Eep! That was me you're talking about! I don't mind there being no word limit, however the author of the story should be aware of how people vote and decide, so a too long story could actually decrease the chances of the author winning no matter how good their story is.
Well, it's an accusation that carries some stigma in the fan fic community or at least once. One should be careful of naming names without proof or evidence. You should probably make the poll public, Angry Fanboy, to prevent any such accusations because then people can see how other people voted. However, I can only remember it happening once, quite a long time ago, and it caused quite some outrage at the time.
In your opinion it's nobody's business but the voter's, in my opinion it is. The wonderful world we live in where our opinions are equally valid, eh? Come on now stop sulking about the lack of a word limit and move on, hopefully the next winner will reinstate one.
Angry Fanboy--when you create the poll, it can be made so that the results can be viewed publicly. Most of the time, that eliminates the problem, but if there's going to be an anti self-voting rule, it should be stated outright when you put up the poll, to make sure there's no ambiguity.
Sweet entry, TLR! I'm a big fan of haiku; I dabble in it myself. I have an idea for this month's challenge... of course, I had an idea for last month's as well, but real life -- as is so often the case -- got in the way. School, kids, that sort of thing. Plus, I can't take my laptop to work anymore, and long stretches of inactivity on the graveyard shift were where I got a lot of my writing done. But we'll see; hope springs eternal, after all.
It's common practice in virtually every writing competition to have a word limit. That way everyone is competing on the same equal footing. After all, how does someone compare a 2,000 word story with a 100,000 word novel? Obviously more work has gone into the novel, but the short story may be a better piece of work. I think it would be helpful to see a limit - the shorter the better - and you'd probably get more entries.
Here's my entry for this month, coming is at 5628 words. "Out In The Cold" - http://www.trekbbs.com/showthread.php?t=171718
Okay, I have a piece of writing ready. This is the first time I've entered. How and where do I post this? Thanks.
So you'd vote for the better piece obviously - quality over quantity. I don't really see the issues faced in comparing a rubbish 80,000 word piece with an excellent 1,000 word piece to be honest - it seems obvious that voting would be based on which is the most well-written, interesting, thought-provoking and ultimately enjoyable.