Awards Post-2016 FanFic Awards discussion/survey

THE 2016 POST-AWARDS SURVEY IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE TATOOINE TOURISM BUREAU​

The image of a family of Twi’leks laying on a lush tropical beach, looking extremely bored, appears on screen.

Tired of vacationing in the same old places? This year, get away from it all... (a star map races outward from the Core, keeps going and going until it reaches the Outer Rim, then zooms in on a tan and brown mottled planet) ...way, way, away from it all to glorious Tatooine!

From the excitement of Mos Espa’s pod-racing circuit... (two pod racers careen wildly through a narrow ravine. A hydro-spanner flies out of the first and is sucked into the second racer's engine. It crashes into the canyon wall in a giant fireball) ...to the tranquility of the scenic Jundland Wastes, we’ve got it all.. (The camera pans slowly across a desert landscape, revealing miles and miles of empty sand)

Take the skyhopper tour of Beggar’s Canyon and see our fascinating wildlife. (The camera looks down on a herd of bantha, traveling single file. A Tusken Raider looks up, raises his rifle and shoots. The image goes spiraling towards the canyon floor.)

Visit the B’omarr monastery, where the monks contemplate the mysteries of the universe in peace and harmony. (The image Jabba’s palace fades to show a brain-walker scuttling through a dank hall way. Something with tentacles reaches out of the darkness to accost it.)

See the boyhood home of Jedi Master Luke Skywalker (the charred remains of the Lars farmstead appear on screen) or have a drink at historic Mos Eisley Cantina, where you can chat with friendly locals (the camera looks down a row of patrons at the bar: a one-armed Ponda Boba, Dr. Evazan and Dannik Jerriko).

Tatooine: we’re the bright spot of the Universe! (The same Twi’lek family appears again. Dad is wearing a hat with bantha horns, grinning broadly. The daughter is hugging a plush womp rat, while the son brandishes a toy gaffi stick. Mom tries to smile for the camera, but is busy wrestling her purse away from a Jawa.)

Paid for by the Tatooine Tourism Bureau. Mention our ad at Tosche Station and get a free power converter! (Fixer scowls at the camera. Behind him, Deak holds up a sign that says “Hi, Mom!” while Windy gives him hoojib ears.)

​

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Chyn wades onto the stage as herself. Yeah, it’s a bit anti-climatic, eh?

Another year of awards has come and gone, and now’s the time to tell us what you liked, didn’t like, think should be kept, think should be improved of this whole process. There’s a list of questions below, feel free to answer as many or as few as you want, or to answer the questions we didn’t ask.

You’ll also find a bunch of detailed stats about participation in post 2 below.

ERAS

1. Following last year’s post-awards discussion, we decided to have Before as a standalone era again. We think it helped get some little-known fics get some extra exposure, is that an assessment you would agree with and should we keep it that way?

2. Due to the transitional nature of this year we had the Sequel Trilogy fics as a standalone era, but this was a stopgap measure. How do you think the New Canon/Legends divide should be handled in the future? From the numbers below, the options would be:

• Keep everything as is: THREE eras (Before, Saga and Beyond) without differentiating between New Canon and Legends -- in this scenario, fics based on the New Canon would compete against fics based on Legends, and we could have some timeline-specific award categories (e.g. "Best Legends Inclusion in a New Canon story")
• Divide fics by timeline rather than era: TWO batches of awards (one for New Canon fics, one for Legends fics) without differentiating by era -- in this scenario, we could have some era-specific awards within each timeline (e.g. "Best Before story in the New Canon timeline")

Here is a quick-and-dirty count of 2016 fics as of 14 May:

(edit 03 July 2017: broken image embed removed)

CATEGORIES

3. We introduced the Best Humour and Best Villain categories in Saga and Beyond. Did you like them? Should we keep them, drop them or replace them with other categories next year?

4. For the smaller eras of Before & ST, we had a smaller number of categories. Did you find that the number was fair, or that we should have more/less?

5. In ST in particular, we had era-specific categories (Best Speculation/Spoiler etc). Depending on how the New Canon/Legends divide is handled next year, should there be more of these? (e.g. in a possible New Canon era, should there be categories such as Best PT Story, Best OT Story? Should we keep Best Legends Inclusion? Etc.)

6. We introduced the Random Award after people asked for a crack!category last year. Should we keep it or replace it with a more straightforward crack!category (e.g. “most WTF moment”)? Or should we do away with it altogether?

NOMINATIONS

7. This year you had the option to nominate up to 2 fics in each category. Most nominators made use of the option, and it did make “filtering” the fics going to the voting round easier (except in Saga). Should we keep it that way or change it?

