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Monday, October 18th, 2021

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Plot spelling/grammar/syntax corrections repeatedly being rejected for nonsense reasons

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093371

The plot outline has misspellings and is ungrammatical:

Mary-Jane, a lonely mother in her fourties, get absorbed in a sentimental affair with a 14 years old boy.

With my corrections:

Mary-Jane, a lonely mother in her forties, gets absorbed in a sentimental affair with a 14-year-old boy.

My reasoning (in the comments):

I'm correcting the spelling (40 is spelled without a U), grammar (verb conjugation tense has an S on "get"), and grammar (with punctuation) (single word adjective "14-year-old" preceding noun, not 3 words; see the article "a"?)

My submission has been rejected 5 times, and I elaborate in the comments more each time, but it doesn't help. The rejections are for ridiculous reasons:

"Does not meet contribution guidelines". It does NOT meet your contribution guidelines if the plot outline was unfortunately written by an illiterate (at least in English), so I'm fixing it.

My submissions for this rejection:

211016-175530-451000

211011-171231-507000

211010-214047-868000

211004-062955-903000

Some of my comments are merely "spelling/grammar/punctuation", others I get elaborately angry (probably at an uncaring computer).

"Factually incorrect". My corrections ARE factually correct, because I am not illiterate.

A previous submission with this rejection:

211009-155104-087000

My comment was simple: "Fixed spelling, grammar, punctuation."

What's the deal with your editors? Or is it your computer system that's rejecting these? They are rejected quite quickly, within a few hours (maybe minutes?), which seems suspiciously like a computer doing it.

My spelling, grammar, capitalization, punctuation, and syntax corrections to plot SUMMARIES get approved fine.

Here's an example of another title's plot outline with more elaborate changes, that was rejected for "Does not meet contribution guidelines":

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119879

A psychotic criminal couple kidnaps a random teenage couple. The woman rapes the male captive, and lets him watch his lover being raped by the man. They then plan to sacrifice the couple.

My changes:

The true story of a Mexican sex torture cannibal voodoo cult. A psychotic couple abducts a random teenage couple visiting Mexico. She rapes the male captive, letting him watch his lover being raped by the man. They then plan the sacrifice.

Nothing majorly wrong with this anonymous contributor's plot outline. Mostly syntax and repetition problems. I removed a redundancy in the first sentence and chose a more apt verb and even appended an additional description. I changed an article-noun into a pronoun in the second sentence and removed the conjuction modifying the verb (better syntax for both changes). I made the third sentence more concise and less redundant (the word "couple" occurs too many times in the outline). I then add an introductory sentence at the beginning. Some of my changes necessarily shortened the sentences to fit the 239 character limit for plot outlines, since I was also adding a sentence and a phrase.

This was also rejected in a few hours, perhaps less than an hour, I didn't monitor it that closely, again leading me to believe that a computer is rejecting it.

My submission for this one: 211016-175247-290000.

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Champion

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16.4K Messages

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351.6K Points

5 years ago

Regarding the latter edit, when I enter your text in the form I get this warning:

Your title includes "true story", which contravenes our policy for plot outlines

Please re-word the outline according to our guidelines here.

So the form tells you one reason why it may be rejected.

(edited)

111 Messages

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1.5K Points

@Peter_pbn 

There's nothing in the guidelines that says the phrase "true story" can't occur in a plot outline. That weird warning appears obsolete. And it's only a warning; it can be bypassed with a checkbox. It's not a make-it-or-break-it rule. I've found most edit warnings inapplicable anyway.

I've also found the reasons for rejections inapplicable as well. More or less a throwaway "reason" when a true reason can't be found.

466 Messages

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8.5K Points

5 years ago

Thanks for flagging this.

 

I can confirm that the first plot outline update has now been applied.

 

Regarding the second update, please refrain from using words like 'this movie, this story etc.' This is already mentioned in our guide here

 

Thanks for your understanding.

111 Messages

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1.5K Points

@Rida 

1. No, the first plot outline changes I'm trying to make have NOT been applied. That's why I posted this thread. Why did you mark it solved when the problem hasn't been addressed? My updates were ALL rejected, none applied. I want to know why.

And I'm convinced now that it's your computer system doing it; no actual human editor ever sees it. The time for processing plot outlines is 5 days behind, and my submissions are being rejected in a few hours or less.

It's not right that your system is rejecting this. There's a problem here that needs to be addressed.

2. The phrase "this story" or "this movie" or "this is a story about" (per the guidelines) does not appear anywhere in the second plot outline. The word "story" appears, but only in the context associated with "true", the operative word here. True tale, true events, true occurrence, real events, based on actual events, etc all these mean the same thing, but it sounds better as "true story".

Is the word "story" prohibited? Is that what the computer is locking on? I'll try some synonym then, like "tale" or "account", though the latter makes it sound like a documentary (which there are plenty of, related to this movie).

This issue isn't solved either. Stay tuned; I'll redo the second, but the first still needs explanation. Your computers or editors can't be rejecting simple spelling/grammar/punctuation fixes like this. Something is wrong.

(edited)

111 Messages

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1.5K Points

@Rida @Peter_pbn

I changed #2 to:

The true tale of a Mexican sex torture cannibal voodoo cult. A psychotic couple abducts a random teenage tourist couple. She rapes the male captive, letting him watch his lover being raped by the man. They then plan the sacrifice.

211019-143314-004000

Declined for Does not meet contribution guidelines. Took 2 days. No warning given when I edited it. I didn't use the word "story". So what in my changes is not acceptable?