ficinabox | Fic In A Box Rules & Info 2024 (Reply)

Schedule:

August 9-16: Nominations Pre-Gaming (participants can load tags from last year’s tagset into this tagset)
August 17-24: Nominations
August 25-26: Nominations Cleanup
August 27-September 7: Signups (Countdown)
September 1: Swap requests open
September 10: Assignments Out By This Date
September 11: Swap requests close
October 20: Assignments Due (Countdown)
November 10: Last Day To Submit Makeup Assignments
~~November 16~~ November 28: Work Reveals
~~November 30~~ December 12: Creator Reveals

All deadlines are at 11:59 PM EDT except for those in November, which will happen at 11:59 PM EST

Information

A gift exchange is an event where participants create fanworks to gift to each other. Fic In A Box is a fanwork exchange with a large minimum gifting requirement and several unique features:

All participants in Fic In A Box are requesting 10,000 words of fanfiction by default, but can opt in to other mediums (such as art, podfic, knitting patterns, and so on). Participants who work in non-writing mediums are very welcome and will get specially matched (as long as they give the mods a heads-up) so they'll have an assignment they can complete.
Participants have the option to split the 10k words (or equivalent) that they owe between several separate works (say, one fic of 3k and another of 7k) to reach 10k total..
The minimum word count per work is 1k by default, but lower wordcount works will count if your recipient has opted into receiving them.
Initial assignments are 10k for one person, but at the start of the exchange we run swaps which will give you the chance to spread that 10k out over multiple assignments for multiple recipients!

For mediums other than the written word, pretty much any medium will be accepted, as long as we can agree on a clear and easily checked equivalent to 1k of written fic. Participants who work in non-writing mediums get specially matched with participants who have opted in to receiving works of that kind so they'll have an assignment they can complete.

If you cannot complete the full 10k (or other medium equivalent) but have posted one or more smaller, complete works, you can default on just the remaining wordcount. You will then be guaranteed (via pinch hit if necessary) a gift equivalent to the amount submitted (rounded down to the nearest 1k). There are also options to "earn back" guaranteed minimum amount by taking pinch hits or completing your original assignment.

Are you new?

Participants who are new to fanwork events, multifandom exchanges, and/or this exchange specifically are encouraged to join the Fic In A Box Newbie Discord Server (link)

Non-Dreamwidth Links:

Dreamwidth Post Links:

Participant Expectations

An AO3 account is required to participate in this exchange, and you must be 18+ to sign up. You may sign up with a maximum of two AO3 accounts per person. AO3 accounts are free. If you don't have one, contact the mods for an invitation code that lets you bypass the waiting queue for new accounts.

Because assignments can be split between multiple works, all accounts that sign up must set themselves on AO3 as open to receiving gifts. You can confirm this on AO3 by going to Preferences > Collections, Challenges and Gifts, then making sure "Allow anyone to gift me works." is checked.

Official communication:

We will post announcements and updates to this Dreamwidth community. You can use the comments sections on various posts to communicate with us about anything that doesn’t need to stay secret/private, and you do not need a Dreamwidth account to do so.
Participants should check the email associated with their AO3 account frequently during the event. When we reach out to participants directly, it will be via email.
We encourage participants not to use an email with their full name, place of work/schooling, or other identifying information included.
If you need to contact recipient(s) you're creating for during the exchange, do not attempt to contact them directly. You must email the mods; we will pass along your question(s). Do this even if your recip has some other form of anonymous contact, as it’s important for us to have a record of things like extra DNW exceptions or opting in to other mediums than written fic.
We’re happy to answer general questions about the event on our tumblr (link) or in various locations on Discord, but you may be redirected to the Dreamwidth community or to email on occasion.

