Now that where all here, I would like to propose a no-dislike truce amoung all the writers of this contest.
As I viewed these stories baseded on ratings, I felt a strong desire to dislike a few, just to bump my own story in the ratings, and I'm sure we have all felt that desire during submission Now that feeling will only get stronger as the contest progress.

With that being said, here is my proposal, during the course of this compotetion, we will not dislike any story, even if we think it's bad. If you disliked a story so badly, you can put it in your watch later folder and dislike it later.
.
This truce is completely voluntary, but I do encourage all of you to fallow. We've all put our heart and soul into these works, and most of us probably haven't even told our family's or non-brony friends about our hard work for various reasons, so lets show some support to our fellow writers, and good luck to you all.

*follow

I don't really dislike stories anyway... even if they aren't my cup of tea I still generally leave them alone.

As for the other writers for the contest, I got nothing but love for all of them, even if I personally didn't enjoy their story. It takes a certain kind of confidence to throw yourself out there with any kind of site like this and for a contest where a lot of us probably only spent a week writing it can be a lot harder. So respect.

So yeah, as was said before, good luck to all of y'all. I had a ton of fun participating and I'm glad so many other writers did as well. Glad they participated... I don't know if you had as much fun as me... I hope you all had fun.

Speaking as a member of the EFNW Writing Staff, I just want to say a couple of things. First off, the judging for the main awards will be done entirely by a panel of staff and guest judges. Likes/Dislikes/Favorites/Etc. on fimfic (or elsewhere) are not a factor. We will consider each story on its own merits alone, regardless of any public opinion already issued via this metadata.

However, the "Community Choice" award, as noted in the contest announcement, will be decided by a public poll. That said, it will not be using fimfic rankings, but will be a poll we take separately from fimfic metadata. Is there room for abuse? Probably. Could you do awful things to try to cheat your way to the top? Most likely. Should you? No! Would it make Fluttershy sad? She'd cry her heart out! Would it disappoint Applejack? You know it would! Do we have some pretty decent tech gurus watching for that sort of thing? Of course! How does Celestia feel about cheaters? I bet you can guess. Would you feel good about yourself in the morning if you cheated? Only you can answer that.

So yeah... This is a contest for fun and some (minor) rewards. We're doing our best to make it as fair and unbiased as possible. I hope that all of you can do the same. This is Pony after all. We're not villains, or rivals... but friends, right?

So, best of luck to all the entrants. I know many of you are submitting your work for for the first time in a contest—some of you, for the first time publicly even. That takes courage! But the community—our community—is better for it. Even if you don't win, know that you added your voice to it, and even if it's in the slightest, raised the bar for what Pony can be.

2990815 Except the judges don't care about ratings... so why does it even matter?

2991166 it just an idea I had for a show of good sportsmanship to prevent any green eye monsters from forming through this contest after I was tempted to dislike some stories that where really good that had no dislikes.

2991278 Sorry to say it, but the dislike trolls are inevitable. Which is why I am currently abstaining from reading too many other entries to remain neutral.

2990815

There are many submissions, and as a direct result, there are also going to be a lot of writers who don't win. When this is all over, if stories have accumulated a bunch of neg votes for any reason, then that might hurt the author's story in the long run anyways.

The proposal I respect, though if I find a story that is really bad, I am not going to just dislike, but also tell them why. So far on this site, I have only read one or two stories that I disliked that much, and considering we put our best forward in this contest, I doubt I personally will meet any stories that bad.

The intent is good, except for that last part where you like all of the submissions. That's... Not sportsmanship, that is something I can't really put into a single word. Authors should not get likes simply because they tried, in my opinion; they have to earn those likes like everyone else who writes a story for this fandom and dares to submit it.

Plenty of concise writing had to go into condensing large stories into a 3K word max limit, 1K word minimum and doing it well. Let this stay a showcase of what parts of the fandom can do with their words, and reward them with likes if they do it well. Reward them with a dislike and a comment otherwise.

That's my cents in the machine.

2991292 you are write, which is why I deleted the all liking part, but will still like all story's that I consider at least okay., you got one in Thai contest?

2991368

I do, it's the only story I so far have publicly published (that'll probably change by later today). It's a one-shot, and since I still have a bunch of Naruto related pictures on the hard drive, coming up with any type of cover art would have been impractical with my lack of experience in coverarts.

2991590 wasn't the deadline yesterday?

2991790

Yes, it was, but I was pointing out that I"ll publish something different just for regular purposes to join it on my stories list.

I would say today, since midnight PST was when things closed down, but meh...

Upon my word as writer, I shall adhere to the truce.

Play nice boys and girls.

That is all,
-Piquo Pie, head of the 2014 Everfree Northwest Writing Track.