Jooster Stories as Birthday Gifts

[amethystaura.livejournal.com]

Tally ho! I have a suggestion about how this nifty little community can make its members' birthdays really memorable. Provided the moderators have no objection.

Birthday boys/girls: All those whose birthdays are coming up should each formulate a wishlist of the stories you crave as birthday gifts. Since disappointment is the last thing you want, these wishlists should be posted to the community at least a fortnight before your big day, so as to give other writers sufficient time to select the stories they wish to write, and then write them. And again, to avoid disappointment, try not to wish for stories you know can't be completed in two weeks. Your posts should be titled "All I Want for my Birthday is..."
Don't forget to state your birth date!!!

Writers: Select the story/stories you're willing to write. Since it's marvellous for someone to receive multiple gifts from many members of the community, please aim to fulfill as many requests as you can. You can even discuss among yourselves to decide who'll wite what. But stories must be written wholeheartedly and posted latest by a couple of days after the recipient's birthday. Promises should be kept, and you needn't be on someone's friends' list to write for them. In fact, you may even reply to the wishlist post, stating in the affirmative that you will write, and if you've decided, what you will wite. The recipient would then have something to look forward to. Your posts should be titled "Happy Birthday *recipient's screen name*".

Nobody will be allowed to judge or criticise a birthday boy/girl for the kind of stories he/she requests, provided they're essentially Jeeves and Wooster. And nobody will judge or criticise a writer for what he/she chooses to write. It's called birthday indulgence.

And please stick to titling your posts as directed. The reason is that many busy members only find time to check their e-mail notifications rather than actually visit the community to see what's new. So only the titles get their attention.

Lastly, nobody who posts his/her birthday wishlist in time (and stating the date) should go without atleast one story as a gift on his/her big day. We must ensure that.

So do you think that this is a good idea?

Comments

[amethystaura.livejournal.com]

PROBLEM 1: Disappointment at someone getting 40 stories & another getting too few.
SOLUTION 1: I think we should drop the idea of writing as many stories as there are years. It's a tempting prospect for some birthday recipients, but let's be frank, it's unfair to some others. Above all, writers struggle to finish writing stories they have already promised, let alone write such huge amounts of other stories. Goals will not be met. Unless they're drabbles, in which case it won't be too hard to give every birthday recipient a good number of drabbles. But then again it might lead to information overload.

PROBLEM 2: Limiting the no. of requests a birthday recipient can make.
SOLUTION: Let the birthday boy/girl pour out his/her heart. If you must impose a limit, make it something like 10 stories at the most. What I said was to try and write as many stories as possible, not all.

PROBLEM 3: Disparity in word limit, such as drabbles and epics.
SOLUTION: The standard is a story of 2000 to 5000 words. It may exceed that, or may fall short. If a birthday recipient requests something much longer, writers can flock together and write it as a joint enterprise, and not focus too much on the other requests. That way the possibility of it getting written is more, and the writers' burdens fall. We'll impose a restriction, such that if the recipients at all wants a story that exceeds 5000 words by a really wide margin (like something that has chapters), he/she can only issue one such request.

Anything else? Is someone willing to re-post the birthday announcement with these changes? And with a link to the original post?

[storyfan.livejournal.com]

How and where will we keep a list of birthday requests and the writers who take them on? The one problem I can foresee is when the birthday post drops behind the first Indeed Sir page (am I clear about that? I don't want to be confusing). And people are contributing so much now that the birthday post could get buried in less than a week. Some people might not see it unless they go back which I don't know if people always do (Right now this post is just 10 away from being pushed to the next page). That means newer writers and readers might not find out about the project. I know this because I only went back to the beginning of this comm just the other day and I've been a member for months. I usually just click on tags to find what I want.

Anyone besides me willing to write a fic for someone's birthday?

[amethystaura.livejournal.com]

Exactly, the information overload is something that most definitely pushes most posts into oblivion. You're right about the fact that many may not get to see this announcement, if they're the sort who don't scan the pages beyond the first in order to see if they've missed out on something. But then there have been many announcements in the past which have been viewed and welcomed by multitudes, such as the sex!fail challenge and other challenges from time to time. So I'm daring to hope...

I just hate the thought that an idea like this from which everyone may benefit, may sink into oblivion because little factors such as these.

[storyfan.livejournal.com]

Where would people sign up to give and/or receive? On this thread? I Haven't checked to see what's on it this morning, but so far people seem to like the idea. So far I'm the only who has signed up to write. It seems like there should be a spot to add your name to give and another to receive. A couple of LJ comms (I wish I could remember their names have this - slashfest maybe?) Perhaps this has to be hosted somewhere else and linked to Indeed Sir. But I'm not versed in how you do that.