Yahoo Forum Archive

These are the present categories as they stood from 2004

1. (Topic) Races & Places
a. Men
b. Elves
c. Hobbits
d. Orcs
e. Rohan
f. Numenor
2. (Topic) Genres
a. Humor
b. Adventure
c. Drama (includes Angst)
d. Romance
e. Horror
f. Mystery
g. Crossovers
3. (Topic) Time/Books
a. The Silmarillion
b. The Lord of the Rings
c. The Hobbit

Topics will stay the same: Races/Places, Genres, and Time/Books

So what are we going to do? Rethink some of them. Time/Books doesn't seem
very changeable, but there might be a genre that wasn't represented or one
that needn't be there. And we might want to reorganize Races/Places. Maybe
places are only subcategories that can become main categories with 20
stories (I went ahead and made that the minimum, making that decision
final.)

Let's start with suggestions to add and remove or combine. There will
probably be a lot of polls on this one unless it seems like unanimous
support here in the dis


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, "Ainaechoiriel" <mefaadmin@e...>
wrote:

> These are the present categories as they stood from 2004
>
> 1. (Topic) Races & Places
> a. Men
> b. Elves
> c. Hobbits

All good. As I mentioned before, I suggest we add Dwarves.

> d. Orcs

I agree with the suggestion that this should be changed to "Villains"
or something like that, to be more inclusive.

> e. Rohan
> f. Numenor

In the interest of fairness and simplicity, I think these should be
made into subcategories of Men.

Also, maybe consider adding a "Cross-cultural" category? For pieces
about interactions between different races?

> 2. (Topic) Genres
> a. Humor
> b. Adventure
> c. Drama (includes Angst)
> d. Romance

All good.

> e. Horror

I think we had a hard time making this viable, and many of the ones
nominated could have been nominated for Adventure or Drama. Maybe
drop this? (I am not a horror fan, so perhaps I don't see why this
distinction is so important.)

> f. Mystery

Good.

> g. Crossovers

Good, but we may need to decide whether pastiches are viable, or
whether there needs to be a real interaction between the two worlds.

I think the first prize winner for Crossover, Altariel's _A Christmas
Carol_ piece (sorry, I'm forgetting the exact title), was a pastiche
more than a genuine crossover.

Possible additions:
- Poetry
- Research Article
- Drabble
- Alternate Universe

> 3. (Topic) Time/Books
> a. The Silmarillion
> b. The Lord of the Rings
> c. The Hobbit
>

All good. I would suggest adding:

- Fourth Age and Beyond
- Movieverse

Also, maybe change the topic name from "Time/Books" to "Source
Material"?

Marta

Hello. I'd suggest having a 4th Age category somewhere. And could we
consider changing "Men" to "Humans?" Regards - Chathol-linn

-----Original Message-----
From: Marta [mailto:MartaL0712@netscape.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 1:54 AM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins


--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, "Ainaechoiriel" <mefaadmin@e...>
wrote:

> These are the present categories as they stood from 2004
>
> 1. (Topic) Races & Places
> a. Men
> b. Elves
> c. Hobbits

All good. As I mentioned before, I suggest we add Dwarves.

> d. Orcs

I agree with the suggestion that this should be changed to "Villains"
or something like that, to be more inclusive.

> e. Rohan
> f. Numenor

In the interest of fairness and simplicity, I think these should be
made into subcategories of Men.

Also, maybe consider adding a "Cross-cultural" category? For pieces
about interactions between different races?

> 2. (Topic) Genres
> a. Humor
> b. Adventure
> c. Drama (includes Angst)
> d. Romance

All good.

> e. Horror

I think we had a hard time making this viable, and many of the ones
nominated could have been nominated for Adventure or Drama. Maybe
drop this? (I am not a horror fan, so perhaps I don't see why this
distinction is so important.)

> f. Mystery

Good.

> g. Crossovers

Good, but we may need to decide whether pastiches are viable, or
whether there needs to be a real interaction between the two worlds.

I think the first prize winner for Crossover, Altariel's _A Christmas
Carol_ piece (sorry, I'm forgetting the exact title), was a pastiche
more than a genuine crossover.

Possible additions:
- Poetry
- Research Article
- Drabble
- Alternate Universe

> 3. (Topic) Time/Books
> a. The Silmarillion
> b. The Lord of the Rings
> c. The Hobbit
>

All good. I would suggest adding:

- Fourth Age and Beyond
- Movieverse

Also, maybe change the topic name from "Time/Books" to "Source
Material"?

Marta





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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm wrong someone (I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was the Race of Men. I know "Humans" is politically correct - but to keep it canonically correct, I think it is best to leave it as Men

Resha

Chathol-linn <chathollinn@comcast.net> wrote:
Hello. I'd suggest having a 4th Age category somewhere. And could we
consider changing "Men" to "Humans?" Regards - Chathol-linn



~To forgive calls upon our love, to forget calls upon our strength~

AIM: Naresha21 MSN: candyman_gypsy@hotmail.com
ICQ: 142117881 Yahoo: fruitcake5m1
Personal LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/nareshaninya/
Writing LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/writingsofresha/

My Website! Slash Me Happy
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http://quiz.ravenblack.net/blood.pl?biter=Resha

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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hello. It is a small departure from the canon, and so much more
inclusive. I hope we can consider using "Humans." Regards - Chathol-linn

-----Original Message-----
From: Naresha [mailto:north_shore_fruitcake@yahoo.com.au]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 9:48 AM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm wrong someone
(I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was the Race of Men. I
know "Humans" is politically correct - but to keep it canonically
correct, I think it is best to leave it as Men

Resha

Chathol-linn <chathollinn@comcast.net> wrote:
Hello. I'd suggest having a 4th Age category somewhere. And could we
consider changing "Men" to "Humans?" Regards - Chathol-linn



~To forgive calls upon our love, to forget calls upon our strength~

AIM: Naresha21 MSN: candyman_gypsy@hotmail.com
ICQ: 142117881 Yahoo: fruitcake5m1
Personal LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/nareshaninya/
Writing LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/writingsofresha/

My Website! Slash Me Happy
http://www.websamba.com/SlashMeHappy

http://quiz.ravenblack.net/blood.pl?biter=Resha

---------------------------------
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Phew! So I'm not imagining things! :-) Can I ask why you want to use Humans??? I have no issue with you suggesting it - please don't think that - I'm just wondering why, especially when the category is Races and the Race is Men. Unfortunately for us girls, political correctness wasn't really big in Tolkien's time! :-)


Chathol-linn <chathollinn@comcast.net> wrote:
Hello. It is a small departure from the canon, and so much more
inclusive. I hope we can consider using "Humans." Regards - Chathol-linn

-----Original Message-----
From: Naresha [mailto:north_shore_fruitcake@yahoo.com.au]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 9:48 AM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm wrong someone(I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was the Race of Men. I know "Humans" is politically correct - but to keep it canonically correct, I think it is best to leave it as Men

Resha


~To forgive calls upon our love, to forget calls upon our strength~

AIM: Naresha21 MSN: candyman_gypsy@hotmail.com
ICQ: 142117881 Yahoo: fruitcake5m1
Personal LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/nareshaninya/
Writing LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/writingsofresha/

My Website! Slash Me Happy
http://www.websamba.com/SlashMeHappy

http://quiz.ravenblack.net/blood.pl?biter=Resha

---------------------------------
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, Naresha
<north_shore_fruitcake@y...> wrote:

> The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm wrong

someone (I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was the Race
of Men. I know "Humans" is politically correct - but to keep it
canonically correct, I think it is best to leave it as Men

>
> Resha
>

Ah, but then we get into the fact that Eowyn was "no living man". :-)
I don't think Tolkien was very consistgent on the subject.

Personally, I prefer Men. If I read a fic where, for example, Aragorn
was referred to as a "King of Humans", I'd probably wince. It seems a
bit un-Tolkienish somehow. But I don't feel all that strongly about
this one.

Marta

Marta <MartaL0712@netscape.net> wrote:
--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, Naresha
<north_shore_fruitcake@y...> wrote:

> The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm wrong

someone (I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was the Race
of Men. I know "Humans" is politically correct - but to keep it
canonically correct, I think it is best to leave it as Men

>
> Resha
>

> Ah, but then we get into the fact that Eowyn was "no living man". > :-) I don't think Tolkien was very consistgent on the subject.

True... But it does seem like that exception is in the minority!!!

> Personally, I prefer Men. If I read a fic where, for example,
> Aragorn was referred to as a "King of Humans", I'd probably wince. > It seems a bit un-Tolkienish somehow. But I don't feel all that
> strongly about this one.

Same here. You're right - Humans just isn't a Tolkienish term! I don't reeeeeeally mind if it gets changed, but I really do feel that it is the Race of Men - that's what Tolkien set it down to be! We still hear the term Mankind! I don't see any reason to change it - plus it might add to the confusion - with people not understanding!

that's just my feeling on the subject.
Resha


~To forgive calls upon our love, to forget calls upon our strength~

AIM: Naresha21 MSN: candyman_gypsy@hotmail.com
ICQ: 142117881 Yahoo: fruitcake5m1
Personal LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/nareshaninya/
Writing LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/writingsofresha/

My Website! Slash Me Happy
http://www.websamba.com/SlashMeHappy

http://quiz.ravenblack.net/blood.pl?biter=Resha

---------------------------------
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, "Marta" <MartaL0712@n...> wrote:

>
> --- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, Naresha
> <north_shore_fruitcake@y...> wrote:
> > The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm wrong
> someone (I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was the Race
> of Men. I know "Humans" is politically correct - but to keep it
> canonically correct, I think it is best to leave it as Men
> >
> > Resha
> >
>
> Ah, but then we get into the fact that Eowyn was "no living man". :-)
> I don't think Tolkien was very consistgent on the subject.

The confusion between the two isn't accidental, of course, it's
deliberate and required or the Witch-king would've stayed the heck
away from any battlefield that Men fought on.

If we are very concerned that "Men" by itself is too exclusive, how
about "Race of Men", "Race of Elves", "Race of... [fill in blank]"?
Compromise by using Tolkien's names, but adding "race of" so that we
are clear that the term is being used collectively in the universal
sense of "mankind" rather than the narrower (and lower case) men=males?

If the Awards wish to remain accurate vis-à-vis Tolkien, then there's
very little to recommend "Humans". If the Awards wish to be more
accurate and inclusive according to contemporary standards, then
"humans" will work.

Dwim

> > > The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm

wrong > > someone (I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was
the Race > > of Men. I know "Humans" is politically correct - but
to keep it > > canonically correct, I think it is best to leave it as
Men> > > > > > Resha

> > > > >

<snipped>>> If we are very concerned that "Men" by itself is too
exclusive, how> about "Race of Men", "Race of Elves", "Race of...
[fill in blank]"?> Compromise by using Tolkien's names, but
adding "race of" so that we> are clear that the term is being used
collectively in the universal> sense of "mankind" rather than the
narrower (and lower case) men=males?

> > If the Awards wish to remain accurate vis-à-vis Tolkien, then

there's> very little to recommend "Humans". If the Awards wish to be
more> accurate and inclusive according to contemporary standards, then

> "humans" will work. > > Dwim

I never considered that "Men" didn't mean "Race of Mankind". I like
Dwim's suggestion to add "Race of..." to each of the Race categories.

