Green Room - Week 36 - Day 18

[clauderainsrm.livejournal.com]

For those of you waiting for confirmation emails from me – don’t worry, they are coming later today. I have about 10 of them currently sitting in my inbox from the last 24 hours. If you sent it *before* that… well, then there might be a problem! ;)

For those of you *not* waiting for confirmation emails – what’s wrong with you???

Well, let’s be real – that “what’s wrong with you” pretty much applies to anyone who comes around here for any length of time! ;)

I will remind people though – because there seems to be a little confusion: there are THREE DIFFERENT sets of voting going on… the poll: http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/595911.html, Gatekeepers, and the contestant/Home Gamer for Week 36 only.

How do you know if you are eligible to vote in any of these?

The poll: Are you a member of the community? No? Then join it. Now you are. I’ve seen LJ remove some votes in the past when you leave the community – so I’d stick around after the fact. (There was someone a few weeks ago advocating the “join, vote and leave” strategy. I know some people don’t want an extra group on their feed… and so it seems like a way of easing them into the process… but the whole point is getting fresh faces through the door. Which means I’m not a fan of that tactic.)

Gatekeepers – Have I emailed you about being a Gatekeeper? Yes. Then you are one. Did I not? Then you are not. It’s not personal, and there’s no sign up list. I appreciate the interest. But it’s not to be right now. However, you *can* still vote in the community only poll http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/595911.html and potentially in the Contestant Only one! (see below)

Contestant Only/Home Gamers vote – Are you a current contestant? Yes? Then you can vote. No? Did you submit a Home Game entry for Week 36? Yes? Then you can vote! No? Sorry, you are not eligible to vote in that particular poll. However, you *can* still vote in the community only poll http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/595911.html !

Did you go to college thanks to Social Security benefits after losing your Father – but now want to make sure that no one else can do that by cutting them? You may not be eligible for a special poll, but you could potentially be VP!

Comments

Re: Let Me Get Real for a Minute Here...

[lordhellebore]

Idol doesn’t exist in a vacuum, it needs fresh bodies to keep the blood flowing and keep it lively and fresh. Bringing in new people puts new eyes on our work which, if we’re serious about writing, is ultimately what we want…

Funny. I was seriously contemplating competing in round 9. M&G brought me here. But all that your drama did was kill any motivation I had. I'd rather avoid being thrown to the snakes like this.

Re: Let Me Get Real for a Minute Here...

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

Things pop up like this in any community, I think. You might be interested in comments to Ann T Social's similar comment from yesterday. Here's a link to the thread.

http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/597223.html?thread=62639847#t62639847

If people are pointing a link to this comment, it would be nice if they would mention this thread as well.

If you decide to participate in Idol, or even hang out in the Green Rooms with us a while, I think you'll find a lot more supporting than arguing going on. It's been a stressful week, and tempers flare when people are stressed.

Re: Let Me Get Real for a Minute Here...

[lordhellebore]

Oh, I read that. And I read a lot of green rooms during the last weeks and months. And the more I realised how much it really seems to be about strategy and game-playing instead of writing, the more disenchanted I got. I can't function like that.

Re: Let Me Get Real for a Minute Here...

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

This time of the season is the hardest for me, and I'll admit that I'm off my center today with the brouhaha of the past 24 hours.

But, I'll tell you why I think there's value to participating in Idol. I have no delusions of winning. I'd like to last longer than I did this season (but I'll get over that some time in the next several years, maybe). :)

What I get out of it is the deadline, the encouragement to write, the exposure to different writing styles, the interacting with people who want to improve their writing skills.

Hell, the interacting with intelligent people who love words. That's not a given in everyone's day-to-day.

I first came across Idol at the beginning of Season 4. And when I look at the people on my friends list with whom I feel the closest connection, not including my two real-world BFFs, they're people I know through Idol. To a person.

So, yeah. There's some amount of scheming, or at least rumors of it, and there's lively discussions of standards of practice for various activities like pimping and beta reading and etc. And sometimes shit blows up. Just like everywhere there are human beings. Difference is, around here I've found a higher percentage of people I would want to meet and keep around a while.

/2 cents :)

Re: Let Me Get Real for a Minute Here...

[theun4givables.livejournal.com]

Honestly, I'd urge you to take a look at java_fiend's exit speech: http://java-fiend.livejournal.com/440946.html#cutid1

Since you've said you've been reading the GR and for the past few months, yeah, it's going to seem like strategy and game-playing really take over the "write and write well" aspect of this community. It was two months ago, now, that I was eliminated. That was week 30.

That was also when I started noticing that people started getting REALLY into the game-playing and strategy aspect. And you know what, it threw me off a bit. It still doesn't make me feel any worse as a writer -- I've been playing the Home Game and still have received wonderful, supportive feedback. I wouldn't trade this community for anything in the world, despite it's pockets of drama.

Compete next season. Write your ass off and get a feel for the game, for yourself. Watching it from the sidelines is really, really different than being in the middle of it, trying to survive from week to week. I made it 8 weeks without a friend's list whatsoever, when I deleted thephantomq and moved to armyandleg. Eight weeks without having the option of relying on a flist, and it was a struggle. But I still fucking loved every minute of it. I loved the excitement of watching a poll and biting my nails, even if it was stressful. Because each week that I did survive the polls, it gave me that much more confidence.

Having a community like this, where you're actively encouraged to write, to try new things, and to play with people with similar interests? I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world. Give it a chance. My only regret is that I wish I had discovered this community sooner.

Re: Let Me Get Real for a Minute Here...

[lordhellebore]

It's good that this works for you. But . . . no. See, I've been writing fanfic for almost eight years now, and this:

Having a community like this, where you're actively encouraged to write, to try new things, and to play with people with similar interests?

I've got this. I don't need to get my confidence boosted, I try lots of new things, and I have a good amount of great people to share my writing passion with.

When I started thinking about joining this competition, I of course realised it was a competition, but I believed it was more about the writing than it really is. And as somebody who isn't even good at playing monopoly, I'd only feel lost and confused and out of my element here. I'd rather stay in my fanfic corner where there's no strategy etc. involved, and go on dedicating time to my original novels.

I hope you'l go on playing and having fun in the next round, though :)

Re: Let Me Get Real for a Minute Here...

[theun4givables.livejournal.com]

It's good that you're involved enough in your fandom to have that. :) I've been in various fandoms for half my life twelve years now, and I'm just now breaking into a new fandom and getting comfortable. I've mostly been a lurker, though, so Idol has been great for me in terms of breaking out of my lurker-shell. ;)

It's still about the writing. Yeah, there are some great writers who fell victim to the polls before many thought it was their time, but that's part of the game. Also, you have to remember, what you feel is an excellent bit of story telling? There can be many, many people who disagree.

So even if the competition was focused entirely on the writing, you still have to fight personal preferences for style and topics. Some people don't like the emotional, some lap that shit up. Others like purely nonfiction, while many prefer fiction and vice versa. Even if it were a pure writing competition and there was less strategy involved in the later weeks, it could have still ended up the way it has.

Re: Let Me Get Real for a Minute Here...

[clauderainsrm.livejournal.com]

I keep using the example, but anyone who has spent time looking at the controversies that arise over pretty much every Nobel or Pulitzer Prize selection knows that the notion of "pure writing competition" is something that exists more in people's heads than anything else.

There are elements of subjective personal taste and yes, personal politics from the biggest and most prestigious selection processes to the school literary magazine to the thing that some person hosts on their blog for the "Best Whatever of 2012".

Which isn't really about any of the above, but it's something that does need to be pointed out when that phrase starts being thrown around.