8. Last year writers who had a fic nominated in more than 3 categories got to pick in which categories their fic would go to the voting round. This year we did it mathematically, so as to ensure that no category was depopulated. As a writer, would you rather we keep it this way or would you like to be asked?

9. In Saga, we found ourselves with an impossibly long list of fics going to the voting round, so we had to “adjust” the filter (see here). Would you rather we had kept all the nominees, with an excerpts thread of 50K+ words?

GENERAL

10. Was the awards calendar (10 days each for nominations, excerpts and voting, rotating by era) convenient for you, or do you think the periods should be longer/shorter?

11. We provided a list of eligible fics by era, did you use it and was it helpful?

12. We provided a very comprehensive set of rules in the Guide Thread, which was kind of a necessity given the number of cooks in the awards kitchen. Did that help or was it confusing?

13. Raissa Baiard designed banners to remind nominators/voters of deadlines. Was that helpful, did it remind you to participate or did you simply dismiss the notification?

14. This year, the mods sat out of the awards process completely (fics weren't eligible, didn't volunteer, didn't nominate or vote) since it was the first time in quite awhile the users had run the awards and they wanted to be on-hand if they were needed. In the past when the awards were run by the users, the mods were eligible just as other users, since the volunteers had much more experience. Bri and Mav were fine with sitting out this year, but do not want their decision to affect future years and future mods. How do you feel in general about the mods being eligible, volunteering and nominating/voting next year?

15. This year the overseer was not allowed send nominations and votes whereas other volunteers were, provided that 1) they sent their PMs before any other PMs were opened and 2) their noms/votes were counted by another volunteer. Do you object to the overseer nominating/voting (not being eligible to compete) under the same conditions as other volunteers?

16. Anything else you’d like to comment on?

 

STATISTICS – GENERAL INFO

(You can see the 2015 stats here.)

A total of 31 users participated in the awards process by nominating, voting or offering prizes. The overwhelming majority are fanfic writers and/or regular posters on the fanfic boards.

18 users sent nominations in one or more eras:

• 6 users sent nominations in 4 eras
• 4 users sent nominations in 3 eras
• 4 users sent nominations in 2 eras
• 4 users sent nominations in 1 era
• 6 users who sent nominations in at least 1 era did not participate in the vote

23 users sent votes in one or more eras:

• 12 users voted in all eras
• 5 users voted in 3 eras
• 2 users voted in 2 eras
• 4 users voted in 1 era
• 10 users who voted had not sent nominations

11 users offered prizes in addition to the mods.

The persons who sent the most nominations sent a total of 89 (2 nominations per category in all eras + the Random Award). The persons who sent the fewest nominations sent 3.

The persons who sent the most votes sent at total of 45 (all categories in all eras + the Random Award). The persons who sent the fewest votes sent 1.

In total, 212 fics and 95 authors/co-authors were nominated. 135 fics and 79 authors went to the voting round, and 38 fics and 24 authors won at least one prize.

In the 45 existing voting categories (including the Random Award), we had 7 ties and 13 cases where the winner was separated from the runner-up by only 1 vote.

STATISTICS – ERA-SPECIFIC INFO

In Before, 7 users nominated a total of 19 fics, 13 authors and 6 reviewers. Of these, 12 fics, 10 authors and 6 reviewers went to the voting round. The 13 voters in this era subsequently selected 3 fics, 3 authors and 1 reviewer as winners.

In Saga, 12 users nominated a total of 92 fics, 57 authors (including co-authors) and 6 reviewers. Of these, 61 fics, 53 authors and 3 reviewers went to the voting round. The 20 voters subsequently selected 13 fics, 16 authors (of which 5 co-authors) and 1 reviewer as winners.

In Beyond, 17 users nominated a total of 72 fics, 39 authors and 9 reviewers. Of these, 44 fics, 27 authors and 4 reviewers went to the voting round. The 20 voters in this era subsequently selected 14 fics, 8 authors and 2 reviewers as winners.

In Sequel Trilogy, 12 users nominated a total of 26 fics, 21 authors and 8 reviewers. Of these, 15 fics, 13 authors and 3 reviewers went to the voting round. The 18 voters in this era subsequently selected 8 fics, 6 authors and 1 reviewer as winners.

For the Random Award, 5 users nominated a total of 4 fics by 4 authors. All went to the voting round and the 10 voters subsequently selected 1 fic by 1 author as the winner.

 

What I did not like, was forcing Random Award nominators to vote for something else.

