due South Seekrit Santa assignments are out!

[desireearmfeldt]

If you signed up for dSSS this year, you should have received an email from AO3 with your assignment for this year's challenge.

If you have not received this email, please check your spam or junk mail filter. If it isn't there either, please let us know ASAP at dsss.admin at gmail dot com.

You should also be able to see your assignment by logging into AO3 and going to My Assignments.

In an effort to avoid some miscommunications that happened last year, we're asking everyone to confirm that they have received their assignments. Please check the email associated with your AO3 account, and send the mods an email at dsss.admin AT gmail DOT com letting us know 1) that you have recieved your assignment, 2) the username of your recipient, and 3) what email you would like us to use if we need to contact you individually about dSSS.


Reminders:

Your assignment may have up to three requests - pick ONE of the requests only.

Optional tags and Dear Santa letters are suggestions only. You are making a fanwork for the character/pairing/moresome as per the request. If you enjoy writing to prompts, go for it, but if your recipient's optional details/suggestions leave you cold, don't worry! As long as you honor their do-not-wants, you'll be fine!

Stories must be at least 1000 words in length, per the AO3's word count. Podficced works must also be at least 1000 words in length. Vids must be at least 1.5 minutes long. Visual art should be equal in effort and time to a well-crafted 1,000 word story. Check the challenge profile for rules and FAQ.

Absolutely do NOT contact your recipient if you have questions. Contact *us* and we will fix things.

Basically, seekrit things are seekrit. Optional things are optional. Required things are required. If confused, ALWAYS ASK THE MODS. If asking reveals things about your assignment, EMAIL, don't comment!

If you have any questions, email us and we'll get back to you as quickly as we can.

If you get finished early and have an idea for a bonus work, that is totally cool, but you only have to make ONE work for your recipient.

We're planning a "treats" round in late November -- keep any eye on the community for more information.

\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/

Welcome to due South Seekrit Santa 2016!

[desireearmfeldt]

Welcome to the 2016 edition of the due South Seekrit Santa fanworks exchange!  We’ve got a great mix of new and returning participants this year, and your mods are getting excited in anticipation of all the great fanworks in store!  We hope you’ll all have a great time!

Please feel free to contact the mods at any time if you have questions or concerns.  We are here to help!  The best way to contact us is via email at dsss.admin AT gmail DOT com.  (Sending messages via Tumblr will not necessarily reach us in a timely fashion.  Commenting on posts to the dSSS LiveJournal comm will reach us, but not as reliably and efficiently as email.)

Returning participants are also a great resource for new folks who are wondering about how things work.  Because we’re split across social media platforms, it’s been harder to get the group socializing in recent years, but we encourage you to talk amongst yourselves, in whatever format works best!  Community bonding is part of the fun!

And now, some important information:

When in doubt, check the rules: ….available at the AO3 collection.

When can we post our gifts? The collection will open on December 1 – watch this space for an announcement when the time comes!  For those of you who finish early (we love you!), some things you can do while you’re waiting to post:

• Do another round of proofreading/editing of your giftwork.  (You did get feedback from a beta, right?)


• Make a treat for your own recipient, another participant, or the mods.  (All requests will be made public sometime in mid-November, when we announce the beginning of Treats time.)

        
Beta-readers/viewers/listeners: Because you are making a gift for someone else, we ask that your final work be polished (free of typos, etc.).

All primary giftworks submitted to dSSS are required to be beta’ed. That is, you must have someone else read/look at/listen to your fanwork and give you feedback, in time for you to edit your work based on their feedback. We encourage Treats to be beta’ed as well, if possible.

Even if you don't usually use a beta as part of your creation process, we ask you to please respect the rules of this gift exchange and take the beta process seriously. (You don't have to follow all your beta's suggestions -- it's your work, after all.  But please do your beta and your recipient the courtesy of seriously considering the feedback you receive.)

To help people find betas, there will be a post going up soon where people can volunteer to beta.  Watch this space for more information!  Also, stay tuned for an “All About Betas” post later this month.

New This Year: This year, we’re asking you to recruit your beta by November 1, so that you don’t find yourself in the position of scrambling to find someone willing to read a 10K fic the night before the posting deadline. If you need help finding someone to beta for you, check out the beta-volunteer post or ask the mods to assist you.

New this year: November check-in! This year, as part of our effort to improve communication, we’re going to have a check-in on November 1.  We will send each participant a check-in email to see how you’re doing and confirm that you have recruited someone to beta your fanwork.

Dear Santa/Giftmaker Letters masterpost

[desireearmfeldt]

Dear Santa/Giftmaker letters are a great way to elaborate on your requests and the sorts of things you enjoy or that you'd prefer not to see in the giftwork made for you. However, posting letters is totally optional; likewise, DSSS participants are not obliged by the optional details of their recipients' letters.

Notes on Letters:
• Please include your AO3 USERNAME so your giftmaker knows which letter is yours!.
• If you included an empty placeholder link in your DSSS signup, you'll need to go back and edit that post.
• If you didn't inlcude a link in your Request on AO3, you won't be able to add one now, but you can still post a letter and comment here with link or text, so your giftmaker can find it.
• If you've forgotten what you requested, you can refer to your signup at this link or by clicking "My Signups" on your AO3 profile page.
• Remember to take into account the non-story formats you included in your requests when writing your letter, in case you were matched with one of our artists, vidders or podficcers!
• Holiday or Christmas-themed giftworks are NOT required and may be unwelcome, given that DSSS is an international and multicultural exchange. If you have a preference concerning December holidays, you should mention that in your letter so your Giftmaker will know.

Everyone: please come back and check this post during the next week or two to see if your recipient has posted a letter.

Need some ideas for how to write a Dear Santa/Giftmaker letter? Check out the "santa letters" tag to see how others have done them in the past.

DSSS Reminders:
• This is a SEEKRIT exchange! Keep everything you're doing seekrit until Reveal Day, Jan. 1st!
• Your assignments are SEEKRIT until Reveal, so refrain from openly discussing your assignments or identifying your recipient.
• Under NO circumstances should you contact your recipient directly. If you have questions about your assignment (no matter how weird!), bring them to your friendly-neighborhood mods at dsss.admin@gmail.com. We'll happily relay questions to your recipient; we can even be sneaky and frame things so they're less likely guess what they're getting. *g*
• Optional Details Are Optional, at least as far as prompts go. We do ask that you respect your recipient's notes concerning things they do not want to receive. We appreciate your kindness.


Once you write your letter, paste or link it in the comments below! Make sure any linked posts are PUBLIC, since your Santa may not be on your access list. If your journal is friends-only, paste your letter below. (Asking your Santa to friend your flocked journal undermines their Seekrit Identity and ruins the fun. Don't ruin the fun! *g*)  If you're a Tumblr user, please post a link to your letter here on the LJ master-post, or leave a comment on this post with your letter.

Okay! When you're ready, please comment below with your letter or link! YAY DSSS! \o/