Participant conduct:

When you are interacting with other participants and/or the mods on Dreamwidth, via email, on Discord, in AO3 comments, or anywhere else, please be respectful and kind. We're all participating in a fan event together, and we would like to foster a positive environment where possible.
The details of what you are offering to create, the details of your offer(s), and assignment(s), and information about any extra gifts you're making are secret until Creator Reveals (November 30th, barring delay) and shouldn’t be discussed or shared elsewhere except with a beta reader.
Works produced for Fic In A Box should be gifts prepared in good faith, to the best of the creator’s ability, in an attempt to make something the recipient will like. However, optional details are optional. Creators are not expected to follow prompts to the letter, although they are expected to avoid items listed as Do Not Wants (DNWs).
Works must be complete to be accepted into the collection. Works fulfilling an assignment must be submitted before or at their due date unless an extension has been given.
It’s considered polite to comment on your gift(s).
Fic In A Box is a Choose Not To Warn space for adults where you will likely run into discussion, prompts, and fanworks involving sensitive, dark, or potentially upsetting topics. You will likely also find people who have listed things you love as Do Not Want(s) for their gifts. Everyone likes and dislikes different things; participants are expected to curate their own online experience and avoid making value judgements over differences of opinion.
Bullying, harassment, and other asshole behavior will earn you a ban; this is a private party you've been invited to attend.

Nominations Pre-Gaming

Last year we accepted over 12,000 tags from more than 1,000 fandoms, which was a lot of work for us and for participants! To save us all some time, in the week before normal nominations, you can ask us to load fandoms wholesale from last year’s tagset to this year’s tagset, with a few exceptions for really chonky fandoms.

This will stop being a thing when normal nominations start, so head over to the Fandom Transfer Post (link) to get on that ASAP.

You can also use the fandom transfer post to tell us if something about your fandom’s tags needs to change or if you want related fandoms grouped differently/not grouped at all/other tagset organization minutia.

Nominations

During this portion of the exchange, participants submit tags that can be used later for Signups! Anything you want to offer or request (fandoms, relationships, etc) must be in the tagset to be used during Signups, so this is an important part of the exchange although it is technically optional.

Participants can nominate relationships, single characters, groups, worldbuilding tags, and optional opt-in mediums
There are no fandom restrictions or rarity requirements for this exchange. Original works, crossover fandom, and RPF are all allowed.
Please read the nomination guidelines before nominating (link)
We primarily conduct nominations through a google form, although the tagset is still an option for people who are confident about their tag formatting. Please check the above guidelines for a link to the form!
Two rules we would like to highlight:
- Ships in Original Works should be nominated with all details you see as essential for the ship included. For example, if the gender of the character is important to you, make certain to include that in the tag. Anything not included in the tag will be considered optional details.
- If you request an ambiguous group (eg: The [fandom] ensemble) we will assume that any member(s) of that group fulfill that request, rather than assuming that every member of the group must appear in your gift.

Signups

Signups will be here (link). Participants make offers which indicate what they are willing to create and requests which explain what kind of gift(s) they would like to receive. Offers are secret, but requests are posted publicly. You are encouraged to browse requests to see who you might like to create for!

When signups start, we will make a post explaining requests and offers in more detail, but below is a short overview of important information & rules regarding signups.

General important signup info

Swaps! See the "Swaps" section of the rules below for more info, but the form for these opens during signups if you want to get your swap offers in ASAP.
Check your email! Please, please check the email associated with your AO3 account at least once per day between September 7th and September 10th.
- If there is a problem with your signup, we will email you. If we don't get a response, we will probably have to delete your sign up or use our best judgment to edit your selected tags..
- If you are unmatchable as a creator (i.e. no one is requesting anything you are willing to create), the mods will contact you when signups close and ask you to add more offers. If you do not reply within 24 hours, your signup will be deleted.
Do Not Match requests: If there is someone you do not want to be matched to as a recipient and/or creator, please contact us. We'll need their AO3 name(s) and how you would like us to handle it if you're their only possible assignment or they try to pick up your pinch hit.

We do not need to know why you don't want to be matched, so please don't tell us.

Offers

Offering mediums besides fic

Everyone who signs up is by default offering 10k of fic unless they email us at ficinaboxmod@gmail.com

This is for various logistical reasons regarding how AO3’s Collection & Challenges system works, not because we don’t want people offering non-fic things! We really, really want you to make non-fic things if you like doing that.

