New award idea

I'm dubious, simply because it would be comparing apples and oranges. I think it'd be hard to compare critiques on different pieces. A brilliant piece of writing may need very little critique whereas a lesser piece might attract a long, in-depth piece that gives a lot of improvement to the work. Also, some critiques built up piece by piece rather than coming in one post.

 

The difficulty with this would be in the parameters. How far back is allowed? First draft, or many drafts later? Each section of the workshop, or overall? What if they've been gone for years, but got what they came for with the one piece posted and its beautiful? What if they had been in the competition section with this piece before? Whole bit, or segment? Is this an award that passes around over time, or is a stagnant by year basis? How do we track it, vote wise, nomination wise, year wise, everything...wise... programmable function? Good luck finding Daniel for the creation and approval.

In other words, that is a massive logical undertaking. Possible? Maybe. Logically done with volunteers? An almost certain no.

 

Mod hat off, just speaking as a member here:

1) Why? The Workshop is to get help, not awards.
2) Across all categories? A novel excerpt vs a horror flash vs a romantic poem?
3) On the same note: How many nominations can there be? It's hard enough for me as a voter to try and read 5-10 themed short stories, the decision-making process gets harder with open prompts, having an essentially unlimited number of stories, genres, lengths, and even forms (poetry vs prose) would make the contest very unwieldy for voters.
4) Anonymity: This is getting slightly into Mod territory, but one of the reason we anonymize stories in the contests is to minimize the possibility of them becoming personal popularity contests with all the attendant clique-y factionalism that can bring with it.

Resting my hand gently on my mod hat but not speaking ex cathedra, it sounds like a lot of extra work for the mod team. Right now there are ten of us, but six are on hiatus and the remaining four are fairly busy as it is. We've got day-to-day and month-to-month issues divided up pretty well, but we're already spending an unhealthy amount of time on the forum, so there's not much slack.

Bit more than two cents worth, but those are my thoughts on the matter.

 

Why only novels and poetry? If it was done, I don't see any reason to exclude short stories.

 

Sounds like you need more moderators.

 

Well, I've posted 10 short stories there since I joined up. There are at least enough from all contributors to be working with.

 

1. How many entries do you imagine there would be if EVERYTHING within the last year was eligible? Think about it - it's not realistic to ask of a volunteer team of mods.

2. Workshop is meant for critique. How do you think members are gonna feel if they knew their writing will be judged later at its presumably roughest form? Massive knock on confidence plus completely defeats the idea of the workshop to begin with.

3. It's not even fair to judge Workshop entries against each other when we have to assume most if not all the entries there are not in its best form. That's usually why it's in the Workshop looking for critique.

4. Continuing from the premise that Workshop entries are, nine times out of ten, not going to be the best writing nor in the best shape - understandably - quite honestly who's going to want to trawl through hundreds of them in the first place?

It's one thing reading the one or two you are interested in, or reading because you wanna be helpful and give critique. It's quite another to be required to read not-ready writing in the hundreds that a. Gives you no pleasure and b. Won't help the writer improve because you're not giving a critique.

ETA: it's also not fair to the members who have entries in the workshop. If everything in the last year was eligible, what are the chances that someone whose entry was in January is gonna get picked? Next to none because it'd be buried by Dec probably.

 

Yeah. It's an interesting idea, but upon reflection, doesn't really seem workable. Aside from the incredible amount of work there would be to oversee the 'contest' and the amount of work the members would need to go through to read all the entries to nominate, then vote on, plus the anonymity issues ...I totally agree with @Mckk and @Iain Aschendale that it would compromise the purpose of the Workshop ...which is not to compete for awards but to get help for writing the authors often realise is substandard. Hence the Workshop....

We do have writing contests, and I reckon that's probably enough for what we can handle here on the forum.

I mean, in the best of all possible worlds, I would love a 'novel' contest as well, as that's what I write and mostly what I read. But seriously. I don't think reading a bunch of novels is manageable at all on this forum. Even contests run by reputable writing organisations and publications don't usually go for novels, unless you're talking the Big Prize ones for published novels, like the Man-Booker, etc. Writing contests don't even like short stories much, unless they are VERY short. So wannabe novelists can't really compete. Just one of those things.

Writing is one thing, but writing for a contest is something entirely different. Some forms just don't suit a contest format.

 

I think what we should leave awards for competitions only. Although we could really do with figuring out how to drum up more support for the competitions we have. There is nothing wrong with the competitions and I don't think they should not be changed (that would be rather messy and horrible). I do think that more entrants, feedback and voting would help. Especially in poetry that is by its nature different and less understood.

The last couple of flash and short story comps have been close and exciting, naturally generating extra interest but maybe we could draw attention to this.