That’s really interesting, Caren. Initially, I was just going to ignore it, then I thought that I would lose traffic during the month, and that everybody will be reading all the competition entries. So I thought I would stick to the topics I always write about, and just put the code tags in. I’ve been trying to figure out how to do that. Not easy.

I was one of the people who won in April. I suspect the criteria for April were different from the criteria since then. I think that, initially, the criteria had more to do with the topics, i.e. people not writing about writing. I then think, after the uproar, that it was changed to giving it to the top 1000 earners.

Engagement, after all, is about people reading the post. Nowhere does it specify that the engagement has to be with others on the site. That, of course, makes me wonder just how many people are earning over $100. That’s because if people are getting the $500 for earning under $100, then there are very few people earning that much.

Then, again, in all the publications I’ve written on, it’s generally the top 5% that earn. By the way, Paul Goodman started writing here at the beginning of the month, and he has already broken $100. I hope he wins the $500.

I agree that the competition is not a good thing. It’s also not possible that every submission will be read, and whoever wins will be criticized. How does one judge writing anyway?