Please include the following in your email:

The username you are signing up with.
A list of usernames of participants who are requesting something you can make, and what relationship/character/WB: tag and medium tag(s) you are aiming for.

We need the info about relationship-field tags and medium tags not because you will be obligated to create that exact thing, but because we will double check during matching that the recipient we’re matching you to hasn’t, for example, removed the medium you said you can create from their request.

You can email us again to update your offers if things change during the sign up period. You will probably find the automagic app helpful for finding recipients, as it lets you search requests by medium.

Offer minimums

You can offer 1-10 fandoms across 1-10 requests. Each request will need at least one tag in the Relationships field.
You may offer a fandom more than once if you need to for some reason.
Although the minimum is 1 offer, we would encourage you to offer 3 or more if possible. Sometimes people drop out of the exchange at the last minute, so you might need a backup offer.
If there's a recipient you cannot create for who is requesting the same tags you need to offer to be matchable to someone you can create for, you can email us a Do Not Match request. You can do this for any reason, even low stakes ones.

Requests

Fandom/request minimums

You can request 1-10 fandoms across 1-10 requests.
You may request a fandom more than once.
You must request 3+ fandoms to be guaranteed a gift.

If you are requesting less than 3 fandoms with distinct lore, you will go out for pinch hit, but we won't hold up reveals for you. We will hold reveals until everyone who requests 3+ fandoms with distinct lore has a gift. You may contact us to add fandoms. The last day that you can add fandoms to guarantee your gift is November 5th.

(Recursive fandoms almost definitely do not count as having distinct lore from the fandom the recursed fic belongs to. For example, Dreaming of Sunshine - Silver Queen (a Naruto fic) doesn't have distinct lore from Naruto.)

Relationships field

You can request up to 20 tags in the relationships field, but your gift(s) will only need to match one tag each.
If you request a relationship that involves an ambiguous group or character description, we will accept your creator's interpretation of canon. For example, if you request "Solo: The Avengers (Marvel Cinematic Universe)" your creator can pick any character who fits the broadest possible definition of canonical Avengers, which might include characters who don't immediately come to mind such as Nebula, James "Rhodey" Rhodes, or Rocket Raccoon.
You can't DNW parts of tags you've requested. If you request "Solo: Creator's Choice of Jedi" and then try to DNW some Jedi, we will ask you to revise your sign up (if we catch it before assignments) or we will side with your creator(s) (if it's only brought to our attention at work reveals.

Medium/length opt-ins (the "Additional Tags" and "Optional Tags" fields):

Those fields are for medium and length opt-ins. You can leave them blank if you only want fic.

The "Additional Tags" field will allow up to 20 medium/length opt-ins.
You may opt into as many mediums as you want — put your medium//length opt-ins numbers 21 through infinity into the "Optional Tags" field.
Tags in the optional tags section must be copy/pasted directly from the tagset. Do not put anything besides medium opt-ins from the tagset into the optional tags field.
You must use the medium/length tags we've provided or otherwise clearly say you'd like to opt in within your optional details to opt in to mediums besides narrative fiction or lengths below 1k.
Anything you opt into has the potential to be your entire gift. While it is unlikely you will receive 100 drabbles if you choose "Length Opt-In: Drabbles", it is technically possible!

Optional Details:

This field is a long text box for including likes, prompts, Do Not Wants (DNWs), and other details you want to let your creator(s) know about. These are called optional details because your creator(s) are not required to follow your likes and prompts (although they do need to avoid your DNWs) when creating your gift(s). It isn't optional to have some kind of likes or prompts, however, because creating 10k for a completely blank request is really hard.

You must include something in your optional details to indicate what you like or have an unlocked letter* before signups close. This can be short (For example: "I really like h/c and fluff!") or long, but it needs to be present. If you're linking to a letter which already has publicly visible information to this effect, that is also acceptable.

(*Dear Creator letters: These are optional details hosted off-site that allow for longer or better-formatted details than can go in the AO3 signup. These are optional.)

