The world of the Foundation is a sprawling web of ideas that interact and twist and turn. There are endless possibilities for SCPs.
And then, sometimes, it seems there isn't. Everyone has had an awesome idea, only to find it's been done before, sometimes many years earlier. That doesn't make the idea bad. But there's no reason to completely ditch a new take on an old idea.
Inspired by Reimagining contests like this one which have been incredibly successful, I am proposing a new SCP designation, which would be an extension similar to -EX, -J, and -ARC. it's called -V.
This would be a great way for authors to revitalize, expand, and give power to old works they love.
How it works
Authors can submit "variant" articles. Doing so is as simple as submitting an article ending in the -V extension, adding a number if there's more than one (like SCP-682-V-2) and using the following guidelines:
1. The differences between the variant and the original shouuld be substantial. Simple changes, word swaps, or alterations which do not add new value or perspective would be ineligible for a -V submission, since the purpose of -V is to provide new and interesting ways to look at existing SCPs.
2. The -V article should stand on its own merit. While variants will have an obvious connection to some old and beloved articles, the article must be a good article independently of the original.
Possible limitations
One potential side effect of this idea would be authors who take recently-posted SCPs and "rework" them to try and get more votes in a way that could be considered "poaching" new ideas.
Given that the intent of -V is not to poach new articles for ideas, -Vs could be:
- Considered a type of rewrite, and require the permission of the original author or the rewrite team
- Allowed only for articles over 90 days old
- Allowed only for articles of a certain series (Say, only locked series) - this appears to be the most popular solution.
I want to reiterate that the purpose of -V articles would be to provide fresh perspectives to other people's ideas in a collaborative way; it is not intended as a way to one-up other authors.
Technical considerations
- This proposal would need a new tag (such as "Variant"). It could also use a hub on the site—or we could list variants in the SCP list under the parent.
- Variants could potentially be nested under their parent, and visible as child pages.
- Links to an SCPs variants should only be allowed with author/rewrite team permission. (I personally discourage this practice.)