Sign-ups are coming! Changes to our form, and rogue tonberries!

[ffexchange_mod]

Hello, everyone!

Barring any disasters, regular signups and beta volunteer sign-ups for DOINK! 2012 will open Sunday, April 1, 2012, 23:00 UTC. Click that link to learn what time that is where you live and come prepared!

The Shiny New Form: Prompts and Content Preferences

Last year, we promised to make some changes to our signup forms to make them friendlier to folks of all preferences. We wanted to let you know about the changes we've made: we hope the new form is not only friendlier but overall easier and quicker to use!

In previous years, we've had a separate section with checkboxes where you could mark things you didn't want to give or receive (see last year's form DW | LJ). As with last year, both parts of the form ("Give" and "Get") will let you specify general ratings you're comfortable with, and the "Give" side also has a space for you to specify genders and combinations you can work with.

New for this year, though, we're doing away with the cumbersome wall of checkboxes section and letting everyone express their preferences, positive or negative, in a more flexible way: preferences that apply only to specific prompts should go in the "Details" box for that prompt, and overall preferences can be entered in a textbox at the end of the form. We've also changed the characters and relationships box on both sides to let you talks about both what you do or don't like, if you choose.

( Example behind cut )

It's that simple! Go into whatever preferences apply to each specific prompt in the same place you talk about the characters, ships, and other details you want. Then cover any general preferences in the box at the end of the form.

This setup depends on two things:

1. Please be respectful. We're all fans alike here; discuss your own preferences in a way that doesn't comment on or pass judgment on those of others. Play nice!


2. Remember this is a gift exchange. If you're very particular in what you like, or very limited in the kinds of things you're comfortable offering, please think carefully before entering. We'll do our absolute best to match people, but if a gift slightly outside your expectations would ruin the exchange, or if receiving prompts that don't match your comfort zone exactly would be very discouraging for you, then a gift exchange might not be the best place to play — you might have a better time with one of our prompt-meme activities, or as a pinch hitter where you can pick and choose what prompts to pick up. Nothing wrong with being particular! It's just not suited to every sort of activity =)

So this is our plan for the form this year! We always welcome feedback to continue to improve the exchange, so please let us know what you think!

Chocobo Down

Remember that there's still time to submit work created for the Chocobo Races to the Chocobo Down 2011 collection!

You can also submit work created for any Doink! activity to our deviantArt group. You can also leave us asks in our brand new tumblr (pardon the dust!) to let us know if you'd like us to feature your art there to help promote the exchange. We're actively looking for people to help us advertise, so please let us know if you'd like to volunteer your work!

Internets! Full of Tonberrys!

As you can see, DOINK! is all over the place! We have so many accounts, we decided to round them up and share them so everyone can know where to find us:

ff_exchange on Dreamwidth
ff_exchange on Livejournal
ff_exchange on AO3
doink-ffex on deviantArt
doink-ffex on tumblr
doink on Pinboard

And, of course, our website, ffex.org, where you'll find signups (once they open), rules, FAQ, unfilled prompts, and everything else you need to make your awesome Doink! experience happen!

Once the round gets going, you'll also be able to join us in our campfire chat room.

Additional Notes

If you need an AO3 account, just send us an e-mail and we'll get one out to you ASAP.

If you're not sure about signing up as a regular participant, you can always sign up to be a pinch-hitter. You can sign up any time — pinch hit sign-ups never close!

Tell your friends! If you would like to help spread the word about the upcoming sign-ups, please do -- we'll soon be posting banners you can use to help advertise as well.



This entry was also posted at LiveJournal.