@WEBNOVEL_OFFICIAL I'm copy pasting my questions from the previous thread + new questions, since I never got an answer.
1. How will you handle works that are reused?
A few of the novels are old novels that were moved to a new novel, just so the authors could enter the contest. While I see nothing wrong with that if there are under 5 chapters, what about people that may have written up to 20+ chapters? A bit unfair for them to have an equal shot at winning a contest when they're already done with most of the work, no matter the quality. This also brings up the question of popularity - said authors might already have fans for their book, which skews the competition in their favor.
2. How are you going to handle fan fiction and/or the use of another author's world?
Will it be considered plagiarism if one of the novels in the contest uses another author's world/setting or just copies from here and there and markets itself as fan fiction? I see this as slightly unfair to everyone that goes to the trouble of creating his or her own world and setting, so I'd like to see it addressed in some way in case somebody does do it. Update: I believe somebody did do this with a Naruto fanfic, which goes against the point of the competition, or am I wrong? I know some people may enjoy these novels, but I thought this was a competition for original works of art, and not fan fiction writing.
3. Are you going to be checking the covers for copyright infringement?
Some people's covers might be directly borrowed art that does not give credit, was not paid for, etc, so I'd be interested on your stance on that matter. For instance, my cover is basically a simple edit of 2 separate photos that are given out from a website that allows its photographs to be used for anything, free of charge, no requirement for any credit.
4. How will you combat any writers that might have numerous accounts?
I know this isn't typical, but it isn't that hard to realistically hide your IP through onion routing or a VPN, hence it's easy for people to create numerous accounts and spend their red stones on their own novel, thus in effect cheating. Are there safeguards to prevent such an event?
5. Is every round open to new entries?
This is something I noticed - you're adding new books to the competition. While this is interesting, as it adds competitiveness to the whole thing, if somebody abuses a ready-made book and posts that at the 2nd, 3rd or 4th round and wins that round, isn't that a bit unfair to people participating from the beginning? Personally I'm okay with new entries, as long as it isn't somebody taking their old book and reposting it. I'm asking this, as I thought the idea of the competition was to help new authors find their mistakes and show them how they can make their original novels more popular.
Thank you for the wonderful work you've been doing and for hosting the competition :)