yeah. I mean I don't mind that I can't submit SS into this (and I do have the author's permission), it's not the end of the world to me. But hey, I do got my own story I'm working on as well, so maybe if I get that going I can submit parts of it or something, I dunno. We'll see. 

Aleu would love it though, since it involves Spectral Shadows characters.


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## BRN (Aug 12, 2013)

A writer may want to showcase something they recently wrote when first joining this contest, that may not have been uploaded that same week.  Unable to use that piece, they're unlikely to roll up their sleeves and get to work on another piece just for it. Far more likely they'll say 'fuck it' and forget about the contest entirely. It makes little sense to be so tough when you're trying to gather attention;  'within this month' is so much more appropriate.


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## Nikolinni (Aug 12, 2013)

SIX said:


> A writer may want to showcase something they recently wrote when first joining this contest, that may not have been uploaded that same week.  Unable to use that piece, they're unlikely to roll up their sleeves and get to work on another piece just for it. Far more likely they'll say 'fuck it' and forget about the contest entirely. It makes little sense to be so tough when you're trying to gather attention;  'within this month' is so much more appropriate.



Well, that was an issue I brought up in my other post. That what if there was a piece that someone had literally missed by a day, perhaps two or three days? 

but hey, this is a new idea; a work in progress. Any idea thought up of seldom undergoes no changes when it's first thought of or presented to others.


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## Aleu (Aug 12, 2013)

Friday said:


> *I'd appreciate if any further concerns were sent to me via PM, so we can leave the thread open for the actual content to be posted. Thanks*


You know, for supposed fans/writers of literature, y'all have issues reading :V

Now, seriously, PMs 'k?


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## Friday (Aug 12, 2013)

Alright, for the first round only, anything submitted in the past month or so can be submitted.


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## kantuck-nadie (Aug 14, 2013)

I just got one story to stage 3 draft this morn. 

https://www.furaffinity.net/view/11352014/

Let me run though it, and my editor first before I officially submit it however. Thank you for the contest.


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## Friday (Aug 18, 2013)

We have our first-round winner! Aleu and I didn't feel like we have enough entrants to qualify a top-five result, so instead we decided to go with just the top one. We had some great entries, and we look forward to the next round. So without further ado, here's titancat's "A Conversation," a story about a young adventurer sets off in search of riches in an ancient tomb, but finds something he never expected: (http://www.furaffinity.net/view/10992586/). 

This story is SFW, and we will always label stories that are deemed inappropriate for workspace environments as such.

We look forward to the next round of entrants! The competition will become bi-monthly, until further notice. The next winner will be announced in about fourteen days, and all stories uploaded from about two days ago until the due date are eligible.


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## Remba Hatari (Aug 19, 2013)

quick question, doesn't bi-monthly mean every 2 months and bi-weekly is twice a month?


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## kantuck-nadie (Aug 19, 2013)

I tend to agree. Such terms can be rather difficult to fandom, hence I would say '2x a month, etc.'


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## Aleu (Aug 19, 2013)

Remba Hatari said:


> quick question, doesn't bi-monthly mean every 2 months and bi-weekly is twice a month?


No.
Bi-monthly is twice a month
Bi-weekly is twice a week
just as bi-annual is twice a year.


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## BRN (Aug 19, 2013)

Aleu said:


> No.
> Bi-monthly is twice a month
> Bi-weekly is twice a week
> just as bi-annual is twice a year.



Actually, all three of them mean both. Yeah.

It's, like, literally the worst thing about the english language.

(ED: I'm not joking. Type 'define biweekly' into google and you get "a periodical occuring twice a week, or once every two weeks". You get the same thing with "bimonthly", and with "biannual" you get redirected to "biennial" which has a whole Wikipedia page on why it means both.)


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## Aleu (Aug 19, 2013)

SIX said:


> Actually, all three of them mean both. Yeah.
> 
> It's, like, literally the worst thing about the english language.
> 
> (ED: I'm not joking. Type 'define biweekly' into google and you get "a periodical occuring twice a week, or once every two weeks". You get the same thing with "bimonthly", and with "biannual" you get redirected to "biennial" which has a whole Wikipedia page on why it means both.)


FUCK YOU ENGLISH.
GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER.


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## Friday (Aug 19, 2013)

They should really cleave those definitions. Wait. FUCK.

EDIT: It is twice a month, by the way.


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## BennyBunnycorn (Aug 19, 2013)

I can't see the story.


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## Friday (Aug 19, 2013)

Can't see the page, the text, or the document? Is the link working?


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## BennyBunnycorn (Aug 19, 2013)

I click on the link and it says "You are not allowed to view this image."


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## Nikolinni (Aug 19, 2013)

I think also we should be able to see what was submitted.


