SITE: Newsblog Essay Contest Rules.

On Monday, I announced that the New Olympian Agora would be hosting its first contest to celebrate its first anniversary.

This entry covers the rules of the contest. Please read over them carefully and remember to check often to see if there are any additions. Failure to follow the rules will result in disqualification, though I will warn you first and give you a chance to fix it.

BASIC RULES

1. For potential legal reasons, you must be at least 13 years old to participate. Please do not attempt to lie about it.

2. Due to the nature of the prize, you and/or your parent/guardian (if you are underage) should be comfortable with privately e-mailing me your address if you win. If this doesn't work for you, but you still really want to enter the contest, let me know and we can work something out.

3. Plagiarism is frowned down upon VERY much here. Your essay must be your own original work and if you quote something or use other people's ideas, you must use proper citations, and I will run searches for this kind of thing.

4. Individual submissions only. No pair or group essays.

ESSAY GUIDELINES

1. The topic, as mentioned in the original announcement, is to take one of the seven main 'Class of the Titans' characters and argue why an alternative mythological ancestor would work, citing specific examples. Entries that try to cop-out of this by arguing why the character's current ancestor is perfect will be disqualified. The alternative ancestor MUST be an existing Greco-Roman mythological character.

2. The word limit is 500-750 words. There is a little bit of leeway beyond this range, but don't be ridiculous about it. Writing more is not necessarily better.

3. Spelling and grammar DO count. A proper essay tone is expected. Take the time to proofread. If English is not your first language, please make sure you let me know, though it's recommended that you get someone more familiar with the language to also proofread for you. Also, use proper paragraphs.

SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS

Please send contest entries to age.of.silicon@gmail.com with 'Newsblog Essay Contest -- [NAME]' with your name or online username (whichever you want to be addressed as) where it says [NAME]. Attach the essay either in the body of the e-mail or as a link to where you've posted it online. The current deadline is May 31, 2007.

Rules are subject to change at any time, so please check back regularly to see if anything has since been modified. Judging criteria and perhaps a sample entry (comparing one of the characters to their current ancestor, so that I'm not potentially infringing on anyone's essay idea) to come in another post.

If you have any further questions, please leave a comment to this entry.