#007 Fest admin

[mi6-cafe]

It's time to sign up for 007 Fest 2024!

What is 007 Fest?

007 Fest is a month-long July celebration of all things Bond! This year, our premise is that the main Bond characters have all been incapacitated and now the world has to rely on the B Team...you!

First, decide on a bio for your character (MI6 janitor? underpaid hench? hapless tourist?). Then, get assigned a time-zone-based team.

Finally, decide on your goals at the beginning of each week in July. Completing these weekly goals helps save the world from that week's threat! (But if you don't complete them...well...maybe your team's part of the world ends up a little more lava-covered than it was before...yes, even though you're not anywhere near a volcano... Luckily, you can help each other out!)

More info on our wordpress or our tumblr post.

I don't write or art! Can I still participate?

Absolutely! If you want, you can only make social goals---hosting or joining watch parties or Discord chats, for example.

We also have fun immersive goals/scavenger hunt activities that don't involve writing or arting.

Additionally, the 'creative' goals don't have to involve fanfic or fanart; if your weekly goal is to make 5 James Bond memes or three headcanons, we support that!

And if you want to make a "hold my beer" level of goal, we also offer prompt tables and other challenges!

You can also participate without goals during certain weeks or the whole month if you want! 007 Fest is as chill or as high-key as you want to make it.

How can I sign up?

Sign-ups are open from NOW until June 15! Just fill out this form and we'll contact you on June 18 so you can meet your team. If you'd like to onboard after that, you can, it will just take the mods a little longer.

We look forward to saving the world with you in July! :D

[spiritofcamelot]

007 Fest 2024 Intro post

Username: xX_Subterranian_Xx

Position: Constantly behind on deadlines website admin

About me: Can most often be found sitting on the roof of the intelligence building, gesticulating wildly at last minute requests for fake websites and growling in frustration at code. I could be getting paid more for my skills, but at the end of the day I enjoy the variety of challenges offered. But also I should be paid more.

Case in point, I only noticed the Big Snooze when it had been more than six hours since a new request for a website to aid a cover story showed up on my task list. I enjoyed the reprieve at first, but when a whole day had passed, I did start to get suspicious.

------

Hi, I'm Linorien! (she/her) Cafe Mod and Co-Station Head of Station Atlantic.

I'm super excited for Fest this year. Really hoping it will bring me that boost of creativity that always comes with a challenge because my real life job has been making it harder to write lately. I love writing from Q's pov and exploring the lives of those who aren't sent on missions. I also love exploring the overlap of magic in tech in fiction, so if you've got any prompts, let me know!

But most of all I can't wait to see all the cool stuff everyone else does!!

[leavesdancing]

Work-Life Balance, by Zephyrfox

Fandom: James Bond (Craig movies), GoldenEye (1995), Midsomer Murders - All Media Types Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: James Bond/Alec Trevelyan, James Bond/Q, Q/Alec Trevelyan, James Bond/Q/Alec Trevelyan Characters: James Bond, Q, Alec Trevelyan, Bill Tanner, John Barnaby, Charlie Nelson Additional Tags: Pining, Established James Bond/Alec Trevelyan, Pre-Relationship, Original Character(s), Q-Branch Match Making, Oblivious Q, 007 Fest 2020, Don't copy to another site

Summary:

Q has a problem with his work-life balance. He doesn't have one. Fortunately, his branch - and his Double O's - have a plan to fix that.

Chapter 1:

Q stopped by his admin assistant’s desk. “Liz, do I have a good work-life balance?”

 “No, sir,” Her grey eyes glinted with amusement. “You have a work balance.”

 “Cheeky,” he muttered, going into his office.

 “Yes, sir!”  Liz called, grinning after him.

[10kiaoi]

For the 007 Fest Anon prompt: Just like in Kingsman 1, an agent is planted with the new recruits to be "killed" if they aren't rescued. This year, James Bond has drawn the short straw. None of the new recruits recognize him, but how good is he at acting helpless? 

