Welcome back!

Congrats on making it back to another great week at yeah write! You all must be recovering from back to school blues as we have another tight grid this week. You only get 2 votes! Use them wisely.

Vote the yeah write way

We don’t throw a clickity-click party at yeah write. We vote on artistic and technical merit.

But what does that mean, Arden?

Well, first of all, we read all the posts before voting. Do you see those little green check marks in the upper left-hand corner of each thumbnail? They’ll let you know that you’ve been there, done that. Make sure you don’t vote until you’ve read them all. Even if you think the first post you read was the best thing since sliced bread, you never know what’s waiting for you. Don’t rush! Those votes will be there until you’re finished.

Done reading? Ready to vote? Think back on your absolute favorites. Make notes on what you liked best about them and compare. Do your favorites have a story to tell? Where is the so what? Are the conflicts clear? Is the writing free of grammatical and structural errors? I sure hope so.

When you’re ready, click on that little heart in the upper right corner of the thumbnail and give it your vote. Remember, these votes are an endorsement of a well-written piece, not a favor to a friend. Speaking of which, you know what drives us a little cray cray? Targeted votes and campaigning for your own entry. You are more than welcome to share the awesomeness that is yeah write but make sure your friends and family understand the guidelines that make this community so great.

Remember Comment Bob?!

He’s still hanging around and searching for the best commenters on our grid. Comment Bob goes to the reader out there who we see is really diving into each post and starting up a conversation. It takes a lot of work to do that. Bob is here to cheer you on!

Kevin the kiwi

With our intimate grid this week, we didn’t get to open the invitational, but we do have the editor’s kiwi badge! As we’re under 30 entries, one lucky post will be awarded Kevin the kiwi. What does that mean, you ask? In addition to the popular vote, we’ll let one of our editors choose her very favorite post!

But wait, there’s more!

Remember those prizes we’ve been talking about the past two weeks? Of course you do! For those of you who took the plunge onto the #176 and/or #177 challenge grids, you are now in the drawing for some prizes! This is no random drawing either. The editors will smash their brains together and select the best of the best for this prize package. Here are the prizes for the ultimate winner:

• a random penguin mug good for all of your drinking needs designed by friend of yeah write ML Philpott;
• NYT bestselling title Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Redemption and Resilience by Laura Hillenbrand; and
• a $20 Shutterfly Gift Card.

Challenge grid voting starts here

The challenge grid crowd favorite and top row will be determined by popular vote.

Everybody gets 2 votes

Click on each thumbnail to read the posts before voting. Click on the voting icon to vote for a post after reading. Do not vote for your own post, please.

Read the posts before voting

We are responsible voters here at yeah write. Read, evaluate, vote on merit. We’re still writing the yeah write way, and we want the votes to reflect it.

Voting is open until Thursday, 10:00 p.m. EDT

• If it’s after 10:00 p.m. EST [-5 GMT] on Thursday when you’re trying to vote, voting is closed. There will be no more voting icons on the thumbnail and voting will not work.
• Once you’ve voted for your favorite posts, you’re done voting. The voting icons will disappear.
• Voting for your own post should be disabled. If it’s not, please don’t vote for your own post.
• Once you’ve voted for the best posts on the grid, you are then free to campaign for votes for your favorite entries.
• If you’d like to see the current vote tallies after you’ve voted, refresh the page.
• If you ask your people to vote for your entry, please let them know they have a set number of votes, and they should vote for yours only if it’s one of the best on the grid. Campaigning for your own targeted votes is highly discouraged.
• Yeah write and the Inlinkz app allow only one set of votes per IP address. When campaigning for votes for your favorites, please ask outside voters to read this section before voting. It will lessen their confusion and curb their clicking enthusiasm.
• Refreshing the page, watching the votes go up and down? First, don’t do that. Second, if you see the votes on each entry fluctuating throughout the day, that’s the vote proctor adjusting each tally for enthusiastic clickers and non-reading voters. Don’t you want your entry to win because it’s the best on the grid and not because you have the greatest social media influence? Write well, campaign for others, leave encouraging comments.

Winner’s post published Friday by noon EDT

Once the voting ends, the challenge grid will sort itself from highest number of votes to the fewest. Ties are broken by number of page views. Until the winner’s post is published, none of the sorting will be official, but you can still get a good idea of where everyone ended up until the votes are validated.

Stacie’s got it goin’ on

Yeah write editor Stacie is all over your votes. Think you can sneak a targeted vote or self-vote past her? Think again. It’s one voting round per IP address, one voting round per person. Thank you!

Yeah write #177 voting is open…

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