I understand the bit about associated colours, but I at least did not ask for colours to be associated with that award, and my nomination was because one of the authors whom I really felt deserved something, had volunteered, and this was my last ditch effort to do something for them.

Taking nothing away from whoever won that, the final stage felt unfair.

 

I was stumped when trying to figure out something to nominate for the Random Award, and I suspect others were too given only 5 noms. Perhaps the random award could be converted into a "special category" which changes each year - for example, best cliffhanger, best dialogue, best action, etc, and fics can then be nominated within that category.

I don't think there's much point separating out new canon - it will only lead to confusion for fics which technically could be either. In fact, the categories of Before, Saga and Beyond aren't really relevant anymore, although I suppose that is more of a categorisation issue than an awards issue. But "Saga" technically goes all the way to TFA now, with "Beyond" not meaning what it used to.

 

ERAS

Q1. Following last year’s post-awards discussion, we decided to have Before as a standalone era again. We think it helped get some little-known fics get some extra exposure, is that an assessment you would agree with and should we keep it that way?

Yes.

Q2. Due to the transitional nature of this year we had the Sequel Trilogy fics as a standalone era, but this was a stopgap measure. How do you think the New Canon/Legends divide should be handled in the future? From the numbers below, the options would be:
•Keep everything as is: THREE eras (Before, Saga and Beyond) without differentiating between New Canon and Legends -- in this scenario, fics based on the New Canon would compete against fics based on Legends, and we could have some timeline-specific award categories (e.g. "Best Legends Inclusion in a New Canon story")
•Divide fics by timeline rather than era: TWO batches of awards (one for New Canon fics, one for Legends fics) without differentiating by era -- in this scenario, we could have some era-specific awards within each timeline (e.g. "Best Before story in the New Canon timeline")

Option #2 - unless it leads to more not less confusion

CATEGORIES

Q3. We introduced the Best Humour and Best Villain categories in Saga and Beyond. Did you like them? Should we keep them, drop them or replace them with other categories next year?

I liked Best Humor, very very much. Best Villain is also fine.

Q4. For the smaller eras of Before & ST, we had a smaller number of categories. Did you find that the number was fair, or that we should have more/less?

I liked the fewer categories, particularly when it came to Character & Relationship - it still left it open to the nominator/voter to be canon/original and romantic/other. That streamlined batch of categories would probably work for even the bigger eras of Beyond & Saga.

Q5. In ST in particular, we had era-specific categories (Best Speculation/Spoiler etc). Depending on how the New Canon/Legends divide is handled next year, should there be more of these? (e.g. in a possible New Canon era, should there be categories such as Best PT Story, Best OT Story? Should we keep Best Legends Inclusion? Etc.)

Yes. Of course, drop the Post Premiere category unless you use it for Rogue One.

Q6. We introduced the Random Award after people asked for a crack!category last year. Should we keep it or replace it with a more straightforward crack!category (e.g. “most WTF moment”)? Or should we do away with it altogether?

This is a very intriguing one. I'm not sure if it was a resounding success or if users were just getting used to the idea but perhaps have it one more year and see from there. I also like JadeLotus' suggestion above about a new category each time like Best Cliffie, Best Snarky Droid LOL

NOMINATIONS

Q7. This year you had the option to nominate up to 2 fics in each category. Most nominators made use of the option, and it did make “filtering” the fics going to the voting round easier (except in Saga). Should we keep it that way or change it?

Yes.

Q8. Last year writers who had a fic nominated in more than 3 categories got to pick in which categories their fic would go to the voting round. This year we did it mathematically, so as to ensure that no category was depopulated. As a writer, would you rather we keep it this way or would you like to be asked?

Mathematically. I do think that would help also with underpopulated categories, i.e., shifting things around or having more options for excerpts etc. Cuts down on the need for PM-ing back and forth.

Q9. In Saga, we found ourselves with an impossibly long list of fics going to the voting round, so we had to “adjust” the filter (see here). Would you rather we had kept all the nominees, with an excerpts thread of 50K+ words?

The cutoff/filter seems fine, and it may not even be an issue with the awards next time. The distribution of fics may be completely different.

GENERAL

Q10. Was the awards calendar (10 days each for nominations, excerpts and voting, rotating by era) convenient for you, or do you think the periods should be longer/shorter?

Perhaps shrink it to 5-7 days inclusive of a weekend.

Q11. We provided a list of eligible fics by era, did you use it and was it helpful?

Yes, very much.

Q12. We provided a very comprehensive set of rules in the Guide Thread, which was kind of a necessity given the number of cooks in the awards kitchen. Did that help or was it confusing?

