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rthstewart ([personal profile] rthstewart) wrote2021-01-30 02:31 pm

Three Sentence Ficathon 2021

We have now opened a new post, for new prompts! Please leave all new prompts there. You may continue to fill existing prompts here. If you didn't get a prompt filled here, feel free to post it on the new post!





Welcome to the Three Sentence Ficathon!
2 Feb. 2021 See important edit below regarding where to find unfilled prompts.


What is the 3 Sentence Ficathon?
This is an open exchange where you answer a prompt with a fic consisting of only three sentences. It's open to all fandoms and you can post and fill as many prompts as you like, as many times as you want.

What do I do first?
You can start 3SF by posting prompts! When posting a prompt please format it this way:

fandom, character(s), prompt word/sentence.

Only one prompt per comment please. So, for example,

Star Wars, Obi-Wan Kenobi, I don't like sand."

Open ended and anthropomorphic fills are popular too, such as:

Any, Any, "I don't like sand."

or

Earth geography, sand, "I don't like humans very much, either."

What happens after that?
You answer other posters' prompts in three sentences (or more if you can't stop yourself) and fill as many prompts as you want, as many times as you wish. If you see that a prompt you loved has already been filled, go ahead and fill it again! Multiple fills of the same prompt are allowed and even encouraged! (We get really fun stories going this way).

Can I still post if I need more than 3 sentences? Or should I just abuse grammar in ways the English language never contemplated?
Yes. Yes.

But I'm not a member of Dreamwidth
No problem. You can comment anonymously or through open ID

I'm really overwhelmed by all the prompts and how much there is and how fast it goes. I can't read 1,000 prompts and fills. It's too much. 
I hear this a lot and it keeps a lot of people from participating.  The 3SF is big and it moves fast, especially at first. 
I get overwhelmed, too, and I'm hosting the thing. With 2020 and 2021 sucking so badly you don't want something that's supposed to be fun cause you anxiety.  I have a couple of suggestions for managing the 3SF volume. 
  • First, really, you don't have to read every prompt and fill on every page.  You can start at the last page of this and just go forward, or back a page or two.  It's fine.
  • You can come and go as time and energy allow, you don't have to participate the whole time, and it drops off quite a bit by mid-February.
  • Even after the 3SF and new prompting end, people fill prompts all year long.
  • You can fill an already filled prompt and you can can leave a prompt that's already been prompted before.  People do it all the time. 
Always make sure you're looking at top-level comments only, not threaded. That helps a lot. Your screen should look like this.




But shouldn't I read everything to see if someone already prompted the same prompt I want to leave if someone already filled it? 

No.  Prompt as many times as you want, as much as you want.  It doesn't matter if someone prompted the exact same prompt.  Go ahead and prompt again!

I left a prompt and no one filled it.  Can I prompt it again?
Absolutely!

Can I spread the word?
Yes, please. I generally fail at creating banners and embed codes but if you create one and make it really idiot-proof, I might be able to post and share it.  Feel free to cross-post this entry. If you create your own banners or icons, let me know and I'll share!
Please share the 3SF with your followers, friends, and any channels and comms you are active on.  I'll post on fandom calendar, Tumblr, and Twitter, but I don't have many connections in other spaces such as Discord.


How long will it go?

The 3SF closes to new prompts on February 28, 2021. The entry stays open permanently and people post fills all year long.

Are there any rules about cross-posting?
Nope, you can post wherever you want, whenever you want. A lot of folks collected their responses together and posted them on AO3 under the 3 sentence fiction tag. 3SFs are a terrific prompt for remixes and could be helpful for Yuletide bears, too.

What about spoilers, content and archive warnings, triggers, pairings, ratings, tags, and squick?
I thought a lot about this. It boils down to reader beware.  In my experience, this typically gets too big, moves too fast, and the stories are too short for content warnings and ratings to even apply. It is too big for me to moderate in this way. You should assume spoilers are fair game and that the initial poster and the responder have opted to use no content warnings or tags. This means AO3 content warnings for dubcon, violence, canon character death, underage, etc. COULD be present. I've found personally that I can skim and scroll by stuff that, from the prompt, I can tell isn't my favorite flavor of delicious cake. Use your best judgment and be prepared to skip over things that aren't your thing. In this format, the obligation is on you, the reader, to protect yourself from triggering content.
Some posters do include warnings and spoiler tags in subject lines or include spoiler space, but they don't have to do so.

