General Discussion : (Un)Official Presents: WAR2: PRIDE - Round 1 - I'VE GOT YOUR NAME

Its on automatic. WOnder  if the new issue of a visa card which is exactly the same but with a new expire date caused this? That sucks . In this day visa should figure out how to make that flow. Damn and fuck. I hate stuff like this. I have enough to do. 

My account looks okay. I gues i will have to contact Kirk somehow. But even if i wren't a paid member, shouldn't i be able to see the posts in WAR? 

@Covewriter--my account expired right at the start of WAR and I couldn't see any threads. If you are on month to month, it auto renews. But I had paid for six months and when that runs out, you have to renew manually.

It's not easy to find whre to change your credit card expire date if that is indeed the problem. Not in my profile or anyting. Sucks. Visa needs to figure out how to make this smoother. Good paying customers have to stop adn rechange everythign cause of the renew. That is stupid.

@Stark I'm on 6 months. I was wondering does LitReactor send a message when it is time to renew because I'm not sure where to look to track it myself. And are there penalties if it expires and you renew the next day?

Thanks

I been a bit busy getting ready(and passing, wooo) my teaching certification test, so I've just started with the voting. Nice to see the voting numbers seem to be holding to the first weeks.

Well i think im on recurring, maybe i did six months, . but at any rate i got no message and still seem to have an accoutn and dont' see how to sign back in if i don't have a paid account. I posted Avery for help.

. 

Yep I did that.  I NEED MY WAR CRACK KIRK HURRY

The log in is the same whether you are a paid member or not.

first, it takes a lot of courage to enter this contest. i've been writng for five years and i got nervous last WAR and I still get butterflies during this WAR. it's normal. but to take on this challenge at all, kudos. you should be proud.

second, i think war is a great way to test your mettle. are you really into it, or just playing around? will you respond to a loss by giving up or by learning what you did wrong and try to do better? how will you handle the win, will it inspire you to write more, to get better, will it make you feel like you can actually write? i hope so.

everybody in here will lose a match, most two. only ONE will go undefeated. so chew on that for awhile. the village will vote and YOU WILL LOSE. what you do with that, how you respond? that will say a lot about who you are and what writing means to you. thicken up that skin.

and have fun, as Utah said. we're not dying here, not curing cancer.

writing is my lifelong dream. no shit. no jokes. i mean it. and there isn't a day that goes by that i don't feel like a total failure. but the pleasure of a well written story, the responses from people, the reactions i get, sheer bliss. it feeds my soul.

"What does not kill me makes me stronger."—Nietzsche

^ what Utah and RIchard said

It does take a lot of balls to submit to a competition like this. You sub to the workshop, you expect helpful eyes. Here there is judgement and competition. It will be fierce at times.

Nobody should be discouraged from battling on because they lost in the first round though. Many of the losing stories are still going to be good, there have been duels where it has almost taken a coin toss to split the stories. In those cases both authors should be damn well proud of themselves. the close fought ones are the most fun.

And think - even if you lose by a wider margin, say 20 votes to your opponents 30, then it's nothing to be ashamed of. That was still 40% of the 'market' picking yours out as the better work. If you imagine this applied to a wider audience, it still bodes well. If 40% of the editors you ever submit to like your stuff, you are on great form. If 40% of the people that read a story of yours decide to check out some more of your work - you will have a fanbase building in no time.

If you got a whooping, well then, take it on the chin, grow, and learn from it. Resolve to fight a little harder in the next round. You are in the right place to be growing as a writer - read the essays here and play in the workshop and I promise you that you'll be fighting harder in the future.

Nobody that loses in this round better drop out!! Warning ya, Avery is a menace and she will come and find you. If you lose in this round you get to have a go at something different, a quick and dirty flash round. New skill will be tested.

We are ALL here to learn and to improve.

^ and maybe I say all that knowing that I lost my duel. Or maybe I won. Who knows?

The war party was planned. You see, today is Richard Thomas' birthday. In lieu of cake, this time, the gift is that of slaying.

Also something to think about is that you're story is getting read by 40-50 people.  For someone like me who's never been published or anything, that's the biggest audience I've ever had for something I've written. So win or lose, you get an honest audience to read your stuff. Just cause you lost doesn't mean your story wasn't good either.  In at least a quarter of the matchups I sat there after reading going, "well fuck, this is hard." Some stories I didn't vote for I liked better than ones I did vote for in other matchups, matchups matter a lot it seems.

Bleh. This again. Learn to tell the bloody time ;-)

Or maybe I am from the future.

if i had the time i'd seriously publish an anthology from the WAR stories. it'd be fantastic. i know some of us have even chatted about that. one thing i didn't say before is that the writers here at LR? they are ALL good. i found that out in the first WAR. SO many people i didn't know, or didn't know very well, just blew me away. i'd say MOST of the stories in this WAR2 have been at LEAST good, then many great ones, and a few really fucking amazing stories. all crafted in one week. even those getting only a few votes, hey, somebody liked it! overall this is a really talented group. period.

and yeah, my bday is 11/21. like i care anymore. i'm old. and bitter. blech.

How lame am I, then, for not even submitting yet the story that beat Americantypo?? Well in the past year I've been very slow in going back to my stories to revise them and send them out. Had too much on my hands. This winter though, sending tons of stuff out! I hope.

Anyway. Do you mean the "losers' bracket" is a constest separate from the winners' bracket? So those who lose don't go back into the main competition, but have one of their own? (I'm also very slow at understanding stuff). If you say the winner of WAR will be the one who never lost, that means the losers never catch up to the main competition? It's the WINNER and the winner, of WAR and war?

In response to wickedvoodoo, richard and utah's conversation a little earlier tonight,

I agree with you guys. For me personally, even deciding to take part in WAR was a huge leap forward in my writing career. I rarely show my work to anyone. Maybe I'm afraid it'll be ridiculed. That's why I want to improve and why I came here.

I haven't even submitted anything to the workshop yet, having just committed to a membership when WAR began. But I'm already thankful for the push WAR's given me to devote more time and more focus to my writing. And, I'm also thrilled at the kind of reception my story has gotten so far (though I won't say more than that, and that doesn't really give anything away.. right?)

All in all, just wanna say thank you to everyone for putting together this tournament. I know what writing can mean to someone and you should consider yourselves heroes for giving people a chance to shine.

So thanks again.

Too bad I got individual immunity. Blindside, bro. See you on the jury.

Happy Birthday Richard

I've been writing for only a year and, living in a non-anglophone country it's been amazing to have my stuff read by other people - motivational.  As to WAR, well I've never writtten to any sort of deadline and being given a week to produce something has been a real learning experience. Gawd! the burning shame I feel looking at what I submitted - completely unfinished, jarring work. Why? Because I didn't manage my time at all, didn't know how to. I have learned since. a bit.

I'd also like to take this opportunity to thank UTAH and Avery, I dont know how much of this site was created by them, but they're clearly the most responisble for maintaining the forum's.

Now for the compliants -first @[message redacted] and shove it up your [message redacted]. And as for [message redacted] you and your infantile habit of [message redacted again] well... it's just unnecessary and worse, unproductive.

And that's all I have to say about that.

Pint in hand - I salut you all. ;)