Contest Terms and Conditions

These terms govern every monthly writing contest run on Writers Grove. Please read them before you sign up. By signing up for contests you agree to them, and by entering a series you confirm that you still agree.

No purchase or payment is necessary to enter or win. Entering is free.

1. Sponsor

The contests are run by Writers Grove (the “Sponsor”, “we” or “us”).

Questions about a contest or a prize go to contest@writersgrove.net.

2. What these terms cover

• These terms apply to every monthly contest listed on the Contests page, in addition to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Where these terms say nothing, the Terms of Service apply.
• We record the version of these terms you agreed to and the date you agreed, on your account.
• A contest is a game of skill. No part of the result is decided by chance.

3. No purchase necessary

• Entering a contest is free. You do not need a Premium subscription, a paid tier, or any other purchase to enter or to win.
• Buying anything from Writers Grove does not improve a series's standing in any way.
• Contests are void where prohibited or restricted by law.

4. Who may enter

To enter you must:

• be at least 18 years old on the day you enter;
• hold a Writers Grove account in good standing with a claimed username;
• have a PayPal account in good standing that can receive US dollars, and give us its email address on the Contests page.

The following may not enter:

• Writers Grove staff, administrator accounts, and members of their households;
• the classics library account and any account we run ourselves;
• accounts that are disabled or scheduled for deletion;
• any author who has already won a contest. Each author can win once.

An author may enter one series per month. A series may be entered by its author only.

5. Contest period

• Each contest covers one calendar month. It opens on the first day of the month at 00:00 UTC and closes on the last day of the month at 23:59:59 UTC. The month is shown on the contest's page.
• Only reading, following and rating that happens inside that window counts towards the standings.
• Entry closes when the month closes. Nothing can be entered or withdrawn after that.

6. How to enter and withdraw

1. Sign up for contests on the Contests page: give the PayPal email address the prize will be sent to and agree to these terms.
2. Open the dashboard of a published series that has at least one published chapter and press Enter this month's contest.
3. To withdraw, press Withdraw from this month's contest on the same dashboard while the month is still open.

You can change the PayPal address on the Contests page at any time. The prize goes to the address on file when it is paid.

7. How the winner is decided

• Every entry is judged by the same published formula, applied equally to all entries. The formula counts, for the contest month only:
  • how many signed-in readers opened chapters of the series that were published during the month;
  • how many of those readers followed the series;
  • how readers who read the series rated its books.
  The Help page describes the formula in detail.
• If two entries have the same score, the one with more readers places higher; if still tied, the one with more follows; if still tied, the one entered first.
• Scoring runs on the first day of the following month. The standings are then published on the contest's page. The entry ranked first wins, and the top ten place.
• Before confirming a winner we may check the standings against the fair play rules in section 10. Our decision on the winner and on any disqualification is final.

8. Prizes

Each contest awards prizes to the top ten entries:

• 1st place: US $100, paid by PayPal, and 12 months of Premium.
• 2nd and 3rd place: 6 months of Premium each.
• 4th and 5th place: 3 months of Premium each.
• 6th to 10th place: 30 days of Premium each.

The cash prize:

• It is paid by PayPal to the PayPal email address on the winner's Contests page, within 30 days of the standings being published.
• It cannot be substituted or transferred to anyone else.
• If PayPal cannot deliver it to the address on file, we will email the account's address. The winner then has 30 days from that email to give a working PayPal address. After that the cash prize is forfeited and is not awarded to anyone else.
• A PayPal account that is locked, limited or otherwise unable to receive money cannot receive it.

The Premium time:

• It is added to the author's account as free Premium time within 30 days of the standings being published. It runs from the day it is added, or from the end of any free Premium time already on the account.
• If the author pays for Premium through a subscription, the same free time is added to the account and the subscription is not charged for that many months, so nothing already paid for is lost. A subscription that is still in its free trial has the trial extended by the same length instead.
• It has no cash value, cannot be transferred to another account, and cannot be exchanged or refunded.

9. Fees, taxes and currency

• The cash prize is US $100 before any fees. PayPal receiving fees, currency conversion, bank charges and any other cost of receiving, holding or using the prize are the winner's responsibility. We do not top up the prize to cover them. The Premium time carries no fee.
• All taxes on any prize, whether federal, state, local or foreign, are the sole responsibility of the winner. We do not withhold tax and we do not give tax advice.
• Where the law requires it, we may ask the winner for a completed tax form (for example IRS Form W-9 or W-8) before paying. If the form is not returned within 30 days of our request, the prize is forfeited.

10. Fair play and disqualification

The standings measure real readers. The following are not allowed:

• creating or using more than one account, or accounts that are not real people;
• buying, trading or otherwise arranging reads, follows or ratings;
• using scripts, bots or automated tools to open chapters, follow or rate;
• asking readers to rate a book they have not read;
• entering a series that breaks the Terms of Service, including the disclosure rules for NSFW and AI-generated content, or that is not the author's own work.

If we find a breach we may remove the entry from the standings, disqualify the author from the current contest and from future contests, and recover any prize paid because of the breach. We may also act under the Terms of Service.

11. Your rights in your work

• Entering a contest does not transfer any rights in your series. You keep every right in your work.
• By entering you allow us to show the series title, cover, author name and placing on the contest's page, as a badge on the series page, and in announcements of the contest on the site, in our newsletter and on our social media accounts. No further payment is due for this.

12. Winner announcement

• The winner and the top ten are named by username and series title on the contest's page once the month is scored.
• Past contests and their winners are listed on the Contests page. A list of winners can also be requested by email at the address in section 1.

13. Privacy

• The PayPal email address you give us is used only to pay contest prizes and referral payouts. It is shown to you and to Writers Grove administrators and to no one else.
• Everything else about your account is handled under our Privacy Policy.

14. Changes, suspension and cancellation

• We may change these terms for future contests. When we do, the version number and date at the top change, and every author has to agree to the new version before entering a series again. Entries already made in an open month are not affected.
• We may suspend or cancel a month's contest if fraud, a technical failure, or anything else outside our control makes it impossible to run fairly. If a month's contest is cancelled, no prize is paid for it.

15. Release and limitation of liability

• By entering, you release Writers Grove and its staff from any claim arising from taking part in a contest or from receiving or using a prize.
• We are not responsible for PayPal outages or delays, for entries that are lost or late because of a technical problem, or for anything outside our control.
• Our total liability to you for any contest is limited to the value of the prize.

16. Governing law and disputes

• These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Michigan, United States.
• Any dispute about a contest shall be resolved exclusively in the state courts located in Washtenaw County, Michigan, or the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan.

17. General

• If any part of these terms cannot be enforced, the rest still applies.
• These terms, together with the Terms of Service and the Privacy Policy, are the whole agreement between you and us about contests.
• These terms are written in English, and the English text is the one that applies.