It was extremely helpful, concise and to the point.

Q13. Raissa Baiard designed banners to remind nominators/voters of deadlines. Was that helpful, did it remind you to participate or did you simply dismiss the notification?

Since I was involved in the whole process, I didn't need the nudge, per se. But I can see how it would be vital for other users.

Q14. This year, the mods sat out of the awards process completely (fics weren't eligible, didn't volunteer, didn't nominate or vote) since it was the first time in quite awhile the users had run the awards and they wanted to be on-hand if they were needed. In the past when the awards were run by the users, the mods were eligible just as other users, since the volunteers had much more experience. Bri and Mav were fine with sitting out this year, but do not want their decision to affect future years and future mods. How do you feel in general about the mods being eligible, volunteering and nominating/voting next year?

I want them to be eligible, because their stuff is stellar! Perhaps just as the volunteers did, send their nominations/votes in the first day or so before opening it up generally if there needs to be a dividing line.

Q15. This year the overseer was not allowed send nominations and votes whereas other volunteers were, provided that 1) they sent their PMs before any other PMs were opened and 2) their noms/votes were counted by another volunteer. Do you object to the overseer nominating/voting (not being eligible to compete) under the same conditions as other volunteers?

I think the overseer needs to be allowed/permitted to nominate, vote, etc., but to do so as the mods would, see prior answer.

Q16. Anything else you’d like to comment on?

I like the idea of a team of volunteers/ co-hosts for eras, or two overseers cooperating together.

 

1. Following last year’s post-awards discussion, we decided to have Before as a standalone era again. We think it helped get some little-known fics get some extra exposure, is that an assessment you would agree with and should we keep it that way?
Yes
2. Due to the transitional nature of this year we had the Sequel Trilogy fics as a standalone era, but this was a stopgap measure. How do you think the New Canon/Legends divide should be handled in the future? From the numbers below, the options would be:

• Keep everything as is: THREE eras (Before, Saga and Beyond) without differentiating between New Canon and Legends -- in this scenario, fics based on the New Canon would compete against fics based on Legends, and we could have some timeline-specific award categories (e.g. "Best Legends Inclusion in a New Canon story")
• Divide fics by timeline rather than era: TWO batches of awards (one for New Canon fics, one for Legends fics) without differentiating by era -- in this scenario, we could have some era-specific awards within each timeline (e.g. "Best Before story in the New Canon timeline")

I think, while a fantastic job was done this year, it might have been too much. Keep the 3 eras but have some time-line specific awards. I also have my own thoughts on how the awards could be organized.
CATEGORIES

3. We introduced the Best Humour and Best Villain categories in Saga and Beyond. Did you like them? Should we keep them, drop them or replace them with other categories next year?
While I liked these two categories, I also think its fun to mix things up.
4. For the smaller eras of Before & ST, we had a smaller number of categories. Did you find that the number was fair, or that we should have more/less?

It was fair.
5. In ST in particular, we had era-specific categories (Best Speculation/Spoiler etc). Depending on how the New Canon/Legends divide is handled next year, should there be more of these? (e.g. in a possible New Canon era, should there be categories such as Best PT Story, Best OT Story? Should we keep Best Legends Inclusion? Etc.)
It think they are fun, but creating more might create them too niche.
6. We introduced the Random Award after people asked for a crack!category last year. Should we keep it or replace it with a more straightforward crack!category (e.g. “most WTF moment”)? Or should we do away with it altogether?
I wasn’t a huge fan of the random award. I think some more straightforward “crack!Categories” (maybe audience submitted before the awards process kicks off) might be fun
NOMINATIONS

7. This year you had the option to nominate up to 2 fics in each category. Most nominators made use of the option, and it did make “filtering” the fics going to the voting round easier (except in Saga). Should we keep it that way or change it?
I really liked the diversity this created. Keep it


8. Last year writers who had a fic nominated in more than 3 categories got to pick in which categories their fic would go to the voting round. This year we did it mathematically, so as to ensure that no category was depopulated. As a writer, would you rather we keep it this way or would you like to be asked?
Knowing how much of a headache it was asking authors, I say stick with the math.

9. In Saga, we found ourselves with an impossibly long list of fics going to the voting round, so we had to “adjust” the filter (see here). Would you rather we had kept all the nominees, with an excerpts thread of 50K+ words?
Again, knowing how much work long list creates, adjusting the filters the right call.


GENERAL
10. Was the awards calendar (10 days each for nominations, excerpts and voting, rotating by era) convenient for you, or do you think the periods should be longer/shorter?

