That’s a question I’ve been asking for the last three weeks. Finally last Monday, we had a partial answer…. and we’ll find out today.
If you didn’t receive the notification by email, or see the blog post, here’s an extract:
Judging by the number of inquiries about the 2017 Challenge that we’ve been getting in our email boxes as well as the A to Z Challenge Facebook site, many of you are wondering what’s going on this year. The A to Z Challenge Blog has been inactive over the past few weeks and not a great deal has been heard from the Challenge co-hosts regarding the 2017 Challenge. In fact, not even a mention of who are the co-hosts for 2017. However the behind the scenes action has been underway as we have been addressing what the 2017 April event might look like.
As you might now be surmising, changes are coming in the upcoming 2017 A to Z Challenge!
In this current post, I am laying the groundwork for the very important announcement post that will be appearing here next Monday February 6th. There will be some vital information that we want you to be sure to read and to help us promote in order that all interested parties can be informed and provide their own input and suggestions. And of course, there will undoubtedly be questions that we can answer for you.
Can you help us get the word out?
So that the maximum number of bloggers can get this very important news, we are asking you to help us get the buzz going by announcing the upcoming post on your own blogs as well as tweeting, Facebooking, and sharing today’s post as much as you can. Let’s get the word out!
We want everyone who is planning on doing the 2017 Challenge to see what is in store by checking out the February 6th post. So, those of you who have already completed your A to Z posts for this year or have them in the planning stages, never fear! The 2017 A to Z Challenge will be here once again in April. There will be much more information to come on the A to Z Blog after next week’s announcement so plan on visiting regularly.
So – I have nothing more to add save to get over to http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com and find out!
I have to say I don’t like their plan. To be listed you’ll have to go to their blog every day to post your own link up. I will be away for several days during April, and I suspect many others will balk at having to post a link each day. The solution is for some of us to come together to post each other’s links.
Are you in that situation? What to join a buddy list to do it?
Thanks for this post Jemima. I will definitely enter the A-Z Challenge this year. I haven’t heard of it til now.
It’s a great way of getting to know more people, Kim (and for them to know you!)
Thanks for keeping us up on this, Jemima. I’ve decided not to enter this year – I have too much work to do on my fourth book. Next year I will probably do something connected to the books again. But I’ll be checking in with everyone else!
I was touch and go for this year, Noelle. I’ve kept it VERY short this year as a result. And shared the workload 🙂
I like the idea of linking for each other, but I’m also keenly aware that my posts don’t go up until rather late in the day, your time. I could use 0:01 UT as my post time, though that makes them go up mid-afternoon the day before for me. And when do I manage to get the links posted (and in a dozen places? Seriously?).
Seems like maybe we could come up with some better, less labor-intensive ways, to keep the list tidy. I get that the job has become huge, and probably minions are hard to come by, but I’m with all the folks who like a centralized list. I’ll be interested to see how many are still bothering by the end of the month.
On the A-to-Z site post, John Holton says he’s planning to do a blog post with ideas to make it easier. My mind is racing ahead as usual, and I’ve suggested they post their A2Z post around 00:01 UTC too.
There are ways of linking your post straight into Twitter and FB – this is something WP does well, and I’m investigating whether I can put a hashtag as well as my twitter handle in the auto thingie. The safest way is to put the hashtag into the post title – not elegant through the whole of April, but I already do it with IWSG, Fi50, FlashbackFriday, etc.
I can’t remember whether my blogger blog posts to Twitter and Facebook or not.
Then again – if you only get more attention from people who use the one source of info, will it matter?
Thank you for opening the discussion on your site, Jemima. Change rarely comes easy and the coming change for A to Z may sound scary and inconvenient, but I think everyone will adapt as the weeks heading to April progress. We should hopefully have posts at the A to Z Blog that will allay most fears and concerns and be able to answer questions as they arise. This year will bring changes that may or may not work well and hopefully we can learn from the mistakes as well as the successes.
We appreciate the loyal A to Z vets like yourself. You keep the A to Z Challenge alive!
Arlee Bird
Tossing It Out
Thanks, Lee!