Contest Official Rules & Guidelines
BY ENTERING THE CONTEST, YOU AGREE TO THESE OFFICIAL RULES (HEREINAFTER REFERRED TO AS THE “Contest Official Rules”), WHICH CONSTITUTE A BINDING CONTRACT BETWEEN SHORT EDITION AND YOU.
1. Contest general information
Contest: America: color it in, summer 2020 contest (hereinafter referred to as the “Contest”)
Organizer: Short Edition, a company registered in Grenoble, France, under number #530 552 009, which registered office sets in 615 avenue du Peuras, 38210 Tullins, France (hereinafter referred to as the “Organizer” or “Short Edition”).
2. Stages of the Contest
Submissions
Once a work is submitted (hereinafter referred to as a “Submission”) by an author who qualifies with the eligibility criteria set forth in Section 5 (hereinafter referred to as an “Author”), it is checked and validated by the Organizer’s editorial team, which ensures that the Submission qualifies based on the minimum requirements set forth herein.
Judgments and decisions made by the Organizer’s editorial team as to Submission eligibility and disqualification are at its complete discretion and are final. The Organizer cannot be held responsible towards any other because a Submission has been qualified or disqualified.
As from the day of publication and for the whole Contest duration, the Author is not allowed to delete the Qualifying Submission. If the Author's work is accepted elsewhere and he or she wishes to publish elsewhere, then the Author must inform Short Édition before the end of the submissions period (August 21th), at which point Short Édition will delete the submission from the contest website. Author may request the submission be deleted from the website at any point following the end of the contest.
Finalists
10 Authors in each category (short story, poetry, creative nonfiction) will be selected by the Organizer’s editorial team to be finalists of the contest (hereinafter referred to as the “Finalists”), and 10 Authors in each category will be selected by the community of readers registered on the Organizer’s website (hereinafter referred to as the “Online Community”) to be Finalists, based on the highest number of Online Community votes. In case there are less than 40 Qualifying Submissions per category, the number of Finalists will equal 50% of the number of Qualifying Submissions in that category. The Organizer’s editorial team will select 1/2 of the Finalists and the Online Community will select 1/2 of the Finalists. The list of Finalists will be announced on the Contest website on September 4th.
No Author can be selected both by the Organizer’s editorial team and the Online Community as a Finalist. The editorial team shall have first choice and the next work with the highest number of votes will be the Online Community choice.
The Organizer’s editorial team reserves the right to increase the number of Finalists at any time, without justification and liability of any kind.
Winners
Once the Finalists are announced on the Contest website, the Organizer resets to zero all the votes made during the submission period of the Contest, as per Section 4, and the Online Community has 2 weeks to vote for their favorite Finalist. Members of the Online Community can vote for as many Finalists as they wish, but only vote once for each Finalist. Members of the Online Community can comment on as many Finalist as they wish.
The Organizer’s editorial team will select among the Finalists 1 winner in each category (hereinafter referred to as the “Winner”) and, 1 runner-up in each category (hereinafter referred to as the “Runner-up”). There will also be an Online Community winner in each category (hereinafter referred to as the “Public Winner”), which will be the finalist in each category who receives the most Online Community votes.
No Finalist can be chosen as a Winner or Runner-up and a Public Winner at the same time. If the Organizer’s editorial team selects the finalist with most Online Community votes as the Winner or the Runner-up, the Public Winner will then be the finalist with the second highest amount of votes.
The Prizes
All Winners, Runners-up, and Public Winners will receive $100.00 USD to be donated to a charity of their choice that fights against racism or for equality, whether at a local or national level. Organizer reserves the right to deem the organization an appropriate choice or not regarding the mission of the organization.
Monetary prizes will be distributed by a wire-transfer mailed by the Organizer or any other payment method chosen by the Organizer to the selected organizations in the name of the Winner.
Voting conditions
The offering of incentives or any other counterpart in exchange for votes or comments is strictly prohibited. The use of bots and/or robotic submissions is prohibited. The Organizer has the right to delete any vote, at any time, where it suspects that such vote violated at least one of the previously mentioned Contest Official Rules, without any liability towards the member of the Online Community or the Author.
Members of the Online Community can vote for as many Qualifying Submission as they wish, but only vote once for each Qualifying Submission. Members of the Online Community can comment on as many Qualifying Submission as they wish. Each member of Online Community has a certain number of available votes, depending on his/her implication in the community. Further information is accessible here
Publication in our Short Story Dispenser
Short Édition reserves the right to contact contest participants to enter into a contract for the publication of their stories in our 300+ Short Story Dispensers across the nation and around the world. Upon signing the contract, Author will receive an advance payment against royalties of either 100 euros for a prose submissions (short story or creative nonfiction) or 75 euros for a poetry submission.
