Schedule and Rules 2023

[thedevilchicken]

2023 Schedule:

(all times 20:59 British Summer Time - UTC+1)

Nominations Open: Friday 16 June
Nominations Close: Saturday 24 June
Signups Open: Wednesday 28 June
Signups Close: Sunday 9 July
Assignments Deadline: Saturday 26 August
Works Reveals: Saturday 2 September
Author Reveals: Saturday 9 September

AUex AO3 Collection | AU Fest AO3 Collection | Tagset | Nominations Guidelines

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Nominations/Eligibility:

• The tagset will be available here. An AO3 account is required.


• Please read the guidelines before you nominate.


• Each participant may nominate up to 6 fandoms with 1-10 characters/relationships in each, plus 20 AUs as freeforms.


• There are no requirements regarding rarity, gender, etc.


• Due to the nature of the exchange, Original Work is not eligible as a fandom.


• RPF is eligible. All RPF nominations must be composed only of people who are famous in their own right, and aged 18+ for modern RPF.


• Creator's Choice of Fandom is not eligible.

Characters and Relationships:

• Characters and relationships will all be nominated in the Relationship slots.


• Single characters will be nominated in the format "Solo: Character name" (e.g. Solo: Natasha Romanov).


• Romantic/sexual relationships will be nominated in the format "Character 1/Character 2" (e.g. Amilyn Holdo/Leia Organa).


• Gen relationships will be nominated in the format "Character 1 & Character 2" (e.g. Brienne of Tarth & Sansa Stark).


• Groups of 3+ characters: these are permitted; please format as groups, as above.


• Crossovers: Crossover ships are permitted. These should be nominated under 'Crossover Fandom' with the fandom name for each character in brackets, e.g. Tony Stark (MCU)/Bruce Wayne (DCEU).


• Original characters in non-original canons: You may nominate Original Character, Canon Character/Original Character or Original Character/Original Character, e.g. Solo: Original Female Character (MCU); Original Female Jedi/Original Droid (Star Wars); Luke Skywalker & Original Male Character; Harry Potter/Original Female Characters.


• Canon AUs: If you wish to nominate characters from a canon AU, please use the format: Solo: Wishverse Buffy Summers; Mirror Kirk/Mirror Spock.


• Worldbuilding: if you want worldbuilding only, nominate Other: Worldbuilding (fandom name) e.g. Other: Worldbuilding (Harry Potter) - the "Other:" here is because we've used "Worldbuilding" in the character slot in previous years and tags in different fields must be unique.

AU Tags:

• AU tags will be nominated as freeforms, separate from individual fandoms.


• This means that all AUs only need to be nominated once, not once per fandom.


• You can be as general or specific as you like! If you think it counts as an AU, if probably does, but feel free to ask (comment here or use the email address below).

Formatting AU Tags:

• If your AU could work for (almost) any fandom (e.g. Coffeeshop AU), nominate in the format: ALL: Coffeeshop AU; ALL: Everyone Lives Nobody Dies.


• If your AU is fandom-specific, it must a) include the fandom name in some form at the start, and b) only be requested/offered for that fandom (or closely related ones, e.g. Game of Thrones tags may be used for A Song of Ice and Fire). e.g. SWST: Snoke turns Rey instead of Ben; LotR: Sauron Wins; MCU: Steve wakes up 10 years earlier.

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Signups:

• Signups will be here. An AO3 account is required.


• You can request 3-10 fandoms with 1-10 characters/relationships, 2-20 AUs, and a choice of fiction, art, or either.


• You can offer 3-10 fandoms with 1-20 characters/relationships, 2-20 AUs and a choice of fiction, art, or either.


• As long as you request/offer the minimum number of separate fandoms, you may repeat fandoms to request/offer different combinations of fandom/character-or-ship/AU/medium.


• If no offers match your requests, your requests will go out for claiming as an initial pinch hit. Please bear in mind that if this is unclaimed for a number of weeks, you may be asked to add extra requests; however, the mod will do all they can to prevent this.


• If no requests match your offers, the mod will contact you to see if there is anything else you can offer. If you do not reply within 24 hours, or there is nothing else you can offer, your signup will be deleted.


• If you do not request/offer the minimum required number of distinct fandoms (3), your signup will be deleted without contact. Please ensure you meet the minimum by the time signups close.


• Dear Creator letters may be linked to in your signup in order to give your gift creator further details on your likes and dislikes. These are optional.


• Please include anything you absolutely don't want to receive (Do Not Wants) in the Optional Details field in your AO3 signup. In the event that a DNW is included in your gift, only reasonable DNWs in your signup will be enforced. (Please bear in mind that DNWs cannot be used to box your creator into producing a very specific work.)


