Sign-Ups Are Open

[samuraiter]

I encourage you to revisit the rules before rolling up your sleeves and signing up.

To be brief, and to borrow (rather heavily) from the sign-ups post from last year:

— You must have – and be logged into – an AO3 account to sign up.

— Please, folks, only sign up if you are 100% certain you will be able to complete your assignment by 18 October 2014.

* * * *

REQUESTS

— You may request four to six fandoms from the list of nominated fandoms.

— For each request, do not forget that you can request art, fic, or both.

— Each fandom must you request must have one to six pairings from the list of nominated pairings. If you choose to request any pairing, double-check the list of nominated pairings for that fandom and make certain that any of the pairings listed are all right by you.

— Your match will be based on fandom, pairing, and format (i.e. fic or art).

— The description section is optional, but it is a very good idea to include information like squicks (especially squicks), general likes, rating restrictions, and prompt ideas. Note, too, that there are things that can be done more easily in fic than in art (and vice versa), so keep that in mind. If you have a great deal to say, it might also be a good idea to link to a "Dear Author" letter in your journal explaining everything.

* * * *

OFFERS

— You may offer four to ten fandoms from the list of nominated fandoms.

— Each fandom you offer must have one to ten pairings from the list of nominated pairings, and, again, if you choose to offer any pairing, double-check the list of nominated pairings for that fandom and make certain that any of the pairings listed are all right by you.

— Again, as for requests, you can offer art, fic, or both.

* * * *

Good notes to remember from last year.

— Occasionally, after you select a fandom, pairings you want might not appear in the drop-down menu despite already being in the tag set. If that happens, please copy and paste the pairing you want from the tag set, but remember that you need to get it exactly the same as it is there.

— You may edit your sign up as much as you like between now and the close of sign-ups.

— Please, please read over your sign-ups one last time before they close. After all, what if you ticked the wrong box?

— Sign-ups close at 5 PM (PDT) on 3 September 2014.

And now, without further ado:

Go here to sign up. :-)

EDIT: Also note that, since there are a number of fandoms that are still listed as Uncategorized, it might not be a bad idea to have a look-see inside that region of the tag set, too.

Comments

[abluestocking]

Eeee, I'm so excited. :) Thanks for all you do!

[samuraiter]

Thank you for participating. :-) Enjoy.

[(Anonymous)]

Are requests not going to be visible?

[muccamukk]

The summary of fandoms requested is up, but we're not posting the full summary of requests until we open for treating.

[samuraiter]

^^^

What she said. :-) Beat me to it by seconds!

[muccamukk]

When did we open them last year? Like a couple weeks after sign ups closed, right?

[samuraiter]

*goes back and checks*

Yup, that's correct.

[aphrodite_mine]

Thank you so much! I am VERY excited!

[muccamukk]

Yay! I'm excited too! I'm not sure if I'll have time to participate myself, but I'm looking forward to the GIANT PILE OF FEMSLASH rather a lot.

[(Anonymous)]

This isn't something you guys can control, but if you select "Compilation of Final Fantasy VII", save your sign up, then go back to edit it, it will automatically check Final Fantasy VI as well. So in order to save it again you have to manually uncheck Final Fantasy VI.

[muccamukk]

That's... interesting. I will file a bug report with AO3.

[alias_sqbr]

Yay!

[muccamukk]

\O/

[(Anonymous)]

Is there a place to post letters?

[(Anonymous)]

Publicly I mean.

[muccamukk]

Not yet. Mean to get that up in the next few days.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm guessing the answer is "no" but I gotta ask to be sure. There's a ship that I'd really like to request, and I'm only just noticing that it hasn't been nominated. Can I mention in the optional details, something like, "in addition to the nominated ships, I also like ___" and hope for the best?

[muccamukk]

We're allowing optional crossovers and threesomes, so as long as you ask for ships in that fandom that you genuinely want–so that if you get matched on them your author/artist doesn't feel like they're second best for writing/drawing what they offered–mentioning that you would also be happy to get unnominated pairing xy/jk would be okay.

