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getyourwordsout2021 Pledges & Requirements
GYWO is BACK for 2019! We’re starting our eleventh year-long writing challenge with ten pledges to help you challenge yourself, achieve your writing goals, and build a writing life.
Keep in mind that even our smallest goals require a serious commitment throughout the year. While it’s okay for writers to be behind or even entirely miss their pledge goal, we want you to pick a pledge that could be achievable for you and will keep you writing all year long. Before choosing your pledge, please take note of the few requirements we have of our members, and carefully consider which of the ten pledges you'd like to choose. You may only choose one pledge.
Membership Requirements & Information
Given that this is a year-long challenge, we expect members to be writing throughout the year. While obviously some months will be better than others, and life can toss roadblocks into writing plans, we are here to encourage you to develop a consistent writing life despite these distractions.
There are a handful of requirements to joining GYWO.
- You must have an account on Dreamwidth or OpenID. (If you are a previous member using a new name or new service, please let us know.)
- Sign up using ONE account from any of the above mentioned services. (You may use a writing journal instead of your personal one, just please sign up with only one. You’ll be asked for your username on other services so we can allow you access everywhere.)
- All members MUST participate in the monthly check-ins. Each month members provide their current year-to-date (YTD) word count or day count totals to the moderators. You will only ever be required to provide numbers; sharing what is written is completely optional.
- At the March check-in, members must have written some number of words toward their goal or worked some number of days toward their goal.
The community’s pledge progress is used by the moderators to determine trends in the group and help gauge when additional encouragement may be needed. We also keep a backup of all members' word counts or day counts, available in a spreadsheet for members' viewing.
If you do not check in for a month, it will be noted; three months in a row without checking in will result in your removal from the community; missing more than 6 check-ins over the course of the year will result in your removal from the community. PM warnings will be sent if you are ever in danger of being removed from the community (so keep PMs turned on if you want to receive communication from the moderators). Please see the information on Monthly Check-ins for further details.
Since check-ins are so important, we strongly recommend you track the !monthly check-in tag at the community, or make note on your personal calendar that check-ins are always open during the first 5 days of a month. Additionally, if you know you will be unavailable during the time frame for an upcoming check-in, you can request to be excused (more information available on the website).
Other community information, including answers to questions you may have, is available on our external website. These include:
Guidelines—membership changes and member conduct
Countable Words—a guide to what words count for the Word Count Pledges (a pressing question for most members)
Writing Activities—a guide to writing activities and parameters for the Habit Pledges
Monthly Check-ins—a preview of the check-in procedure
Community—what to expect in the GYWO community
After reading these, please let us know in this post if you have any additional questions you need answered before making your pledge.
Pledge Types
GYWO offers two kinds of pledges dedicated to helping you increase your productivity and prioritize your writing life.
Word Count Pledges
- Word Count Pledges are GYWO Classic, focusing you on writing a certain number of words over the course of the year. Members who pledge for 2019 may use any number of writing projects to add to their word count over the year. Projects may include (among other things) novels, fanfics, poems, songs, and essays. You may count any words you write, regardless of if you edit them out of your final draft. Think of this as a way to measure the amount of work you put into your writing each year. You can find out more information about what words count by visiting GYWO.net.
Word Count Pledges start at 75,000 words and go up to 500,000 words, with seven incremental pledge levels. Think carefully before choosing one because you won’t be able to change your pledge during the year.
Habit Pledges
- Habit Pledges are designed to help you build a writing habit by counting the number of days you spend on writing activities. For the purposes of these pledges, writing activities must have a recorded creative element such as drafting or revising, outlining or brainstorming on paper, writing query letters or synopses, or completing world building or character sheets. Instead of focusing on word count production, these pledges offer a more holistic take on the writing life. You can find out more information about habit pledge activities by visiting GYWO.net.
Habit Pledges start at 120 days and go up to 350 days, with three incremental pledge levels. Think carefully before choosing one because you won’t be able to change your pledge during the year.
