How It Works: A Brief Explanation of the Proceedings for the Olympics [Archive]

Shaun

06-16-2010, 05:19 PM

Note: I have changed some things in this post and have introduced blind judging. Please read carefully. Thanks!

Some of the following information has been discussed, but I want to clarify some points and give a guide to how the Writing Olympics will work.

If you have any questions about the following, or believe I should add more information, please let me know.

Themes
There are two kinds of themes for the Writing Olympics. Public themes and hidden themes.

Public themes are those that are given for events that have days-long time limits. They will be released in a themes thread on the day that event begins and will remain available throughout the event. You'll have until the end of the last day of that event to finish writing and submit.

Here is a list of events that use public themes:
--Science Fiction Olympics (individual)(3-day time limit)
--Fantasy Olympics (individual)(3-day time limit)
--General Fiction Olympics (individual)(3-day time limit)
--Writing Relay Pentathlon (team)(1-week time limit)

Hidden themes are exactly like they sound: themes that are not made public. Some events will have themes that will not be made publicly available. Why? Because they are timed events with limits of an hour to four hours, and we do not have a set time for all those events to occur (because that would mean some people couldn't participate).

How do you get a hidden theme so you can start your story/poem? All of the judges will have a list of all of the themes for the events. All you have to do is send any judge (or all of the judges at once) a PM requesting the theme for the event in question. Once you get your theme, your time limit starts. Some of the events that use hidden themes are individual, and some are for groups.

The judges are:
Shaun
Isis
Rose
Clarissa
Optional Toaster
(others will be listed later)

Here is a list of events that use hidden themes that must be acquired from a judge:
--100 Meter Flash Fiction Challenge (individual)(1 hour time limit)
--1,000 Meter Flash Fiction Challenge (individual)(2 hour time limit)
--25 Line Poetry Challenge (individual)(1 hour time limit)
--Micro Fiction Speed Relay (group)(1 hour time limit)
--Flash Fiction Speed Relay (group)(2 hour time limit)
--Short Fiction Speed Relay (group)(4 hour time limit)

How Events Will Work
On the day of the event, you will either have to request a theme (as described above) or go to the thread for the event to find the public theme for that event. Once a theme is made available to you (either publicly or in private), your time limit begins (whether that be in hours or days).

Once you or your group have written your entry, you must submit it to the blind distributor of the event. This person will be announced in the thread specific to that event and will give your entries to the judges to make the judging blind. Some minor stipulations:
--If your event is a group event with specific number counts per person, then each section must be colored differently from the rest (let us know who is who) so we can verify that each member has written the exact amount of words.
--If your entry has arrived within the time limit, then you will be entered for the chance to win a medal.

Judges will then have 72 hours after the event has ended to decide who are the winners. The winners will be announced in this thread (not yet active) (where we are keeping all the statistics for the Writing Olympics).

Individual Events
All individual events are fairly straightforward. You are tasked to write a story, poem, group of poems, group of stories, or a mixture of all kinds of forms, and you must do it all on your lonesome. Please refer to the section on themes above for specifics.

Group Events
Group events can be a little tricky, but hopefully not too confusing. To make sure that every group member performs the same exact duty (in the same way that every member of a running relay has to run the same distance), many of the group events are designed with specific word limits or line limits per person. Below is an example of how this will work, using the Flash Fiction Relay:
Bill, Jill, and Freddy are on a team and they are participating in the Flash Fiction Relay. This event requires them to produce a flash fiction story of exactly 999 words, split equally among them, meaning that Bill, Jill, and Freddy must each write 333 words. No more and no less. Bill starts by writing 333 words, which miraculously ends a sentence. Jill, however, is not so lucky, and finds that she has reached her 333-word limit in the middle of a sentence. But Jill has to stop and hand over the reigns to Freddy. When Freddy gets the story, he realizes he has to finish Jill's sentence and mulls over it for a while. Finally, he manages to come up with a perfect ending to the sentence and starts adding his 333 words. The story luckily ends on an exclamation point without anyone going over or under their limit.

All of the group events work like this, but with different word or line counts. Refer to this list (http://www.youngwritersonline.net/showthread.php?t=6820) for descriptions of all of the events. Just remember: if you have reached your word limit, you have to stop, no matter what; if you're in the middle of a sentence, one word in, one word from the end, or halfway through a though or image, you still have to stop and hand over the reigns to the next person.

Some teams may have issues organizing their time schedules to be online at the same time. If you have this problem, please decide on an order in which each person will write ahead of time. Then, in that order, each person should request the theme, write their portion, send it to the next person with an update on the time left, and so on until the relay is finished. The last person on the team should post the final product as soon as possible. This might mean there will be delays for deciding who wins some of the relays, but it will also make sure that each of you can participate in these events. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask.

Who Will Win and What Do They Get?
As mentioned here (http://www.youngwritersonline.net/showthread.php?t=4361), all medal-winners will receive a real-life medal for the event they medaled in. These are real medals, though they are obviously not made of real gold, silver, or bronze (we're not that rich). Medals may or may not be engraved with your name (we're still deciding on that) and will be given to each member of a group for group events.

Second, there will be a grand prize for the group that performs the best in the Olympics. This will be based on how many medals your team received overall and the value of those medals, which also means that participating in every event increases your chances.

The grand prize is still being decided, but it likely will include free books. More details on the grand prize will be announced as we acquire them. We're working on acquiring sponsors.

And that's it!