• Participants may sign up with a maximum of two accounts each. If you sign up with two accounts, please bear in mind you will be expected to 1) produce at least one fanwork per signup, and 2) arrange your requests/offers to ensure that you cannot match with yourself (unless you're happy to create a gift for yourself). Please sock responsibly!

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Assignments:

• Assignments are only guaranteed to match on one fandom, one ship, one AU tag, and one medium.


• Minimum requirements are 1000 words or a completed piece of fanart, which must include a requested fandom/ship/AU/medium combination. Fic should be a completed standalone work written by you. Art should be original work created entirely by you; icons, manips, etc. cannot fulfil art requests.


• Please do not discuss your assignment in public; creators should remain anonymous until after creator reveals. Do, however, feel free to discuss with a beta reader.


• If your assignment does not match any of the fandoms/ships/AUs/media you offered, contact the mod as soon as possible. It will not be possible to change assignments for any other reason.

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Posting:

• To post your fic/art on AO3: navigate to your AO3 dashboard, click on 'Assignments', find your Alternate Universe Exchange 2023 assignment and click 'Post to fulfil'.


• Works containing excessive spelling or grammar errors (enough to hinder comprehension) will not be accepted.


• Due to the collection's anonymous period, do not post your work elsewhere before creator reveals.


• You can edit your work after posting it, but your gift must be complete enough to stand as it is by the deadline.


• Saved drafts do not fulfil assignments. Please ensure that you post your gift!

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Defaulting:

• If you cannot complete your assignment, please default.


• To default: navigate to your AO3 dashboard, click 'Assignments', locate your Alternate Universe Exchange 2023 assignment and click 'Default'.


• If you default and your creator also defaults, you will not be assigned a pinch-hitter.


• There is no penalty for defaulting before the deadline.


• If you have not posted a gift by the deadline, the mod will default you. You will need to post a full gift for any request in the exchange (excluding your own) before you will be permitted to participate in any further rounds.


• No extensions will be granted this year.

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Pinch hits:

• Pinch hits will be posted to the Dreamwidth community.


• Please reply to the pinch hit post to claim, including your AO3 username; if you are successful, the mod will contact you and officially assign the pinch hit to you through AO3.


• You can claim a pinch hit even if you aren't signed up for the exchange, but you will need an AO3 account.


• Note that if you claim a pinch hit without logging into Dreamwidth, I will not be able to respond to your comment.

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Treats:

• You can write/draw additional gifts for other participants and post them to the exchange collection as treats. You will need an AO3 account to post to the collection.


• To post a treat: navigate to the collection and click 'Post to Collection'. You will need to manually add the name of your intended recipient - please check this carefully!


• Do not gift treats to multiple recipients. Each work must be gifted to a maximum of one recipient.


• You are also welcome to post treats to the collection without a recipient (please do not add a mod as the recipient!), as long as they feature a fandom, character/ship and AU from the tagset.


• Treats do not have to fulfil the minimum fic length/art requirements but must include a requested fandom/ship/AU/medium combination (if gifting to a specific participant). Do not gift a work to someone who has not requested it.


• You are welcome to post treats even if you aren't signed up for the exchange.


• Treats will not become main gifts for this exchange.

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Misc:

• The aim of this exchange is to create gifts that the recipients will enjoy. If you break the rules above or are found to be participating in bad faith (e.g. signing up with multiple accounts in bad faith; acting spitefully toward the mod or other participants), you will be banned from participation.


• You must be at least 18 years old to participate.

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AU Fest!

As in previous years, a prompt fest (AU Fest) will be running alongside AUex.

You don't have to sign up for the exchange in order to make prompts for the fest; you don't have to make prompts for the fest if you sign up for the exchange. Or you can do both if you like!

You don't have to claim prompts in order to make prompts. Likewise, feel free to claim prompts (or just fill them without claiming!) without making any yourself.

Claiming doesn't oblige you to complete a work. You also don't have to claim in order to fill a prompt, and multiple people can claim the same prompt.

We'll be using the same tagset as the exchange and nominations will be open throughout. I won't be checking nominations as often after signups for the exchange close so feel free to comment here, email me at the address below, or DM me on Discord (if we share a server) and let me know there are nominations to approve - it's absolutely fine to do so.

Gifts can be posted to the main AUex collection if you prefer (make sure the recipient's name is added correctly!) or to the AU Fest collection.

Basically: make 1-10 requests and hope for the best - you won't be guaranteed a gift but hey, maybe!

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If you have any questions, please feel free to ask! You can either comment on this post (anon is on), or email thedevilchicken+auex@gmail.com.

Comments

[thedevilchicken]

I'm afraid that's not possible. Making "Any" a possibility in signups causes many more issues than is solves, unfortunately - especially as it technically means "any in the tagset" but I reopen nominations through the signup period, meaning the characters and ships that form "any in the tagset" has potential to change quite dramatically.