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## Titancat (Aug 19, 2013)

The link works for me (though it is my account), are you logged into a FA account? It has a mature content advisory (for language and violence as a warning), so I think only members can view it. Could that be the problem?


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## BennyBunnycorn (Aug 19, 2013)

Ah, I had General setting on. I'll see if it works with the maturity filter off.

Edit: Okay, now it works. Turned it back to General after reading.


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## Titancat (Aug 19, 2013)

Sorry for the extra inconvenience!


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## BennyBunnycorn (Aug 19, 2013)

Why are you appologizing? You did nothing wrong.


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## Titancat (Aug 19, 2013)

You obviously don't know me (but how could you?), but I apologize for just about everything. It's one of my major character flaws.


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## Friday (Sep 1, 2013)

Three more days to submit entries!


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## Silver Palth (Sep 5, 2013)

*Archive of our Own (AO3)*

All,

Have you guys considered using AO3 to host the results of the contest each week? AO3 was designed by active writers across a variety of fandoms for archiving and posting stories and other creative works. It's also just a generally awesome place as well, and I know several people who utilize it for posting their stories (including someone who has been writing SW/FFX fanfic for a long time).

Sadly, there is currently a waiting list to get invites to the Archive, but I may have one to give out for the 'archivist account' if there will just be one account posting the stories to each monthly collection.

http://archiveofourown.org/


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## Friday (Sep 7, 2013)

I would like to say that I have not forgotten about this contest; in fact, to the contrary, I'm painfully aware of it. We've only received one submission for this round, and as such, it's not really a contest. I'm going to give this another week; if we get even one more entry, I'll make a contest out of it, but if not, I'll just call this experiment a failure and move on.


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## Nikolinni (Sep 7, 2013)

Well, if that's the case, I'd like to submit an entry then, and yes, I do have permission of the author to do so. If at all possible, I'd like to submit this short story for consideration, called "The Art of Romance", by Perri Rhoades. 

It was originally intended as a short story to show me how to do a romance scene (hence the title), but hey, it's a decent story in its own right. It's also SFW, so um...yeah. There's ya go.


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## Schwimmwagen (Sep 7, 2013)

Greetings

I would like to enter a thing of mine

here

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eKMHBWTXEKVkF9uq1Ej3hHy_WIIVA9wkAYYqCV8bKsU/edit


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## Mr-Awesome1942 (Sep 9, 2013)

Hey, I just wanted to throw my 2 cents in here. I think this is a great idea. It gets peoples work out there and gives them an incentive to improve their writing skills. I have written a few times and just seeing views on a story is enough incentive to keep trying.

That being said, not a lot of people know about this. Hell, I have been around FA for years and I didn't even know there was a forum. Unfortunately, I do not know how to improve this.


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## Friday (Sep 10, 2013)

Getting people to post about in in their journals helps; I've posted about it in various places. Anyone who wants to post about it on their account, well, that would be welcome.


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## kantuck-nadie (Sep 14, 2013)

Just checking. Now that FA is fixed, and I've got two stories to post finally. Is this contest still in progress?


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## Friday (Sep 15, 2013)

Yes! I'll await your submission, then do the judging.


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## Friday (Sep 16, 2013)

Due to only one of the stories following the submission rules, I'm afraid we still have a no-contest situation.


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## Nikolinni (Sep 16, 2013)

Friday said:


> Due to only one of the stories following the submission rules, I'm afraid we still have a no-contest situation.



...wait how do you mean? Which story is the only one following the rules?

I was going over mine, and I think that the problems with it was it was lacking the description, but also more than 2 weeks old (recent actually) from the round's beginning. I was counting it as valid though since when you said the contest would be extended by a week I figured the submission deadline/limit/what have you was extended as well. 

I think that if someone submits a work and it's "Not valid" then they should have a judge or someone let them know either in-topic, or PM them about it so they're aware of it.


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## Friday (Sep 16, 2013)

Yours was the only one that was furry, actually. Hence the issues.


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## Nikolinni (Sep 16, 2013)

Friday said:


> Yours was the only one that was furry, actually. Hence the issues.



.....are you serious?


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## Friday (Sep 16, 2013)

Sadly yes.


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## Nikolinni (Sep 16, 2013)

Well, there it is folks. 

Proof no one reads the OP.


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## BennyBunnycorn (Sep 20, 2013)

Friday said:


> Yours was the only one that was furry, actually. Hence the issues.



Huh? Oh, weird. I thought I entered this.


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## Friday (Sep 21, 2013)

BennyBunnycorn said:


> Huh? Oh, weird. I thought I entered this.



Shit. I'm sorry, yes, you did. I got confused because I have three different places to coordinate entries from, not counting the ones Aleu gave me. I lost track. Which is another instance of 'no one reads the rules,' it seems.


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## M. LeRenard (Sep 21, 2013)

Closing thread on OP request.


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