What is the WELL?

The WELL is a unique online gathering place that has been hailed as the most influential online community. The hundreds of WELL discussions range from the technical and specific to the abstract and surreal, from Jazz to Java, from Generation X to Y2K. Throughout its 14-year history, the WELL has been a virtual meeting place for an eclectic mix of writers, computer experts, propononents of counter-culture, and anyone else interested in intelligent conversation. Click here to find out more about the WELL.

The Categories:

Submit your favorite work in any of these four categories:

Online Journalism: Displaying excellence in reporting or editorial comment created for dissemination via the Internet.

Personal Essay: Home pages have heralded the rebirth of the essayist, sure in voice, view and sense of a new kind of audience. Last year our judges said this was the most needed category -- the online essay or thoughtful rant -- so here it is.

Fiction: If the Internet connects us in a global village, who are the village storytellers? We seek the best stories of, by and for the greater online community.

Writing Using Hyperlinks: Writers can do more than make footnotes or pointers to other sites with the use of links. Webbed writing can be almost sculptural. Reading it can be an adventure in a terrain of words. Is it art yet? The WELL Online Writing Awards seek the best tangled webs woven this year.

Grand Prize:

One grand prize of $500 will be awarded.

Plus:

Each author of the winning compositions in the four categories will receive a year's WELL Membership and will have their award-winning work published on The WELL!

The Judges:

Kathi Kamen Goldmark is best known in the publishing world for founding and performing with the all-author garage band, The Rock Bottom Remainders. She is the president of "Don't Quit Your Day Job Records," which recently released Stranger Than Fiction!, a quirky collection of rock, R&B, country classics and original songs sung by authors ranging from Stephen King and Norman Mailer to Maya Angelou and Molly Ivins.

Andrew Brown is a columnist for the London Guardian, and the author, most recently of "The Darwin Wars", a vulgar history of the selfish gene. He worked for ten years on the Independent, and still writes regularly for it, as well as for the Daily Mail and the Daily Express. He also writes for magazines ranging from the New Statesman to the Church Times.

Steve Silberman is a contributing editor of Wired magazine. As the senior culture writer for Wired News and Hotwired, he covered the social dynamics of the online world as the Web emerged as a popular medium. His essays and commentaries have appeared in Time, NetGuide, Nerve, the Whole Earth Review, and many other national publications. He is also the co-author of Skeleton Key: A Dictionary for Deadheads and the co-producer of the Grateful Dead's So Many Roads (1965-1995).

Donald Peter Dulchinos is the author of Pioneer of Inner Space: The Life of Fitz Hugh Ludlow, Hasheesh Eater. Dulchinos is a telecommunications industry expert in his day job and a part-time author working toward a full time writing career. Buoyed by the success of his first book, he is now working on a manuscript that explores the religious implications of the Internet.

Martha Soukup is an acclaimed science fiction writer. Her most recent book, "The Arbitrary Placement of Walls," contains 17 critically lauded tales, including the Nebula-winning "A Defense of Social Contracts." She was a sysop on GEnie for many years, and hosted HotWired's weekly "Head Space" chat during its run.

Stephanie Vardavas is a sports attorney but her real claim to fame is that in 1975 Brooks Robinson lent her his uniform for Halloween. She was an American Studies major and a disciple of the late A. Bartlett Giamatti. On The WELL she hosts the Business conference and co-hosts the Weird conference. On the Internet she is best known for her site "Secrets of really good chocolate chip cookies," where she shamelessly advocates tripling the vanilla.

How to Enter:

It's easy to enter! Select a category (Journalism, Online Fiction, Hypertext links, or Personal Essay) and submit your entry of 1,500 words or less. On November 19, 1999, our discerning panel of judges will choose the most outstanding and brilliant piece!

Each submission must have been composed for online readers (not adapted or copied from print or another medium), must be original, must be first distributed on the Internet this year, and cannot exceed 1500 words in length. You must be 18 years or older to enter the contest. Only one entry per author allowed.

Please E-mail your submission to contest@well.com. Please put the title of the entry in the subject line. Essays, stories and journalism entries must be included in the body of the email. (Entries for best writing using hyperlinks please simply include an URL for the site.) Please include in the body of the e-mail the author's name, mailing address, phone and e-mail address. Please indicate the category for which you are submitting your entry. No attachments will be accepted. No phone inquiries please. ALL ENTRIES MUST BE RECEIVED BY NOVEMBER 19, 1999.

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Next page | The WELL Online Writing Awards Official Rules