Meh, I’m on here everyday, so this isn’t exactly applicable.
11. We provided a list of eligible fics by era, did you use it and was it helpful?
BACK IN MY DAY, WE HAD NONE OF THESE FANCY LISTS! YOU HAD TO GO THROUGH PAGES TO REMEMBER WHAT YOU WANTED TO NOM.

But, seriously, yeah, people probably found it helpful.


12. We provided a very comprehensive set of rules in the Guide Thread, which was kind of a necessity given the number of cooks in the awards kitchen. Did that help or was it confusing?
I’m not going to lie, it was probably a lot longer than it needed to be.

13. Raissa Baiard designed banners to remind nominators/voters of deadlines. Was that helpful, did it remind you to participate or did you simply dismiss the notification?

They didn’t really apply to me, but they were pretty!
14. This year, the mods sat out of the awards process completely …
I’m not answering my own question

15. This year the overseer was not allowed send nominations and votes whereas other volunteers were, provided that 1) they sent their PMs before any other PMs were opened and 2) their noms/votes were counted by another volunteer. Do you object to the overseer nominating/voting (not being eligible to compete) under the same conditions as other volunteers?
I personally don’t have a problem with it.

16. Anything else you’d like to comment on?

I’d kinda like to propose an idea for an option for organizing the awards. Next year’s volunteers can take it or leave it. But, basically, before Mav and I decided we were done with the awards, I was brainstorming ideas on how to deal with the whole new-canon issue and this was my slightly insane idea.

Basic awards for each era [so, basically, there would be something like: Before(legends), Beyond(legends) (or maybe BBY Legends and ABY Legends), PT(which would include new canon even pre-TPM), OT, and ST (or something along those lines)]. Each of these era would have the 4 big awards: Best Canon, Best AU, Best Author and Best New Author.

Then, there would be a whole list of awards that any fic would be eligible for (there would maybe be some more specific, but it would generally be a free-for all). So, while where might not be era-specific genre awards, the whole list of Drama, Romance, Horror, Humour, etc, would return. There could be some awards that may play more to a specific era/timeline (IE best fic based from a video game, or speculation fic on a upcoming movie). The character and relationship categories could be more diverse (ie, best Jedi, best alien, best OC female and male, best master/apprentice, best family, best friendship, best married couple, best not married couple). There could be "Battle" categories that normally would not see much competition if done by era, as well as a crack-category. Then, volunteers could sign up for a verity of categories, not an era.

It might be totally insane, but it might also be a fun spin on awards.

 

I came up with these questions, so I'm just going to answer question #14 about mod participation and throw a few ideas out there about how to handle the New Canon/Legends divide and the number of eras.

Re: mod participation, of course they should be eligible to compete, volunteer, nominate and vote like everybody else. Anyone who isn't handling nominations and votes should be allowed to compete, and I can't see any reasons mods shouldn't nominate and vote when volunteers get to do it in the eras where they're volunteering.

Re: the New Canon/Legends divide and the number of eras, the main issue IMO is to find a breakdown that doesn't marginalise fics written in the less popular genres and timeframes while remaining practical for nominators/voters and also for volunteers. The positive of many eras and categories is that it gives a chance to many people to have their moment in the sun, the negative is that it makes the process cumbersome both for nominators/voters and the volunteer team.

The "normal" breakdown of fics into Before, Saga and Beyond is familiar to all of us; however the New Canon/Legends divide makes it contradictory at times, if not outright absurd, since some fics that take place after RotJ are now Saga - New Canon whereas others are Beyond - Legends. Furthermore, sticking to the breakdown by era causes a major issue regarding the definition of canon and AU fics, which many of us seem to regard as basic award categories, since New Canon fics and Legends fics are AUs of each other.

Dividing fics into New Canon/Legends instead of breaking them down by era doesn't eliminate the grey areas (there are New Canon fics that integrate Legends elements and vice-versa) but it does narrow it down to each individual author's choice to label his/her fic(s) as New Canon or Legends. It also has the positive of bringing the whole awards process down to two batches of awards instead of three, which is less cumbersome for everyone and opens the door to the option of having one overseer for each batch, so that no one has to forego eligibility entirely. Lastly, with only two batches of awards we'd have the option to expand slightly the number of categories in each batch without turning this into a mammoth project, and to create custom categories in order to give fics of less popular genres/timeframes a chance to shine but also in order to have some categories that are more relevant to each universe.