Do Not Wants (DNWs)

Include anything you absolutely don't want to receive in the Optional Details field in your AO3 signup under a list labeled "DNW:" or "Do Not Want:".

A Do Not Want list lets you specify elements that would prevent you from enjoying your gift. A DNW could be a trigger, squick, something you really dislike, or just something you don't want to receive for literally any reason. This helps creators make a better gift for you!

Your DNW list should not explain why you don't want something, only what you don't want and potentially additional details about how to avoid it. Listing "dogs (I hate them so much they're gross)" isn't helpful to potential creators and will make people who like dogs feel bad; listing "dogs (including wolves, but canonical werewolves are fine)" is very helpful.

Other DNW notes:

If you receive a gift that includes one of your DNWs, email us immediately.
Letter-only DNWs are unenforceable.
In the event that a DNW is included in your gift, only reasonable DNWs will be enforced.
DNWs cannot be used to box your creator into producing a very specific work, and cannot DNW parts of tags you've requested.

Swaps

Participants can optionally attempt to trade part of their assignment with part of someone else's assignment. For example, you might give up 1k of your assignment to write a 1k gift for someone else. This keeps your assignment total at 10k, but lets you create for more than one person!

During Signups, a post will go up explaining how swaps work in detail and how to tell us what swaps you want.
Non-participants who want to pick up swaps are invited to join in.
Swaps are 100% optional. You can ignore them completely and simply fill your assignment yourself if that's your preference. If we don't hear from you about swaps, we will just assume you don't want to swap.

Assignments

Assignments are only guaranteed to match on one fandom and one relationship field tag. When you get your official assignment email from AO3, it will list all of your recipient's requests, but you're not obligated to fill all of them. Some people (swaps participants, pinch hitters) will also receive assignments via email from the mods, which may not come with an email from AO3.

If your assignment does not match the fandoms/ships you offered, or if there are any other issues, contact us via email as soon as possible.

Assignment requirements

Minimum requirements are 10k total works of fanfiction, which may be split into multiple works with a minimum of 1000 per work. Everyone who signs up is opted into this by default.
- for the purposes of this exchange, fanfiction is defined as narrative fiction to distinguish it from the less usual formats that must be opted into
Your 10k may be split between multiple requests as long as each work matches a fandom and relationships field combination that your recipient requested.
All works must be complete at deadline.
All works must avoid your recipient's DNWs.
Works containing excessive spelling or grammar errors (enough to hinder comprehension) will not be accepted.
Works may not be wholly or partially created by generative text or art programs (so-called “AI”) such as chatGPT or OpenArt.ai. This includes content which you don't intend to receive wordcount credit — AI content is not allowed in the collection.

Medium/length opt-ins:

If your recipient has opted into other mediums or a minimum lower than 1000, those are also eligible with a requirement of 10k equivalent submitted to complete your assignment. Please see this post for equivalents (link)
Opt-ins can be done with tags or optional details. If you usually have "epistolary" in your likes, you can leave it there to opt in without selecting the tag. Unless you don't want epistolary for this exchange, in which case do remove it!
All mediums except for fanfic (which for the purposes of this exchange is defined as narrative fiction to distinguish it from the less usual formats that must be opted into) must be opted into by the recip.
Please don't give people mediums they haven't requested.

Wordcount assessment details:

We only round down for PH purposes! If you submit one fic that is 1,001 words and one fic that is 8,999 words then you have written 10k for your recip and completed your assignment.
Each work you submit should fill only one requested fandom and at minimum one requested relationship field tag. For example, if you're filling a request that has an A/B tag, a C/D tag, and a worldbuilding tag, you're only expected to create a work focusing on one of those tags, not all three of them. Your assignment should focus on one of your recipient's requested characters, ships or worldbuilding tags.

