FAQ
 GeneralWhat is this? The Terra Firma Admin Team is in awe of the amazing authors we have here and decided we would like to recognize those authors through the Terra Firma Fanfic Awards. These awards are not intended to replace or compete with the Sparkys, Auroras, or any other fandom-wide awards. They are intended as a thank you to the wonderful writers who are such a big part of this community! Is it too late to suggest a category? Not quite yet. Suggestions for new categories will be entertained until 28 June to give the Admin Team time to consider these suggestions. Please contact one of the Admin Team and we will consider the category. NominatingWhen are nominations open? 15 July - 15 August 2010. What fics are valid to nominate? Any fic written and posted at Terra Firma (either as full text or as a link in the Uncharted Terra-stories) between 2 June 2009 - 14 July 2010. If the fic was posted in the Uncharted Terra-stories via a link to another site, the original publishing must also have been within the designated time frame and the link must have been posted by the author, not as a recommendation by an enthusiastic reader. This means that the story nominated must have a http://terrafirmascapers.com URL or it will be removed from consideration. How many fics can an author have nominated per category? For 2010 we are allowing two fics per author, though we encourage authors to not compete against themselves and choose their best fic. Authors will be contacted if they have more than two stories nominated in a category to choose which fics they want to go to voting. If the author does not reply back, the Admin Team dartboard will decide which fics to put forth. Can I nominate more than one fic in a category? Yes! Thanks to the wonderful jagwriter78 you can nominate two stories per category. Just make sure you keep track of which stories you are nominating so you don't nominate the same one twice. Can I nominate my own fics? Certainly. Can I nominate a work in progress? Sorry, no. A story just isn't a story until it reaches the end. Keep note of it and you can nominate it next year when it's complete. Note: If a work in progress was started before 14 July 2010 and completed before 15 August 2010, it is eligible. Do I have to nominate all categories at once? No. Due to the wonders of technology, you can nominate one or a few and come back later and nominate the rest. Are crossovers allowed? Yes! We have a crossover category just for that sort of story. This is the only genre category in which crossover fics will be allowed. The only stipulations are that characters and/or settings must be recognizable as Farscape and that the two fandoms must interact. Additionally, crossovers are eligible for Best Characterization categories. A wordcount is required for my nomination, which words do I count? You count the actual body of the story. Disclaimers, Author's Notes, section dividers and story and chapter titles do not count. If the story is not near one of the limits though, it really doesn't matter if those words are counted. How do I count the words? Doing it manually seems tedious. Tedious and unnecessary. Technology has provided the answer. If you have Word 2007, Microsoft has actually made this easy and the wordcount is displayed in the bottom left, near the page number. To count only eligible text, you can either delete the ineligible or highlight the eligible. If you have Word 2003 and earlier or Open Office (a freeware program with equivalents to Microsoft Office), paste the story text into a document or open the file on your computer. There are two methods: Either delete out the text that you don't want counted or highlight the text you do want counted and click 'Tools-->Wordcount'. If you don't have either of these, you can try this Wordcount Script (Opens in a new window) or use the approximate values of 400-500 words per page in WordPad (use 'Print Preview' to see the number of pages). But beware of fics that are close to a cutoff - if it's nominated in the wrong category it will be deleted. I don't have the author's email -- can I still nominate his/her fic? Yes. If you have the author name and fic title correct, it should be quite simple to PM the author. One of the Admin Team will do that so that you as the nominator do not have to reveal yourself. Since all the fields need to have information, you can use dummy (at) terrafirmascapers.com for the email. All links need to have a terrafirmascapers.com URL. Any story with an incorrect link will be purged from the nominations. Why are some categories mutually exclusive? Future fic and AU are by definition exclusive. If you want to nominate a story, but aren't sure which category it falls into, I recommend contacting the author and asking which they feel it belongs in. Additionally, drama and comedy are also by definition exclusive of each other. And as mentioned above, crossover fics are not allowed in the genre categories. Other than that, a fic may be nominated in more than one category, though take care to ensure if you are nominating the same fic in more than one Character