Of course all this is based on the current figures for fics in 2016. If there were to be major changes to the trend by the end of this year, I might come up with entirely different arguments

 

I need to think about this in-depth, but as I didn't participate in nominating or voting, I found the reminder banners a little frustrating. I have a 10.1" netbook with a 1024x600 screen, and the banners kept popping up even after being dismissed, and they literally took up 2/3 of my screen. Every page load meant that the whole first screen was taken up by the site banner and then the awards banner, and that pissed me off.


What I liked done in years past was having three separate awards ceremonies, having them staggered over a few weeks, handled by different teams. To be frank, I have absolutely no interest in prequels stuff and next to no interest in saga stuff. So having three awards (Prequels, Saga, Beyond), and then deciding whether to split categories based on Legends or New Canon depending on the number of stories in the era(s), would be the way I'd go.

 

1. Following last year’s post-awards discussion, we decided to have Before as a standalone era again. We think it helped get some little-known fics get some extra exposure, is that an assessment you would agree with and should we keep it that way?

Yes.

2. Due to the transitional nature of this year we had the Sequel Trilogy fics as a standalone era, but this was a stopgap measure. How do you think the New Canon/Legends divide should be handled in the future? From the numbers below, the options would be:

• Keep everything as is: THREE eras (Before, Saga and Beyond) without differentiating between New Canon and Legends -- in this scenario, fics based on the New Canon would compete against fics based on Legends, and we could have some timeline-specific award categories (e.g. "Best Legends Inclusion in a New Canon story")
• Divide fics by timeline rather than era: TWO batches of awards (one for New Canon fics, one for Legends fics) without differentiating by era -- in this scenario, we could have some era-specific awards within each timeline (e.g. "Best Before story in the New Canon timeline")

CATEGORIES

3. We introduced the Best Humour and Best Villain categories in Saga and Beyond. Did you like them? Should we keep them, drop them or replace them with other categories next year?

I think those are good categories to keep.

4. For the smaller eras of Before & ST, we had a smaller number of categories. Did you find that the number was fair, or that we should have more/less?

I think it was reasonable for this year, given that fewer people nominated and voted for the smaller eras. I think having a longer list would have just made people more reluctant to venture in there, actually. But that could change if next year brings some popular New Canon thing that would fall into Before. In that case, I think it would make sense to take a second look.

5. In ST in particular, we had era-specific categories (Best Speculation/Spoiler etc). Depending on how the New Canon/Legends divide is handled next year, should there be more of these? (e.g. in a possible New Canon era, should there be categories such as Best PT Story, Best OT Story? Should we keep Best Legends Inclusion? Etc.)

Those worked out well this year, so yes.

6. We introduced the Random Award after people asked for a crack!category last year. Should we keep it or replace it with a more straightforward crack!category (e.g. “most WTF moment”)? Or should we do away with it altogether?

Definitely keep some kind of silly category. The way it was structured this year made for some really funny suggested awards and I liked that, but I could also see the weirdest moment or whatever being entertaining too.

NOMINATIONS

7. This year you had the option to nominate up to 2 fics in each category. Most nominators made use of the option, and it did make “filtering” the fics going to the voting round easier (except in Saga). Should we keep it that way or change it?

Keep it.

8. Last year writers who had a fic nominated in more than 3 categories got to pick in which categories their fic would go to the voting round. This year we did it mathematically, so as to ensure that no category was depopulated. As a writer, would you rather we keep it this way or would you like to be asked?

I could see someone being disappointed if their fics went to categories that they were personally less interested in and/or felt like they had poured less energy into that year. So my two cents is that the writer should be asked and get at least get one veto vote. As in, they should get to pick at least one of the categories that they've been nominated for as one of their final round categories, regardless of category depopulation in anything else. That just seems fair to me.

9. In Saga, we found ourselves with an impossibly long list of fics going to the voting round, so we had to “adjust” the filter (see here). Would you rather we had kept all the nominees, with an excerpts thread of 50K+ words?

It looked to me like Saga was the victim of its own success this year and the sheer amount of nominated fanfic hadn't been anticipated. That is a lot to sort through and no mistake about it.

Thankfully, this year's awards team has now served as the guinea pigs so that all will behold the tale of our woes and despair. Now that we know, I think the next year's team should plan to allot more volunteers and more time to Saga. Yes, it's a lot of stuff. But it's also the era that a huge percentage of readers/writers show up for and I think the writers/stories should count as just as nominated there.

This might be more trouble than it's worth, but:

Is it possible that running different sets of era awards throughout the year (as in whole volunteer team and overseer could be different for each unless some want to volunteer each time) would remove some of the burden of coping with the enormity of Saga? As in, you have Before in January-February, Saga probably running a bit longer in the summer, Beyond in the fall with a break in the winter for holidays. That way you wouldn't have one set of people doing this for quite so many months on end -- maybe.

