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Hi Ainae,

> Sorry but there was call for a Gondor category this year because

Men/Gondor

> had so many stories in it. It seemed to make more sense than Rohan

or

> Numenor since they had so few.

I see the point you're making, but I tend to want to solve the
direction the other way. Yes, it doesn't make much sense to have
Numenor and Rohan as their own categories but Gondor as a subcategory
of Men. That's why I suggest do away with Numenor and Rohan as
independent categories and make them subcategories of Men.

If we're going with graduated categories, I really think we need to
do away with the idea of calling First, Second, and Third prize as
awards with separate names. Theme the banners, that's fine, but for
those who aren't involved in the discussion of the awards it just
gets too confusing. I know it's cute and clever, but it also causes a
fair number of complaints that I've heard.

> This makes it possible for us to have that flexibility. It

shuldn't be too

> hard to come up with three awards titles for them. Rohan and

Numenor

> already have some.

Yes, I could easily come up with three awards for Gondor. It becomes
increasingly hard, however, to have *unique* awards names.

<snip>

> We could go with the troubled family of Denethor,
> Boromir, and Faramir.

That's my first instinct. But then you run into the problem of using
those characters for awards elsewhere.

> Graduated categories just makes us more flexible.

I see they make us more flexible than we were this year - where we
were stuck with independent categories for Rohan and Numenor but not
Gondor. But I don't see why this is more flexible than having all of
them as subcategories of Men.

Marta

-----Original Message-----
From: Marta [mailto:MartaL0712@netscape.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 02, 2005 11:51 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] graduated categories; was: Re: New poll for MEFAwards

>I see the point you're making, but I tend to want to solve the direction

the other way. Yes, it doesn't make much sense to have Numenor and Rohan as
their own categories but Gondor as a subcategory of Men. That's why I
suggest do away with Numenor and Rohan as independent categories and make
them subcategories of Men.

Then vote Yes on the poll.

>If we're going with graduated categories, I really think we need to do away

with the idea of calling First, Second, and Third prize as awards with
separate names. Theme the banners, that's fine, but for those who aren't
involved in the discussion of the awards it just gets too confusing. I know
it's cute and clever, but it also causes a fair number of complaints that
I've heard.

If I understand this right, you're saying do away with the awards titles?
No.

> This makes it possible for us to have that flexibility. It

shuldn't be too

> hard to come up with three awards titles for them. Rohan and

Numenor

> already have some.

>Yes, I could easily come up with three awards for Gondor. It becomes

increasingly hard, however, to have *unique* awards names.

I don't think it would be that hard.

> We could go with the troubled family of Denethor, Boromir, and
> Faramir.

>That's my first instinct. But then you run into the problem of using those

characters for awards elsewhere.

It isn't that hard. We only had two such awards with that problem in 2004
and they were easily solved.

> Graduated categories just makes us more flexible.

>I see they make us more flexible than we were this year - where we were

stuck with independent categories for Rohan and Numenor but not Gondor. But
I don't see why this is more flexible than having all of them as
subcategories of Men.

Marta, if the poll is voted Yes, then they will be subcategories of Men. And
Mirkwood would be a subcategory of Elves. Or Silmarillion. Or LOTR or
whatever. But if there were then 20 or more stories in that subcategory,
that's worthy of becoming a main category. It was discussed here during
December with overall positive thoughts and the decision was made. Final.
There will be graduated categories. Period. The question right now is
whether all places will be.

--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



Marta






Yahoo! Groups Links

Hi Ainae,

> >I see the point you're making, but I tend to want to solve the

direction

>>the other way. Yes, it doesn't make much sense to have Numenor and

Rohan as

>> their own categories but Gondor as a subcategory of Men. That's

why I

>>suggest do away with Numenor and Rohan as independent categories

and make

>>them subcategories of Men.

> Then vote Yes on the poll.

I think I did, but I'll make sure I did. Thanks for clarifying.

>> If we're going with graduated categories, I really think we need

to do away

>>with the idea of calling First, Second, and Third prize as awards

with

>>separate names. Theme the banners, that's fine, but for those who

aren't

>>involved in the discussion of the awards it just gets too

confusing. I know

>>it's cute and clever, but it also causes a fair number of

complaints that

>>I've heard.

> If I understand this right, you're saying do away with the awards

titles?

> No.

I was saying that. I'm sorry, I didn't realize it was non-negotiable.

>> Yes, I could easily come up with three awards for Gondor. It

becomes

>>increasingly hard, however, to have *unique* awards names.

> I don't think it would be that hard.

Okay. One of the main reason I can think of not to create more awards
is the difficulty in finding unique award names. (I think you told
me, back when I proposed poetry last Spring that one of the reasons
you were against it was the difficulty of finding suitable awards
names. But maybe my memory is faulty.