Posting

For guides on how to post your assignment or treats in their various forms, please see the Posting Guidelines (link).
If there is anything you think may be easy to miss or that you think may make it easier to check your work, please add a note about it to the author's note at the top of your work. For example, if you have art embedded within a fic, let us know how many images. If you've posted a podfic, let us know how long the original fic was.
If you are posting parts of your assignment from different accounts, you must let the mods know what your alts' names are for those works to be correctly counted towards your minimum.
All mediums except for fanfic must be opted into by the recip.
As works should remain anonymous during the collection's anonymous period; do not post your work elsewhere before creator reveals. Some mediums have exceptions such as signatures or identification within recording, please check the rulesets (link) for these.
Saved drafts do not fulfill assignments. Please ensure that you post your gift!
Treats are welcome! All treats must meet the same minimum requirements as works that count towards assignments, including length. Opt-in mediums and lengths must be opted into by the recip.
Gifts to the collection are allowed.

Pinch Hits

Pinch hits are participants who are without creators, in whole or in part, either because no one offered anything that matched any of their requests or because their assigned creator was unable to complete their assignment and defaulted. Pinch hitting is the practice of volunteering to make a gift for a pinch hit.

Pinch hits will be posted to the Dreamwidth community. We will attempt to send pinch hits out in chunks in an effort to avoid making any defaults obvious (without limiting time for writing too much either).

Claiming pinch hits

You can claim a pinch hit without a Dreamwidth account as long as you follow the instructions on the pinch hit posts.
You can claim a pinch hit even if you aren't signed up for the exchange, but you will need an AO3 account to post it.
Since each recipient comes with limited AO3 assignments, not every PHer will be assigned through AO3. Everyone who doesn't get an AO3 assignment will be emailed and will still be officially assigned in our spreadsheet.
Pinch hits can be claimed in increments of 1k. For example: if a PH is out and needs 6k, you can offer to pick up 6k, or you can offer to pick up any amount of that in 1k increments (1k, 2k, ect).
Pinch hits will not always be for 10k. If a pinch hit's original creator has partially submitted their assignment, the pinch hit will go out for 10k minus those submissions, rounded up to the nearest 1k. For example, if the original creator gave them 3.5k, the pinch hit will go out for 7k. Swaps and defaults on swaps also sometimes create pinch hits that are less than 10k.

Posting pinch hits

All the usual posting rules for assignments apply to filling pinch hits.
If you submit more than the amount you claimed and that recipient is still out for pinch hit when you submit (or if they later need to go out again), the amount you submitted rounded down will be what is used to calculate how much they still need.
If you have treated your recipient prior to picking up their pinch hit, any treats you have given them that meet the assignment requirements will be automatically counted towards your assignment!

This is a side effect of how we're automating the tracking for this exchange. If you have given your recipient a treat that you do not want to count towards your assignment, please let us know when you post to the DW to claim the pinch hit or shoot us an email.

Defaulting

If you cannot finish a full 10k for your assigned recip, please default. You will still be sent out to PH up until October 20th. The only penalty for defaulting is not being guaranteed a gift (or, if you partially defaulted, only being guaranteed the total sum of the amount you completed rounded down to the nearest 1k increment) during this round. There is no year to year penalty.

There are two kinds of defaults in this exchange: full defaults and partial defaults.

Full defaults:

A full default is a default that lets us know you won't be able to complete any of your assigned word count. This is the kind of default you should do if you haven't finished any part of your assignment.
If your assignment was given to you via AO3, default by navigating to your AO3 dashboard, clicking 'Assignments', locating your Fic In A Box Exchange assignment and clicking 'Default'.
If you need to default on an assignment that you don't have on AO3, you can do so by either emailing the mods or using the google form (link).

Partial defaults:

A partial default is a default for when you've completed and posted one or more works for your recipient, but you haven't reached your assigned word count.
Whether your assignment was given to you via AO3 or if you received your assignment from us via email, you will need to either emailing the mods or use the google form (link) to let us know you're defaulting on part of your assignment.
If you have completed more than 1k of your assignment or equivalent, you will still be guaranteed a gift in this exchange. The amount you are guaranteed is equal to the total you have submitted, rounded down to the nearest 1k.
This means if you submit a 3.5k fic and a 1.6k fic for a total of 5.1k before defaulting, you will still be guaranteed at least 5k, which will go out according to the rules in the Pinch Hits section.
If your full gift is not posted by October 20th, the mods will default you on whatever wordcount you haven't yet submitted. If you were given a different deadline then follow that deadline.