Notes: Unbetaed as always. Canon typical violence.

Contrary to popular belief, their intakes are varied and diverse. 

He gravitates towards the ex-military, of course. It is always easier to make a connection with those you share similar experiences with. But he keeps an eye out on the other potentials as well. 

Techies, engineers, logistics staff make up the majority. Fewer are the specialists- thieves and con artists and the like who dabble with the underworld and live to tell the tale.  

The room is abuzz with soft chatter as the occupants begin to get to know each other. 

He flirts between the different cliques, striking up conversations as he pleases. The ex-military sees something of themselves in him, takes to him like a duck to water. The techies are wary, but open up to his charms and genuine appreciation of their skills. The rest follow not long after. 

Amongst themselves, most are drawn to their own kind- forming several small easily identified groups in the room. Far too segregated and all too easily divided and conquered. 

MI6 will break them of the habit soon enough.

-------

MI6 commandeers an aging office building slated for demolition. But the participants hardly know that. 

By all accounts it’s an active building. The front desks are manned by two ladies. One is current staff in logistics, the other is an active field agent. 

The field-agent-turned-receptionist-for-the-day smiles politely when he hands over the letter of invitation, makes a show of checking his ID and verifying his identity. 

“Have a good day,” she wishes him, then calls for the next person in line. 

He passes by the second floor on the way up. It’s temporarily home to admin staff- admin staff who all possess medical licenses and have varying degrees of experience in dealing with unruly agents. 

No one bats an eyelid when he joins the group of new intakes gathering in the conference room. 

-------

By design, all buildings must come with a minimum of one exit. Anything otherwise is what is called a coffin.

It’s also where most people rush towards in a panic. It makes sitting ducks of them to be caught in a bottleneck.

The report of gunfire sends the sensible people scattering towards the exits. The less sensible ones start screaming in terror.

And then you get the gung ho ones. Ardent and over confident and trying to impose some semblance of control over the rest. 

In a word, it’s chaos.  

He honestly expects better. He suspects he’ll be needing a word with the recruiters over at HR soon. Hardly their fault of course. One can seem perfect on paper, and yet have the personality equivalent to a brick in person. Hardly adequate for a demanding role in spy work. Still, the interview should have rooted out the worst of the worst. 

On the other hand, sometimes the best isn’t always what they are looking for either. 

-------

Q Branch does excellent work. But that work doesn’t come about without multiple trials and errors. 

Being shot point blank hurts like a bitch, but Q Branch will be pleased to be informed that their new bulletproofing textile passes muster.  

The suit however, will be beyond saving. 

He’s morbidly amused to discover that they’ve even gotten the consistency and colour of the fake blood right too.  

-------

In his defense, he expects them to fail completely. They are simply too uncoordinated, too fractured and too unacquainted still to achieve otherwise.  

Agents rarely have the luxury to have all the cards in their favour. 

The smarter ones have made themselves scarce, perhaps even breaking out through blowing a hole in the wall. The workable ones have concocted barricades with whatever resources they have in reach. 

There are no sealed rooms accessible.

Then there are those who will be fast tracked to the field agent roles, possibly even Double Oh status. 

-------

He doesn’t even need to feign the pain. A savage dig of his fingers to where the bullet has struck sends the groans tumbling out from his lips. 

The smokescreen is harmless but blocks out everything beyond an arm’s width. 

He doesn’t hear anything, but that simply means they are being picked off one by one by a silent foe.  

He lays there, straining his ears to catch anything at all, hand over the imaginary wound. His role is practically over, his mission an outstanding success. It is also an irrevocable failure on the part of those being tested. He hears nothing at all, save the soft hum of the vents.

A hand clamps around his wrist. 

He startles badly, quite nearly letting out a yell that will most undoubtedly blow their cover and reveal their location. He bites down on his lip.

The pale bespectacled face emerges from the smokescreen, shaken yet determined. 

