getyourwordsout | GYWO 2017: Pledges & Requirements (Reply)

GYWO is BACK for 2017! We’re starting our ninth year-long writing challenge with seven pledges to help you challenge yourself, achieve your writing goals, and build a writing life. Keep in mind that even our smallest word count goals require a serious commitment throughout the year. Even though 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 seven pledges you'd like to choose.

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 Livejournal, 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 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 for their goal.

Your word counts are 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, 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. A habit of missing check-ins may result in an additional warning. 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 (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 (a pressing question for most members)
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.

Pledging

Members who pledge for 2017 are permitted to 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 can find a guideline of what kinds of projects we count at our website.

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 goal, consider your personal writing habits and what you find most motivating. Will hitting your 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? 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 have join the community.

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

Reminders: Sign up with only ONE account.
You may sign up using Livejournal, 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, if you are signing up on Dreamwidth), please let us know so we can track our repeat members.

Step 2: Request Once you have made your pledge, please request to join the community. We’ll approve memberships on January 1st (as we still have the 2016 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 2017 member 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.

You have until January 15, 2017 to make your pledge.
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 of words in 2017 and you think they should too.

[img: notebook paper with "GYWO 2017" printed in large black letters with a blue
shadow. under that, "writing decathlon" in handwritten black letters with an
orange shadow. printed at the bottom in black is "sign up dec. 14 - jan. 15"]
GetYourWordsOut: Year Nine!
Pledges & Requirements | GYWO.net