Judges' Top 10 - voting begins!

I originally put up the fanfiction site and this blog saying we would vote based on the judges' top 10 for the public's top 2 favorites.  We have 25 entries posted and judged.  It is about half of last time and a couple of weeks ago I changed my mind and thought we would only do the top 8.  Now having the results from the judges, the scores were a tie for 8 and 9.  I will say number 11 was only a fraction of a point from number 10, also 11 and 12 not far behind.  But I want everyone to READ all the entries and that is why I narrow it down to the judges' top scores.

I do this contest to encourage and support authors and to have more stories.  It is for FUN!  It won't be perfect because nothing is perfect.  It's as objective as it can be.  If it were totally objective, we wouldn't need judges, I would just have a computer do the scores or something.

These judges were tough, very critical compared to last time.   The bulk of the scores ended up in the 5s and 6s.  I translate those to a score out of 100 and the top story got a 70.   That is much lower than last time. The judges don't always like the happy stories I do, which is part of why I need a hosts' pick.  It never ceases to amaze and confuse me how one judges' favorite is another judges' lowest scoring story.

I have created a poll to see when might be a good time to run this contest next year when the last book comes out and another season of True Blood. Vote if you haven't
I Write the Songs 2013 poll

Here is the voting; please READ the entries. You may vote for your top 2 favorites. 
Top 10 - public vote for favorites - click on Vote now

So the poll will be up until August 8th at 6pm CST.     Winners will be announced August 10th!