Sulriel

> I never considered that "Men" didn't mean "Race of Mankind". I like
> Dwim's suggestion to add "Race of..." to each of the Race

categories.

>
> Sulriel

That compromise works for me as well.

Marta

Can you see the angels dancing on that pinhead?

Race of Men, Race of Elves, Race of Dwarves, Hobbits, and Ents. The Free PEOPLES of Middle-Earth. That's Tolkien, that's how it should be catagorized.

And there should be a separate catagory for AU, regardless of political correctness.

RubyG


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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

What about Race of Humankind? That works for me. Best regards -
Chathol-linn

-----Original Message-----
From: Marta [mailto:MartaL0712@netscape.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 1:42 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

> I never considered that "Men" didn't mean "Race of Mankind". I like
> Dwim's suggestion to add "Race of..." to each of the Race

categories.

>
> Sulriel

That compromise works for me as well.

Marta





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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hello. If one doesn't like "King of Humans" then no need to say it.

As for categories, I hope we will consider "Humans" as the category
instead of "Men." It is more inclusive. Best regards - Chathol-linn

-----Original Message-----
From: Naresha [mailto:north_shore_fruitcake@yahoo.com.au]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 11:46 AM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins


Marta <MartaL0712@netscape.net> wrote:
--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, Naresha
<north_shore_fruitcake@y...> wrote:

> The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm wrong

someone (I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was the Race
of Men. I know "Humans" is politically correct - but to keep it
canonically correct, I think it is best to leave it as Men

>
> Resha
>

> Ah, but then we get into the fact that Eowyn was "no living man". >

:-) I don't think Tolkien was very consistgent on the subject.


True... But it does seem like that exception is in the minority!!!

> Personally, I prefer Men. If I read a fic where, for example,
> Aragorn was referred to as a "King of Humans", I'd probably wince. >

It seems a bit un-Tolkienish somehow. But I don't feel all that

> strongly about this one.

Same here. You're right - Humans just isn't a Tolkienish term! I don't
reeeeeeally mind if it gets changed, but I really do feel that it is the
Race of Men - that's what Tolkien set it down to be! We still hear the
term Mankind! I don't see any reason to change it - plus it might add
to the confusion - with people not understanding!

that's just my feeling on the subject.
Resha


~To forgive calls upon our love, to forget calls upon our strength~

AIM: Naresha21 MSN: candyman_gypsy@hotmail.com
ICQ: 142117881 Yahoo: fruitcake5m1
Personal LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/nareshaninya/
Writing LJ: http://www.livejournal.com/users/writingsofresha/

My Website! Slash Me Happy
http://www.websamba.com/SlashMeHappy

http://quiz.ravenblack.net/blood.pl?biter=Resha

---------------------------------
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Okay, I usually read through everything and then reply to the short ones
first, but I wanted to jump right on this one.

It's going to stay Men. Because "Men" is what's used throughout LOTR.
Tolkien doesn't say "Humans" and he doesn't say "Race of Men" and "Race of
Elves" everywhere. Elves, Men and all free Peoples, etc.

Race of Men, etc., maybe conclusive but it's clunky as a title.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com




-----Original Message-----
From: sulriel [mailto:Sulriel@htcomp.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 11:30 AM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

> > > The only thing I have against that - and correct me if I'm

wrong > > someone (I'm not an expert by any means!) - is that it was the
Race > > of Men. I know "Humans" is politically correct - but to keep it >

> canonically correct, I think it is best to leave it as

Men> > > > > > Resha

> > > > >

<snipped>>> If we are very concerned that "Men" by itself is too exclusive,
how> about "Race of Men", "Race of Elves", "Race of...
[fill in blank]"?> Compromise by using Tolkien's names, but adding "race of"
so that we> are clear that the term is being used collectively in the
universal> sense of "mankind" rather than the narrower (and lower case)
men=males?

> > If the Awards wish to remain accurate vis-à-vis Tolkien, then

there's> very little to recommend "Humans". If the Awards wish to be
more> accurate and inclusive according to contemporary standards, then

> "humans" will work. > > Dwim

I never considered that "Men" didn't mean "Race of Mankind". I like Dwim's
suggestion to add "Race of..." to each of the Race categories.

Sulriel






Yahoo! Groups Links

I know that Free Peoples is a thought but it does limit us to just two
categories in Races/Places (if we make places graduated categories). What
about some other category title to put in other Free Peoples that aren't
already mentioned (Elves, Men and Hobbits will definitely be viable, I
think. Ents isn't so likely.)? Any ideas?

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com



-----Original Message-----
From: Amy Miller [mailto:amy_j12000@yahoo.com]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 4:22 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins


Can you see the angels dancing on that pinhead?

Race of Men, Race of Elves, Race of Dwarves, Hobbits, and Ents. The Free
PEOPLES of Middle-Earth. That's Tolkien, that's how it should be
catagorized.

And there should be a separate catagory for AU, regardless of political
correctness.

RubyG


---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
All your favorites on one personal page - Try My Yahoo!

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]




Yahoo! Groups Links

-----Original Message-----
From: Marta [mailto:MartaL0712@netscape.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 12:54 AM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins



--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, "Ainaechoiriel" <mefaadmin@e...>
wrote:

>In the interest of fairness and simplicity, I think these should be made

into subcategories of Men.

That's my idea for graduated categories.

>Also, maybe consider adding a "Cross-cultural" category? For pieces about

interactions between different races?

Good idea. It was a useful sub-category for LOTR last year. I've added it
to the database.

> 2. (Topic) Genres
> a. Humor

> e. Horror

>I think we had a hard time making this viable, and many of the ones

nominated could have been nominated for Adventure or Drama. Maybe drop this?
(I am not a horror fan, so perhaps I don't see why this distinction is so
important.)

This was more easily viable than Mystery. I'd see Mystery go before Horror.
Maybe they could be combined into something like Suspense?

> f. Mystery

>Good.

> g. Crossovers

>Good, but we may need to decide whether pastiches are viable, or whether

there needs to be a real interaction between the two worlds.

>I think the first prize winner for Crossover, Altariel's _A Christmas

Carol_ piece (sorry, I'm forgetting the exact title), was a pastiche more
than a genuine crossover.

Well, I don't know. First, you'd have to define pastiche. If not for your
example, I wouldn't have known what it was. And we did only have one story
like that last year so I doubt it would be viable. Is there a term that
covers both?

>Possible additions:

- Poetry

I still think I don't want that as a main.

>- Research Article

I doubt there would be enough to be viable.

>- Drabble

Same as poetry.

>- Alternate Universe

Not sure I like that as a main either. Should a Men/AU and a Men story be
separate? Couldn't they both compete together? They could both be quality
stories. And what about the delimmiting line between AU and non-AU? Some
are obvious. Some aren't. Take my story Immortal. It poses a conversation
between Merry and Legolas before Merry and Pippin die. It didn't happen in
the books. So it's AU. But it *could* have happened. Nothing in the
precludes it. It fits the timeline notations in the Appendices. So it's
not AU.

Is it, or isn't it?

And remember that authors are going to choose their categories. If an
author chooses her Men/AU story to be in Men, will that be allowed if there
is an AU category? Or do we let there be both and let the authors choose
which one they'll be in?

This one is in the database.

> 3. (Topic) Time/Books
> a. The Silmarillion
> b. The Lord of the Rings
> c. The Hobbit
>

All good. I would suggest adding:

- Fourth Age and Beyond
- Movieverse

>Also, maybe change the topic name from "Time/Books" to "Source Material"?

No, because it plays double-duty. Books should be obvious. But Time
because it provides a place for a story if you just can't find another
appropriate category. You can probably set it in time. Fourth-Age and
Beyond I could see would be a good addition, even though there isn't a Book
for it, so it can't play double-duty, but it does cover that other time
after LOTR.

And that brings up other perfect opportunities for graduated categories:
First Age, Second Age, etc.

As for movie-verse, we have the same issues as for Alternate Universe. If
we have it, do we allow authors of movie-verse stories to place their
stories elsewhere? Or what about those that combine book and movie? I do
that. Again, having it be the authors choice may make this a lot easier.
We could just have the availability of the category there and the author can
choose whether the story goes there or not. And if one isn't viable well
then, it's not viable.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com

Hello! What about "Men and Women" instead of just Men? And leave the
others as-is. No need of "The Race of." Regards - Chathol-linn

-----Original Message-----
From: Ainaechoiriel [mailto:mefaadmin@earthlink.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 8:32 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins

I know that Free Peoples is a thought but it does limit us to just two
categories in Races/Places (if we make places graduated categories).
What
about some other category title to put in other Free Peoples that aren't
already mentioned (Elves, Men and Hobbits will definitely be viable, I
think. Ents isn't so likely.)? Any ideas?

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said,
"for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com



-----Original Message-----
From: Amy Miller [mailto:amy_j12000@yahoo.com]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 4:22 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins


Can you see the angels dancing on that pinhead?

Race of Men, Race of Elves, Race of Dwarves, Hobbits, and Ents. The Free
PEOPLES of Middle-Earth. That's Tolkien, that's how it should be
catagorized.

And there should be a separate catagory for AU, regardless of political
correctness.

RubyG


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Oh, now! We don't say Hobbits and Hobbitesses, and we don't say Male Elves and Female Elves, and we don't say Dwarves and Dwarvettes. It simply isn't necessary. People *do* know when Men means " human" and men means "male", and it's very important that we not mess with that. It is after all, the reason that both Eowyn and Merry were needed to kill the Witch-king: Eowyn was a Man but not a man, and Merry was a man but not a Man. Let's not mess that up.
Dreamflower
(Barbara)

----- Original Message -----
From: Chathol-linn
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 9:40 PM
Subject: RE: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins


Hello! What about "Men and Women" instead of just Men? And leave the
others as-is. No need of "The Race of." Regards - Chathol-linn

-----Original Message-----
From: Ainaechoiriel [mailto:mefaadmin@earthlink.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 8:32 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins

I know that Free Peoples is a thought but it does limit us to just two
categories in Races/Places (if we make places graduated categories).
What
about some other category title to put in other Free Peoples that aren't
already mentioned (Elves, Men and Hobbits will definitely be viable, I
think. Ents isn't so likely.)? Any ideas?

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said,
"for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com



-----Original Message-----
From: Amy Miller [mailto:amy_j12000@yahoo.com]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 4:22 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins


Can you see the angels dancing on that pinhead?

Race of Men, Race of Elves, Race of Dwarves, Hobbits, and Ents. The Free
PEOPLES of Middle-Earth. That's Tolkien, that's how it should be
catagorized.

And there should be a separate catagory for AU, regardless of political
correctness.

RubyG


---------------------------------
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All your favorites on one personal page - Try My Yahoo!

