Schedule and details

[Ocicat]

We received 121 submissions.  An excellent number, as well as a palindrome.  These stories have been put into 10 groups, each with 12 stories.  Mostly.  One unlucky group has 13.  You may vote for up to 3 stories in each group.  You are allowed to vote for your own stories, but not allowed to reveal which stories are yours.  Author names will be revealed as soon as a story is knocked out of the competition.  Voting in each group will be live for one week.  A new group will be posted every three days.  Hopefully this will give less voter fatigue than the every-other-day schedule in the previous contests.

If after voting ends a group has a tie for third place, a tiebreaker poll will be posted.  Tiebreakers will last only 3 days.  Ties in tiebreakers will be decided by Talia and I (hey, it's the only time we get to vote!)

After voting in all groups is completed, the semi-finals will begin.  The 30 stories will be divided into 3 groups of 10.  Each semi-final will contain at least 3 stories that won their initial group.  Once again, voting will last 7 days, and a new group placed up every 3.  Tiebreaker polls will again be used as needed.

The finals will be 9 stories, with three winners going on to be produced by Podcastle.  Voting will last a week, and hopefully no tiebreaker will be needed.


I make no promises on holding to an exact schedule, but here's the general idea:

Group 1: Sept 5-12
Group 2: Sept 8-15
Group 3: Sept 11-18
Group 4: Sept 14-21
Group 5: Sept 17-24
Group 6: Sept 20-27
Group 7: Sept 23-30
Group 8: Sept 26-Oct 3
Group 9: Sept 29-Oct 6
Group 10: Oct 2-9

For the Semis, we'll have a new group posted every 2 days.
Semi-final A: Oct 10-18
Semi-final B: Oct 12-20
Semi-final C: Oct 14-22

Final: Oct 23-Nov 1 (or Oct 26-Nov 4 if semi-final tiebreaker is needed)


Whew!  That seems like a long time from now, but there's a lot of stories to vote on.  And I'm sure the winners are going to be fantastic, and some well beloved stories aren't going to make the cut.  Of course, the editors reserve the right to purchase any stories they like regardless of how far they get in the voting, as well as purchasing the top 3 finalists.

[Wilson Fowlie]

Just out of curiosity, why not go with 11 groups of 11? 121 isn't just excellent, isn't just a palindrome, it's a perfect square, too.

As I say, just curious.

[Ocicat]

It didn't escape my notice that we could do 11 groups of 11.  But I didn't go with that for two reasons:

1) It would make the contest take at least slightly longer
2) There would be 33 entries in the semifinals, and I wanted those groups to be smaller.

[Wilson Fowlie]

Fair enough. Thanks for the answer.

[Umbrageofsnow]

But...

Perfect square!

Nah, it makes perfect sense the way you're doing it.

[Ocicat]

I updated the schedule posted above for the Semi-finals.

This presumes that group 10 doesn't result in a tie for third place, but it doesn't look like it will.

[flintknapper]

Thanks for the heads up Ocicat. I am just realizing the semifinals start tomorrow... At least I think I remember most of them so I probably will not have to reread them. I also got a couple favorites to root for, but I don't know I will probably end up going back through all the comments which will actually take longer than just rereading the story again.

Bring on the contest!!!

[Varda]

Yeah, well done Ocicat! Enjoy the night off. :-)

Looking forward to semi-finals. I have no idea how I'm going to choose between my favorites. O_o

[Ocicat]

Final is up ahead of schedule - we'll be all done before Halloween!

[Varda]

And more importantly, done before NaNoWriMo.

[heyes]

So I have a question. If the editors reserve the right to purchase any story, even non-winners, how does that impact my rights to sell or share this piece elsewhere? I didn't win, so it's less clear to me and I don't want to screw up some rule/way things are by being noobtastic.

[DKT]

Hi Heyes We'll be announcing which other stories we want to buy hopefully by the end of the week, so if you don't mind waiting, that's cool. That said, at this point, the rights of the stories that did not win are the authors'. So you can try to sell the piece elsewhere. That said, I'd encourage everyone to sit tight until an announcement is made on the additional stories. (Not a mandate or anything, just my suggestion!)

Does that help?

[Unblinking]

Hi Heyes We'll be announcing which other stories we want to buy hopefully by the end of the week, so if you don't mind waiting, that's cool. That said, at this point, the rights of the stories that did not win are the authors'. So you can try to sell the piece elsewhere. That said, I'd encourage everyone to sit tight until an announcement is made on the additional stories. (Not a mandate or anything, just my suggestion!)

Does that help?

I would sit tight, myself, but that's largely because I'd like to get a story into Podcastle after 4 years of trying and complete the trifecta.    As Dave said, by the rules and by the ethics you can submit it somewhere else at this point, and from my point of view, if Podcastle were to make an offer I'd consider an after-the-fact not-officially-part-of-the-contest just as if an editor solicited you for work out of the blue.  That being said, since Dave has specifically said they'll be buying some non-winning stories, and has given a deadline, all one would lose by waiting for that deadline would be just a few days of submitting time. 

[heyes]

Hi Heyes We'll be announcing which other stories we want to buy hopefully by the end of the week, so if you don't mind waiting, that's cool. That said, at this point, the rights of the stories that did not win are the authors'. So you can try to sell the piece elsewhere. That said, I'd encourage everyone to sit tight until an announcement is made on the additional stories. (Not a mandate or anything, just my suggestion!)

Does that help?

Yep it sure does!  Thanks!!

[Fenrix]

It's also worth noting since these were on a members-only portion of the forums, they do not count as published, so first-publication rights are still intact.

[Unblinking]

It's also worth noting since these were on a members-only portion of the forums, they do not count as published, so first-publication rights are still intact.

Indeed!  And, woot!  I wouldn't participate in the contests if this weren't the case.  There are other writing contests at other publications that post them publicly, so always check the rules in detail, if you want to get the most out of your story.

[DKT]

Just a heads-up, in that we're not completely there yet. I hope to have our decisions out sometime this weekend, and will let everyone here know what they are as soon as possible.

Thanks for your patience!

[MokalusOfBorg]

I've fallen a little behind on my listening. Have we seen all the winners published yet?

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'm guessing it's hard to fit them in with the quarterly themes.
PPS - And how do the new editors feel about Dave's picks?

[Fenrix]

I've fallen a little behind on my listening. Have we seen all the winners published yet?

Episode here: http://forum.escapeartists.net/index.php?topic=7701.0

If you wish really hard, you just might see Round 4 start up late this year.

[Devoted135]

*wish wish wish wish*

[will write for beer]

I've fallen a little behind on my listening. Have we seen all the winners published yet?

Episode here: http://forum.escapeartists.net/index.php?topic=7701.0

If you wish really hard, you just might see Round 4 start up late this year.

fingers crossed! (although that makes it a bit harder to type.)

[Fenrix]

*wish wish wish wish*

fingers crossed! (although that makes it a bit harder to type.)