“Quiet,” the stranger orders softly. 

He can only stare in wonderment.  

It’s all he has time to do before they both hear the low dreaded click of a firearm.

The fear that passes over the stranger’s face is terrible and visceral. But there’s no time to contemplate the peculiar emotion that reaction triggers in him before the stranger is hauling him behind a desk. 

The bullet ends up in the concrete beside where they were a moment ago.

There’s something like desperation in the stranger's eyes now, darting about rapidly in assessment. There’s nothing immediate of use- MI6 has made sure of that. Merely standard office stationery and the usual implements that wouldn’t look out of place in any other office.   

The distress is clearly evident as the stranger seems to realise there’s nothing else he can do. 

Bond’s breaths come quick. Truth on a silver platter is almost too much of a temptation. He digs his fingers into his side again. 

The rifle barrel of slides out of the smoke pointed straight at them. The man behind the mask wielding it is inscrutable.  

He can feel the stranger trembling. 

An ear splitting horn blares through the building. The stranger jumps in his skin, fingers wrapped around a metal body ballpoint. 

The rifle is lowered. The gunman rips off his mask, revealing a familiar face and shooting them a wide grin. 

Bond relaxes marginally at the sight of 006. 

The stranger merely looks flabbergasted. 

-------

On particularly rare occasions, they strike a gold mine in these elaborate intake tests. A diamond in the rough but a diamond nonetheless. The jackpot prize that well justifies the expenditure and efforts towards the setup.

Management is all too keen to get their hands on these individuals. “‘M’ Material,” Tanner jokingly calls them as Bond visits him to drop off his report on this latest intrigue. 

He tactfully does not point out how the Chief of Staff himself is one of these outstanding “M Material” individuals. 

Some of the more jaded the Double Ohs look upon them with pity- they know all too well the fate awaiting those who are handpicked for their will defend to the death when pressed. 

The feeling is always tinged with conflicted regard. 

As for he- he plops down onto the desk, identical to every other desk in Q Branch, sending drafting pencils clattering and the computer monitor to shudder dangerously.

The venomous look Q shoots him could peel paint. He grins as he presents the mug of tea in offering. It’s accepted with the mildest glances of suspicion. 

Bond tries not to feel too disappointed a familiar metal body pen is whisked away unobtrusively into a hidden pocket.

Q may not be Quartermaster just yet, having plenty still to learn under the guidance of Q Branch but-

That his file is added to the minuscule pile of those being groomed for managerial positions at MI6 doesn’t sit badly with Bond at all.

One might even say he has a gut feeling that it’s inevitable.

[mi6-cafe]

Get Ready for 007 Fest 2024!

007 Fest is a celebration of Bond for the whole month of July! We've made some changes to the format, illustrated in the slides below. You can also check out our new and updated Wordpress pages.

What's staying the same from past 007 Fests?

We still have activities like the scavenger hunt, prompt tables, anon prompt exchange, and masterposts/brag sheets!

Why the changes?

007 Fest has always been about celebrating Bond, helping people achieve their personal fandom goals, and bringing the community together to have fun. In the past, the competitive nature of the points system has helped energize people but it has also led to conflict. (It could also be tedious, e.g., fandom taxes.) 

We hope that being on new time-zone-based teams will foster more community events and that the structured weekly goals will help people pace themselves. Also, we love that the ability to help others means that there is a chance for EVERY team to accomplish 100% of their goals! We hope to create a supportive environment where people can challenge themselves and grow together. 

When is all this happening?

June 01–15: 007 Fest sign-ups are open! 

June 18: 007 Fest teams, including team Discord channels, are released 

July 01: 007 Fest begins; participants make weekly goals every Mission Monday 

July 28: Team-Up Week begins as participants make one last push to help each other achieve their goals! 

July 31: 007 Fest ends at 11:59 PM your local time. 

If you have questions, please check out our FAQ on wordpress, but if you can't find the answer in there, reach out to us via the Cafe blog on tumblr, or find Castillon02 or Linorien on either slack or discord. One of us will see your question and do our best to answer.