As for thread length, I wonder if the Saga excerpts thread could be divided into two for the eyesight and well-being of everyone? Maybe it could be alphabetical by author or something, since many stories span the prequels and later films.


GENERAL

10. Was the awards calendar (10 days each for nominations, excerpts and voting, rotating by era) convenient for you, or do you think the periods should be longer/shorter?

It worked for me, but I was already inclined to nominate and vote. A slightly (not much) longer time to do those things might increase numbers. Or not.

11. We provided a list of eligible fics by era, did you use it and was it helpful?

Yes, I used it and it was much appreciated!

12. We provided a very comprehensive set of rules in the Guide Thread, which was kind of a necessity given the number of cooks in the awards kitchen. Did that help or was it confusing?

Both? I'll admit the rule lists were a bit overwhelming, but part of that was unfamiliarity and the fact that we were needed to give input on the structure. I have a feeling this may become easier for future years since Chyntuck had to invent much of that particular wheel and future teams can probably re-use the vast majority of it.

13. Raissa Baiard designed banners to remind nominators/voters of deadlines. Was that helpful, did it remind you to participate or did you simply dismiss the notification?

Personally, I liked the banners. I was volunteering though, so I would have remembered anyway. However, I noticed that Dantana Skywalker reports having some technical issues with her machine and browsing the forums with the banners. Is there a way that the issues with different devices could be reduced?

14. This year, the mods sat out of the awards process completely (fics weren't eligible, didn't volunteer, didn't nominate or vote) since it was the first time in quite awhile the users had run the awards and they wanted to be on-hand if they were needed. In the past when the awards were run by the users, the mods were eligible just as other users, since the volunteers had much more experience. Bri and Mav were fine with sitting out this year, but do not want their decision to affect future years and future mods. How do you feel in general about the mods being eligible, volunteering and nominating/voting next year?

I don't think there would be problems with the mods being eligible and participating; the way things were done this year nobody was counting their own eligible eras anyway. (Which is the only reason I can think of for this to be a thing.)

15. This year the overseer was not allowed send nominations and votes whereas other volunteers were, provided that 1) they sent their PMs before any other PMs were opened and 2) their noms/votes were counted by another volunteer. Do you object to the overseer nominating/voting (not being eligible to compete) under the same conditions as other volunteers?

The same conditions as other volunteers sounds fine to me; while I understand that no one wants there to be a doubt, this and the no-mods thing seem unnecessary to me.

16. Anything else you’d like to comment on?

Well, just the questionable wisdom of my observations as a volunteer for this year.

While I don't want to discourage anyone from volunteering (please, people -- volunteer!), it seems appropriate to say that when you sign up for that you're signing up for an extensive group project that may take up to 3-4 months. It's often a significant chunk of time and energy, so account for that when considering whether to do it.

That said, the awards are one of my favorite fanfic events and getting to help with them is like being able to be the Tooth Fairy (Fanfic Diathim? I have no good SW metaphors, this is terrible! ) for many of your fellow users. By volunteering for the awards, you get to help people here in Fanfic recognize each other for the great things they do all year. That's pretty awesome.

 

I typed a thing and then accidentally closed the window. FML in particular.

Dantana Skywalker - this should not be an issue when you're logged in, unless you have changed cookie settings. Odd!

 

Nope. Didn't change any settings. Definitely logged in. It didn't show on mobile but on my netbook, the banners just came back again and again. I don't mind having them there so much as the size of them and that they just wouldn't stay dismissed.

 

It wasn't the same banner the whole time, there were several different ones, so every time a new banner was uploaded, you would have to dismiss it again.

 

No, I mean every single page load, every single visit, no matter the banner. I dismissed and it came right back.

 

I never even saw the option to dismiss them.

While /I do understand the need for these reminder banners and support their use in future Awards, they did seem to be rather obtrusive because of their size; the one for the award ceremony was of more reasonable proportions, however.

 

Hmm... yeah, that's weird. I just went back and doubled checked to make sure the banners were dismissable, and they were. Sorry about that, I have no idea why that was happening other than what EP said about something with your cookies.

Most announcement banners you can dismiss in the right corner of them, a hover X will appear.

 

Dantana Skywalker I think you should take your dismissed-notifications-coming-back issue to this thread in Comms. My experience with banners and notifications is that they remained dismissed until I restore them or until a new one comes up, so something here doesn't feel right.

