D/Hr Advent Taking Nominations

[boundbooks]

Origin: dhr_advent

Link: Nominations

Description: D/Hr Advent is a seasonal fic fest that follows an advent calendar format. The D/Hr Advent Calendar will have 24 authors/artists create a short one-shot or fanart which will then be posted each day leading up to Christmas.

Timeline: Nominations have begun and will continue till Oct. 6th and 11:59pm.

Note - musyc, I have no idea what the appropriate tag would be for something like this. :P

Comments

[eevilalice]

Still massively unsure about this undertaking, unfortunately. I had a whole list of nominees all ready to go because I figured a new mod had been found for the old comm way back when kalina originally asked, and now no one can hunt her down.

[boundbooks]

I did end up putting in nominations. The mod's unproven, *but* the old community is unrecoverable, and we've recently had a number of Dramione seasonal fests either fail to run luvlikerocketz (back in February/March, but they hadn't run an event since 2009, so they're effectively retired) or currently teeter on the brink of cancellation dmhghalloween (October 2011) and a Dramione advent (the entire problem with no mod being given ownership/powers for dramione_advent).

Those challenges that I mentioned have potential burn-out issues, just because it's got H+V staff running it. I love the H+V staff, but it's really too much for them to run H+V and challenges/fests during the year. I think that they probably ran a lot of these communities before H+V was created, and they're really stellar organization people (which is why H+V is a success), but it's not humanly possible to do both. Not with the way H+V is exploding (1,000 to 2,000 new members per month).

A *large* number of the Dramione exclusive stuff ended this year or had mod hand-overs. dramione_duet switched hands. I mean, heck, dmhgficexchange retired this year. I'm working on otterandferret, but if I hadn't stepped into the Dramione ship when I did back in May, what would the next fic exchange look like? Would there be one this year, or would it rotate off and have to be revived a year or two from now? =/

Right now the 'regular yearly' Dramione stuff stands at:

dramione_duet
dramione_remix
dmhgaprilfools (If it runs again)
dhr_advent (If it works)
otterandferret (If I don't @$#@ it up. :P)

So, it's pretty much a list that's half composed of 'maybes'.

My feelings are that the new mod *did* put out a call for co-mods, publicly, at all the major LJ Dramione comms. So far, no one's responded because they don't know the mod and people are kind of going 'oh, I won't nominate/participate because I don't know the mod.' It's kind of a nasty feed-back loop. I mean, come December, if no one nominates and no one participates because they were afraid it would fail, and then it *does* fail for lack of nominations and participants , I kind of feel that's more the Dramione community's fault than the mod's. =/

I kind of feel like it's setting up the new mod up for failure, when it's really not her fault that the old Advent mod left without passing on the old community to anyone at all. Right now the shortage in the Dramione community seems to be people who have the time to be staff (see dhr_news), not a lack of writers/artists. We have someone here who's stepped up and volunteered to be staff, which is really the dire need right now.

I'm going to err on the side of being optimistic and participate in this new advent. If it works, it works! If it doesn't work, the alternative wasn't dramione_advent, but no advent at all. I'd rather see it be attempted and maybe not run smoothly, than have a Dramione advent vanish off the calendar year. :)

[eevilalice]

I think the problem is that, yes, the new advent comm mod did make a call for assistance before forming the new comm, but then BAM, next day went ahead and started running the show, giving the impression she didn't need assistance (the entries on the comm are worded with "I"). People felt like, "Oh, okay then..." This was still when efforts to hunt down kalina, the old mod, were still ongoing. There was a feeling of gun-jumping happening, and in fandom, for better or worse, that gets to people in a bad way.

Kalina DID make efforts to find a new mod way back in July. If no one stepped up (or someone or two did and then fell away), what should she have done? LJ no longer provides a way for comms to be taken over, and if RL matters were more pressing for her, I understand that. I think it's unfair to blame her for the situation, and I don't think anyone's blaming the new mod for the fact that Kalina is MIA.

I'd been thinking of PMing the new mod, just to try and politely explain why there's trepidation. Who knows? It may be that even if she officially calls for a co-mod, on the new comm itself, no one will step up and the situation will persist.

[boundbooks]

"People felt like, "Oh, okay then..." This was still when efforts to hunt down kalina, the old mod, were still ongoing. There was a feeling of gun-jumping happening, and in fandom, for better or worse, that gets to people in a bad way."

Totally true. I definitely understand where the trepidation is coming from.

"Kalina DID make efforts to find a new mod way back in July. If no one stepped up (or someone or two did and then fell away), what should she have done? LJ no longer provides a way for comms to be taken over, and if RL matters were more pressing for her, I understand that. I think it's unfair to blame her for the situation, and I don't think anyone's blaming the new mod for the fact that Kalina is MIA."

Totally odd-ball comment/idea, but here goes. I'm going to guess that part of the reason why the dramione_advent hand over got @#$@-ed up (aka, didn't happen) and the dramione_duet hand-over went smooth as glass, was due to an odd twist of social quirks. I bet it came down to screened vs unscreened comments.

The January 2011 dramione_duet call for a new mod (http://dramione-duet.livejournal.com/16352.html) had unscreened comments. So, it was very clear when a new mod had been found. Anyone interested could see that it was open, and then see when a new mod had been found.

The July 2011 dramione_advent call is screened (http://dramione-advent.livejournal.com/19898.html). So, no one knows how many people volunteered. It's possible that *no one* did, initially, because they thought *someone else* must have done so. I think that's actually a pretty common social phenomenon. It's actually impossible to tell how many people, and when, stepped up to volunteer to mod that community, because comments are screened.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Bystander_effect
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Diffusion_of_responsibility

A community of 208 members, where it's impossible to see if someone has volunteered/answered the call for assistance, is pretty much a perfect set-up for those phenomena. Everyone assumes that it *must* have happened, so it's entirely possible that *no one* volunteered until a couple months down the line (September), when the community should have put up the preliminary post for this round. It was completely unintentional, but screening the comments was probably not the best of decisions. I don't think the situation is Kalina's fault. It's really more of a situation where it's not her fault, it's just that there are questions only she can answer. Since she's moved on from fandom, I guess I'm kind assuming that she will never be available to provide those answers, since usually exiting fandom is a one-way trip.

"I'd been thinking of PMing the new mod, just to try and politely explain why there's trepidation. Who knows? It may be that even if she officially calls for a co-mod, on the new comm itself, no one will step up and the situation will persist."

I think that's a fantastic idea, if you're willing. I hope that if she puts up a post saying 'Sorry for jumping the gun, I was just super enthusiastic, if you're at all interested in co-modding, please get in touch with me', it will go a long way with people. :)

[eevilalice]

Yes, the screened comments thing is a totally good point and possible scenario, and I know I'm personally less likely to step up for something if comments are screened. Something to keep in mind for future modding efforts.

I'll PM her and we'll see what happens. I should go ahead and nominate my writers, too. :)

[boundbooks]

The screened vs unscreened thing never would have occurred to me either, if not for the fact that I'd spotted the unscreened post on the dramione_duet community. :)

As you said, definitely something I'll keep in mind, especially for otterandferret.

Best of luck with that PM, and happy nominating! :D