The Blocktrades Contest | Fifty word short story challenge of the week + mini writing workshop

With huge thanks to @anomadsoul and @blocktrades for all you do for Steemit and the community, here are the details of my entry into the Blocktrades Scholarship contest.

I absolutely love the fact that you are hosting a contest where to enter you have to have been engaged in certain activities over time, vs. launching into a mad-scramble effort now. So smart! And I love the fact that it is about community, and regular activity. That is what makes this platform tick.

Source: Pixabay

Note: Hopefully this won't confuse the Fifty Worders, who are going to be looking for this week's challenge. (Sorry for the confusion, guys! The requirement for this contest is to choose a recent post to enter into the Blocktrades Scholarship contest. The new prompt for the coming week will be coming out later today.)

Contest Requirements

I am pretty sure I meet all the req's. Here a quick review:

Requirement 1: You must have posted at least 3 times per week for the past 2 months (October and November).

I post almost exactly three times per week. I posted 13 times in October and 10 times so far in November. (This is my 11th.) It's kind of an addiction, and if a few days go by without posting I get the shakes. Ha ha.

Requirement 2: You have made at least 60 comments in the past two months.

I counted 60 in the past 5 days, so I think I'm good on this one.

Requirement 3: You are part of a community and you are active in it.

I am active in several writing communities on Steemit and Discord, most notably @thewritersblock. I also have built a little community here on Steemit with the weekly #fiftywords challenge.

Requirement 4: Your posts are top quality, made with effort, time and dedication.

I wouldn't have it any other way. I believe in posting content that is of value to others in some way, whether it's to enlighten, support, or entertain. While I'm certainly not perfect, I also try to do a full edit on all of my posts so they are free of typos.

I recently calculated that it takes me 3-4 hours to write the weekly 50-words post. While I use a kind of formula for efficiency, each week I add a new mini writing workshop section, and I list all of the stories from the past week, with links, and choose 5-7 really nice stories to highlight. It's time consuming but totally worth it!

Requirement 5: Your reputation is higher than 50 without bidbots.

What's a bidbot? Ha ha. I'm kidding. I haven't used them, and wouldn't know how. But I really want to build my reputation on my own merit as much as possible. I do get some upvotes from curation trail activity and from delegations to some communities. Do those count as bidbots? (I'm honestly not very savvy about this.)

And here is my checklist of the contest steps:

• Pick a post you made between November 15 - 23, preferably the best one you made. I choose my most recent 50-word challenge post. This was a tough decision, because I also really put time and energy into SteemFest retrospective: A whole bunch of shout-outs. That post took me two days of writing and editing and formatting pictures. But since this contest is about community involvement, I'm choosing my challenge post. I like this one because it shares the value of editing your creative writing, and how it can make a huge difference in the quality of your work.
• In no more than 20 lines, explain why do you think you are a role model Steemian who engages daily with other users and posts quality content regularly. Okay, I may fail here because I am incapable of tooting my own horn. But I'm here on the platform with open arms, an open heart, and some writing and editing skills that I think can benefit others. I post the weekly #fiftywords challenge to encourage writers to stay active, to post weekly, and to work on improving their writing skills. Also, I comment on every story submitted to the challenge and engage daily with people as much as my crazy schedule allows. I love the Steemit community, and I do my best to engage in regular, consistent activity, including posting, commenting, conversing and curating, to maintain an active presence on the platform, through thick and thin!
• Include a link to the previous post you chose. Done. See above.
• Resteem this post. Done.
• Use the tag "blocktradescontest." Done.
• Title post: The blocktrades contest | The title of your previous post. Done.

Thank you again for this opportunity, @anomadsoul and @blocktrades!

Much love.

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Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://jaynalocke.com/2018/11/25/the-blocktrades-contest-fifty-word-short-story-challenge-of-the-week-mini-writing-workshop/

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