June 4th, 2010 / 12:14 pm
Contests

20 Under 40 Pick ‘Em Winners

inland | dan mcpharlin illustration print

I’ve finally gone through the 24 entries (forgive my slowness), double-checked them, emailed the winners, and then I also had to wash the dishes and do a few other things before I could get this post live. Anyhow, thank you for being patient; I now present to you the 20 Under 40 Pick ‘Em Winners:

1st place: James Tanner (13 correct picks); Tanner selected prize package #2.

2nd place: Snowden Wright (12 correct picks); Wright selected prize package #1.

3rd place: Georgia Cool (12 correct picks, submitted one hour after Snowden’s entry); Cool will receive prize package #3.

Last place: Marshall, who submitted the following list:

1. Tao Lin 2. Tao Lin 3. Tao Lin 4. Tao Lin 5. Tao Lin 6. Tao Lin 7. Tao Lin 8. Tao Lin 9. Tao Lin 10. Tao Lin 11. Tao Lin 12. Tao Lin 13. Tao Lin 14. Tao Lin 15. Tao Lin 16. Tao Lin 17. Tao Lin 18. Tao Lin 19. Tao Lin 20. Dave Eggers

Congratulations, again, to the winners, and thank you to everyone who took the time to submit an entry! I hope this was a bit of distracting fun for all. If you liked this contest, please help us spread buzz about our next pick ’em: 10 Authors Most Likely to be Dropped by Their Publishers in 2011!

Thanks, especially, to all the authors and publishers and editors who donated products of their hard work to the prize packages. Please consider supporting them however you can.

(illustration from Dan McPharlin’s series Inland)

26 Comments

  1. ravi

      wait… i got twelve too… (quickly double-checking the email). yeah, it’s twelve.

  2. Snowden

      Thanks! It was a fun contest. Thanks also to the authors and publishers who donated prizes. (Not that it matters, but my last name’s Wright, not White)

  3. Ryan Call

      ravi, i just emailed you! sorry!

  4. Ryan Call

      made the correct, snowden

  5. marshall

      I’d like to address my strategies and feelings re winning this contest. [Aside: It seems like some people use a colon following “re” invariably, even when it seems inappropriate with regard to “proper punctuation.” Someone should investigate this. I’m not completely sure I use the word correctly myself. I think it could be funny to use it “loosely,” though, like how Carles from Hipster Runoff abuses the Latin preposition “via.”]

      I didn’t think I could win this contest “legitimately” due to my unfamiliarity with contemporary writers and the aesthetic of The New Yorker magazine, so I tried to win the category for “worst entry.” I wasn’t really sure I could win in this division, either. I thought there was a non-zero chance that my entry would be simply disregarded. I read a comment (http://htmlgiant.com/contests/the-htmlgiant-20-under-40-pick-em-contest/#comment-73819) that suggested that The New Yorker would “just write ‘Tao Lin’ ~20x.” I thought that was funny, so I stole the idea. I changed #20 is “Dave Eggers” because I thought it would make it funnier. I didn’t realize that Dave Eggers wasn’t even eligible due to his age, which makes it funnier, I think.

      I don’t know how I feel about winning this contest. It doesn’t seem “real” at this point in time. I’m not really sure what I’ve won. Maybe someone else would appreciate these books more than me. I feel like a usurper, maybe.

  6. marshall

      I’d like to thank HTMLGIANT, Publishing Genius, and everyone else who donated prizes for making this contest possible. I’d like to thank Jah; I will email Jesus and tell him to forward to Moses and cc Allah. I’d like to thank all of the OG commenters who have been holding it down since 2008. Peace, yall.

  7. stephen

      i am actually ‘a little’ curious re: how do use ‘re’ properly. ‘re’ by itself seems ‘naked’/’missin its colon friend,’ whereas ‘re:’ reminds me of the ‘re:’ in emails and makes sense to me, to some degree. also, the colon seems to signal, ‘yo, there’s some shit after this, and that’s what i’m referring to.’

  8. marshall

      Wikipedia says re “re”: “More literally, ‘by the thing.’ From the ablative of ‘res’ (‘thing’ or ‘circumstance’). It is a common misconception that the ‘Re:’ in correspondence is an abbreviation for ‘regarding’ or ‘reply’; this is not the case for traditional letters. However, when used in an e-mail subject, there is evidence that it functions as an abbreviation of ‘regarding’ rather than the Latin word for ‘thing.’ The use of Latin ‘re,’ in the sense of ‘about, concerning,’ is English usage.”