3. Contest duration
The Contest opens on Saturday, July 4th, 2020 (12:00 a.m. EST) and will remain open until tuesday, August 21th, 2020 (11:59 p.m. EST). Finalists will be announced on September 4th, 2020. The Organizer’s editorial team review of the Finalists Submissions and the Online Community votes begin on September 4th, 2020 and runs through September 18th, 2020 (12:00 a.m. EST). The Winners and the Runners-up and the Public Winners will be announced on September 18th.
4. Author eligibility
The contest is open to all writers who have lived or are currently living in the US. All participating Authors must be age 16 and up. All Authors must create their author account online (https://short-edition.com/en/login) and submit their Submission using a valid email address.
Authors shall choose their own username while creating their author account — this username will therefore be associated with their Submission when published on the Contest website — and shall also provide their full name and contact information to the Organizer. The Organizer must be able to easily get in touch with the Authors for any reason.
Each Submission will be emailed a confirmation of receipt. Authors will receive an email if there is a change in status of the Submission.
5. Submission conditions
General Submission conditions
No purchase is required to submit or to win the Contest. All the Submissions will be reviewed by the Organizer’s editorial team to ensure they comply with the Contest Official Rules. Each Submission can be disqualified if it does not comply with the Contest Official Rules.
Each Submission must be new, unpublished, original and written by the submitting Author and shall be written in English.
The submission process is entirely electronic via the America: color it in, summer contest 2020 submission portal.
No paper manuscripts will be accepted. The submission form is copy/paste format.
All submissions must fall within the short story, creative nonfiction, or poetry categories.
Multiple Submissions
Authors can submit up to one Submission in each category
6. Rights granted on the Submissions
The Author grants to the Organizer the right to publish any Qualifying Submission on the contest website (hereinafter referred to as the “Temporary License”). This Temporary License allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in the Contest. The Author acknowledges and agrees that no royalties or any other payment of any kind is due in application of the Temporary License.
However, the Organizer reserves the right to contact an Author to enter into a long-form license contract for the publication of their Submission in the Short Story Dispensers around the world outside of the Contest framework. At the end of the Contest, Short Edition will have four (4) weeks to notify the Author of its intent to further publish a Qualifying Submission in Short Edition’s Short Story Dispensers and/or on any other media. If Short Edition decides to further publish a Qualifying Submission, Short Edition’s current General Terms and Conditions shall constitute a contract between Short Edition and the Author.
7. Author’s personal data
Submission of the registration details and any prize notification documents (hereinafter referred to as the “Entrant Data”) constitutes the Author’s consent given to the Organizer to obtain, use, and transfer the Author’s name, address and other details for Contest purposes.
By accepting a prize, the Winners, the Runners-up and the Public Winners give their consent for the use of their names, biographical information, including city and state of residence, for promotional purposes (hereinafter referred to as the “Promotion”) by Organizer, and its designees, including but not limited to the posting of their names on the Organizer’s website, in a winners list, without additional compensation, except where prohibited by law. Such Promotion shall be solely under control of the Organizer and/or its licensors, and the Winners, the Runners-up and the Public Winners hereby waive any right on the Promotion contents as well as any possible claims of misuse of the Winners', the Runners'-up and the Public Winners' names under contract, tort or any other theory of law.
8. Author’s warranties
The Submissions shall not violate or infringe any rights (including but not limited to privacy rights, copyrights, trade secrets, confidential information, trademarks, or trade names). Submissions shall not defame, libel, or slander anyone or any entity. Submissions shall not contain or describe any excessively obscene, vulgar, offensive, profane, or provocative violence or sex. Submissions shall not contain derogatory, racist, or sexist language or situations. Submissions shall not contain plagiarism, which includes the use of third-party poetry, song lyrics, characters or another person’s universe, without written permission. Each Author is responsible and shall defend and hold the Organizer harmless from and against any infringement claim related to its Submission.
9. Applicable law – Disputes
This Contest and these Contest Official Rules are submitted to the laws of France.
In the event of difficulty over the validity, interpretation or performance of these Contest Official Rules, the Author or the Organizer shall contact the other for an amicable dispute resolution. In case such amicable dispute resolution fails, or no solution is found within thirty (30) days from notification, the Author or the Organizer shall bring the dispute before the competent courts of France.