[(Anonymous)]

Thanks! :)

[(Anonymous)]

Is it necessary to put the Dear Author letter ink for each fandom we request? I noticed there's a spot for it for each one, but is one sufficient?

[muccamukk]

You don't HAVE to. You're assigned author or artist will see all the requests together and be able to go from just the one link. However, I would encourage you to put it in ever one because when we open for treating the requests will be divided by fandom, and then you'd only have you're letter attached to one request.

[(Anonymous)]

I've yet to submit my sign-up form, but was wondering: will it be possible for us to edit our own requests manually (ourselves), or will it be like the nominations where revisions first have to be approved by a mod?

[muccamukk]

Once you submit your form, you will be able to edit it until sign ups close. So if you change your mind about nominations, or decide not to sign up after all, you can alter or delete it. The only people that will be able to see your sign up is yourself and the mods, though the fandoms will be tallied on the sign up summary page.

Whatever you have up when signups close next week is what will be processed for matching. You can't alter it after close of sign ups.

[(Anonymous)]

Great, thank you for the detailed response! :)

Query about OFCs

[stranger]

In looking through the list of nominated fandoms and pairings, I'm often intrigued by the "Named Character/OFC" entries in a number of fandoms, and also the "Original Work" category. When I think of writing one of these, the original character(s) often turn into other media characters in my mental story sketch, crossovers or similar pick-ups from TV, song, story or mythic archetypes. Is this within the spirit of the rules? Should actual named crossover characters be avoided in these situations, or embraced?

Re: Query about OFCs

[muccamukk]

There aren't any rules that apply to this, but I'd avoid explicit crossovers.

If, for example, I asked for fic Delenn/OFC and my writer decided to make it Delenn/Kara Thrace because that seemed like a cool pairing to them, my author has no way of knowing that I hate BSG and everything about it.* Now if my author wrote about Delenn and a smart mouthed fighter pilot with mommy issues, who was similar to Kara but had the serial numbers filed off, I'd mind it less, probably. The same holds true of Original Works category.

Unless your recipient just straight up lists the characters or crossovers they might like, I'd stay away from existing canon characters.


*I don't hate BSG, but as an example.

Re: Query about OFCs

[stranger]

Thanks for the prompt answer! This is a good clarification, and makes sense to me.

[x_dark_siren_x]

I don't know if it's significant, or even anything you guys can control, but the pairing "Moriarty/Joan Watson" isn't appearing in the sign-up form as an option for Elementary, though it is nominated. Interestingly enough, though, "Irene Adler/Kate (Sherlock)" is appearing as a sign-up option for Elementary, despite being a Sherlock pairing and under Sherlock's nominations. O.o

[samuraiter]

Interesting catch. I have added Moriarty/Joan Watson under Elementary (TV), so it should be an option now, but, in looking at that heading, Irene Adler/Kate (Sherlock) isn't under it, only under Sherlock (TV). Most peculiar.

[x_dark_siren_x]

Huh. Maybe it's just me. All the interesting technical stuff happens to me. (I have a reputation at college now. /o\)

[muccamukk]

We can report it as a bug, but there's not much else we can do about it now, as changing the tag set would screw up everyone else's signups.

ETA: It shows up if I sign up for Elementary as well, so I imagine everyone is seeing it. I'll submit a bug report to AO3.

[(Anonymous)]

— Occasionally, after you select a fandom, pairings you want might not appear in the drop-down menu despite already being in the tag set. If that happens, please copy and paste the pairing you want from the tag set, but remember that you need to get it exactly the same as it is there.

Nothing they can do about the latter.

[x_dark_siren_x]

Yeah, I get that, and that's what I did, but I thought in this case it might be some kind of glitch, since there was a Sherlock pairing appearing instead of "Moriarty/Joan Watson" for me.