Reedsy’s Short Story Contest Terms of Use
Thank you for your interest in Reedsy’s Short Story Contest! These terms of use set out important information applicable to the Contest, so please read them carefully.
This Short Story Contest (Contest) is operated and promoted by Reedsy Limited (Reedsy, Us, We, Our), a company incorporated in England with registered number 08841985 and whose address is 483 Green Lanes, London N13 4BS. By entering our Contest, you agree to these terms of use.
In these terms of use when we refer to:
● Reedsy, we might use “us,” “we,” or “our.”
● The person entering the Contest, we might use “the entrant,” “the author,” “you,” “your,” or “user.”
● The short story Contest, we might use “the Contest.”
● Reedsy Prompts, we mean this page: https://blog.reedsy.com/creative-writing-prompts/
1. The Contest
Every Friday, Reedsy sends a newsletter that includes five themed writing prompts and publishes the same five prompts on Reedsy Prompts.
Writers then have one week (until the following Friday at 11.59pm EST), to submit a story based on one of the five prompts. Submitted stories (Entries) should be between 1,000 - 3,000 words and written in English.
Entries may be submitted free of charge, but they will not be judged or submitted into our Contest. Unpaid entries will, were appropriate, still be published on the site and readers will be able to like or comment on them.
Those wishing to participate in the Contest will be charged a submission fee of $5 per Entry.
Each week, one winning Entry (Winner) is determined by Reedsy’s team based on the quality of the submission. The Winner is announced on Friday and featured on Reedsy Prompts and awarded $250. In addition, Reedsy may choose to shortlist one or more runners-up (Runners-up), each of whom will receive $25 of coupons to spend in the Reedsy Marketplace.
To participate in the Contest, you must sign up at: https://blog.reedsy.com/creative-writing-prompts/
Reedsy is not responsible for the content submitted to the Contest.
2. The Prizes
The prizes are:
- for the Winner: $250 USD, to be delivered via PayPal
- for the Runners-up: $25 of coupons for the Reedsy Marketplace
- publication on Reedsy Prompts, where it will be highlighted as a winner or runner-up, as applicable
- publication in our curated Short Stories directory.
There are no alternative prizes and prizes are not transferable. We may alter arrangements or prizes at our sole discretion and we may cease the Contest at any time.
Winning entries may also have their stories included in a Reedsy published anthology.
3. Entering the Contest
Prompts go out every Friday. The deadline for submissions in response to those prompts is the following Friday at 11:59pm EST (the Closing Date/Time). Only Entries that are submitted on Reedsy Prompts before the Closing Date/Time will be eligible for the Contest. All Entries submitted to the contest will be published on Reedsy Prompts, unless the Reedsy team decides otherwise. We reserve the right not to publish stories and/or to remove stories from Reedsy Prompts at any time, without warning to the author.
The steps for submitting an Entry are:
● Sign up for a free Reedsy Prompts account: https://blog.reedsy.com/creative-writing-prompts/
● Select one of this week's five prompts from the top of the page.
● Enter the story title and story, and select "Submit story."
● If you are entering our Contest, you will need to pay the $5 entry fee.
All Entries must be new, original, and standalone work written by the user submitting the story, must be written in English in response to the user's selected prompt, must not have been previously published elsewhere online and/or in print, and must not infringe the copyright or intellectual property rights of any other party. Reedsy accepts no responsibility if entrants fail to abide by these Terms of Use, and entrants agree to indemnify Reedsy against any claim by any third party arising from any breach of these terms of use.
While submissions can include mature themes and language, submissions must not contain defamatory, obscene, graphic, explicit, offensive, or any other such unsuitable material, as well as any form of promotion of a product, company, or service not owned by Reedsy. Reedsy reserves the right to disqualify and remove Entries, as well as user comments on Entries, containing such matter. Reedsy also reserves the right to remove users from Reedsy Prompts at any time, without prior warning, should they violate any of the aforementioned terms.
4. Use of Submissions
Each entrant retains the copyright to their entry but grants to Reedsy a non-exclusive, irrevocable, perpetual, transferable, sub-licensable, worldwide, royalty-free license to store, publish, edit and otherwise use the entry on our website(s) and platform(s) to publish all or part of your entry and in all media now known or hereafter discovered at our discretion.
You agree that such use by Reedsy may include editing and publishing your entry, including within a compilation together with others, into a book format (or any other format) which may be published and sold or provided free of charge at Reedsy’s discretion.
If your story is selected as Winner (and even if you are not selected as a Winner), you may still publish the story elsewhere, but the publication must include:
- the relevant prompt;
- acknowledgment to Reedsy.com for providing the prompt that inspired the story.
This acknowledgment should be in the form of a mention, and in the case of a digital publication, a “dofollow” link back to https://blog.reedsy.com/creative-writing-prompts/.
By submitting an entry, you agree that Reedsy may at its sole discretion edit, adapt, abridge, or translate the entry for the purposes listed in these terms and conditions.
You grant permission to Reedsy to use your name and entry for promotional purposes without additional compensation, and to publish all or part of your entry in all media now known or hereafter discovered, worldwide and on the Internet and World Wide Web, without notice, review or approval.
5.Eligibility
The Contest is open to all writers over the age of 18.
By entering the Contest, you confirm that you are eligible to do so and eligible to claim any prizes you may win. Reedsy may require you to provide proof that you are eligible to enter the Contest.
Multiple Entries per person are permitted (even in the same week). Entries may refer to one or more prompt. The same author may win the Contest on multiple occasions, even sequentially.
Entries not submitted in accordance with these terms and all other rules and directions given by Reedsy, or Entries that are incomplete or illegible (as determined in our sole discretion) will not be eligible.
6. Judging
The judging panel is comprised of Reedsy employees, contractors or our registered reviewers, though it may also include Reedsy partners or any other people as determined by Reedsy at our sole discretion.
The decision of the judging panel is final, and at their sole discretion. No correspondence or discussion will be entered into by us in relation to that decision.
Winners are notified by email sometime in the two weeks following their submission.
We will make all reasonable efforts to contact the Winners. If a Winner cannot be reached within a period of one week following the first attempt, Reedsy reserves the right to withdraw the prize from the original Winning entry and to award the $250 USD to another eligible entrant from that week’s batch of submissions. Reedsy does not need to remove the original winning story from publication.
7. Privacy and Use of Information
We will use any personal information that you give us in accordance with the law and our Privacy Policy, for the purposes of the Contest, in the ways described in these Terms of Use, and for any marketing or other purposes you may indicate your consent to.
You agree that we may also share your details with our judging panel, with your consent. As described above, winning entries may have their name publicised for promotional purposes.
8. All the Rest
We are not liable for any damage, loss or disappointment suffered by you taking part or not being able to take part in this Contest, or from being unable to claim your prize.
In the event of unforeseen circumstances, we may alter, amend or stop running the Contest without prior notice. We reserve the right to change these terms at any time.
Our general user terms (https://reedsy.com/about/tou) will continue to apply to your use of the Reedsy platform, in addition to these specific Contest terms. If you have any questions or concerns about these Terms of Use, please contact us at prompts@reedsy.com
