I’ve finally managed to work through the huge backlog of submissions we had generated, so it’s time to announce a new submissions model for 50WS, one that will hopefully allow more people to participate in sending their stories to the site, without leading to more massive backlogs with two-month or longer wait times to hear back on their submissions.
Here’s How It Will Work
Each month, submissions will be open for the first 15 days of the month. Any stories received on days 16 to 31 of a month will not be read (but can be submitted in the next month). Each author may only submit one story per month.
From the stories received in those 15 days, the best stories will be selected to be published the following month. Only enough stories will be selected to publish two stories per weekday.
Stories that were not selected will not be published, will not roll over into the following month, and cannot be resubmitted in following months. Authors will be notified whether their story has been selected or not once all stories from the month’s submissions have been reviewed. This will prevent huge backlogs.
What Won’t Change
The Top Stories program will not be affected. I will still choose a story of the week, story of the month, and story of the year in the same way.
Implementation
It’s too late for this system to be in place for September’s stories, so as of today I am temporarily reopening a traditional approach to submissions, until we have enough new stories to cover the month of September. The new system will kick in as of October 2015.
I hope this will help me maintain the site more efficiently and make it a more rewarding experience to submit your stories to the site. I’m looking forward to receiving more stories from all of you again!
P.S. If any issues with this system arise, I’ll tweak it as necessary. It will be an experiment at first, but I think it will work out well overall.