The contest will be broken up into three periods of 48 hours each. At the beginning of each period, a THEME will be announced. From the moment the THEME is announced, contestants will have exactly 48 hours to write and post an article based on that theme. All contest articles posted for each period must adhere to that period's theme — if you write an article for the first period but only post it in the second period, that article will be disqualified from the contest.

Winners will be determined by vote count. There will be first place winners for each theme, as well as two Grand Prize Winners: one for the entrant who writes for all three themes and amasses the highest overall vote count, and one for the entrant who writes one article of each type (SCPs, Tales, and GOI Formats) and amasses the highest overall vote count.

You are free to solicit as much critique as you can get within the time period.

Rules:

Contest submissions will begin at 12:01 AM (EDT) on March 9 and end at 12:01 AM (EDT) on March 15. Contest voting, and therefore the contest proper, will end on March 29 at 12:01 AM (EDT). International entrants be aware that American Daylight Savings Time begins March 8! Authors may not collab with each other. One author per article only! You can still get critique from as many people as you can! This year, each theme will run for 48 hours. Per feedback from last year, posting time has been effectively doubled: As soon as a theme is announced, entries for that theme are OPEN: for the next 48 hours, they can be worked on and posted for the contest. As soon as the NEXT theme is announced, entries for the PREVIOUS theme are CLOSED and cannot be posted for the contest. To clarify: you can still post articles for closed themes to the site, but they will not be considered as contest entries. Each theme's entries will have fourteen days to accumulate votes, beginning at the CLOSE of their posting period. At the end of this voting period, net upvotes will be tallied and used to determine the final placements. All types of articles - SCPs, Tales, and GOI Formats - are allowed. Entries can be as long or as short as you want. Feel free to add supplements or use ListPages; however, only the main page of the article — the first one with a rating module — will be considered for the entry. Authors may pick and choose which themes to submit to. However, only authors who submit entries for all three themes, or submit at least one of each kind of article format, will be considered for the Grand Prizes. Each Grand Prize consists of an article of your choice featured on the front page for the entire month of April. Authors can try for both Grand Prizes. If someone wins both Grand Prizes, then they will receive both. The first-place winner of each day will also receive a prize: an article of their choice featured on the front page for ten days in April. Authors may submit any number of entries per theme, but only the highest-rated entry per theme or article format will be considered for voting totals. The first Grand Prize is theme-based. You simply need to submit an article for each theme and accumulate the highest cumulative voting total across all three themes. The second Grand Prize is format-based. You only need to submit an SCP, Tale, and GOI Format and and accumulate the highest cumulative voting total across all three. So if you post a tale and SCP for Theme 1, post nothing for Theme 2, and then post a GOI Format for Theme 3, and have the highest cumulative score for all people who posted one of each article type? You win the Second Grand Prize. However, each format must be unique. They can each be parts of a single serialized story, but they cannot simply be different versions of the same story. Your GOI Format can't just be an alternate description of your SCP or vice-versa. No edits more significant than SPaG fixes until voting for your entry's theme closes. If you wouldn't do it to someone else's work without their permission, wait before you do it to your own. Contest entries will go through the normal deletion process. There is no limit on the number of entries you may post so you may always reenter. However, you MAY NOT repost a new version of a previously deleted entry in the contest. You can still submit the new version to the site, just not for the contest. Entries must be new and original. You cannot submit a pre-existing draft for this contest. No exceptions. Similarly, your entries cannot incorporate any media (pictures, videos, audio, etc.) that you had saved or created before the theme period began. Shenanigans Rule: The contest organizers reserve the right to disqualify entries and entrants for behavior they deem unsportsmanlike, such as downvoting other contestants' entries solely to gain a vote advantage or excessively self-promoting their articles. If you're not sure whether or not your action will fall under the Shenanigans Rule, ask either A Random Day ProcyonLotor Tag your entries with 'jam-con2020'.

Winners will be chosen through total upvotes. At the conclusion of the contest, a post will be made by the judges announcing winners and awarding special prizes to deserving entries. The judges for this contest are A Random Day and ProcyonLotor - please PM them with any further questions you might have.