Ballot stuffing can take several forms, and all of them are against the rules of the Awards. We DO perform extensive security checks during the nomination and voting phases. We realize that free email addresses are easy to get. We don't rely only on email addresses to determine cheating.
Ballot stuffing wastes the time of the awards team and lowers the credibility of the winners. We operate a zero-tolerance policy. Anyone who participates in ballot stuffing will be forever banned from the awards. No appeal.
DON'T:
1. Vote several times using the same or different email addresses. You get one vote per person, not one vote per address you invent. One warm body with one head, two hands and two eyes = one vote.
2. Get several people together and send in votes for only one person. If you're not interested in the other stories in the area, don't vote. A small number of single-author votes will be permitted by the team, but too many will be considered ballot stuffing. Your friend will not thank you if you get him/her disqualified.
3. Ask your sister and all her friends and all their friends to vote for someone.
Campaigning is asking people to nominate or vote for specific works, whether they're yours or someone else's works. The "Do's" and "Don'ts" of campaigning are listed below.
DON'T:
1. Say "please vote for X", even in the context of letting people know something has been nominated
2. Directly solicit nominations and/or votes for any fan work
DO:
1. Post recommendations, including recommendations from the nomination's lists
2. Tell people about the Awards, including posting URLs to the awards' site
3. Let people know you have been nominated
4. Thank people for their support
5. Tell people which fan works you intend to vote for.
Any form of campaigning, whether it's asking friends and family to vote for you, posting to mailing lists, message boards livejournals, or anything else, will be considered cheating and anyone caught doing this will be disqualified from the Awards. Forever.
Please review the rules regarding eligibility requirements and ineligible works.
Ineligible Fiction, Title: A-M
Ineligible Fiction, Title: N-Z
1. We will only accept nominations from valid email addresses.
2. Fans may submit as many unique nominations for other authors/artists as they wish during the nomination phase. Duplicate nominations for the same work will be deleted. Flagrant violations may result in the deletion of all entries submitted.
3. Self-nominations are limited to five (5) entries per author or artist. You must declare that the entry is your own work on the nomination form. This information will be kept confidential. Not claiming a self-nomination is in violation of the awards rules and justification for losing the right to participate in the awards.
4. A category must have at least five (5) nominations in order to be in the awards. Categories may be combined at the discretion of the Awards Team to prevent deleting any works from the competition.
5. A sub-category must have at least five (5) nominations in order to be in the awards. Sub-categories may be combined at the discretion of the Awards Team to prevent deleting any works from the competition. If no reasonable combination is available, the sub-category will be deleted from the awards.
If you are an author or artist and prefer to not participate in these awards, please let us know.
Authors or artist may choose to exclude some or all of their works from the awards. Non-participating authors/artists names are strictly confidential. If a work that you nominated does not appear in the awards, please consider that the author/artist may have asked to have their work removed from the competition.
We will not remove co-authored stories without the consent of all of the authors involved.
1. Fans complete and submit nomination forms using valid email addresses. Entries must include the following information to be entered into the awards:
2. Nominator email addresses are verified.
3. Nominations from valid email addresses are stored in the awards database.
4. The Awards Team cross checks nominations for eligibility and removes entries that don't meet the requirements.
5. After nominations close, the Awards Team contact each author/artist by email for URL validation and awards category placement. Each author/artist will receive a username and password so they can access all their nominations. The author/artist will only be able to view his/her own nominations.
6. The author/artist must confirm their desire to participate in the awards by placing their nominations into the correct categories and sub-categories based on the category definitions. Failure to respond within the time frame allowed will result in forfeiting their nominations.
7. The Awards Team reviews all valid, author/artist confirmed nominations to ensure correct placement. Generally, the author/artist placement will stand unless there is disagreement about the work's main division. The team will discuss any movement of a nominated work within the main divisions or the categories with the author/artist.
8. The Awards Team determines the sub-categories for each category based on the number of entries within that category. Some combining of sub-categories may be required if the minimum number of entries isn't reached.
9. The Awards Team determines if any warnings are necessary for each entry based on the ratings or content (non-con).
10. The nominations phase is complete.
1. Nominations will be accepted via the online form only.
2. A valid nomination submission must include:
Please give the exact URL of the work, not the address of the archive.
If a work is available in several locations on the web, please specify the address of the larger archive. The author/artist may change the URL based on their personal preferences.
If at all possible, please give the author/artist's email address. We need this information to contact the author/artist regarding their nomination. If their email addresses is not available, then give the URL for the feedback form with the author/artist can be contacted.
If you are unable to locate either an email address or a contact form for the author/artist, we will do our best to track down this information. If we cannot contact them, we will delete your nomination.
Please select 'yes' if this is a self-nomination. This information is kept confidential but the team needs to know if the work is self-nominated to aid us with the nominating process.
3. The nomination form is infinitely expandable. Well, within reason. To add several nominations at one time, click the "Add More" button. You can also select "delete" by each row if you want to eliminate that row.
4. You will not have to figure out where the fan work needs to be placed. Just find your favorite fan works, and fill out the easy form. The author/artist will place the work for us. After all, they know best where their work should go.
5. You must check the "I have read the rules" box. Please read the rules first. Your nomination will not go forward unless you check that box.
6. When you are finished, click the "Review Nominations" button. A form validator will let you know if a required field is missing.
7. The next screen is a review of what you ve nominated. You can edit your nominations by clicking the "edit nominations" button. If you are happy with your nominations, press the "Submit Nominations" button.
8. You will receive a confirmation email to verify that you have used a valid email address. If your email is not valid, any nominations that you have submitted will be deleted without notification.
9. We strongly suggest that you print the "My Nominations" screen so you can keep track of what you have nominated. Submitting duplicate nominations for the same work may result in all of your nominations being deleted.
10. You may nominate as many times as you want to during the nomination period. Please remember that self-nominations are limited to five(5) total. You only need one nomination for the fan work to be included in the awards.
Next phase: Fan Judging
We will only accept enough donations to cover the awards site needs. We are a completely non-profit, volunteer-run organization.