category, that the characters have a major role in the fiction. The Microfic topic says 100 words, does it have to be exact? We realize that the guidelines on the Weekly Microfics have been lax, so there will be a 5% leeway on this one. That means that the Microfic needs to be between 95 and 105 words to be eligible. What are the criteria for the character categories? The character you are nominating the story for must play a major role in the story. Cameo appearances do not count. Stories that do not feature the character in a major role will be disallowed. What counts as a Canon Pairing? These are the romances that were focused on during the broadcast of the show, not just casual flings. They are: Aeryn/Velorek, Chiana/D'Argo, Chiana/Jothee, Jool/D'Argo, Sikozu/Scorpius, Zhaan/Stark and Crais/Larrell. Other pairings would fall under the Non-canon category. What counts as a Series? These are any two or more related stories that have not previously won a prior Fanfic Award for Best Series. Eek! I nominated the wrong fic / in the wrong category / with the wrong details. The first two can't be helped - if they're way off the fics will be discounted at the voting stage. The correct details (along with which category and the name of the fic you nominated so it can be tracked down) can be PM'd to LT Garrix for correction. Are authors told they've had a nomination? Yep, there's an email alert, along with the choice to refuse the nomination. Authors, if you have a fic nominated for a category it's clearly not suited for, or the fic doesn't fit within the timeframe, please refuse the nomination - it saves me a lot of time since fics will be verified before moving to voting. In the case of a person not knowing the author's email, I will endeavor to notify the author of the nomination before the closing of Nominations. I share a computer/network with others who also want to nominate. Submit one person's nominations as normal, then PM LT Garrix with the rest. My fic was nominated and I'm proud of that fact. Is there any way to show that nomination? Yes! There are little nomination buttons that you can put on your website or in the TF archives. Please download the graphic to your computer and upload it to someplace like photobucket. 
VotingWhen will voting be? Voting will run from 17 August - 7 September for round one (though it may open earlier if everything is verified quickly). Where did my nomination go? 'I nominated/was nominated and now it's not showing up anymore.' This happened for one of several reasons: the fic was not eligible for a category, the author declined the nomination, or someone stuffed the nominations. We're not mind readers, and if you nominate more than two stories for a category, we don't know which one you really wanted nominated, so the only fair thing to do is to delete all your nominations in that category. Where did X category go? For any of the Character categories that did not have a minimum of 5 nominees, they were combined into the Other (female) or Other (male) categories. For the categories with lengths, the divisions were changed to provide better competition. Why did the word counts change? Categories with word counts may see shifts in order to make the category more competitive. In some cases, it may go from 'short, medium and long' to 'short and long'. We apologize for having to do this mid-stream, but it is more competitive to have 2 categories of 4 or 5 rather than three categories of 2 or 3 or even have one category with 7 or 8 and the others with 2. The shifts made the first year were quite minor, but did even out the number of nominees Can I vote for more than one fic in a category? No, once only. Any attempt to circumvent this restriction will result in all your votes being invalidated, not just the ones for that category. Is this Draconian? Perhaps, but it is fair. Besides, how much meaning will a win have if it was you voting for your fic 20 times? It's much more meaningful if your fic wins on its merit. I share a computer/network with others who also want to vote Submit one person's votes as normal, then PM or email LT Garrix with the rest. ResultsWhen will the results be up? Hopefully within a couple of days of voting closing. And hopefully the winners' banners will be ready at the same time, though RL can throw a monkey wrench in the plan. What will I win? Since fanfiction is written for the enjoyment of others and no profit is made, there is no physical prize. What you do get is more important, the recognition of your fellow Scapers. Even if you don't win, you will have the knowledge that folks enjoy your writing enough to nominate it. Now, for those wanting something a bit more substantial, there will be banners that you can post with your story. Will there be little awards buttons for the winners? If there is interest in a smaller button, please, contact LT Garrix and the banners can be altered. How are the results counted? By the script and the script alone, which doesn't so much not show favoritism as hate everyone equally. The votes that went in will be the votes that go out, less doubles. |