The Eighth Annual American Zoetrope Screenplay Contest opens June 1. The early deadline is August 2 and the final deadline September 7. So dust off that old screenplay and edit, edit, edit. Who knows, right?

From Zoetrope:

The winner and top-ten finalists will be considered for representation by UTA, Paradigm, William Morris Independent, The Gersh Agency, CAA, Exile Entertainment, ICM, The Schiff Company, The Radmin Company, Energy Entertainment, Dontanville/Frattaroli, and The Firm.

Their scripts will be considered for film option and development by leading production companies, including: American Zoetrope, Samuel Goldwyn Films, Fox Searchlight, Sony Pictures Classics, IFC Entertainment, Paramount Classics, Lionsgate, Icon Pictures, Working Title, Dimension Films, Antidote Films, Plum Pictures, Frelaine, Greenestreet Films, Michael London Productions, Number 9 Films, Pretty Pictures, This Is That, Roserock Films, Benderspink, Astrakan Films, Industry Entertainment, Nine Yards Entertainment, Anonymous Content, Jim Wedaa Productions, Robert Evans Company, Fortis Films, Jean Doumanian Productions, FX, and Ziskin Productions.

Now in its ninth year, this contest seeks today's best poems on the theme of war. Winning Writers will award $5,000 in prizes including:

1. First Prize, $2,000 cash and publication on WinningWriters.com (over one million page views per year)
2. Second Prize, $1,200 cash and publication on WinningWriters.com
3. Third Prize, $600 cash and publication on WinningWriters.com
4. Twelve Honorable Mentions, $100 cash each and publication on WinningWriters.com

For more info and to submit your entry, check out the Winning Writers war contest page.

Click here to read winning entries from the past.

Marked by the Absence of Human Life, Activity, or Comfort by Erin Hopson

Congratulations to Erin and to all our finalists, and thank you to everyone who wrote in to vote. Look out for more contests to come in 2010 -- and keep writing.

We have narrowed the list to five finalists. Please help us choose a winner.

Marked by the Absence of Human Life, Activity, or Comfort by Erin Hopson

The Legend of Arthur Rimbaud (Part 1) by JayS

One Size Fits All by Marc Paltrineri

Thumbspeak Across the Universe by Stephanie

Western State by Waex Youngblood

• E-mail the title of your favorite to bryan.falla@peerscribe.com

Good luck to the finalists and big thanks to all participants. We had some really strong entries that we hope to see again in future contests. We have some interesting things planned for 2010, so keep writing!

HOW TO ENTER:

All entries must be tagged with poetry contest 2009 and social network for writers as the sub-genres (separate the two sub-genres with commas). Only three (3) entries will be accepted per user. Entries must be submitted no later than Nov. 15, 2009. Be sure to set "Access" to Public and "Write access" to Private. The winner will be announced Dec. 1, 2009, and will be awarded $100 (paid through PayPal) and will be featured on the Peerscribe home page.

To enter:

JUDGING:

1) Peer feedback
*if you are entering the contest, it might help to dole out the good vibes on peers' entries to get back some good peer karma

2) Peerscribe administrators jury panel
*we will look at mechanics, creativity, and originality

AS ALWAYS:

Your entry must be your original work of authorship. That means it cannot infringe on any third-party intellectual property rights. All entries remain the property of the author (that's you).

New to Peerscribe? Sign up here.

One of the things that sets Peerscribe apart from regular social networks is the ability to create and join workshops. Workshops allow you to exercise your creative muscles by forcing yourself to write in a structured environment.

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Creating a workshop on PS is very easy. Go to your Workshop tab (up top), click on Create a new workshop, then fill out the form top-down. Separate Topics with commas the way you would separate tags on a blog. For the Website, try adding a page that might further explain the subject of your workshop. A Wikipedia page might be a good, simple addition to your workshop. (Adding a Website is optional, however.)

To add a manuscript to your workshop, click on the Workshop manuscripts from the workshop's main page. Once in the Workshop manuscripts page, click on New manuscript.

If you join a workshop with a shared manuscript (like Telephone), you can edit the workshop manuscript by going into the Workshop manuscripts page, selecting the manuscript, and clicking Edit manuscript.

Done and done.

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Now go check out some of the open workshops already in progress, get some ideas, and create your own.

We started Peerscribe in hopes of creating a space on the Web for writers. We hoped it would become a place to foster creativity. A place where we could get feedback on our works-in-progress. Where we would feel comfortable giving advice one day and seeking guidance the next. A place that would connect us to our peers on the other side of the planet as easily as it would our peers on the other side of town. Slowly, it is becoming that place.

As our community grows, we hope our collective ambition grows with it. Among us we now have published poets and seasoned storytellers, but we also have writers who are just getting to know their craft. Through feedback, workshops, and the simple act of publishing our work for our peers to examine, we hope Peerscribe will become an instrument that nurtures our voices, cultivates our talent, sharpens our skills, and focuses our view of the world.

Thank you for helping us write this vision.

Poetry, short stories, novels... they're never really completed until the ink has settled on the paper and royalty checks have been mailed. And even then, any writer worth his salt will look at his words and find ways he could've said it better.

It's a process. That's why Peerscribe lets you track your edits. See your voice develop with every deleted word. Every new sentence. Every fragment. Evolve. Now you have proof.