Origins

Founded by Sango-sama in 2002, the Inuyasha Fan Guild is a Yahoo Group dedicated to awarding outstanding fanfiction written for the Inuyasha fandom. From a tight-knit group of roughly twenty members awarding fanfiction in only nine categories once a month, the IYFG has grown to a community of well over fifteen-hundred members awarding fanfiction in twenty different categories on a quarterly basis, with annual awards for "Best of the Year" in each category, “Best Completed Serial” and "Hidden Treasure" of the year.

When Sango-sama retired, she passed on the duty of running the Guild to the late, great Kristine Batey (Bachan), who in turn brought in a team of moderators to help run the growing group. Although most of those original moderators have moved on to other things, bringing in successors from time to time, the list continues to be managed by this committee of volunteers. As the list has grown and the voting process has been further refined, additional committees of dedicated members and moderators have been formed to deal with specific issues and routine tasks in order to improve the efficiency of the awards process and the caliber of stories that we honor.

How the Guild Works

Once a quarter, Guild members nominate outstanding fanfiction from the previous quarter through emails to the yahoo list. (Click on Join Us to go to the YahooGroup) These are collected and organized by the moderators according to the Guild’s rules and regulations. Following the nomination period, and a brief interlude, the Guild members then have the opportunity to second nominations, again through emails to the yahoo list. Any fanfics that make it through the nomination and seconding processes will appear in the polls at the end of the quarter, in which the Guild members all vote to determine the winners.

Meanwhile, as nominations and seconds are taking place, the Quality Committee screens all incoming nominations for any technical issues that may disqualify them from competition (see the Challenge Guidelines for details). Any problems discovered by the Quality Committee (or by any other Guild members) are submitted as challenges to the Challenge Committee, which then investigates these potential problems and determines whether or not they warrant disqualification.

The other two Guild committees, the Definitions Committee and the Website Committee, come into play mainly during the downtime between quarters, when the main list is open for debate about policy and procedure. This is when we fine-tune our operations. The Definitions Committee is responsible for fashioning appropriate definitions for new categories when they are created, as well as reforming and updating older definitions to suit the needs of the Guild. The job of the Website Committee is to build and maintain the website, keeping it as user-friendly and up-to-date as possible.

All of these committees are made up of members who have donated their time and brain power to keep the Guild running smoothly and keep the quality of the stories we award high.