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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

We won't. If this was just a general area, I'd be all for the PC of "human"
but this is about Tolkien and Middle-Earth and the term just wasn't used.
Men stood for all men and women of the human race. I'm not rewriting
Tolkien so I'm not changing this. Sorry, Chathol-linn, but this isn't about
being politically correct. Our theme is Tolkien and Middle-Earth. And just
as aelfwina said, Tolkien used just that very same play on words. No living
man. Well Eowyn wasn't a living man. Though she was of the race of Men.
It gave WK a false sense of security. He didn't plan on a woman being a
Man.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com



-----Original Message-----
From: aelfwina [mailto:aelfwina@cableone.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 10:01 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins


Oh, now! We don't say Hobbits and Hobbitesses, and we don't say Male Elves
and Female Elves, and we don't say Dwarves and Dwarvettes. It simply isn't
necessary. People *do* know when Men means " human" and men means "male",
and it's very important that we not mess with that. It is after all, the
reason that both Eowyn and Merry were needed to kill the Witch-king: Eowyn
was a Man but not a man, and Merry was a man but not a Man. Let's not mess
that up.
Dreamflower
(Barbara)

----- Original Message -----
From: Chathol-linn
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 9:40 PM
Subject: RE: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins


Hello! What about "Men and Women" instead of just Men? And leave the
others as-is. No need of "The Race of." Regards - Chathol-linn

-----Original Message-----
From: Ainaechoiriel [mailto:mefaadmin@earthlink.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 8:32 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins

I know that Free Peoples is a thought but it does limit us to just two
categories in Races/Places (if we make places graduated categories).
What
about some other category title to put in other Free Peoples that aren't
already mentioned (Elves, Men and Hobbits will definitely be viable, I
think. Ents isn't so likely.)? Any ideas?

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said,
"for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com



-----Original Message-----
From: Amy Miller [mailto:amy_j12000@yahoo.com]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 4:22 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [MEFAwards] Categories Post Mortem begins


Can you see the angels dancing on that pinhead?

Race of Men, Race of Elves, Race of Dwarves, Hobbits, and Ents. The Free
PEOPLES of Middle-Earth. That's Tolkien, that's how it should be
catagorized.

And there should be a separate catagory for AU, regardless of political
correctness.

RubyG


---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
All your favorites on one personal page - Try My Yahoo!

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]




Yahoo! Groups Links











_____

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* To visit your group on the web, go to:
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* To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
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Hi Ainae,

>> In the interest of fairness and simplicity, I think these should

be made

>>into subcategories of Men.

> That's my idea for graduated categories.

Perhaps I'm not understanding exactly what you mean by graduated
categories. If Gondor became a graduated subcategory, would it have
to have its own banners distinct from Men? Or could it use the same
banners, just as Men/Poetry or whatever? It seems keeping it as a
subcategory is just much simpler than making it its own category.

>> Also, maybe consider adding a "Cross-cultural" category? For

pieces about

>>interactions between different races?

> Good idea. It was a useful sub-category for LOTR last year. I've

added it

> to the database.

Which means we probably need to think of awards names at some point.
Gimli and Aragorn seem natural choices, as they symbolize inter-race
friendships to me. Maybe Fingon as well? (Or was it Finrod? The first
Elf to meet the Men in Beleriand.)

This brings up another issue that I've been going back and forth on.
The awards names are confusing! If you aren't involved in the MEFAs,
you probably do not know why Lothlorien is Elves/First and Imladris
is Elves/Second, or whatever. I've talked to probably five or so
people who share this opinion. I know it's anecdotal, but... I really
think we should consider having a theme for the different awards per
categories but calling them [Category]/[Ranking] instead of "The
Imladris Award" or whatever.

Is this at all negotiable?

>>>2. (Topic) Genres

<snip>

>>> e. Horror

>> I think we had a hard time making this viable, and many of the ones
>>nominated could have been nominated for Adventure or Drama. Maybe

drop this?

>>(I am not a horror fan, so perhaps I don't see why this distinction

is so

>>important.)

> This was more easily viable than Mystery. I'd see Mystery go before

Horror.

> Maybe they could be combined into something like Suspense?

Yes, that would work well. But if we do so we will need to define
what should be nominated in each category. More on this below.

<snip>

>>> g. Crossovers

>> Good, but we may need to decide whether pastiches are viable, or

whether

>>there needs to be a real interaction between the two worlds.

<snip example>

> Well, I don't know. First, you'd have to define pastiche.

For me, a pastiche is a piece written in the style of another - for
example, Dwim's "The Hamster". A crossover is a piece that has
characters from two worlds interacting, or has some connection beyond
simply style. Fileg & Flick's "Rogers & Hammerstein" crossover is a
good example of this -- you have elements of Rogers & Hammerstein,
but also Lord of the Rings.

I think both can fit in this category. I certainly wouldn't recommend
creating a main "Pastiche" category (though I suppose it could
conceivably be its own subcategory of Crossover).

I think we really need a category guide on the website. Describe what
the different categories represent, so people know where a piece
might best fit. Something similar to the one for the Mithril Awards
(http://www.viragene.com/tolkien/categories.html). And yes, I'm
volunteering to write this if you're interested.

<snip>

>> Possible additions:
>>- Poetry
> I still don't want that as a main.

<rearranging>

>> - Drabble
> Same as poetry.

I'm afraid I don't see why. Can you explain your reasoning? They
certainly take a distinct skill and are as much a distinct genre as
any of the other categories. It takes a very distinct skill to first
find a story that can be told in a hundred words, and second to
successfully create a story arc in that amount. Yes, you're often
only telling a moment, but it still has to set the stage, present a
conflict, and resolve it, all in a very few number of words. Also,
remember this year that all of the HASA birthday drabbles will be
publicly accessible because the challenge closed on the 31st.

Poetry is even more a specialized genre, with its own distinct words.
Often the poems I nominated I loved more because of their mastery of
the form and their genius as poetry, rather than because they were
good drama or told a scene from LotR. The category they were
nominated in was secondary to the fact that they were poetry. Also,
remember how small some of the poetry categories were.

These are two things I write. I think you mentioned in your comments
that you weren't really interested in, and also that you didn't
really write poetry. I don't mean this as a criticism of you - but is
it possible you don't see the distinctions as well as people who do
write these forms? (I know I have this problem with genres I don't
write or usually read.)

>> - Research Article

> I doubt there would be enough to be viable.

As I stated when I first suggested this in the original post-mort, I
personally can nominate enough. Some are only available on the
members-only side of HASA, but if you'll allow this category, I will
offer these authors hosting space on my own personal site. Even
without that, I can think of at least eight essays offhand that I
would like to see nominated.

>> - Alternate Universe

> Not sure I like that as a main either. Should a Men/AU and a Men

story be

> separate? Couldn't they both compete together?

Sure - just as a story about Elves in the Elves category could
conceivably compete with a story about Elves in the Silmarillion
category or the Drama category. It's up to the nominator (or the
author) to decide whether they think it works best as a genre piece,
a race piece, or a time/books piece.

> They could both be quality
> stories. And what about the delimmiting line between AU and non-

AU? Some

> are obvious. Some aren't. Take my story Immortal. It poses a

conversation

> between Merry and Legolas before Merry and Pippin die. It didn't

happen in

> the books. So it's AU. But it *could* have happened. Nothing in

the

> precludes it. It fits the timeline notations in the Appendices.

So it's

> not AU.

No, that's not AU. AU (at least in my opinion) is a story where
Tolkien (or whatever canon - PJ's scriptwriters in movieverse, I
guess) say something happened some way but the author decides to take
it another way. Gollum dies escaping Mirkwood. Merry & Pippin are
recaptured by the uruk-hai. Denethor lives. Frodo dies in Mordor.
Frodo doesn't sail West with Elrond & Co. Elrond decides to not let
Pippin go on the Quest after all. Aragorn marries Finduilas or Eowyn.
You name it -- these are all scenarios that Tolkien explicitly said
didn't happen. Very different from a gapfiller, or a scenario that
Tolkien didn't say happen but could have.

> And remember that authors are going to choose their categories. If

an

> author chooses her Men/AU story to be in Men, will that be allowed

if there

> is an AU category? Or do we let there be both and let the authors

choose

> which one they'll be in?

I go with the latter. We didn't have any problem with
Elves/Silmarillion on top of the Silmarillion category, did we? I
don't see why this has to be any difference. If the author thinks her
story is primarily about Men and secondarily AU, then he or she can
choose to put it in Men/AU. If it's primarily an AU, they might
choose to put it in AU.

<snip>

>> Also, maybe change the topic name from "Time/Books" to "Source

Material"?

> No, because it plays double-duty. Books should be obvious. But

Time

> because it provides a place for a story if you just can't find

another

> appropriate category. You can probably set it in time. Fourth-Age

and

> Beyond I could see would be a good addition, even though there

isn't a Book

> for it, so it can't play double-duty, but it does cover that other

time

> after LOTR.

Fair enough. I can see why you need to include Time. But if we
include movieverse, I think we maybe need to have it
as "Time/Source"? Because the movies are not a book.

Re: Fourth Age - I do think it's important that this includes *and
Beyond*. Case in point - I recently started a story about Tom
Bombadil teaching St. Patrick his song he used to drive the snakes
from Ireland. This would most likely be post-Fourth Age (Sixth Age, I
guess? Or seventh?) but certainly fits under "and beyond".

> And that brings up other perfect opportunities for graduated

categories:

> First Age, Second Age, etc.

Yes, that would be good. I'm not sure how you could phrase this, but
if you go this way, you might want to draw a distinction between Ring
War-era (or possibly post-Quest for Erebor (post-TA 2941?)) and
events that happened earlier in the Third Age. Maybe combine it with
Second Age?

This can be hashed out later, though.

> As for movie-verse, we have the same issues as for Alternate

Universe. If

> we have it, do we allow authors of movie-verse stories to place

their

> stories elsewhere?

Sure. We allow stories set in The Hobbit to also be nominated for
Drama, or whatever.

> Or what about those that combine book and movie? I do
> that.

And you're not the only one. I think it would be the authors' call.
It's certainly *eligible* for movieverse, but if the authors think it
fits better elsewhere, that's fine, too. This isn't an effort to
relegate movieverse or hybrid stories to one category - but instead
to give movieverse gapfillers and similar stories a place to compete
against each other.

> Again, having it be the authors choice may make this a lot easier.

About this - I'm confused on one thing. Does the nominator suggest
categories and the author chooses whether those are acceptable (or
possibly suggest their own)? Or do we just say to the authors "Story
[X] has been nominated, a list of categories is available at URL [Y],
where do you want it to compete?"

I say nominators should make suggestions that are passed along to the
authors, and then authors can accept those suggestions or make their
own. This does two things:

1. If a category proves nonviable, we have backups without going back
to the author for further suggestions.
2. Nominators are probably more involved in the awards than authors.
So they know the categories already. This saves authors from having
to read through the categories and decide where their story best fits.

> We could just have the availability of the category there and the

author can

> choose whether the story goes there or not. And if one isn't

viable well

> then, it's not viable.

Yes, that seems like a good plan.

Marta

-----Original Message-----
From: Marta [mailto:MartaL0712@netscape.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 11:40 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

>Perhaps I'm not understanding exactly what you mean by graduated

categories. If Gondor became a graduated subcategory, would it have to have
its own banners distinct from Men?

Yes.

>Or could it use the same banners, just as Men/Poetry or whatever? It seems

keeping it as a subcategory is just much simpler than making it its own
category.

No, it would not longer be a subcategory under Men. It would be a main
category under Races/Places and may even have viable subcategories of its
own.

>> Also, maybe consider adding a "Cross-cultural" category? For

pieces about

>>interactions between different races?

> Good idea. It was a useful sub-category for LOTR last year. I've

added it

> to the database.

>Which means we probably need to think of awards names at some point.

