Winter Writing Contest Discussion - Going Forward

Hello, all. I hope this year has treated you well.

So, it being November now, the Winter Writing Contest is a month away. The last couple years, we have had our all-time lows in terms of participation. 9 in 2015, 5 in 2016, and 4 in 2017. I suppose this comes to no surprise. FAKKU has undergone an evolution in the last few years, and the community in turn. Although our section has traditionally had low-activity, this decline has led us to this point in which only the most dedicated among us are left. To continue to have as many prizes as participants seems disingenuous to call this a contest anymore.

So, things will need to change. I've been thinking about how best to go about this. I've thought about ending them. I've thought maybe there should be no contest and only a writing event. Maybe there should only be participation prizes? I've thought maybe there should be only one judge so that there can be more participants, but that will make the judging process lose its balance and fairness. However, I think losing the judging process is inevitable. Perhaps there should be no judges and just the voting? I can continue to create the contest threads and we can vote on themes for the contest in this thread maybe? That will allow those who judge to participate freely.

I'd love to help continue this tradition of ours if we are able to, but I must acknowledge the reality of this situation. I'm unsure what to settle on, so I thought it'd be best to ask everyone their thoughts on this matter. What do you think we should do continuing into the future?

-X

I as well don't want to see it go... I'll certainly try to make a not sucky story for the bomb ass contest.

As for a possible theme? I'm not sure... but voting might be a good thing for deciding winners and the sort... assuming people vote... I miss the old days...

How about that?! Possible theme... the past! (Ohoho... leave those gelnanas on the shelf!)

Just take a theme and do a writing event with a poll for the best of the winter entries or something. Don't think we need a judge to say Yanker wrote another great piece.

Prizes feel moot for the cause, as they were meant to incentivize people into joining these contests. At least that's how I saw it.

I don't know about leaving it up to just a poll. No offense to anyone, but I don't think we all vote for the one we think is actually the best written. It feels dumb though to have a contest that has almost as many judges as there are entries. I guess we could still have a poll but just not take it too seriously. In the end for me at least, what I've looked forward to most in the years that I participated as a writer has been the fun in writing a short story that's relatively stress-free, and getting feedback on it.



That's a good point. If the only people who participate would have participated regardless of a prize, then having one becomes pointless in that regard.

I feel like the people who were already going to participate would have participated regardless of whether or not prizes were available.
I think the contest should go ahead, but whether or not there are prizes is entirely up to you. Entering the contest was always more for the friendly competition and chance to be a part of a community rather than any monetary gain.

I probably won't enter this year. To be honest, I really don't like writing short stories anymore, probably because I can't pump them out as easily as I could before, and there's an innate pressure to better whatever I wrote last time. That, and I've also lost a shittonne of time since I started working fulltime.

I will still be around reading (and maybe commenting) though. I still hold hopes that the forum will make a revival.

The writing events are excuses for me to write. It is reasonable to introduce prizes for just showing up and write if only because there are so few people participating!

You can try advertising these events on the Discord Servers. There should be a few Discord servers and online communities dedicated to writing too, that is if they don't mind logging into a website devoted to drawn smut.

IF you want to stop that tradition, it is fine by me. But I hope you won't mind if I decide to come up with a writing event just for the fun of it. I have a few ideas in my head that needs to be written out by the way so if you want to host an event now, chances are I would participate.

I believe it's probably better to do away with the contest nature of the event. I personally believe that the community is basically gone now, but if you did want to to continue it, I think removing the prizes would be a way to go. Low turnout rates and defaulted prizing feels pretty silly to me.

These past few times, the event was more about having a catalyst to write something for me; so like Rise said, just throwing out a theme and allowing everyone to participate would be one way to do it.

Hi folks,

Thought I'd just throw an idea out there. I know there's a handful of already established writers out there, and I imagine that this competition may be tailored towards people that write for more than just an offhand whim. So perhaps maybe as a prize the winning piece could get some more than just a kudos - maybe an official stamp of notoriety to be used in a writing portfolio. I know I myself would highly value using a winning piece of writing that had the backing of some writers that I could reference.

Just throwing the idea out there to think on!

I am trying my best to contribute, hence why I wrote two new chapters finally continuing the maid story, but honestly, my time and motivation is at a very low point these days. I am months away from becoming a full time Art and History teacher at a High School, so time has been scarce. In addition, I am so busy that I am often mentally exhausted and unmotivated. Strangely enough, I knew being a teacher is one of the most difficult jobs, but I didn't expect it to be THIS difficult.

I believe the contest should continue as tradition, but a contest empty contestants can feel a tad somber. As for prizes, I don't think they matter. The few times I did participate, it was to try and get more people to read and review my works. The prize would have just been an added bonus.

It's incredibly heartening to see that you've kept the flame burning as long as this. I channelled an undue amount of energy into the two contests that I ran, and took them entirely too seriously. I couldn't write fiction for shit, and yet I felt empowered to judge others based on my own aspirations as a writer and a critic. The attention and the buzz around the place was nice; the amount of politicking I engaged in to push it on the front page (and my pissy PMs and supercilious critiques) less so.