[mi6-cafe]

007 Fest prompt tables and scavenger hunt

The 007 Fest prompt tables have been released! You can see them on our wordpress.

The exact prompts are on the linked page, but to give you an idea, the table themes for this year are

001: collab prompts

002: art challenges

003: images

004: AO3 tags

005: Historical AU

006: Minor Characters

007: word count

008: It's not all about Bond

009: whump

Our scavenger hunt list has also been released! It includes prompts for items from role playing (introduce your Station character) to creative editing (make a social media profile for a Bond character) to community-building (send an anonymous message of positivity).

Prompt tables and the scavenger hunt are optional ways to participate in 007 Fest, but for those who like them, we hope they'll provide a lot of fun this July. <3

[mi6-cafe]

End of 007 Fest Reminders

As August sweeps across the globe, we’ll have to say goodbye to this amazing month of creation. Here’s how.

Create a masterlist of your 007 Fest fancreations. It’s great for self promotion and it's a fun way to celebrate yourself! Brag about crossing the 007 Fest finish line and reflect on your successes; you’ve earned it! (Confused on what a masterpost looks like? Check out our suggested template!)

Fill out the Fest Wrap-Up Survey. This is how we collect your masterposts and how we find out what you liked and didn't liked. We redesigned Fest based on the feedback from previous surveys, and so this year it is even more important that you let us know how it went. It is also the way to be entered into the prize drawing. You will have until August 7th to fill out the survey!

(The google form is a little long this year, but it should autosave.)

Post your works to the 007 Fest AO3 collection. This way everyone can find and support your fancreations!

Finally, if you’ve filled any anon prompts, make sure to go back to the prompt exchange and add links to your prompt fills.  

We hope you’ve had a fantastic 007 Fest! If you have any questions, just send an ask or email the Cafe (mi6cafemod [at] gmail [dot] com)

[mi6-cafe]

Post-Fest hang out evening

What: Come hang out with Cas and Lin in discord after Fest concludes! We'd love to chat about the cool things you all did during Fest this year, how much we loved the different Fest characters, and anything else Cafe related.

Also, we really enjoyed the quiplash game the other night so we are very likely to play some more while we chat.

When: Saturday Aug 3rd at 10pm ET (After readalong ends.) It's on the Fest events calendar as well.

[mi6-cafe]

It's Success Report Sunday!

How did your week go? Did you meet your goals? Put a check in the box on your mission tracker sheet and celebrate it! Then see if anyone needs help with their goals.

Did things not quite go according to plan? It's time to come together as a community to save the world!

If you have unfinished goals:

Let us know what needs to happen to bring the goal to completion. (ex: One more drabble needed)

You can do that either via reblog on this post, or sharing in the slack/discord channels.

Celebrate when someone reaches out with what was needed to complete your mission!

Today only, the 7th, is the last day to set your monthly goals if any.

[mi6-cafe]

IT’S 007 FEST SIGN UP TIME!!!

SIGN-UPS ARE OPEN NOW >>HERE<<

Are you a Fest veteran? ➡ 1) Reread the rules and check out what’s different this year. 2) Make sure you understand and agree with everything.  3) THEN GO SIGN UP! (Also please, help us get promo for the fest by reblogging your favourite fest posts telling us what you enjoyed the most about the fest. Tag @mi6-cafe​ so we can find it and reblog it)

Signups end on June 15. (After that day you’ll still be able to sign up via email but we’ll assign you to a team randomly)

Not sure what the 007 Fest is?

Well, the gut reaction is to shout:

IT’S THE BEST PART OF THE YEAR AND YOU WILL LOVE IT!

Well, here’s the calmer explanation put in the most concise terms possible:

007 fest is a month-long event organised by the @mi6-cafe​.