Gimli and Aragorn seem natural choices, as they symbolize inter-race
friendships to me. Maybe Fingon as well? (Or was it Finrod? The first Elf to
meet the Men in Beleriand.)

Yes, we'll need to think up some award names if this is decided to be a new
category. Right now I's just a suggestion.

>This brings up another issue that I've been going back and forth on.

The awards names are confusing! If you aren't involved in the MEFAs, you
probably do not know why Lothlorien is Elves/First and Imladris is
Elves/Second, or whatever. I've talked to probably five or so people who
share this opinion. I know it's anecdotal, but... I really think we should
consider having a theme for the different awards per categories but calling
them [Category]/[Ranking] instead of "The Imladris Award" or whatever.

>Is this at all negotiable?

No. And to which I say, "too bad." Sorry, but that's that. We added the
bars under the banners so someone seeing my Witch King award would know it
was for 3rd place in the Horror Author category. MEFA doesn't mean much
when it's just the letters either. It doesn't take much investigation
however to find out what it means. With the bars on the bottom of the
banners, it's even easier to tell what the Witch King Award stands for. You
don't even have to click.

Look, I said this before when I first started these awards, I couldn't come
up with a good gimicky name for the overall awards, like the Mithrils or the
One Rings because all the ones I thought up were already taken. So I came
up with separate awards titles for each of the awards. That's the fun part
for me. I don't begrudge my Best DS9 General Story 1998 award because it
has a generic name, but it is rather boring. When discussion came up at ASC
to come up with a name for the awards (like ASCEM has the Golden O's), I
suggested the ASCIIs. It made sense. ASC is in ASCII and the format of the
newsgroup is ASCII. But we ended up sticking with neither. It's still a
great awards schema but it's a bit boring.

I wanted these to not be boring. As long as I'm admining them, there will be
awards titles. Someday when I hand this off, it will be up to the new admin
to see what changes will be made. Or I might decide this is like the
comment-based system and non-changeable.

I can try and write up something more in the Q & A (soon to be renamed the
FAQ) to try and help with the confusion, but there will be awards titles.
Period.

> This was more easily viable than Mystery. I'd see Mystery go before

Horror.

> Maybe they could be combined into something like Suspense?

>Yes, that would work well. But if we do so we will need to define what

should be nominated in each category. More on this below.

Well, what do you think of when we say "suspense" stories?

>I think we really need a category guide on the website. Describe what the

different categories represent, so people know where a piece might best fit.
Something similar to the one for the Mithril Awards
(http://www.viragene.com/tolkien/categories.html). And yes, I'm volunteering
to write this if you're interested.

Okay, but I do feel we're setting the bar rather low. I tend to believe
people are fairly intelligent. They'd know a Romance from a Suspense from a
Crossover from a Drama from a Humor.

><snip>
>> Possible additions:
>>- Poetry
> I still don't want that as a main.

<rearranging>

>> - Drabble
> Same as poetry.

>I'm afraid I don't see why. Can you explain your reasoning?

Not always. We went through this a LOT back in the early days of the post
mortem. Being that I hate research (and going through all those posts sure
feels like research) and repeating myself, and I have an unreliable memory,
I'm rather loathe to try at this point.

> They certainly take a distinct skill and are as much a distinct genre as

any of the other categories.

Yes, and that's why they are separate for author categories. Not every story
writer can be a poet. But I don't want ten thousand Poetry subcategories.
What I mean is I don't want Poetry/Men, Poetry/Romance, Poetry/Elves,
Poetry/Drama. With Poetry/Author/Elves, Poetry/Author/Men. Do you see the
problem there? And they all get the same awards titles and banners. Yuck.

> It takes a very distinct skill to first find a story that can be told in a

hundred words, and second to successfully create a story arc in that amount.
Yes, you're often only telling a moment, but it still has to set the stage,
present a conflict, and resolve it, all in a very few number of words. Also,
remember this year that all of the HASA birthday drabbles will be publicly
accessible because the challenge closed on the 31st.

Yes, but they are still dramatic drabbles or Elves drabbles or humorous
drabbles. They are still stories the product of an author. They are not
their own genre. They are a format.

>Poetry is even more a specialized genre, with its own distinct words.

Again, it's a format, not a genre. Drama is a genre. Poetry is a format.

>Often the poems I nominated I loved more because of their mastery of the

form and their genius as poetry, rather than because they were good drama or
told a scene from LotR. The category they were nominated in was secondary to
the fact that they were poetry. Also, remember how small some of the poetry
categories were.

The author gets to choose the category so an author can decide where they
will compete.

>These are two things I write. I think you mentioned in your comments that

you weren't really interested in, and also that you didn't really write
poetry. I don't mean this as a criticism of you - but is it possible you
don't see the distinctions as well as people who do write these forms? (I
know I have this problem with genres I don't write or usually read.)

I don't understand this. Aphasia stepping in. I did get some of it. I do
write poetry. I don't write it formally. I don't write sonnets or whatevers.
But I have written some poetry and probably will in the future. You can
read it at HASA if you like. Several of the poems are in my forum.

>> - Research Article

> I doubt there would be enough to be viable.

>As I stated when I first suggested this in the original post-mort, I

personally can nominate enough. Some are only available on the members-only
side of HASA, but if you'll allow this category, I will offer these authors
hosting space on my own personal site. Even without that, I can think of at
least eight essays offhand that I would like to see nominated.

Then we can put it to a poll. But yes, those research articles would have
to posted on a public (not members-only) site BEFORE Nomination Season
starts. Not after.

>> - Alternate Universe

> Not sure I like that as a main either. Should a Men/AU and a Men

story be

> separate? Couldn't they both compete together?

>Sure - just as a story about Elves in the Elves category could conceivably

compete with a story about Elves in the Silmarillion category or the Drama
category. It's up to the nominator (or the
author) to decide whether they think it works best as a genre piece, a race
piece, or a time/books piece.

Yes, I think as I write and I did get to that. They could both be available
and then the author could decide. We'd have to make our note to the authors
a lot longer though. "Think about your story. It could fit into more than
one category, so please look over the list entirely before making your
decision as each story can only compete in one category."

> They could both be quality
> stories. And what about the delimmiting line between AU and non-

AU? Some

> are obvious. Some aren't. Take my story Immortal. It poses a

conversation

> between Merry and Legolas before Merry and Pippin die. It didn't

happen in

> the books. So it's AU. But it *could* have happened. Nothing in

the

> precludes it. It fits the timeline notations in the Appendices.

So it's

> not AU.

>No, that's not AU. AU (at least in my opinion) is a story where Tolkien (or

whatever canon - PJ's scriptwriters in movieverse, I
guess) say something happened some way but the author decides to take it
another way. Gollum dies escaping Mirkwood. Merry & Pippin are recaptured by
the uruk-hai. Denethor lives. Frodo dies in Mordor.
Frodo doesn't sail West with Elrond & Co. Elrond decides to not let Pippin
go on the Quest after all. Aragorn marries Finduilas or Eowyn.
You name it -- these are all scenarios that Tolkien explicitly said didn't
happen. Very different from a gapfiller, or a scenario that Tolkien didn't
say happen but could have.

That could be your opinion. Personally, I don't find it AU, but some might.
Some are easy to spot, I'll grant you. Dwim's LDID, every Mary Sue fic ever
written.... But some are slippery.

> And remember that authors are going to choose their categories. If

an

> author chooses her Men/AU story to be in Men, will that be allowed

if there

> is an AU category? Or do we let there be both and let the authors

choose

> which one they'll be in?

>I go with the latter. We didn't have any problem with Elves/Silmarillion on

top of the Silmarillion category, did we? I don't see why this has to be any
difference. If the author thinks her story is primarily about Men and
secondarily AU, then he or she can choose to put it in Men/AU. If it's
primarily an AU, they might choose to put it in AU.

Yeah, that's what I came around to.

<snip>

>> Also, maybe change the topic name from "Time/Books" to "Source

Material"?

> No, because it plays double-duty. Books should be obvious. But

Time

> because it provides a place for a story if you just can't find

another

> appropriate category. You can probably set it in time. Fourth-Age

and

> Beyond I could see would be a good addition, even though there

isn't a Book

> for it, so it can't play double-duty, but it does cover that other

time

> after LOTR.

>Fair enough. I can see why you need to include Time. But if we

include movieverse, I think we maybe need to have it
as "Time/Source"? Because the movies are not a book.

Nobody said we're going with Movie-verse yet. It's still just a suggestion.

>Re: Fourth Age - I do think it's important that this includes *and

Beyond*. Case in point - I recently started a story about Tom
Bombadil teaching St. Patrick his song he used to drive the snakes
from Ireland. This would most likely be post-Fourth Age (Sixth Age, I
guess? Or seventh?) but certainly fits under "and beyond".

I agree and I do think it needs to be in there.

> And that brings up other perfect opportunities for graduated

categories:

> First Age, Second Age, etc.

>Yes, that would be good. I'm not sure how you could phrase this, but

if you go this way, you might want to draw a distinction between Ring
War-era (or possibly post-Quest for Erebor (post-TA 2941?)) and
events that happened earlier in the Third Age. Maybe combine it with
Second Age?

Depends. I see it as Second Age graduates because it has 20 stories. It now
becomes a main category under the topic of Time/Books. It has it's own
subcategories: 7 stories fall under Pre-Last Alliance and 13 others are just
floating about nebulously in the Second Age.

That's how it would work. Subcategories would still have to be viable. But
this would save us from having Silmarillion/Second Age/Pre-Last Alliance. I
don't want sub-subcategories.

>This can be hashed out later, though.

> As for movie-verse, we have the same issues as for Alternate

Universe. If

> we have it, do we allow authors of movie-verse stories to place

their

> stories elsewhere?

>Sure. We allow stories set in The Hobbit to also be nominated for

Drama, or whatever.

Okay that could be doable, but what about the splices....

> Or what about those that combine book and movie? I do
> that.

>And you're not the only one. I think it would be the authors' call.

It's certainly *eligible* for movieverse, but if the authors think it
fits better elsewhere, that's fine, too. This isn't an effort to
relegate movieverse or hybrid stories to one category - but instead
to give movieverse gapfillers and similar stories a place to compete
against each other.

And if it ends up unviable?

> Again, having it be the authors choice may make this a lot easier.

>About this - I'm confused on one thing. Does the nominator suggest

categories and the author chooses whether those are acceptable (or
possibly suggest their own)? Or do we just say to the authors "Story
[X] has been nominated, a list of categories is available at URL [Y],
where do you want it to compete?"

The latter, and they'll make three choices just like we did when we
nominated in 2004.

>I say nominators should make suggestions that are passed along to the

authors, and then authors can accept those suggestions or make their
own. This does two things:

>1. If a category proves nonviable, we have backups without going back

to the author for further suggestions.

We'd go to their 2nd choice.

>2. Nominators are probably more involved in the awards than authors.

So they know the categories already. This saves authors from having
to read through the categories and decide where their story best fits.

Perhaps, but authors know their stories best. And since stories can fit
into more than one category, the author should rightly be the one to decide
where they will compete.

> We could just have the availability of the category there and the

author can

> choose whether the story goes there or not. And if one isn't

viable well

> then, it's not viable.

>Yes, that seems like a good plan.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com









Yahoo! Groups Links

Marta wrote:

> > e. Rohan
> > f. Numenor
>
> In the interest of fairness and simplicity, I think these should be
> made into subcategories of Men.
>
> Also, maybe consider adding a "Cross-cultural" category? For pieces
> about interactions between different races?