      So, I don’t know.

  9. demi-puppet

      I have always resisted the colon after ‘re’. I mean it really doesn’t make sense, except maybe in email title. It’d be like going “Well, I’m pretty knowledgeable concerning: the different ways to stain your pants.” It’s just strange.

  10. James

      Woo!

      Thanks again, Ryan. That was unduly fun.

      Marshall, if we must pick on a commonly garbled term, I say we leave poor ‘re:’ alone and zero in on ‘cf:’ instead:

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cf.

      Who uses It correctly? No one!

  11. anon

      I too also got 12, what was the tiebreaker?

  12. Ryan Call

      hi anon, tie breaker was who sent it in earliest.

  13. ravi

      wait… i got twelve too… (quickly double-checking the email). yeah, it’s twelve.

  14. Snowden

      Thanks! It was a fun contest. Thanks also to the authors and publishers who donated prizes. (Not that it matters, but my last name’s Wright, not White)

  15. Ryan Call

      ravi, i just emailed you! sorry!

  16. Ryan Call

      made the correct, snowden

  17. Guest

      I’d like to address my strategies and feelings re winning this contest. [Aside: It seems like some people use a colon following “re” invariably, even when it seems inappropriate with regard to “proper punctuation.” Someone should investigate this. I’m not completely sure I use the word correctly myself. I think it could be funny to use it “loosely,” though, like how Carles from Hipster Runoff abuses the Latin preposition “via.”]

      I didn’t think I could win this contest “legitimately” due to my unfamiliarity with contemporary writers and the aesthetic of The New Yorker magazine, so I tried to win the category for “worst entry.” I wasn’t really sure I could win in this division, either. I thought there was a non-zero chance that my entry would be simply disregarded. I read a comment (http://htmlgiant.com/contests/the-htmlgiant-20-under-40-pick-em-contest/#comment-73819) that suggested that The New Yorker would “just write ‘Tao Lin’ ~20x.” I thought that was funny, so I stole the idea. I changed #20 is “Dave Eggers” because I thought it would make it funnier. I didn’t realize that Dave Eggers wasn’t even eligible due to his age, which makes it funnier, I think.

      I don’t know how I feel about winning this contest. It doesn’t seem “real” at this point in time. I’m not really sure what I’ve won. Maybe someone else would appreciate these books more than me. I feel like a usurper, maybe.

  18. Guest

      I’d like to thank HTMLGIANT, Publishing Genius, and everyone else who donated prizes for making this contest possible. I’d like to thank Jah; I will email Jesus and tell him to forward to Moses and cc Allah. I’d like to thank all of the OG commenters who have been holding it down since 2008. Peace, yall.

  19. stephen

      i am actually ‘a little’ curious re: how do use ‘re’ properly. ‘re’ by itself seems ‘naked’/’missin its colon friend,’ whereas ‘re:’ reminds me of the ‘re:’ in emails and makes sense to me, to some degree. also, the colon seems to signal, ‘yo, there’s some shit after this, and that’s what i’m referring to.’

  20. Guest

      Wikipedia says re “re”: “More literally, ‘by the thing.’ From the ablative of ‘res’ (‘thing’ or ‘circumstance’). It is a common misconception that the ‘Re:’ in correspondence is an abbreviation for ‘regarding’ or ‘reply’; this is not the case for traditional letters. However, when used in an e-mail subject, there is evidence that it functions as an abbreviation of ‘regarding’ rather than the Latin word for ‘thing.’ The use of Latin ‘re,’ in the sense of ‘about, concerning,’ is English usage.”

      So, I don’t know.

  21. demi-puppet

      I have always resisted the colon after ‘re’. I mean it really doesn’t make sense, except maybe in email title. It’d be like going “Well, I’m pretty knowledgeable concerning: the different ways to stain your pants.” It’s just strange.

  22. James

      Woo!

      Thanks again, Ryan. That was unduly fun.

      Marshall, if we must pick on a commonly garbled term, I say we leave poor ‘re:’ alone and zero in on ‘cf:’ instead:

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cf.

      Who uses It correctly? No one!

  23. anon

      I too also got 12, what was the tiebreaker?

  24. Ryan Call

      hi anon, tie breaker was who sent it in earliest.

  25. thad

      that was hilarious. tried to go to your site, and failed.

  26. thad

      that was hilarious. tried to go to your site, and failed.