Mutually Exclusive
- You may choose only ONE pledge for the purposes of official tracking at GYWO. If you are interested in both a Word Count Pledge and a Habit Pledge, we invite you to personally and unofficially track one of the pledges—it will give you a basis for choosing a pledge in future years.
Pledging
If you pledged in a previous year, and didn't meet your goal, quit, or were removed from the comm for missing check-ins, you are welcome to pledge again.
When choosing your pledge, consider your personal writing habits and what you find most motivating. Will hitting your word count goal early help propel you to keep writing through the remainder of the year? Do you need a major challenge to keep you on pace? Have you surpassed smaller goals in previous years and need more of a challenge? Are you already writing multiple days a week? Make sure the pledge you make is one that will motivate you.
To make your pledge, there are two steps to complete: Pledge & Request.
Step 1: Pledge
Follow the link for your pledge to the appropriate post and leave a comment using the journal you intend to use to join the community. Cut and paste the form at the pledge post to ensure you’re leaving all of the information needed.
- Word Count Pledges
- 75K words, the Light level, approximately 6.25K words/month, 205 words/day (reserved for members with significant impact to their writing time)
- 150K words, the Modest level, approximately 12.5K words/month, 411 words/day
- 200K words, the Basic level, approximately 16.6K words/month, 548 words/day
- 250K words, the Moderate level, approximately 20.8K words/month, 685 words/day
- 300K words, the Difficult level, approximately 25.0K words/month, 822 words/day
- 350K words, the Insane level, approximately 29.1K words/month, 959 words/day
- 500K words, the Ludicrous level, approximately 41.6K words/month, 1,370 words/day
- 120 days, the Apprentice level, approximately 10 days/month
- 240 days, the Journeyman level, approximately 20 days/month
- 350 days, the Master level, approximately 29–30 days/month
Habit Pledges
Reminders: Sign up for only ONE pledge.
Sign up with only ONE account.
You may sign up using Dreamwidth or OpenID.
You may use a fic/writing journal instead of your personal one.
Include your username on the other platforms requested to have access everywhere.
If you have previously participated under a different username (or on Livejournal), please let us know so we can track our repeat members.
Step 2: Request
Once you have left your pledge comment, please request to join the community. We will approve memberships on January 1st (as we still have 2018 members scrambling to hit their goals!), but we'll hold you in the queue.
If you are a current member, you won’t need to request as you are already a member of the community.
If you’re concerned we didn’t receive your pledge: We will be updating the 2019 list in the profile as new members are verified. Please give us at least twenty-four hours from submitting your pledge before inquiring about your status. (Over the Christmas holiday we will not be vetting pledges, so please check back on Dec 27th.)
IMPORTANT: Anyone requesting to join the community who has not made a pledge will not be added. To ensure you are not left out, make your pledge first, then request to join.
After that time you will NOT be able to change your pledge
or join the challenge, so think carefully before committing.
Promotion
If you want to share GYWO with your friends, please feel free to use either of the codes provided to let them know you’ll be writing a lot in 2019 and you think they should too.
[img: notebook and pen on wooden desktop with "GYWO 2019"
printed in large white letters with a black shadow. under that,
"writing decathlon" in handwritten white letters with a black shadow.]
GetYourWordsOut: Year Eleven!
Pledges & Requirements | GYWO.net
[img: notebook paper with "GYWO 2019" printed in large black
letters with a blue shadow. under that, "writing decathlon" in
handwritten black letters with an orange shadow.]
GetYourWordsOut: Year Eleven!
Pledges & Requirements | GYWO.net
Hopefully that covers everything you need to know about what is required of members, what the pledge options are, and how to make your pledge. Questions are welcome in this post! We hope to see your pledge soon!
FAQ
• If I’m a 2018 member, do I need to pledge? Do I need to request membership?
• Can I pledge if I previously quit the challenge, was removed for missed check-ins, or didn’t meet my goal?
• I participated before but can’t remember my previous username. What do I do?
• What happens if I finish my pledge early?
• What happens if I don’t finish my pledge?
FAQ #4: Finishing Early?
Date: 2018-12-14 01:22 pm (UTC)