I agree to both,
1) subsume Rohan and Numenor into Men
2) Cross-cultural for stories showing evenly various Races

(for me the Men of Middle Earth are NOT humans of our earth,
therefore I do not think that we should use Race of Humans
(answer to Cathol-Linn),
Men means mortals with a varying lifespan (up to 500 years),
while Elves might live as long Middle-Earth exists)

> > e. Horror
>
> I think we had a hard time making this viable, and many of the ones
> nominated could have been nominated for Adventure or Drama. Maybe
> drop this? (I am not a horror fan, so perhaps I don't see why this
> distinction is so important.)

I think this should be still a separate category, because terror and torture
IMO does not belong into Adventure and Drama.
But Horror was somehow the wrong name of this category this year.

But maybe one could make a subcategory in Drama for such a
kind of stories which describe the terror and extinction of the
protagonists.

> Possible additions:
> - Poetry
> - Research Article
> - Drabble
> - Alternate Universe

I support definitely Research Article, but also the other
proposed categories.

> > 3. (Topic) Time/Books
> > a. The Silmarillion
> > b. The Lord of the Rings
> > c. The Hobbit
> >
>
> All good. I would suggest adding:
>
> - Fourth Age and Beyond
> - Movieverse

I agree to that.

>
> Also, maybe change the topic name from "Time/Books" to "Source
> Material"?

Agree here also.

Elanor

And the other thing is - the category is Races and Places! It implies that it is "The Race of..." at least to me! :-)

Resha


Ainaechoiriel <mefaadmin@earthlink.net> wrote:
Okay, I usually read through everything and then reply to the short ones first, but I wanted to jump right on this one.

It's going to stay Men. Because "Men" is what's used throughout LOTR. Tolkien doesn't say "Humans" and he doesn't say "Race of Men" and "Race of Elves" everywhere. Elves, Men and all free Peoples, etc.

Race of Men, etc., maybe conclusive but it's clunky as a title.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder


~To forgive calls upon our love, to forget calls upon our strength~

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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

> > This was more easily viable than Mystery. I'd see Mystery go before
> Horror.
> > Maybe they could be combined into something like Suspense?
>
> >Yes, that would work well. But if we do so we will need to define what
> should be nominated in each category. More on this below.
>
> Well, what do you think of when we say "suspense" stories?

I think I'd rather see both Horror and Mystery *offered* as categories
to authors whose works are nominated. *If* they fail to meet the 8x2
requirement, then move them to different categories or perhaps make
"Mystery" a subcategory of Drama and Horror a subcategory of Action.
Horror seems to be very physical, very visceral to me--so it fits in
my conceptual schema with Action Adventure, while Mystery, because it
focuses more on problem-solving and relations, fits more naturally
with Drama.

The reason I suggest this rather than the new conglomerate category of
"Suspense" is that I do see a distinction between Mystery and Horror.
Horror is supposed to scare you or repulse you--to incite horror, in
other words. Suspense *may* be used to do this, but it isn't
necessary, either. Take "Pippin's Crucible"--that was pretty horrific
in its descriptions--warm red puddles on the ground, staring dead
eyes, desire to cut off feet, etc. It could've run as horror if the
author had wanted, I think. But it isn't a mystery story. Mysteries
are puzzles--the point isn't necessarily to frighten, but to present
pieces of a problem, and see how the characters go about figuring out
how to put them together and then solve the problem. That, to me, is a
different set of writing skills from Horror. I can do horrific; I
cannot do mysterious because I tend to get lost in my own attempts to
be clever.

<snip>

>
> Not always. We went through this a LOT back in the early days of

the post

> mortem. Being that I hate research (and going through all those

posts sure

> feels like research) and repeating myself, and I have an unreliable

memory,

> I'm rather loathe to try at this point.
>
> > They certainly take a distinct skill and are as much a distinct

genre as

> any of the other categories.
>
> Yes, and that's why they are separate for author categories. Not

every story

> writer can be a poet. But I don't want ten thousand Poetry

subcategories.

> What I mean is I don't want Poetry/Men, Poetry/Romance, Poetry/Elves,
> Poetry/Drama. With Poetry/Author/Elves, Poetry/Author/Men. Do you

see the

> problem there? And they all get the same awards titles and banners.

Yuck.

I think the trouble we're having here is that we have two competing
categorization standards.

There seem to be two bases on which to make a category or subcategory:

1) Content-based differentiation--we don't want to judge hobbits
against elves against men, and so on and so forth, because it takes a
certain kind of eye to capture the feel of these different races.

2) A distinctly different skill needed to write a particular kind of
work (I cite horror, as per my argument above, and also mystery,
drabbles, poetry).

Ultimately, two is the more basic argument that grounds (1)--it's just
a general statement, which is applied specifically in (1). So for me,
ultimately, the second criterion is the court of final appeal.

What I think we have here is a conflict internal to criterion 2, then:
that certain categories that should be approved if we appeal only to
criterion 2 in terms of broad skill sets can also be disqualified as
categories, also by appeal to criterion 2 in the guise of (1).

So the argument (I think) is that there would be such differentiation
in terms of *content* among poems (a category argued to be justified
by criterion 2) that the whole category would consist of nothing but
highly specialized categories (criterion 2 at work again in the guise
of (1)--it takes different skills to write poetry that sounds hobbity
or that deals with hobbit-specific events/ways of life, etc., from
those it takes to write about Elf-centric events, etc.).

The implied conclusion is that such a degree of specialization would
make competition far too narrow to be meaningful, either to the
competitors or to the general fandom readers.

In this case, I think it is arbitrary that Poetry isn't a category in
its own right. It could be, very easily, and there would simply be one
fewer subcategory within several major categories. It would have its
own subcategories, yes, but all we would need are three award names
and a subcategorial schema that is more broad than content-based
distinctions can draw (so avoid (1)). However, since it worked out
well enough to put poems under other categories as subcategories,
inertia will provide its own argument for keeping them there.

Poetry is certainly a law unto itself in terms of writing--the
format/genre distinction is not, I think, clearly viable. What is a
genre but a particular way or format for telling about a certain
event, after all?

Given all this, my suggestion would be to decide whether (2) or (1)
should prevail when it comes to setting up new categories and then act
accordingly and consistently until some unmanageable problem forces a
reevaluation. (The same argument can be made for drabbles, btw.)


Gotta go move siblings back into dorms.

TTFN,

Dwim

--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, "Ainaechoiriel" <mefaadmin@e...>
wrote:

> >I think we really need a category guide on the website. Describe

what the

> different categories represent, so people know where a piece might

best fit.

> Something similar to the one for the Mithril Awards
> (http://www.viragene.com/tolkien/categories.html). And yes, I'm

volunteering

> to write this if you're interested.
>
> Okay, but I do feel we're setting the bar rather low. I tend to

believe

> people are fairly intelligent. They'd know a Romance from a

Suspense from a

> Crossover from a Drama from a Humor.

I'd second the suggestion for a category guide. I don't think it is
always clear where a piece belongs, particularly because different
sites categorise differently. I got a second for drama for 'To Sing
of War' so presumably it did fit into the MEFA's classification of
drama, but over at HASA it is listed as General because none of my
stuff fits into their drama classification, just to give an example
of where confusion might arise.

Avon

-----Original Message-----
From: avonaus [mailto:avonaus@yahoo.com]
Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 3:02 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins



--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, "Ainaechoiriel" <mefaadmin@e...>

>
> Okay, but I do feel we're setting the bar rather low. I tend to

believe

> people are fairly intelligent. They'd know a Romance from a

Suspense from a

> Crossover from a Drama from a Humor.

>I'd second the suggestion for a category guide. I don't think it is always

clear where a piece belongs, particularly because different sites categorise
differently. I got a second for drama for 'To Sing of War' so presumably it
did fit into the MEFA's classification of drama, but over at HASA it is
listed as General because none of my stuff fits into their drama
classification, just to give an example of where confusion might arise.

Yes, but where would you put it, if you were in charge of putting it into a
category. And that's what we're going to do in 2005. Let the author
choose. We're leaving length up to authors, with only suggestions. They
don't have to stick with them. Do we then need to spell out genres?

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com

Nothing personal, Dwim, but I have a very hard time reading your posts
sometimes. Aphasia + long sentences don't mix well. I'll try though.

-----Original Message-----
From: dwimmer_laik [mailto:dwimmer_laik@yahoo.com]
Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 1:45 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

> Well, what do you think of when we say "suspense" stories?

>I think I'd rather see both Horror and Mystery *offered* as categories to

authors whose works are nominated. *If* they fail to meet the 8x2
requirement, then move them to different categories or perhaps make
"Mystery" a subcategory of Drama and Horror a subcategory of Action.

The only problem with that is they we decided to stay with 5 X 2 and a
viable subcatgory has the same requirement as a category: 5 x 2. So if it
wasn't viable as a category, it wouldn't be viable as a subcategory either.

>Horror seems to be very physical, very visceral to me--so it fits in my

conceptual schema with Action Adventure, while Mystery, because it focuses
more on problem-solving and relations, fits more naturally with Drama.

>The reason I suggest this rather than the new conglomerate category of

"Suspense" is that I do see a distinction between Mystery and Horror.
Horror is supposed to scare you or repulse you--to incite horror, in other
words. Suspense *may* be used to do this, but it isn't necessary, either.
Take "Pippin's Crucible"--that was pretty horrific in its descriptions--warm
red puddles on the ground, staring dead eyes, desire to cut off feet, etc.
It could've run as horror if the author had wanted, I think. But it isn't a
mystery story. Mysteries are puzzles--the point isn't necessarily to
frighten, but to present pieces of a problem, and see how the characters go
about figuring out how to put them together and then solve the problem.
That, to me, is a different set of writing skills from Horror. I can do
horrific; I cannot do mysterious because I tend to get lost in my own
attempts to be clever.

I agree that Horror and Mystery are different, but I do think both have an
aspect of suspense. We don't know what horrors await us around the corner or
we don't know where the mystery lead. But perhaps there is some other term
that might encompass both?

>I think the trouble we're having here is that we have two competing

categorization standards.

>There seem to be two bases on which to make a category or subcategory:

>1) Content-based differentiation--we don't want to judge hobbits against

elves against men, and so on and so forth, because it takes a certain kind
of eye to capture the feel of these different races.

If by this you mean content as opposed to format, then yes, this is where I
come from.

>2) A distinctly different skill needed to write a particular kind of work

(I cite horror, as per my argument above, and also mystery, drabbles,
poetry).

For me, this is a case for author comments, not stories. In reviewing a
story you aren't reviewing so much skill. A story has no skill. In
reviewing an author, you review skill to craft that story. During a review
of a story, the skill of the author may come into the discussion. But that
is still meat more for author comments than story comments. And so this is
a better place for subcategories than categories.

>Ultimately, two is the more basic argument that grounds (1)--it's just a

general statement, which is applied specifically in (1). So for me,
ultimately, the second criterion is the court of final appeal.

Oh, I think when we get down to calling on distinctly different skill sets
we're going to see a lot of different opinions as to what those skill sets
are. It's more subjective than criterion 1. Is it about Elves. Yep. Then
it's Elves. Content can be judged rather easily.