Why is 3SF split among several posts?  That seems confusing.
It is confusing and we always lose momentum once we have to move to a second post. The reason is because at 5,000 comments to a single post, DW installs a human test CAPTCHA, which is a pain for users.  So, once this entry gets to the upper 4,000 comments, I open a new post.  If you've been waiting until things slow down to participate, when we open a second post is often a good place to join.

If I have questions, what do I do?

I'm rthstewart everywhere, here, Twitter, Tumblr, gmail and AO3.

A special thank you to [personal profile] conuly  .
Last year, Conuly started logging all unfilled prompts.
This year's (2021) unfilled prompts are here.
Last year's (2020) unfilled prompts are here.
Conuly asks that you not reply, as they want to be able to edit and add more prompts to the list.
Conuly does this just because they are an awesome person but should you want to write them fic in thanks, you can find a birthday wish list here.

Here is the 3SF 2021 Friending Meme to show of your new DW account.

Here, have some icons and banners and let me know if you've created your own!

 






text box you can try to cut and paste

















vialethe: (Narnia Group)

[personal profile] vialethe 2021-02-01 08:28 am (UTC)(link)
Narnia, Lucy & Edmund, never be so kind, you forget to be clever/never be so clever, you forget to be kind

(Anonymous) 2021-02-01 05:11 pm (UTC)(link)
The first post-Witch winter was greeted with excited suspicions by Narnians great and small - some of whom had in fact pre-empted Royal Sanctuary in mid-November.

Edmund bore with Rabbits in the garderobe and Red Dwarves bivouacking round his throne, but when the Bears showed up pleading sniffles he pinched a pot of honey from the kitchens and laid out a trail to Lucy's favorite balcony.

"Look," Lucy told him that night, pointing to the Bees singing themselves to sleep on her balcony, and Edmund, biting his lip, put his arms around his sister and listened.
vialethe: (Narnia Group)

[personal profile] vialethe 2021-02-01 07:50 pm (UTC)(link)
The Bears made me laugh - I do love a slightly goofy Narnian Bear! This is very sweet, and I love that it all turned out all right in the end. Thank you!
snacky: (narnia edmund)

Narnia, Lucy & Edmund, I should've asked you how to be / asked you to write it down for me

[personal profile] snacky 2021-02-07 10:33 pm (UTC)(link)
It's a lesson they teach each other over and over again - Lucy reminds Edmund to temper justice with mercy in so many cases, and Edmund points out that Lucy's kindness, while endless, must not allow her to give away heart and soul to anyone who asks.

"Did we do the right thing?" Lucy asks, wiping the tears from her eyes as a grieving mother Fox leaves the throne room at Cair Paravel, mourning the loss of her kits - Lucy had been ready to grant her whatever she wished to ease her pain, until she realized that what Mother Fox wished was for the deaths of the young Bears who had caused the kits' death when they had accidentally crushed the foxes' den.

Edmund, so close to sentencing the Bears to accede to Mother Fox's pleas, was the one who learned that it was all an accident, and together they came up with the idea to send the Bears to Mother Fox, to help her rebuild her home and life, and offer her what they could in way of solace. "Perhaps?" but his voice is unsure. "Maybe it's the best we could do."
vialethe: (Narnia)

Re: Narnia, Lucy & Edmund, I should've asked you how to be / asked you to write it down for me

[personal profile] vialethe 2021-02-07 11:05 pm (UTC)(link)
It's such a sad little story, but lovely as well, that they remembered to listen and so did the best they could, even if no solution could ever be perfect. The important thing was that they all tried, after all.
snacky: (narnia lucy)

Re: Narnia, Lucy & Edmund, I should've asked you how to be / asked you to write it down for me

[personal profile] snacky 2021-02-08 12:05 am (UTC)(link)
I feel like they had a lot of stories like this, where they wanted to make things perfect but could only settle for good enough. But they got there by working together.
snacky: (narnia vdt lucy on board)

Re: Narnia, Lucy & Edmund, I should've asked you how to be / asked you to write it down for me

[personal profile] snacky 2021-02-08 12:46 am (UTC)(link)
Thank you! It felt very sad, but also very apt? Like I always like the idea of them learning how to rule, and how to rely on each other.