For 31 days we celebrate all things Bond by

writing fics / headcanons / metas

creating awesome art

watching movies / having readalongs

posting recipes

commenting on the Bond creations of others

taking part in the Scavenger Hunt

going slightly insane together on Slack and Tumblr and Discord

here’s a link to the scav hunt list and fills from 2022, some items might be being reprised 👀

There’s weekly themes, prompt tables, and other activities to spur on your creativity… ��

We do all this because it’s fun and because it’s a competition for prizes–although you can take part and not compete for points and have a chance to win a prize and also have just as much fun. 🤪

There are 4 teams:

Team Q Branch

Team 00

Team Villains

Team Civilian (the non-competing one, as you might have guessed)

Yes, you heard correctly: PRIZES!

More info under the cut:

So how is 007 Fest organized this year?

OK. So there’s the three competitive teams (Q-branch, 00, Villains) and one non-competitive team - the Civilians. Right?

And if you are part of a competitive team, then all of your actions in the Fest (e.g., commenting, making fancreations, joining readalongs, etc) will earn points for your team! You’ll count up your points at the end of the Fest and submit them through a google form. The team with the most points wins! (The point system isn’t as scary as it sounds, you’ll get the hang of it. No worries.)

But I don’t have to compete?

Nope! If you think 007 Fest sounds fun and you’d like to participate, but you’re not into the competition or counting up points, then you can join Team Civilian!

(You can also participate without joining a team if you want! Just tag your posts with #007 Fest. We just think teams are fun. ^ ^)

And you mentioned prizes?

Yes!

We have two prize drawings at the end of the fest. Everyone who participates, including Team Civilian participants, has a chance to win something from the all-participants prize pool.  

For the second drawing, people on the winning team will also have a chance to win prizes from a winning team prize pool!

Prizes can be anything! Past prizes have included drabbles or ficlets, sketches or fanart, fandom bookmarks or pins, Redbubble or Amazon gift certificates, and more. If you would like to donate any prizes for the prize pools, we would love to hear from you. You can email the Cafe mods at mi6cafemod@gmail.com

Has anything changed since last year?

Only slightly. The main changes involve some simplification of bonus points. We’ve outlined the changes here. Even if this is your fifth time participating, please make sure to refamiliarise yourself with the rules and the points.

And this signing up process?

Easy–just fill out THIS short google form (also linked above). We mostly ask you for a way to contact you and for your choice of teams. Please keep in mind that although we’ll try to put everyone on their preferred team, we also need to ensure a balanced number of participants for each competitive team.

Sign-ups start NOW, and they end on June 15th! After June 15th, you can still join the Fest, but if you want to compete instead of join Team Civilian, you will be randomly assigned to a competitive team.

What can we do between now and July?

Anything you want! Points can only be earned by fancreations posted from July 1-July 31, but you can certainly start brainstorming or working on a WIP!

You can add the 007 Fest calendar to your personal calendar, and talk to the mods if you have an event you want on the calendar. You can spread the word to get other people to sign up. You can familiarise yourself with our wordpress site and all the Fest info on it.

You can also add to the BONUS PROMPT LIST for 007 Fest 2023! This is a list of anonymous fic or art prompts, and anyone who creates a fancreation fill for something from the prompt list gets bonus points. Whether you’re adding prompts or thinking about filling them, the prompt list is a great place to look for inspiration. ^ ^

We’re super excited about 007 Fest 2023, and we hope you are too! For more detailed information, you can check out the 007 Fest rules here.  

Also, here’s the link to the COLLECTION OF INFO PAGES ABOUT THE FEST.

[mi6-cafe]

Watch party time zones!

To host a watch party or other event, all you have to do is let your Station head know when it will be so they can add it to the 007 Fest calendar. You can also make a post for the Cafe to reblog so we can let people know about it.

To make watch parties and other 007 Fest events accessible at a glance, we're asking you to include time zones for four different cities (Paris, New York, LA, Sydney) in your announcement posts!