>What I think we have here is a conflict internal to criterion 2, then:

that certain categories that should be approved if we appeal only to
criterion 2 in terms of broad skill sets can also be disqualified as
categories, also by appeal to criterion 2 in the guise of (1).

You lost me.

>So the argument (I think) is that there would be such differentiation in

terms of *content* among poems (a category argued to be justified by
criterion 2) that the whole category would consist of nothing but highly
specialized categories (criterion 2 at work again in the guise of (1)--it
takes different skills to write poetry that sounds hobbity or that deals
with hobbit-specific events/ways of life, etc., from those it takes to write
about Elf-centric events, etc.).

>The implied conclusion is that such a degree of specialization would make

competition far too narrow to be meaningful, either to the competitors or to
the general fandom readers.

>In this case, I think it is arbitrary that Poetry isn't a category in its

own right. It could be, very easily, and there would simply be one fewer
subcategory within several major categories. It would have its own
subcategories, yes, but all we would need are three award names and a
subcategorial schema that is more broad than content-based distinctions can
draw (so avoid (1)). However, since it worked out well enough to put poems
under other categories as subcategories, inertia will provide its own
argument for keeping them there.

>Poetry is certainly a law unto itself in terms of writing--the format/genre

distinction is not, I think, clearly viable. What is a genre but a
particular way or format for telling about a certain event, after all?

I don't agree. Historical fiction is a genre. It can be in the format of
poetry, short story, vignette, novella, novel, movie, tv show, miniseries,
etc. Romance is a genre in the same way: poetry, short story, vignette,
novella, novel, movie..... You get my point. Poetry can only be in the
various formats of poetry. It's not a genre.

>Given all this, my suggestion would be to decide whether (2) or (1) should

prevail when it comes to setting up new categories and then act accordingly
and consistently until some unmanageable problem forces a reevaluation. (The
same argument can be made for drabbles, btw.)

Okay, though I get lost again in the criterions, you helped me put my finger
on why I don't like poetry as a category.

Content, not format. Poetry is a format. Drabble is a format, Vignette is a
format. The subject of a story is the content. The genre of the story is
the content. The characters in a story are content.

So, I'll make this rule:

Categories are based on content, not format. Subcategories may be based on
format.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com

Hi Ainae,

<snip>

>> Or could it use the same banners, just as Men/Poetry or whatever?

It seems

>>keeping it as a subcategory is just much simpler than making it its

own

>>category.

> No, it would not longer be a subcategory under Men. It would be a

main

> category under Races/Places and may even have viable subcategories

of its

> own.

Okay, I think I just had a "Eureka!" moment and saw at least one of
the advantages of graduated categories. For example, let's say Gondor
had twenty entries, seven of which were poems. So as its own category
you could make a subcategory (Gondor/Poetry). But if you only allow
one levels of subcategories, you could not have (Men/Gondor/Poetry).
I was assuming that a subcategory could have its own sub-subcategory.
Maybe this is a misunderstanding on my part.

>>> Also, maybe consider adding a "Cross-cultural" category? For

pieces about

>>> interactions between different races?

>> Good idea. It was a useful sub-category for LOTR last year. I've

added it

>> to the database.

>Which means we probably need to think of awards names at some point.
> Gimli and Aragorn seem natural choices, as they symbolize inter-race
> friendships to me. Maybe Fingon as well? (Or was it Finrod? The

first Elf to

> meet the Men in Beleriand.)

> Yes, we'll need to think up some award names if this is decided to

be a new

> category. Right now I's just a suggestion.

Sure; sorry I jumped ahead. I think this stems from my
misunderstanding (previously mentioned) that it was hard to think up
awards. Sorry about that.

>> This brings up another issue that I've been going back and forth

on.

>>The awards names are confusing! If you aren't involved in the

MEFAs, you

>>probably do not know why Lothlorien is Elves/First and Imladris is
>>Elves/Second, or whatever. I've talked to probably five or so

people who

>>share this opinion. I know it's anecdotal, but... I really think we

should

>>consider having a theme for the different awards per categories but

calling

>>them [Category]/[Ranking] instead of "The Imladris Award" or

whatever.

>> Is this at all negotiable?

> No. And to which I say, "too bad." Sorry, but that's that. We

added the

> bars under the banners so someone seeing my Witch King award would

know it

> was for 3rd place in the Horror Author category.

Okay, that's better - if people are seeing the banners. I archive
most of my stuff at HASA, where banners aren't allowed. And I'm still
building my own site. So I hadn't even gotten around to looking at
the banners where I had won! I thought they just had the
subcategories on them if there was one.

> MEFA doesn't mean much
> when it's just the letters either. It doesn't take much

investigation

> however to find out what it means.

That's true. But MEFA is used so widely, I think most people who have
heard about the awards know what the acronym means. When I'm
introducing them to people (for example, people whose stories I
wanted to nominate) I usually did so as "The Middle-earth Fanfic
Awards (MEFAs)". Instant education.

> With the bars on the bottom of the
> banners, it's even easier to tell what the Witch King Award stands

for. You

> don't even have to click.

Just so I'm clear... does the sub-bar have just the category (and
subcategory where applicable)? Or does it have the place as well.

> Look, I said this before when I first started these awards, I

couldn't come

> up with a good gimicky name for the overall awards, like the

Mithrils or the

> One Rings because all the ones I thought up were already taken. So

I came

> up with separate awards titles for each of the awards. That's the

fun part

> for me. I don't begrudge my Best DS9 General Story 1998 award

because it

> has a generic name, but it is rather boring. When discussion came

up at ASC

> to come up with a name for the awards (like ASCEM has the Golden

O's), I

> suggested the ASCIIs. It made sense. ASC is in ASCII and the format

of the

> newsgroup is ASCII. But we ended up sticking with neither. It's

still a

> great awards schema but it's a bit boring.

I think this is where you and I are coming at this from different
directions. I don't care about a snazzy titles. Why do I value my
awards? Because they represent the accolades of my piers. Anyone can
name an award anything they like; for me it really doesn't matter, if
I don't value the person's opinion who gives the awards. I'd much
prefer something be easily understood.

But in the end, that's just my opinion. And though I am committing a
fair amount of time and energy, in the end they're not *my* awards.
If the catchiness is part of what makes it fun for you, then so be it.

> I wanted these to not be boring. As long as I'm admining them,

there will be

> awards titles. Someday when I hand this off, it will be up to the

new admin

> to see what changes will be made. Or I might decide this is like

the

> comment-based system and non-changeable.

Can we have a list of what is negotiable and what's not? I have to
say, I keep feel like I'm stepping on your toes. It's not what I
intend to do, but if I understood what you're not willing to change,
then I could try to be more respectful of that.

<snip>

> Well, what do you think of when we say "suspense" stories?

I really don't know, immediately. Probably mystery or something
rather similar.

>> I think we really need a category guide on the website. Describe

what the

>>different categories represent, so people know where a piece might

best fit.

>>Something similar to the one for the Mithril Awards
>>(http://www.viragene.com/tolkien/categories.html). And yes, I'm

volunteering

>>to write this if you're interested.

> Okay, but I do feel we're setting the bar rather low. I tend to

believe

> people are fairly intelligent. They'd know a Romance from a

Suspense from a

> Crossover from a Drama from a Humor.

Yes, I agree for shorter pieces. But longer pieces often bridge
genres. I have a piece that has about equal elements of humor and
drama; I've seen others that include hybrids of drama and romance,
drama and action, romance and humor, etc. I don't think it's always
so cut-and-dry. And besides, this is a rather simple way to make
things clearer. Even if it is setting the bar low, I don't think it
will hurt.

<snip>

>> They certainly take a distinct skill and are as much a distinct

genre as

>>any of the other categories.

> Yes, and that's why they are separate for author categories. Not

every story

> writer can be a poet. But I don't want ten thousand Poetry

subcategories.

> What I mean is I don't want Poetry/Men, Poetry/Romance,

Poetry/Elves,

> Poetry/Drama.

But you already have Men/Poetry, Romance/Poetry, Elves/Poetry,
Drama/Poetry - at least as often as they're viable. I don't think
you'd have to have this many subcategories.

For me, the bottom line comes down to why I think a certain piece is
worth nominating. Often, it's *not* because it's a fine piece about
elves, or of the romance genre, but because it's a good use of a
certain form. And as such, I think such stories should be judged
against other poems rather than against elf pieces or romances.

<snip>

> With Poetry/Author/Elves, Poetry/Author/Men. Do you see the
> problem there? And they all get the same awards titles and

banners. Yuck.

Sorry, I don't see the problem - I'd just put them all in
Poetry/Author, and not bother with subcategories beyond that. Maybe
I'm not understanding why you feel the need to subdivide further?

<snip>

>> These are two things I write. I think you mentioned in your

comments that

>>you weren't really interested in, and also that you didn't really

write

>>poetry. I don't mean this as a criticism of you - but is it

possible you

>>don't see the distinctions as well as people who do write these

forms? (I

>>know I have this problem with genres I don't write or usually read.)

> I don't understand this. Aphasia stepping in. I did get some of

it. I do

> write poetry. I don't write it formally. I don't write sonnets or

whatevers.

> But I have written some poetry and probably will in the future.

You can

> read it at HASA if you like. Several of the poems are in my forum.

Sorry, I might be confusing you with someone else. RL has been really
grisly lately, and my memory is iffy at best. (And sorry if I'm
coming across as more antagonistic than I usually do. I think I might
be, but it's not intended if I am.)

>>> - Research Article

>>>I doubt there would be enough to be viable.

>> As I stated when I first suggested this in the original post-mort,

I

>>personally can nominate enough. Some are only available on the

members-only

>>side of HASA, but if you'll allow this category, I will offer these

authors

>>hosting space on my own personal site. Even without that, I can

think of at

>>least eight essays offhand that I would like to see nominated.

> Then we can put it to a poll.

Excellent. Should I go ahead and create one, or add it to the
database? Or is there anything else you need me to do?

> But yes, those research articles would have
> to posted on a public (not members-only) site BEFORE Nomination

Season

> starts. Not after.

Sure. But just so I understand - why is this so? You allow stories
written in a language other than English, don't you? This doesn't
seem that different to me.

<snip AU>

>> AU (at least in my opinion) is a story where Tolkien (or
>>whatever canon - PJ's scriptwriters in movieverse, I
>>guess) say something happened some way but the author decides to

take it

>>another way.

<snip examples>

>>these are all scenarios that Tolkien explicitly said didn't
>>happen. Very different from a gapfiller, or a scenario that Tolkien

didn't

>>say happen but could have.

> That could be your opinion. Personally, I don't find it AU, but

some might.

> Some are easy to spot, I'll grant you. Dwim's LDID, every Mary Sue

fic ever

> written.... But some are slippery.

With all due respect, it doesn't really matter what an individual
reader considers AU. With the category guide we get to define what is
AU for the purposes of this award, and authors get to decide whether
their story fits that category

<snip>

>> I can see why you need to include Time. But if we
>>include movieverse, I think we maybe need to have it
>>as "Time/Source"? Because the movies are not a book.

> Nobody said we're going with Movie-verse yet. It's still just a

suggestion.

As is my suggestion that we change it to "Time/Source". If we decide
not to make movieverse a category, the suggestion is moot.

<snip>

>>> As for movie-verse, we have the same issues as for Alternate
>>> Universe. If
>>> we have it, do we allow authors of movie-verse stories to place

their

>>> stories elsewhere?

