Writers' Contest Rule Quesion

The bit that might get you is "Entries may not have been previously published in professional media."

What exactly does "professional media" mean? I don't know, but personally I wouldn't risk publishing a story myself until after it's been rejected by the contest. Not unless it was going to make me a lot of money or acclaim.

Thanks, @ease.  Intuitively, I'd agree.  Yet the rules very carefully define professional publication as 8¢ a word and 5,000 copies or more.  Even if I self-publish (not a professional publisher) an ePub on Amazon's Kindle store (a very professional seller), it doesn't meet WotF's definition until 5,000 copies are sold and my net earnings exceed 8¢ a word.

Still, your advice is sound.  I'll hold off making it available until I hear official word from the contest.

Thanks,
Mark

So if you win the contest, your stories could be seen in two different anthologies?  I think you may technically be very close to a conflict, but I get the point.  The fact that your personal anthology is "not sold to the public" may be a finer point though than you may think.  I hope it goes okay for you.  

I understand professional media to mean the Internet. Your high school paper? Probably not. Amazon? Surely. Even a publicly visible blog. That's professional *media*.

Where did you get that understanding?  Is there additional guidance elsewhere?  I've always considered a "professional publication" to be one that pays authors for their work.  If a blogger is making money, sure, that's professional.  But a blogger with a dozen followers and no revenue?  I don't see that as professional.

Again, I'm going to hold off on making my anthology available for general sale, but I really think that if the publisher (which, in the case, is me) does not pay the author (which, in this case, is also me) it cannot be considered "professional media" under rule #3, which states,

3. ... Entries may not have been previously published in professional media.

Because the definition of "professionally published" is crystal clear in rule #5.

5.  ... Professional publication is deemed to be payment of at least eight cents per word, and at least 5,000 copies, or 5,000 hits.

Granted, rule #3 states that the story cannot be "previously published" in "professional media."  If, for example, my story were published in Analog Science Fiction magazine ( https://www.analogsf.com/ ) and I were not paid, the story would clearly be ineligible, because it was published in professional media.  Analog is professional media because it pays its authors -- except for me, oddly, because I'm a hack.  Maybe I was owed a favor?

How about Royal Road ( https://www.royalroad.com/ )?  They're a well-established publisher of fiction, but they don't pay their authors, they don't allow their authors to put ads in their stories for revenue, and authors that win contests on Royal Road are "paid" in advertising credit on Royal Road's website.  They're allowed to put PayPal and Patreon links on their stories for readers to voluntarily donate to the author, but that's the author's only source of revenue on Royal Road.  If a story was uploaded to Royal Road, would it be considered previously published in professional media?  Given that Royal Road does not pay authors, can it be considered "professional media?"  I don't think so.

If rule #3 stated, "Entries may not have been previously published," then the answer would be clear.  But it clearly states, "... in professional media."

Apologies if I'm being insufferable.  I'm an engineer and deal with exact language every day.  If I'm not insufferable, things I design literally go 'boom.'  Well, one of the things I worked on went 'boom' by design, so that's an exception.

Thanks for the reply, @tj_knight!

Mark

Mark,

I appreciate your professionalism, and the discussion to be sure we get this right.

My understanding comes solely from my Swiss cheese memory of having this come up in the past and the answer being "posting a story is publishing a story." However, your argument has merit given the "professional" tag.

Conversely, if you post a story and you win with it then people can find it. The contest wants to introduce new authors to the world - with their winning story. Having it available online would negate that distinction.

Agreed to wait for official word. Hope you'll post the reply.

Hi Mark!

I think it's safer to write a new story to WotF every quarter so that you wouldn't have to worry about the publication part for disqualification. As for your anthology question, I think that it's best to wait until the stories submitted to WotF are rejected before posting for public sale.

I don't think you should enter stories already published, whether you have gotten paid for them or not, because "professional media" isn't so much as the publication being widely well-known, but more so that your work is now out there. Imagine paying for a recipe that's already been published to the internet, giving everyone free access to that recipe. You'd feel kind of cheated, right?