Earning back your minimum after defaulting

You may earn back up to the amount that you defaulted, for a maximum owed amount of 10k. The amount you're guaranteed as a gift will be the total sum of what you have submitted to your original assignment before defaulting plus the total amount you submitted to the methods below, rounded down to the nearest 1k.

There are four ways to earn back the minimum wordcount you are guaranteed to receive in this exchange!

Earn your minimum back via completing pinch hits

Any pinch hits you pick up will immediately add however much you picked up to your minimum. (So if you defaulted after writing 5k, then pick up 1k, your new minimum is 6k)
The deadline for earning back your minimum by picking up pinch hits is November 14th at 10:00PM EST.

Earn your minimum back via completing your original assignment

If you need to default early on and then things change and you are able to complete your assignment, you may do so without penalty.
If you swapped, your original assignment may always be completed for up to 10k, and any swaps may be completed for up to the assigned amount of the swap.
The last day to post a defaulted assignment to earn back minimum is November 10th 10:00pm EDT.

Earn your minimum back via completing a gift for a PHer request

If you post a completed gift for a PHer request (link) that will count towards your minimum amount.
The deadline for earning back your minimum by gifting to a PHer request is November 14th at 10:00PM EST.

Earn your minimum back via posting a workskin and tutorial

Many works in the exchange will use AO3 workskin templates in order to display documents, social media sites, and a lot of other things! There are a lot already out there, but there's always more that are needed and an exchange like this is likely to expose some of those gaps.
You can earn up to the full 10k by creating new workskins, writing tutorials for those templates, and posting them to the collection with no recipient. Each workskin/tutorial will be worth 2k of your minimum.
These workskins will be revealed immediately (still anonymous until creator reveals) so that the rest of the participants may use them!
In order to count towards making up wordcount, the workskin and tutorial you create should be something that doesn't already exist. You can check with us ahead of time if you want to be sure.

Extensions

Assignments and PHs with due dates of October 20th:

May ask for an extension to October 27th, or November 3rd!
If you ask for an extension to October 27th and need more time, you may ask for an additional extension up to November 3rd.
The absolute last extension date is November 3rd. The only exceptions for this are PHs that were assigned with an initial due date of later than October 20th. If you had a normal assignment or a PH with a deadline of October 20th then you will not be given an extension past November 3rd for any reason.

PHs with initial due dates after October 20th:

May ask for an extension to October 27th, or November 3rd!!
May ask for extensions past November 3rd as we get closer to that date, these aren't guaranteed and will be handled on a case by case basis.

Extension Defaults:

Anything not turned in by your extension deadline will count as a full or partial default. If you need to confirm your extension deadline, please contact us!
We will be automatically defaulting extensions that are not turned in by their deadline, even if they could have been extended further.
If you default before your deadline then there are no consequences.
If you are no show defaulted by the mods on an extension this round you won't be able to request an extension the 2025 round. This applies only to the 2025 round and only to extension requests! This does not affect normal defaults, only no shows. You will receive an email letting you know if this applies to you.

Delays

To make things easier for us and more predictable for everyone, we're setting rules for exactly how any potential delays will go this year!

The absolute latest due time for a PH will be 12 noon Eastern before reveals. If a PHer needs to bump their due time into the afternoon we'll delay a day to avoid down to the wire announcements and give us plenty of time to do a final check of everything.
If there are still PHs up on the wednesday before scheduled reveals then delays will happen in one of two ways:
- If there's a PHer ready to pick up the final PH who needs up to a week of extra time, then the exchange will be delayed based on their timeline.
- If the PH needs to stay up then the exchange will be delayed a week to the following Saturday. We will reassess the following Wednesday if the PH is still up at that point.