Community Event / Creation Drabble Contest Poll: Out of Fuel
- Thread starter Frank
- Start date
Heh, called it long ago - that was an obvious winning drabble when I saw it, though it did come up against some quality competition. Well done all round for some great drabbles this week!
Having got I think 8, 6, 3 votes in each week I have entered, I fear for the entry I have just made to the Sabotage theme for this week!
I'm supposed to be getting better, not worse!
I'm supposed to be getting better, not worse!
The thing is the votes you do or don't get isn't just dependant on the quality of your drabble, it also depends on the quality of the other drabbles and what appeals to the voters. Before now I've had zero votes on a drabble that I thought was ok and good scores on one that I had doubts about, I don't know the secret to writing a vote winning drabble. The best you can do is to keep trying.
But have you noticed that Ghost Ship is impossible? There are no AI's in ED. And this ship thinks, as if self-aware.
Well, firstly no AIs isn't necessarily true. They're banned. Doesn't mean they don't exist.
Secondly, the story could be interpreted as anthropomorphism rather than actual AI. A play on personality, an inspection of how such an object would think were it in those circumstances. A bit of imagination and creative license, both things which can be perfect for telling an interesting story.
There's a great bit in the Red Dwarf novel where it talks about the feelings of a plastic, potted plant. We see a whole part of the plot from this plant's perspective. At not point is it seriously implied that the plastic plant is actually self-aware.
People want interesting and original drabbles, ones that present ideas they hadn't thought about before. It's the uniqueness of Ghost Ship that got it so many votes.
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The clue is in the title. Its a ghost in the machine sort of thing.
Always had bit of a fascination with inanimate objects as characters, and it's a theme that runs through some of my other writing.
Exactly. It's a literary device, not necessarily a literal one. Unless you want to read it that way, of course.
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Variform is right. Are these drabbles set in a specific Elite universe, or aren't they?. I thought exploring the Everse was the point of the excercise.
Yes, they're Elite-themed. I don't see what is non-Elite about the story, or about the vast majority of the drabbles.
I had a similar story a few weeks back about a ship trying to hail a dead Commander Jameson. No one complained then - it won the poll, in fact. Was it just because I name-dropped?
Let's not get the topic police out on this. No one here is justified in saying what does and doesn't fit, unless we start adding in obvious Trek references etc.
And you can always vote with your, well, vote. If you don't think something is Elite-themed enough for you then don't vote for it. Clearly with the number of votes the drabble received there's enough people that think it's both an excellent story and perfectly fitting.
Indeed. Banning something that didn't exist would be pointless.
Unicorns are banned!