But since we're discussing literal meanings...

#3 states "All entries must be original works by the entrant, in English...Entries may not have been previously published in professional media."

#5 states "The Contest is open only to those who have not professionally published a novel or short novel, or more than one novelette, or more than three short stories, in any medium. Professional publication is deemed to be payment of at least eight cents per word, and at least 5,000 copies, or 5,000 hits."

I believe you're mixing the #'s here. #5 is NOT consequential to #3, therefore, the rules stated in #5 is NOT applied to #3. 

#5 is a rule regarding your overall publishing efforts, whether you're a professionally published author or not.

#3 is a rule regarding your entry to WotF, whether the entry can also be published in any other media.

"Professional media" is not the result of being paid. Your aunt paying you a few dollars to take pictures at the family reunion does not make you a professional photographer. Likewise, working as a pro bono lawyer for a case where a client doesn't pay you doesn't mean you are not in fact, a lawyer. So, you printing out copies of your story for your friends and family is not a professional medium. You making that anthology for sale with the entries to WotF in them before getting an acceptance or rejection on Amazon does make that a professional medium. Your anthology would be on sale all over the world. So, NO, you may not do that.

I would suggest you not publish your anthology with your WotF entries made publicly available until it's been rejected.

I would also suggest you to not use stories already published elsewhere in any format for whatever purposes for any amount of payment whether that was in the form of publication copies or actual money.

Write a new story. You can do it. I'll cheer you on. Make this the best new year to come for your writing endeavors! 

Sincerely,

Anna

PS

Professional media is not the same as professional publication. Those words can't be used interchangeably. Professional publication is in fact explained by #5, but professional media applies to more than just publication. It applies to any medium that provides a platform on which you're able to promote yourself or others do that for you. In terms of not being paid for Analog and Royal Road, I'm pretty sure they promote their magazines, so they do apply as professional mediums whether you got paid or not.

Thank you, @tj_knight and @annax, for your inputs.  You've convinced me to keep my anthology out of public sale unless I get official word on my situation that allows it.

Yes, @tj_night, any official word I get, I'll share on this form thread.

Yes, @annax, I agree that professional media and professional publication are not the same thing.  Professional media focuses on the vehicle in which the story is delivered, i.e. professional media is something your purchase.  Professional publication is the act of paying an author for the rights to publish their work.  They're not the same thing and the rules are unclear, thus I'm asking.

It all goes back to how "professional publication" is defined.  The SFWA would have previously not considered self-publication a legitimate credential for their membership criteria, because the author does not get paid by a reputable publisher.  However, they've changed their rules.  Now, if an author nets $1000 off of a self-published book or epub within a 12-month period, that passes their membership criteria.  At least, that's how I understand it.

Thus, I contend that if I sell a self-published book and don't sell 5,000 copies and make 8¢ a word, I don't think WotF would consider my self-published book to be professional media.

But @annax makes good arguments.  It made me realize that if a book is for sale (whether it sells one copy or one million copies) isn't that book a professional publication, just on the merit of being a product in the marketplace?  That's a convincing argument.  And it would make me a professional publisher!  (Of course, that's where the argument breaks down, because I'm not.)

I don't think much else can be said, so I'm going hold off making my anthology available to the public and wait to see if the Contest provides any further guidance.

Mark

Disregarding the legalese for a minute, let me share an anecdote which solved this question for me.

I used an AI program to generate art, and submitted that to the Illustrators contest. It placed as a finalist but on the phonecall with the wonderful @jonilabaqui I disclosed my use of AI. Using AI is not (currently) against the rules. In fact, the current rules explicitly stated "use of computer-generated art is prohibited". However, because AI generated art cannot be copyrighted (not strictly black-and-white, but as far as the contest is concerned it's a dark-enough shade of gray) it couldn't be published in the anthology. And thus, I was (quite fairly) disqualified.

Previously publicly published written works, "professional" or not, will almost certainly face the same roadblock.