Competition Lore
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Posted by Colin Harvey Oct 27, 2009 |
Last week one of my tutors suggested that students enter their short stories into competitions, and named some likely targets. I recognized one of them, and queried that they charged an entry fee.
Her response was illuminating: "I'd expect students to spend money on competitions as they would on textbooks. Many reputable magazines charge an entry fee for competitions."
I've heard it said that there are two kinds of students. Those who are there to learn, and those who are there to show off how much they know. I'm one of the first group, so I kept quiet, and resisted the urge to point out that many places run competitions for which there is no entry fee. But I have major reservations about paying money to enter a competition.
Apart from the on-going mantra of SFWA, HWA and every other writer's organization I've encountered (Money flows to the author. Money flows to the author. Repeat after me --money flows to the author...). One of the reasons is simple pragmatism; why pay money to submit a story when there are so many venues that are free to enter? And if the author is desperate enough to gamble, many of those free-to-enter markets pay for stories. Money should flow to the author wherever possible, not vice versa.
The second reason is that while many of the fee-charging markets are reputable, some are not. Unless a magazine is auditable, how does a competitor know how much of that fee is the cost of running the competition, and how much is pure profit.?
There certain competitions I would advocate entering:
1. Where the prize money is above the market average (ie Zoetrope)
2. Where there is no entrance fee (ie Writers of the Future)
3. Where the contest is so high profile that it carries significant prestige -- as the two above do.
If costs need to be covered, let the competition do as ralan has done and make public the costs involved -- let's have as near to full public disclosure as we can. If Strange Horizons and critters and ralan can do it, so can everyone.
That, or don't charge a fee.