We Survived Springfest '05!
From April 23 through May 1, all of us in our worlds joined together to celebrate our annual Springfest festival . . . a tradition that actually goes back to the "Beta-Launch" in March, 2002, when AncientWorlds was reborn from the ashes of AncientSites, which went dark the year before. Quelle three years! Each world will do its own recap of perhaps our most ambitious festival to date - more awards, more nominations for "Best of Fest," more tours and other permanent contributions to the worlds' historical and plain "fun" resources. All praise go to the scribes and the citizen volunteers who helped them, and read on for details!
Best of Fest Awards!
This year's Best of Fest nominees included almost every world and, in many cases, citizens nominated multiple entries per world; Hellas led the pack with four nominations, but the overall quality from all the worlds was excellent! The nominations were:
MESOPOTAMIA
Divine-O-Rama Hut
GERMANIA
Tour of the Stave Churches
ROME
Circus Maximus Tour
The Catch the King Hunt
HELLAS
Tour of the Armesion
Iliad: The Spoof
Hellas Quiz Central
Temple of Artemis Gift Shop
THE ORIENT
Climb Mt. Everest
The Forest of Stone Stele
Teahouse of the April Moon
CELTIA
The Tour De Gaulle
Awards for "Best of Fest" awards in two categories - pure history and socio-game-fun history - were awarded on May 2. And the winners are! . . .
HISTORICAL:
Gold Medal: Rock Art Tour, THE AMERICAS
Silver Medal:
Infinite Goddess Exhibition, MESOPOTAMIA
Bronze Medal:
A Day in Ancient Rome , ROME
SOCIAL:
Gold Medal: Memoires of the Great Wall , ORIENT
Silver Medal: Amun’s Puzzle Scavenger Hunt, EGYPT
Bronze Medal: The Deer Hunt/Chase , HELLAS
Best Homes Awards!
One of AncientSites' favorite contests was the "Best Homes" competition, in which talented citizens were nominated for, and won, awards for their elegant AW homes. Well, it's back! With the tremendous efforts of Bryce Yupanqui, Laurels Curius, and Cornellia Cornelius, the awards were announced after a month-plus period of citizen nominations, and the "oooh ahs" that went up were compliment enough to those who'd worked so hard! Read up on the winners from all worlds, beginning here!
Special cheers for the winners, and thanks to Arachne's staff for their ongoing efforts to teach us all idiot-proof ways to dress up our virtual residences.
Festivals in Future
AncientWorlds is, as we all know, an ongoing experiment in virtual community, so it's logical that, after every major site-wide festival, discussions are ongoing on how to tweak, improve, or change our festival events. Several discussions are going on at various leadership groups concerning the possibility of going back to the "two-festival" concept - a site-wide festival in the spring and again in the fall, in loose celebration of our "Gold Launch" in the fall of 2002 - but with a "global" theme, where half our worlds would combine to present "global" events. Stay tuned, and if you have ideas or thoughts, share them with your scribes or post where we can see them!
Helpful 'Newbie' links
Lost? Don't know where to go? Although we are revamping and updating our "Beginner's Guide" to AncientWorlds, in the meantime, there's a wealth of good information here.
We also have our global 'Newbie' help board and welcome area: Welcoming Newcomers.
For avatars, homesite decor resources or code help check out Arachne's Web HelpCenter & FAQ.