About the issue of fics going to the voting round that Findswoman and Kahara raised, we clearly need an improved "filter", for the following reasons:

1. The current filter doesn't take into account the fact that, with two nominations per category, the list of nominees can become so huge that the voting round essentially becomes a second round of nominations, and the sheer size of the list becomes a disincentive to vote.
2. The current filter doesn't give us a way to filter fics in a category when all the fics are in a thirteen, fifteen or seventeen-way tie (there were 7 such categories in Saga).
3. The current filter can result in several fics by the same author competing against each other in a given category. By "several", I mean 4 fics by the same author competing against each other, or three characters from the same fic competing against each other -- which is great for those authors, but not so great for everyone else.
4. The current filter penalises most the authors and fics that get lots of scattered nominations instead of multiple nominations in one category -- e.g. a fic that was nominated in every possible category went to the voting round only in one or not at all because it received a single nomination in each category, whereas fics that got a single nom in a single category went to the voting round.

I've been trying to figure out a way to filter fics so as to as to overcome those issues while remaining relevant to all the nomination scenarios we had this year, but it's a bit of a head-scratcher.

If we don't want to change the filter, the only solutions are:

• To find a magic wand that increases participation in the nominations process, so as to have more overlapping nominations,
• To prolong the nominations phase in an era where the list of nominees is problematic, until there are enough nominations to filter the list properly,
• To prolong the excerpts and voting phase in an era where the era where the excerpts list is exceedingly long.

(Needless to say that, if I'm ever overseer again, prolonging anything is out of the question -- this whole process was long enough as it is )

 

I am just wondering (not criticizing anything), did you think about a nomination jury which members are chosen by a President?
Maybe this could solve the issue of underpopulated categories although this is less participative of course in such a case.

 

I see the need for a filter definitely! But there is no way to control how many will nominate what by which author and how many you'll end up with eventually, so especially with well-read authors, you're going to get categories/situations where their characters, relationships, stories are heavily represented. That's why in years past I believe there was a category of "Most Underrated" which could take the spill-over from the underpopulated categories.

 

Someone suggested that after last year's awards and people weren't too excited about it. Besides the fact that it takes the fiesta element out of the awards process by limiting participation, I can see several problems for this approach:

• It's a perfect recipe for a lot of internet drama (e.g. "I wasn't nominated because this person/these people on the jury don't like me" etc).
• There's also the issue of the jury members participating in the vote on the basis of a list they established -- that doesn't feel so transparent, and I doubt so many people would be willing to forego their voting rights.
• The jury members would need a set of more-or-less objective criteria to make their selection, but those are difficult to implement and monitor (every single fic should have been read by at least one of them, they should look at the number of reviews a fic got, they should be able to agree on how to define quality, etc).
• Based on this year's experience, having fewer nominators results in a longer list, not a shorter list of nominees -- and while I'm all for having a diverse list of nominees going to the voting round, it should also be short enough for people to be able to read the excerpts in the time alloted to that era and to be able to have a look at the fics themselves if they wish to do so.
• Etc

 

Before I remember what the thing I wrote the other day said:
the point about what Ny called well-read authors being penalised stands. Some were penalised less, some more.

Ultimately, it did not help change anything, as a well-read author will win everything or almost everything they were nominated for...because they're known. It does not and it cannot change the entire process.

No system is ideal, but whichever ends up being picked over this one, it should provide us with some transparency, as Kahara and Findswoman implied.

In general, I have no other major issues other than the fact that the rule change occurred in the middle of the process. That's more of a headscratcher than what it actually resulted in. And I think this thread should remain active until the next awards, with all of us participating in it, as it could result in different conversation dynamics. One of the ideas this year was to give Saga and Before more importance, and what happened was not a surprise, since this was the first year they were important, after a long time. It just looked the way it did in Saga, because Saga is huge and it can only get bigger.

 

Actually, because I'm the only person who has seen (and actually memorised!) all the nominations and votes, I can assure you that this is not the case. Some fics that ended up winning with an overwhelming majority in their category were fics that received a single nomination and found themselves in the voting round by chance, whereas other fics that received so many nominations that a voting round didn't even seem necessary didn't win anything in the end.

The reason it happened in the middle of the process is that we found ourselves with a situation that wasn't planned for. As stated in the Guide thread (item 17 of the FAQ about fics going to the voting round):

 

But maybe not as transparent as the year the awards runners posted the number of votes each nominee received.

 

Are you talking about the final vote tally? I personally don't think that it should be made public, but if a lot of people think it should, that's a problem that can be easily overcome.

 

Yeah, they posted how many votes everything received in each category, as part of the ceremony. Lots of people were upset to find they'd been dead last.