I really enjoyed reading and judging everyone's work, don't get me wrong. But if I'm being honest, the contest was more of an excuse for me to wrangle a bit of authority, have some fun, and helm something in which I felt (wrongly) that I had expertise. You've evidently turned it into something much purer, and that is to be cherished. A Christmas event (maybe with a specific brief) is a good solution, but I'd be happy as long as it still encourages a few people to create something awesome, and put that out into the world.

That said, if you are serious about taking it forwards, talk to Jacob. People love free stuff, and I'm sure the site still gets good traffic, so it surprises me that the prizes last year didn't hook people. Given Fakku's current, paid model, there obviously needs to be a way to entice people onto the forums. Did the Writing Contest get a front page post last year?

Maybe the front page needs a redesign, to give equal priority to the content and the community. It's possible that it's a lost cause at this point, and there may not be the impetus to change it. But it's worth a shot. I've lost my youthful vigour for this kind of stuff - I'll leave it to you guys to light the way.

I'm unsure whether it was a sense of fondness, duty, or stubbornness that kept me bringing it back year after year. I certainly didn't want it to go away, I had too much fun my first time! That being said, I am very appreciative for you and the others who contributed to creating it. It caused me to start posting on the forums after years of lurking. Because of that, I had met some very fine friends through participating in these events and even had some friendly rivalries as well. I know many others across the years felt the same. For your initiative, I will be eternally grateful for setting fire to this torch. I merely worked toward carrying it forward and keeping it lit.

In regards to your honest confession, I'm sure we all have had moments where pride inspired us to do something passionate, even if it might have been as a vice. But what was created was clearly more than a sandbox where you could be king. Maybe it's because I am an exceptionally positive person or because my moral code demands it of me, but I choose to look back on those memories with warmth and, if it's any consolation, you helped form the foundation of those good times. I recall that you wrote something similar to me in the veteran thread that happened a half decade ago (and now we're even bigger veterans!) and I think back to that with happiness. I don't know where your self-deprecation comes from, but I choose to view it as a necessary humility. Likewise, as far as your expertise is concerned, I don't know about your attempts at personal writing, but I can tell just from the way you write on this forum that you have a tremendous ability. Maybe someday I will have the distinct pleasure to enjoy something you've written (consider this an invitation for this year's event!)

To digress back to the contest, I will get into contact with Jacob and the community organizers about prizes. I have helped to fund this event out of my own pocket in the past, but thanks to FAKKU's business model now, it has been very easy to secure convenient prizes for winners in recent times, in additional thanks to some special employees who have been supportive. I'll get in touch with them as well. To answer your question, the writing contests haven't gotten front page posts in a number of years but it did happen a handful of times. There was a shift away from news being posted to the front page if it wasn't hentai-related. Possibly because it might have been a burdensome bombardment of the web traffic visitor's attention and taken up web real-estate. I don't expect this to change with how FAKKU has prioritized selling its service. But people have been asking for more community involvement from the Discord server, so perhaps something might come of that but I won't expect it. I've advertised the contest in various Discord servers and literary groups in the past, although it hasn't attracted much participation. I will continue to do so, however.

Anyway, thank you for coming in here to share your thoughts and wisdom with us, doswillrule. It is much appreciated and I hope you never shy away from doing so again in the future. Your words help to ground us and provide insight from a true veteran to this forum.

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For the rest of us, thank you all for your genuine thoughts and insight. The help and guidance is comforting in figuring out the direction we want to go together. We will move forward with the contest this year, but there will be no judging portion. This means that the three people (usually myself and two others, mostly Cinia) will have the ability to participate. There will be a poll for fun and camaraderie, but I don't think the winner will win anything special to downplay the significance of it. If there are prizes, I will push for something participatory. It will depend on how many entries we get at the end of it. I will check with Jacob and other FAKKU staff for ideas and we shall see what comes of that. The last thing that needs to be decided on is the contest theme. Usually I ask the other judges for suggestions but this year I think if this is going to be a community event then we can toss out ideas together. Waterflame already suggested "the past" (although maybe that was in jest but we can run with it). Maybe we can go with one, several, or all of them. Feel free to do so here. In a week, I'll post the thread like usual with those themes and we can enjoy our nice yearly event together once more!

-X

How about chance? Recently, I keep making jokes that the only God I worship is Icosahedrax, the God of Chance.

Why don't we get something like six types of scenarios, character archetypes, and themes, and let chance dictate what one writes. Someone might get something out of their comfort zone and that seems like loads of stressful fun for example. It'd be interesting to see someone make something out of a pacifist with a gun whose barrel is pointed at someone's head contemplating on the idea of revenge. Of course, that's providing those are the stipulations the writer receives.

In reality, as fun as this sounds, I don't think people are as fond of random chance as me. Not only that, but there would need to be a decision on variables to use as well as a decider who bestows the results of those variables to a contest participator.

While that would make for a great exercise, I think it would limit the ability I like to give participants to write more freely. I tend to prefer more open-ended themes so that people have the option to write on many topics that might inspire them. We could definitely make it a theme to work with, though. I like the sound of having Fate or Chance as themes.

I didn't expect it to get any traction, but I thought I'd throw some ideas out. Icosahedrax is a fair God, haha. Whatever we do, I'll try to participate. After all, I kind of feel obligated after publishing new Maid chapters in like what? Three years? My writing was never anything stellar, but I'm still willing to give it a shot after such a long period.

Can't think of any possible themes.