For example, the wonderful @wambold is hosting Craig!Bond watch parties on Sundays at 8AM Pacific. For Casino Royale on July 7th, that would look like this:

Time Zones

Paris: Sunday, July 7, 5:00 PM

New York: Sunday, July 7, 11:00 AM

LA: Sunday, July 7, 8:00 AM

Sydney: Monday, July 8, 1:00 AM.

You can also include a time zone converter link as well. If you want to get really fancy, you can use the event announcer and provide a link that automatically converts for people.

We're hoping to help as many people as possible to go to the events they're interested in. Happy 007 Festing!

[mi6-cafe]

So, when can I get help with my mission objective?

Part of the new 007 Fest format includes being able to help each other complete mission objectives! The idea is you do your best to complete your weekly mission, and if life gets away from you, then you can reach out to ask for help. To avoid having a long queue for help on Sundays (AND to avoid any pressuring of people who might complete their goals later at night on Sunday), we suggest this schedule!

July 1-7: You work on your week 1 mission.

July 7: Finalize a monthly goal if you want. Also, declare success or not on your week 1 mission.

July 1-28: You work on your monthly goal.

July 8-14: You work on your week 2 mission. You may help others retroactively complete their week 1 mission.

July 15-21: You work on your week 3 mission. You may help others retroactively complete their week 1 or 2 mission.

July 22-28: You work on your week 4 mission. You may help others retroactively complete their week 1, 2, or 3 mission.

July 29-31: During team week, you may help retroactively get any weekly mission to a success. You may also now help anyone get closer to completing their monthly mission.

[mi6-cafe]

007 Fest Prizes

Part of 007 Fest includes prizes! 

When we get to the end of our celebrations in July, we draw names to see who wins something from the prize pools. Prizes can include pretty much anything! Past prizes have included:

homemade bookmarks, buttons, bags, and other crafts

various fan merch

a ficlet or doodle commission

gift certificates for Redbubble, etc 

If you would like to add to the prize pools, please email the MI6 Cafe mod email so we can add your donation to the list! 

[mi6-cafe]

Thank you to everyone who participated in 007 Fest 2023! Whether you created, commented, reblogged, or just enjoyed all the Bond on your dashboard, we're so happy that you joined us for our eighth year of 007 Fest. Thank you for a month filled with Bond fandom community!

Comments

One of our favorite parts of 007 Fest: together, we made over three thousand comments on tumblr and AO3! The total reported number was 3149. Well done, Bond fandom!!!

And now, the big reveal---

The winner of 007 Fest 2023 is...

...

...

Team Q Branch!

Congratulations, Team Q Branch! Well played!

Prizes

If you have received a prize, you should be getting an email from the Cafe soon, connecting you with your prize giver in case you have not already connected. This will be the same email you used to sign up with. Please allow a few days for these to be sent out.

A special thank you to...

Once again, all of you! But especially to our 007 Fest team captains and cheerleaders, all of whom are essential to making this event possible. Thank you so much for your hard work and leadership! <3

Survey results

As we have in the past, Lin and I have reached out to a few people to help us reflect on the anonymized survey results. We are so pleased to have a lot of detailed feedback from those who completed the survey; there's a lot of valuable input to sift through! As usual, we should have initial survey reflections posted by September. Thank you for helping us make 007 Fest better every year; it has grown so much since the first one in 2016, and a lot of that is because of your thoughtful survey comments!

[mi6-cafe]

It's Mission Monday!

By the end of the day (your local time), please lock in your weekly goal by putting them on your mission tracker sheet.

If you need inspiration, check out our sample mission objectives.

[mi6-cafe]

Fest emails

If you signed up for 007 Fest this year, the first of the two welcome emails has now been sent out. If you don't see it, please check your spam folders. If you still don't see it, please reach out to the Cafe Mods via email (mi6cafemod [at] gmail.com) to let us know.

If you are seeing this and still want to sign up, you can also send us an email and let us know. We'll get you added, but your on-boarding may be a little slower.