So yeah, I'm pretty sure that unless a miracle happens I'm not going to finish my entry anywhere near in time. I'll probably still try to get it written at some point, but there's really no way it's happening by the end of January.

 

Mine didn't happen this month, unfortunately. (A new management job has eaten my free time, unfortunately.) I'll see if I can publish a one-shot out of an aligned concept by the month's end...

Good luck to those still in this!

 

A move to Hawaii, along with a time-consuming new job, have killed any hopes I had of getting a long gestating story off the ground. It's the topic I suggested, and I can't even participate. Ah well. Maybe next month work will calm down.

 

Wow. I'd almost call this hilarious, but it really is more sad than anything else. And now I feel bad for dropping out, but if no one else is approaching completion... a week left roughly, yeah?

Shit. I might yet see if I can make something of what I have and submit on the last day.

EDIT: Nope, not gonna happen. Ah well.

 

I think I will still be able to enter, but my entry will be around 20k-ish so not the longests troy out there, and I'm not in the same league as Taure or other so...

 

From the first page of this thread it's supposed to be less than 50k words anyway. Mine will be around 20k as well, though I may expand it if people like it.

 

Ok, we've now started to receive entries. Fair play to those who are bowing out, hope to see you compete in the future.

Just a reminder to those wanting to put in an entry, send it to DLPWritingContest@gmail.com. We'll be accepting every entry put in up until I get up on the morning of the 1st of February, as that will give those of you in the US and similar regions until midnight or just after in your time zone to get your entries in.

We've now got our graphic prizes for first and second place, courtesy of Hero of Stupidity. Many thanks to him for that.

Regarding length, don't worry about it being 20k. Judges will not be marking on length, but on all the factors outlined previously. The only thing about length that matters is that the entries not be longer than 50k.

Kmfrank, sorry for the confusion mate but the only topics that have been set are this rounds and the next. We'll be doing another poll for topics for the next couple of rounds in march at some point. So whilst it could end up being Professor Potter, there is no certainty of it. The full list that Dwitty posted was just to show where things placed in the poll for those that were interested. It wouldn't really be fair to announce the topics so far in advance, as it lets folk (as you're doing now) spend ages preparing and polishing their entries.

 

Phew, submitted just under the wire. I hope, anyway...the email hasn't bounced back yet, at least. I'm looking forward to reading everyone's entries.

 

Annnd I was meant to post this yesterday.

We've had a few people say they couldn't finish by the deadline, enough so that we decided to extend the deadline.

If you've yet to finish you've got another week. After which we may be willing to extend again by another week.

New Deadline: Friday February 8th 2013.

 

I hopefully can make that. I'm roughly 75 percent done, but I've had a huge project at work the last two weeks that's taken up roughly all of my life.

 

@melior: We got the email, no worries. If you're wanting to edit it more in the new time set feel free to do so (that's not me saying it needs it, just giving a suggestion).

@everyone who was going to submit: We're discussing adding a full month to the deadline as so many folks haven't been able to submit - January seems a bad time for writing, evidently - and will have a decision for you all soon. and we have a go ahead.

New Deadline: Thursday February 28th 2013

 

It's a contest, no? A marathon's finish line isn't pushed back because not enough people made it.

Enforce yo shit, dawg. Otherwise we'll end up with a bunch of people just writing fics.

 

Go away.

/10 chars

 

Just some friendly advice man, but ok. Good impression gained, at least, of how it will be run.

/Lizard out.

 

This is pretty much what happened with the last series of contests. It's tough to meet deadlines with long stories. Just is - people have life to deal with, and most people on DLP have a hard enough time updating their main fics with any regularity (myself included).

I, for one, think this type of thing would work a lot better if it was based more on Flash fiction - i.e. have a contest every week, or every 2 weeks, and have a wordcount limit of say 3-5k. Not only would people be able to meet the deadlines, but they'd be more willing to devote the day or two it would take to churn out a nice one-shot or flash fiction piece. And you could have contests more frequently and get some cool little stories out of it.

Anyway, just my two cents. Obviously, it means nothing right now.

 

I don't much care for one-shots, either to read or write. I'd take a flawed contest of novellas over perfect one-shot contests

 

The overall point of contests isn't to crown champions, but rather to add more quality stories to the fandom. Despite some hiccups, the last contest accomplished that admirably. If the organizers believe that by extending the deadline by a week or so we'll see more completed stories worth reading, I think it's a sound decision on their part.

 

I think that regardless of what happens with round 1, two months is a bit long. One month provides a much closer deadline while still allowing a decent amount of writing done - many entries in previous contests were 10-15k in length and a few have turned into ongoing stories, which is basically what we're aiming for.

 

This right here.

Not that I lack ideas for stories to write - as everyone who's read my shit can attest to, its that I lack the ability to finish stories or dedicate time to writing, these days - but the list of contest ideas gave me an idea for a new one, and if it inspired other people to do the same, then regardless of whoever gets the gold star, it was a great idea to host.

I honestly couldn't care less about a banner But inspiration/someone to slap my wrist to write more is probably good.

 

By the way, whatever happened to those blurbs we were supposed to send in?