Open Novella Journal 2024

This Year's Drama

Every year, there's been some kind of crazy thing that's gone down with ONC, but I want to talk about this year's crazy and previous years by reminding people that the ONC ambassadors are volunteers. This year's snafu also involves the ONC rules, guidelines, facts, etc. not being clear when, in reality, they are. The fact a specific word is never used doesn't mean they're not clear, but I'm saying this as someone who's dyslexic. 

It's actually not a clarity issue regarding what the ambassadors have written in the ONC book but a clarity issue regarding how Wattpad works for those not familiar with how the site works, and yes, there is a difference between the two. Acting like this is otherwise is honestly dishonest and treats a clearly complicated issue as if it were a black-and-white matter that the ONC ambassadors could just resolve with a desired word change even if there are x issues that arise.

I'm saying this as someone who has had a couple of their entries eliminated during the first round because one year I submitted my story that wasn't co-written as being co-written and another year because I didn't hit send on my final submission. Yes, getting eliminated for those reasons wasn't fun, but I recognize that certain technical difficulties that are the result of elimination are the fault of the writer, not the ONC ambassadors.

I feel in this case there's been too much blame levied on the ONC ambassadors simply because a certain word isn't used, rather than understanding this is an issue of certain writers, even some who've used the site for years, not understanding how the site operates which in turn makes this idea that they should have had the hindsight to just use the word when the ONC ambassadors aren't going to think of every single way an individual may or may not know how to use the site, or google forms when submitting, which in my case I did know how to use the form and still slipped up.

But yes, let's start off with the fiascos of the previous years.

2018 - This was the first year. There was a limit to the number of prompts, and everyone was testing the waters for ONC. I didn't do well this year, I remember, because I tried making my chapters 2k exactly.

2019 - This year was about ironing out the kinks, such as the fact we could submit multiple entries and that we didn't have to stick with the prompt to the letter, yet the prompt did have to be recognizable.

2020 - This year was affected by COVID, which resulted in a lot of people dropping out during the second round either because they caught COVID or they were on the front lines. This would also be the year that a certain prompt resulted in a slew of entries that the ambassadors felt the need to add the disclaimer about potentially triggering content.

2021 - This is the year ONC was accused of favoring LGBT content. Still, the claim was specifically that if we didn't have LGBT content in our stories, we were unfairly eliminated, that there was some kind of bonus points for LGBT content when I'd argue they're actually harder on such content because they're in the position of making sure any rep (LGBT or not) doesn't misrepresent the group being represented.

2022 - This is the copyright scare year, but to clarify - this year, an additional prize for the grand prize winner gets the same treatment as the winner of the Wattys was offered up, and to that, there is automatic legal jargon that is added to such contests where a third party is involved. And yes, this did contradict the statement in the ONC book that the Wattpad staff aren't involved.

This wasn't, though, some grand scheme to steal the winner's work as certain people claimed, but an attempt to try and add something new and exciting to ONC that wasn't completely thought out that actually ended up being removed even before ONC started that year resulting it becoming a non-issue. Yet, there were some who decided the automatic legal jargon still applied despite the ONC stating publicly that this wasn't the case.