>> Sure. We allow stories set in The Hobbit to also be nominated for
>>Drama, or whatever.

> Okay that could be doable, but what about the splices....

As I've said before, it's up to the author. The author could place
them in LotR or movieverse, or some other category that fits (hobbits
or drama or whatever) - whichever they thinks fits best.

<snip>

> And if it ends up unviable?

So be it. If it's not viable, we can always move the stories to the
second and third choices just like any other category. And we can
rethink about it for 2006. But I really think there are enough
stories out there that it probably won't be.

Marta

-----Original Message-----
From: Marta [mailto:MartaL0712@netscape.net]
Sent: Tuesday, January 04, 2005 11:13 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

>Okay, I think I just had a "Eureka!" moment and saw at least one of the

advantages of graduated categories. For example, let's say Gondor had twenty
entries, seven of which were poems. So as its own category you could make a
subcategory (Gondor/Poetry). But if you only allow one levels of
subcategories, you could not have (Men/Gondor/Poetry).
I was assuming that a subcategory could have its own sub-subcategory.
Maybe this is a misunderstanding on my part.

Right. I don't want to have sub/subcategories and I think my new revelation
that I think categories should be based on content and subcategories *may*
be based on format (or content, if that wasn't understood) should help.

Sometimes I don't know what I think until it's clarified through discussion.
That's why I can't just run out a list of what's negotiable and what's not.
My brain just isn't that cooperative anymore.

> Yes, we'll need to think up some award names if this is decided to

be a new

> category. Right now I's just a suggestion.

>Sure; sorry I jumped ahead. I think this stems from my misunderstanding

(previously mentioned) that it was hard to think up awards. Sorry about
that.

No apologies. I jumped ahead just as much when I mentioned about picking
names for the Dwarves awards if Dwarves becomes a new category.

> No. And to which I say, "too bad." Sorry, but that's that. We

added the

> bars under the banners so someone seeing my Witch King award would

know it

> was for 3rd place in the Horror Author category.

>Okay, that's better - if people are seeing the banners. I archive

most of my stuff at HASA, where banners aren't allowed. And I'm still
building my own site. So I hadn't even gotten around to looking at
the banners where I had won! I thought they just had the
subcategories on them if there was one.

Sorry for snapping. For places where you can't put banners, I'm all for
adding the award in text: Winner of the Morgoth Bauglir Award for 1st Place
Horror Fiction in the 2004 Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards.

I need to remember to add that to my story on ff.net and HASA. I have the
banner on my own site.

>That's true. But MEFA is used so widely, I think most people who have

heard about the awards know what the acronym means. When I'm
introducing them to people (for example, people whose stories I
wanted to nominate) I usually did so as "The Middle-earth Fanfic
Awards (MEFAs)". Instant education.

So is the bar. See below....

> With the bars on the bottom of the
> banners, it's even easier to tell what the Witch King Award stands

for. You

> don't even have to click.

>Just so I'm clear... does the sub-bar have just the category (and

subcategory where applicable)? Or does it have the place as well.

Yep, it also includes the place. Viv did a very classy job with them, I
think.

>I think this is where you and I are coming at this from different

directions. I don't care about a snazzy titles. Why do I value my
awards? Because they represent the accolades of my piers. Anyone can
name an award anything they like; for me it really doesn't matter, if
I don't value the person's opinion who gives the awards. I'd much
prefer something be easily understood.

>But in the end, that's just my opinion. And though I am committing a

fair amount of time and energy, in the end they're not *my* awards.
If the catchiness is part of what makes it fun for you, then so be it.

Yep that's sort of what it comes down to. The MEFAs are my little baby. I
created them and so I want them to retain the parts I feel are important.
Even the gimicky parts. ;-)

>Can we have a list of what is negotiable and what's not? I have to

say, I keep feel like I'm stepping on your toes. It's not what I
intend to do, but if I understood what you're not willing to change,
then I could try to be more respectful of that.

Unfortunately, I often don't know until I get there. Let's see what we've
hit so far:

1) Comment-based. A definite.
2) There will be gimicky award titles
3) Banners will be creative and not overly standardized
4) Authors can self-nominate with no recriminations
5) Categories based on content.

I can't remember any others at this time.

>> I think we really need a category guide on the website. Describe

what the

>>different categories represent, so people know where a piece might

best fit.

>>Something similar to the one for the Mithril Awards
>>(http://www.viragene.com/tolkien/categories.html). And yes, I'm

volunteering

>>to write this if you're interested.

>Yes, I agree for shorter pieces. But longer pieces often bridge

genres. I have a piece that has about equal elements of humor and
drama; I've seen others that include hybrids of drama and romance,
drama and action, romance and humor, etc. I don't think it's always
so cut-and-dry. And besides, this is a rather simple way to make
things clearer. Even if it is setting the bar low, I don't think it
will hurt.

Okay then, if you'll write it. Sounds too much like homework to me. ;-)

>But you already have Men/Poetry, Romance/Poetry, Elves/Poetry,

Drama/Poetry - at least as often as they're viable. I don't think
you'd have to have this many subcategories.

Dwim helped me find my opinion. (Really does happen through discussion for
me, a lot of times.)

>For me, the bottom line comes down to why I think a certain piece is

worth nominating. Often, it's *not* because it's a fine piece about
elves, or of the romance genre, but because it's a good use of a
certain form. And as such, I think such stories should be judged
against other poems rather than against elf pieces or romances.

As mentioned above, Dwim helped me realize I base categories on content.
Not skill level or format. So that the poem is about Elves means it should
be Elves/Poetry. Format is one possible means of subcategorizing. To
eliminate the confusion, I made that a rule: Categories are based on
content.

> I don't understand this. Aphasia stepping in. I did get some of

it. I do

> write poetry. I don't write it formally. I don't write sonnets or

whatevers.

> But I have written some poetry and probably will in the future.

You can

> read it at HASA if you like. Several of the poems are in my forum.

>Sorry, I might be confusing you with someone else. RL has been really

grisly lately, and my memory is iffy at best. (And sorry if I'm
coming across as more antagonistic than I usually do. I think I might
be, but it's not intended if I am.)

Iffy memories, I understand. Be careful. I know why you've been stressed
with RL. Let me be a warning to you, and anyone else. As far as I know, I'm
the only person who has gotten aphasia from stress. If you start to have
memory loss, lack of concentration, inability to do things you used to be
able to do....you're running into trouble. See a counselor, try finding
ways to reduce your stress (some things you can reduce, some you have no
control over). Stress can kill. Don't let it get to the point it got to
with me. I'm a writer. To not be able to trust my ability to read or put
words together in a way that makes sense is scary. And the neurologists
can't find any "hardware" reasons for it. No brain tumors or dementia or
alzheimers (too young for that anyway). This started at a time of severely
high stress. And it hasn't let up even though the stress has. Stress is
dangerous. Sure, we all need some or we'd be dead. But there has to be
balance or we begin to break. Take care of yourself.

Okay, off the soapbox.

>Excellent. Should I go ahead and create one, or add it to the

database? Or is there anything else you need me to do?

Just add it to the database for now. Let's get on to more suggestions of
new categories if we can. Then we'll take a look at the list and make
decisions (mostly with polls).

> But yes, those research articles would have
> to posted on a public (not members-only) site BEFORE Nomination

Season

> starts. Not after.

>Sure. But just so I understand - why is this so? You allow stories

written in a language other than English, don't you? This doesn't
seem that different to me.

That's been in the rules from the get-go. Any nomination has to be on a
public website, otherwise all the MEFA winners would have to sign up at
every website to read the nomination. It has to be in a place where no
sign-ins are necessary. And just to have some sort of deadline (there are
literally tens of thousands of stories in the LOTR fandom), we have a
cut-off date. We can't legitimately make a deadline on each end. "Must be
posted between May 1st and April 30th, 2005" like ASC does (must be posted
between Feb 1st and Jan 31st) because we aren't an archive. If we did that,
we'd have no good way of policing it, and we'd be throwing out the chances
of some very good stories that were written years ago. With 30000+ stories
out there, we can't possibly have read them all to say we've found all the
good ones that were posted by now so that we can now limit ourselves just to
this year's new crop. There are still so many out there that were posted
before that we just haven't found yet. So we have a deadline on the other
end only. Think of it as making things easier for the adminstration. We
need to know that when Nomination Season opens and all those nominations
come rolling in, they all have valid URLs to public sites. It also keeps
this scenario from happening: the day before Nomination Season ends, Author
X posts her story to ff.net just to get it nominated. If Author X wants to
do that, get it posted by the day before Nomination Season starts.

So, Marta, you might want to offer any of those Research Article authors a
secondary public site for their articles, if you have the space. It may
likely become a category (under Genres).

> That could be your opinion. Personally, I don't find it AU, but

some might.

> Some are easy to spot, I'll grant you. Dwim's LDID, every Mary Sue

fic ever

> written.... But some are slippery.

>With all due respect, it doesn't really matter what an individual

reader considers AU. With the category guide we get to define what is
AU for the purposes of this award, and authors get to decide whether
their story fits that category

Yeah, but defining it can be tough. Look at the trouble we had a HASA on the
review guidelines. Let's put up some definitions and then we can put them
to a poll.

Here's mine:

An AU story is one that concretely diverges from the source material. For
the MEFAs, this means The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, and The Lord of the
Rings. Examples of concrete diversions would be "What if" scenarios, new
characters, etc.

I'd define Movie-verse as stories that are based primarily on events in the
Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings films rather than on the books by Tolkien.

And for splices and blends, I'd just let the author categorize them
somewhere else.

> Nobody said we're going with Movie-verse yet. It's still just a

suggestion.

>As is my suggestion that we change it to "Time/Source". If we decide

not to make movieverse a category, the suggestion is moot.

Okay, I've warmed up to this, but only if movie-verse makes it as a
category.


Re: Movie-verse

>> Sure. We allow stories set in The Hobbit to also be nominated for
>>Drama, or whatever.

> Okay that could be doable, but what about the splices....

>As I've said before, it's up to the author. The author could place

them in LotR or movieverse, or some other category that fits (hobbits
or drama or whatever) - whichever they thinks fits best.

Yep. See, I *am* persuadeable. ;-)

<snip>

> And if it ends up unviable?

>So be it. If it's not viable, we can always move the stories to the

second and third choices just like any other category. And we can
rethink about it for 2006. But I really think there are enough
stories out there that it probably won't be.
I'm just a contrary author. I don't like calling any of Trek stories AU
either, though especially the later ones had to diverge from the source
material because the source material ended the war and split up the crew
before I was done with either! I liked to call myself canon-compatible,
meaning my stories could conceivably fit nebulously in the timeline between
seasons or episodes or whatever. To me an AU means something is
significantly different. Like Gollum not being there, or Bashir did get
kicked out of Starfleet. If all the characters act like the characters and
all the events of canon happened, then, well it's not AU to me. And should
I ever finish my present lot of ST stories, I might end up back compatible
to the canon (war over, crew dispersed). In fact, I even have one story that
is! I like to bend the canon timeline rather than break it.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com

I apologize if someone previously mentioned this, (I took an oath of abstinence from the computer for a month. An early New Year's resolution, if you will.) but what about Dwarves? They are the most neglected- and in my opinion the most fascinating- race of Middle-earth.