>>> Graduated categories just makes us more flexible.

>> I see they make us more flexible than we were this year - where we

were

>>stuck with independent categories for Rohan and Numenor but not

Gondor. But

>>I don't see why this is more flexible than having all of them as
>>subcategories of Men.

> Marta, if the poll is voted Yes, then they will be subcategories of

Men. And

> Mirkwood would be a subcategory of Elves. Or Silmarillion. Or

LOTR or

> whatever. But if there were then 20 or more stories in that

subcategory,

> that's worthy of becoming a main category. It was discussed here

during

> December with overall positive thoughts and the decision was made.

Final.

> There will be graduated categories. Period. The question right now

is

> whether all places will be.

I keep going over this in my head, trying to understand why you (the
collective you; not Ainae specifically, but everyone who's in favor
of graduated categories) sees subcategories as more important than
categories. The same number of stories compete for the same number of
awards whether they run as Gondor or as Men/Gondor. And I can see
practical advantages (mainly simplicity of the category scheme) in
keeping it as subcategories of the race rather than as its own
graduated category.

I think this is my fault. For the life of me I cannot remember the
discussion that occurred. I'm not saying it *didn't*, just that I
have no recollection of it. Can you perhaps point me to the first
message in that thread and I'll go read it myself?

To paraphrase Boromir (ironically, of Gondor ;-) ) "If this is the
will of the group, Marta will see it done." If this is a non-
negotiable either because Ainae wants it or because most people have
alreaedy agreed with it, then I'll accept it. I'm just trying to
*understand* it, and if I could read over where this was first
discussed, I think that would help a lot.

Marta

Last one, then I've got to get to bed. Since some of this was covered in the
other e-mail, there will likely be some snippage.

-----Original Message-----
From: Marta [mailto:MartaL0712@netscape.net]
Sent: Tuesday, January 04, 2005 9:09 PM
To: MEFAwards@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MEFAwards] graduated categories; was: Re: New poll for MEFAwards



Hi Ainae,

>> Yes, I could easily come up with three awards for Gondor. It

becomes

>>increasingly hard, however, to have *unique* awards names.

> I don't think it would be that hard.

>Okay. One of the main reason I can think of not to create more awards is

the difficulty in finding unique award names. (I think you told me, back
when I proposed poetry last Spring that one of the reasons you were against
it was the difficulty of finding suitable awards names. But maybe my memory
is faulty.

Some categories are harder than others. Poetry would be hard. Gondor being
a place, it's easy to come up with smaller places within it or significant
people. LOTR was easy with three books. The Hobbit was easy with three
places on the journey, Rohan was easy with the three royals, etc. Some were
trickier.

>I keep going over this in my head, trying to understand why you (the

collective you; not Ainae specifically, but everyone who's in favor of
graduated categories) sees subcategories as more important than categories.
The same number of stories compete for the same number of awards whether
they run as Gondor or as Men/Gondor. And I can see practical advantages
(mainly simplicity of the category scheme) in keeping it as subcategories of
the race rather than as its own graduated category.

>I think this is my fault. For the life of me I cannot remember the

discussion that occurred. I'm not saying it *didn't*, just that I have no
recollection of it. Can you perhaps point me to the first message in that
thread and I'll go read it myself?

Me? No. My memory is likely worse than yours and my aversion to research
goes far back before the stress that damaged me. Hey, I picked an MA
program without a thesis for a reason! And I'm not envious of Dwim and all
her homework at all! What I remember is that there were questions in the
beginning of the Post Mortem about fairness of categories which kind of blew
me away. When Shadow975 and I were brainstorming we weren't thinking of
fairness. Fairness never came into it. Who knew Gondor would have so many
stories and Numenor so few? It was all just brainstorming. But yes, Gondor
was mentioned specifically. People thought it had been unfairly left out
when it had loads of stories and Numenor and Rohan weren't left out and they
didn't have as many combined. Even during Check Ballot season, seeing so
many Men/Gondor nominations, I thought hey, we're going to have to have a
Gondor category next year. It was more of a lack of foresight than
anything. So now, with graduated categories, it allows for lack of
foresight.

>To paraphrase Boromir (ironically, of Gondor ;-) ) "If this is the will of

the group, Marta will see it done." If this is a non- negotiable either
because Ainae wants it or because most people have alreaedy agreed with it,
then I'll accept it. I'm just trying to
*understand* it, and if I could read over where this was first discussed, I
think that would help a lot.

Thanks, Marta. Now, go have a cup of hot cocoa and curl up with a lovely
kitty cat and relieve some of your stress. I worry about you. (And quite
frankly anyone else who has too much stress.)

--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