Also, I think it would be nice to have a section dedicated to articles and essays.

Cheers,
Bridilliel

Ainaechoiriel <mefaadmin@earthlink.net> wrote:


-----Original Message-----
From: Marta [mailto:MartaL0712@netscape.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 12:54 AM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins



--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, "Ainaechoiriel" <mefaadmin@e...>
wrote:

>In the interest of fairness and simplicity, I think these should be made

into subcategories of Men.

That's my idea for graduated categories.

>Also, maybe consider adding a "Cross-cultural" category? For pieces about

interactions between different races?

Good idea. It was a useful sub-category for LOTR last year. I've added it
to the database.

> 2. (Topic) Genres
> a. Humor

> e. Horror

>I think we had a hard time making this viable, and many of the ones

nominated could have been nominated for Adventure or Drama. Maybe drop this?
(I am not a horror fan, so perhaps I don't see why this distinction is so
important.)

This was more easily viable than Mystery. I'd see Mystery go before Horror.
Maybe they could be combined into something like Suspense?

> f. Mystery

>Good.

> g. Crossovers

>Good, but we may need to decide whether pastiches are viable, or whether

there needs to be a real interaction between the two worlds.

>I think the first prize winner for Crossover, Altariel's _A Christmas

Carol_ piece (sorry, I'm forgetting the exact title), was a pastiche more
than a genuine crossover.

Well, I don't know. First, you'd have to define pastiche. If not for your
example, I wouldn't have known what it was. And we did only have one story
like that last year so I doubt it would be viable. Is there a term that
covers both?

>Possible additions:

- Poetry

I still think I don't want that as a main.

>- Research Article

I doubt there would be enough to be viable.

>- Drabble

Same as poetry.

>- Alternate Universe

Not sure I like that as a main either. Should a Men/AU and a Men story be
separate? Couldn't they both compete together? They could both be quality
stories. And what about the delimmiting line between AU and non-AU? Some
are obvious. Some aren't. Take my story Immortal. It poses a conversation
between Merry and Legolas before Merry and Pippin die. It didn't happen in
the books. So it's AU. But it *could* have happened. Nothing in the
precludes it. It fits the timeline notations in the Appendices. So it's
not AU.

Is it, or isn't it?

And remember that authors are going to choose their categories. If an
author chooses her Men/AU story to be in Men, will that be allowed if there
is an AU category? Or do we let there be both and let the authors choose
which one they'll be in?

This one is in the database.

> 3. (Topic) Time/Books
> a. The Silmarillion
> b. The Lord of the Rings
> c. The Hobbit
>

All good. I would suggest adding:

- Fourth Age and Beyond
- Movieverse

>Also, maybe change the topic name from "Time/Books" to "Source Material"?

No, because it plays double-duty. Books should be obvious. But Time
because it provides a place for a story if you just can't find another
appropriate category. You can probably set it in time. Fourth-Age and
Beyond I could see would be a good addition, even though there isn't a Book
for it, so it can't play double-duty, but it does cover that other time
after LOTR.

And that brings up other perfect opportunities for graduated categories:
First Age, Second Age, etc.

As for movie-verse, we have the same issues as for Alternate Universe. If
we have it, do we allow authors of movie-verse stories to place their
stories elsewhere? Or what about those that combine book and movie? I do
that. Again, having it be the authors choice may make this a lot easier.
We could just have the availability of the category there and the author can
choose whether the story goes there or not. And if one isn't viable well
then, it's not viable.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com












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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

--- In MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com, Bridilliel Nealay <bridilliel@y...>
wrote:

> I apologize if someone previously mentioned this, (I took an oath of

abstinence from the computer for a month. An early New Year's
resolution, if you will.) but what about Dwarves? They are the most
neglected- and in my opinion the most fascinating- race of Middle-
earth.

>
> Also, I think it would be nice to have a section dedicated to

articles and essays.

>

Hi Bridiliel,

Good for you for taking a break! Sometimes I wish I could convince
myself to do that. I suggested both of those categories, and I think
others thought they were a good idea. I'm sure there will be a poll at
some point.

The other two categories that're drawing a lot of discussion right now
are movieverse and "Fourth Age and Beyond". They would be in the Time/
Books category. What are your thoughts on this?

Marta

::jumping in from a somewhat forced abstinance::

Hey people!

I wanted to bounce in and second Bridilliel's suggestion of dwarves and critical essays. I don't know how viable either category would be, but I can think of a few suggestions already. The dwarves definitely need more publicity, in any case, and there are some really good critical essays out there.

>> Marta wrote:
>> The other two categories that're drawing a lot of discussion right
>> now are movieverse and "Fourth Age and Beyond". They would be in the
>> Time/Books category. What are your thoughts on this?

I would endorse a separate category for "Fourth Age and Beyond." We'd have to nail down what is meant by "Fourth Age," though. I know of some who consider that to be anything after the departure of Elrond's ship, but I also know of some who tend to look much further down the timeline.

A Movieverse category sounds like a good idea, but I'd be concerned about drawing the line. I know of several stories that fit both movieverse and bookverse. Also, this seems to me to be one of those categories that might fall into problems of cross-categorization. Where would you place a story that was set in Gondor, had elements of movieverse in it, and was also set about fifty years after the War of the Ring? You could place it in Men, Movieverse, and Fourth Age and Beyond. That might not seem like a big problem as the author would be the one deciding, but what if there were three more stories with the same scenario? And what if their authors chose to put them in different categories? They wouldn't be competing against one another anymore, and it seems to me that a lot of the discussion about categorization was done in an effort to get similar stories to compete. But if you open up too many categories that share ground with other categories, you take the edge off much of that competition. That's my two cents, for what it's worth.

Thundera Tiger

My thoughts are we'll need many more volunteers. ^__^

Actually, I think it'll be more than worth the extra effort. Even though I generally don't like movieverse, having its own category will be nice. I love the idea of having storieds sorted through the time period.


Marta <MartaL0712@netscape.net> wrote:

Hi Bridiliel,

Good for you for taking a break! Sometimes I wish I could convince
myself to do that. I suggested both of those categories, and I think
others thought they were a good idea. I'm sure there will be a poll at
some point.

The other two categories that're drawing a lot of discussion right now
are movieverse and "Fourth Age and Beyond". They would be in the Time/
Books category. What are your thoughts on this?

Marta





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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

-----Original Message-----
From: Laura [mailto:thunderalaura@juno.com]
Sent: Sunday, January 09, 2005 7:04 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

>::jumping in from a somewhat forced abstinance::

Hi!

>Hey people!

>I wanted to bounce in and second Bridilliel's suggestion of dwarves and

critical essays. I don't know how viable either category would be, but I can
think of a few suggestions already. The dwarves definitely need more
publicity, in any case, and there are some really good critical essays out
there.

I would n't call any category critical essay. Nonfiction perhaps, or Essay,
or Article, but not "Critical". It has a bad connotation.

>I would endorse a separate category for "Fourth Age and Beyond." We'd have

to nail down what is meant by "Fourth Age," though. I know of some who
consider that to be anything after the departure of Elrond's ship, but I
also know of some who tend to look much further down the timeline.

Yeah, being a non-scholar of all this, I just kind of break things up by the
wars. The Last Alliance of Elves and Men ended the Second Age. The big
breaking of the world brought on by the last war between the Valar and
Morgoth brought on the Second Age. And the War of the Ring ended the Third
Age, though I know it's really not as simple as that. That's just how my
mind works. Would it be easier to have a Post-War of the Ring rather than a
"Fourth Age" to get us out of this quandry?

>A Movieverse category sounds like a good idea, but I'd be concerned about

drawing the line. I know of several stories that fit both movieverse and
bookverse. Also, this seems to me to be one of those categories that might
fall into problems of cross-categorization. Where would you place a story
that was set in Gondor, had elements of movieverse in it, and was also set
about fifty years after the War of the Ring? You could place it in Men,
Movieverse, and Fourth Age and Beyond. That might not seem like a big
problem as the author would be the one deciding, but what if there were
three more stories with the same scenario? And what if their authors chose
to put them in different categories? They wouldn't be competing against one
another anymore, and it seems to me that a lot of the discussion about
categorization was done in an effort to get similar stories to compete. But
if you open up too many categories that share ground with other categories,
you take the edge off much of that competition. That's my two cents, for
what it's worth.

Well, that is the beauty of letting the authors decide. If they don't
compete together, oh well. And no, in th e2004 MEFAs we did a lot of moving
around to try and get the categories viable. I really wanted all the
default categories to be viable. This year, I don't think we should
manipulate unless we have to. If elves doesn't come up viable (not likely)
then oh well, it doesn't. Or Mystery or whatever we decide as the default
categories. So, if Author A decides her story should be in Elves,
Movieverse, and Fourth Age... In that order, but Author B decides on
Movieverse, Elves, and Fourth Age, and Author C decides on Fourth Age,
Movieverse, and Elves, the only consideration on moving them is viability.
If Elves, Movieverse, and Fourth Age are are viable, we won't move these
stories from their first choices. If, say, Movieverse turns out not viable
even with Author B's story, then Author B's story would move to Elves,
Author B's second choice. I want there to be less manipulation this year.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Bridilliel Nealay [mailto:bridilliel@yahoo.com]
Sent: Monday, January 10, 2005 7:19 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [MEFAwards] Re: Categories Post Mortem begins

>My thoughts are we'll need many more volunteers. ^__^

We will, and I'll probably put the call out in March. I won't draft the
2004 volunteers into 2005. Everyone will have to sign up again. Thus, I'll
be clearing out the Staff group. Doesn't mean you can't volunteer again.
In fact, I'd love it if you would! I just want to keep it down to just
staff and I get confused easily. Have no worries, nothing goes on over
there that can't be said over here. The archive is public. Anyone can read
the messages. It just keeps this list a lot cleaner of all the boring
staffy things. Like this Post Mortem. Some of you may be getting tired of
it. Some may not. Well, this is the prper place for the Post Mortem, but
once everything is decided, you don't need to sit through all the posts
about category viability and which authors have been contacted and what not.
We can do that admin-y stuff over at the Staff Group and spare everyone else
the details.

So, that becaem quite a tangent, huh? Anyway, I'll put out a call for
volunteers, much like we had last year in March. To get you thinking about
it, this is what we'll need: *Author Contacters (remember you can get an
author's permission when you nominate, if you'd like. I'll provide a form
for them in the Files section that you can copy into an e-mail. Otherwise,
staff will contact authors.)
*Categorizers (these people gather nominations by the 1st choice category
and collect them so at the end of Nomination Season we can see what's viable
and what's not. This basically takes the place of the Status-of-Stories
Maintainers at ASC.)

We won't worry about Vote Counters until Voting Season is closer. And heck,
we may not need them except as a backup, if we get the electronic stuff to
do all we think it can do.

>Actually, I think it'll be more than worth the extra effort. Even though I

generally don't like movieverse, having its own category will be nice. I
love the idea of having storieds sorted through the time period.

I think some of these suggestions are ready for polls.

--Ainaechoiriel
MEFA Admin and Founder

"This evil cannot be concealed by the power of the Elves," Elrond said, "for
it is Windows-compatible, and freeware at that." --H.F.

http://gabrielle.sytes.net/mefa The Middle-Earth Fanfiction Awards
Blog: http://www.ainaechoiriel.blogspot.com