~ There is an explanation of the categories that Genericizing uses in the "enter" section. Do not enter a site that does not fit into one of these categories. If you feel that I've horribly overlooked a category, you can Neomail me, but I am not running a competition for sites of the following type:
^ Guild/chatgroup/gallery webbies
^ About me pages
^ Wishlists
^ Lablogs
^ FAQs
Now, if you happen to have any of these on a page with something else, you can still enter the "multipurpose" category.

~ Only enter sites on Neopets. Meaning that the URL you give me begins in "www.neopets.com/~".

~ You must link to me while you are in the competition. I don't care where you put this link--whether you banner it across your welcome section and shout "VOTE FOR ME AT GENERICIZING" or just stick a little blurb in your updates that says, "by the way, I've entered Genericizing, vote for me?", but you must link to me. If you do not link to me by the time voting is ready to start, I will remove you from the competition.

~ Please, no early/late entrants. Once a category is closed, don't ask to be put in it. You only have to wait a couple weeks at the max, so just keep it in the back of your head: "Oh, and I need to enter Genericizing when it opens up again". Or write yourself a note or something.

~ Voting in a category will start as soon as it is full. However, after the first or "entrance" week of a competition, all voting will start regardless of the number of entrants in a category.

~ I will Neomail you when voting starts in your category, if it starts early.

~ You may only enter one site per category per competition, but if you have, say, a review site and a directory, you may enter both of them in the same competition.

~ Don't send me ugly Neomails if your site is removed from the competition or doesn't score well. It's not even under my control; it's the voters or whether or not you linked to me. If you were removed from the competition but you do have a link to me, you can go ahead and Neomail me pointing it out. If I've overlooked you, I'll return you to the competition.

~ Do not steal my awards. "Stealing" means either taking one when you did not earn it or removing the link back to this page. If the way you display your awards requires that you remove the link from them, have a link back to this page somewhere nearby.

~ You may not enter the competition directly after one that you have placed in with the same site. If, however, you did not place in the last competition, you may enter the next one. Likewise, if you have two sites and one of them placed, you may enter the other one the next competition.

~ You are not required to have a slogan, but if you want me to put one up for you, list it on the form. You may not make changes to this slogan once it is up.

~ You must have an 88x31 button. You may specify which button to use in the form.

~ If there is only one competitor in a category when voting starts, that category will be shut down for the current competition. A Neomail will notify you if this happens to you. If you have already put up the ribbon award, you may keep it up.

~ If your site is made up of more than one page, give me the link to your welcome page.

~ No stolen content. If it's not yours, I'm not giving you an award for it.

~ If your site is on hiatus and you don't have anything left up when I check for link backs, I'll remove it from the competition without notice. If you're on hiatus but you have everything up and you've linked back to me, I'll leave you in the competition.

~ When I say pet, you say chicken. This is how I know that you've read the rules.

~ Don't Neomail me asking if I've seen your vote yet. I will update the vote totals whenever I can, and I will reply to your message letting you know that I have counted your vote. If you do not get a reply, either I'm Neomail banned, which I will post under updates, or I haven't gotten your message yet.

~ If my inbox is full, send me junk. I will reject it. Usually I'm fairly good about emptying my inbox, though, because for some reason I often have people wanting to talk to me.

~ You may vote for different categories at different times and in different Neomails. I will keep track of which categories you have voted for, though not publicly. If you do not have a vote for a category at the time when you send the Neomail, just delete that spot or write "none", "N/A", or something of that sort. I'm not stupid most of the time; I can figure out what you mean.

~ All votes are completely anonymous. The only people who know what you voted are you, me, and anyone you decide to tell.

~ You may vote for your own site.

~ When I say pet, you say spider. That's how I know that you've read the rules, or at least this one.

11/21/09: One additional entrant.

11/20/09: One additional entrant.

11/19/09: One new entrant.

11/18/09: One new entrant. I also changed a couple rules a bit, for clarification.

11/17/09: One more entrant.

11/16/09: One more entrant.

11/15/09: Happy birthday, Neopets! Well, I'm finally closing the fourth competition even though I didn't really get any votes. The fifth competition is now open for entrance. One new entrant.

11/10/09: One new affie.

11/9/09: One additional vote. Due to lack of votes, I'll be keeping to competition open a little longer.

11/6/09: Received one vote.

11/3/09: I changed the button for one of the entrants because they had changed image hosts.

11/2/09: I wasn't able to get on yesterday, so I accepted one new entrant and started the competition today. I also collected one set of votes.

10/31/09: Removed one entrant who was on hiatus. Four people entered. One new affie. Added a rule about hiatuses.

10/30/09: One new entrant.

10/29/09: One new affie.

10/28/09: One new entrant.

10/27/09: Three new entrants. One new affie.

10/25/09: One affie changed their name, and Genericizing is reopening. Cleared out my affies, removing several who were closed or not linking to me, and added a note under affies. Two new affies. One new entrant.

10/10/09: Listed in one new directory.

10/6/09: Listed in one new directory.

9/24/09: Semi-closed Genericizing due to suspension.

9/22/09: One new affie.

9/21/09: No longer on hiatus, and new layout. I also removed all closed affies/link backs and got five new competitors. Five new affies. Listed in one new directory.

9/7/09: Still not coming off hiatus yet, but I added an affie.

9/1/09: No, I'm not totally dead. No, I'm not coming off of hiatus, sorry. I have, however, fixed a date for me to come off of hiatus: whenever Kolibri finishes making me a new layout. Because I don't like this one. And whatever. So, er...that's all, folks.

8/23/09: Put Genericizing on hiatus for the moment. Sorry. This does mean more time to enter, though.

8/16/09: School has started, so I may not update as much. Closed voting for the third competition and started entering for the fourth one. One site entered.

8/10/09: Added votes for one person.

8/9/09: Closed entering and opened voting for the second competition. One person voted. I was also informed that the form for voting hadn't been updated since I changed the categories. D'oh. So I changed it.

8/8/09: Mailed one contestant about not having linked back. Entered one site.

8/6/09: Five sites entered. Reduced the amount of slots in each category to five. Removed the "ideas" category.

8/5/09: One site entered.

8/4/09: Eight sites entered.

8/2/09: Got a last minute tiebreaker vote and began ending the current competition. Put up results. Added dates to the results. Opened the third competition. Got listed in one directory.

8/1/09: Got listed in one new directory.

7/30/09: Added votes for one person.

7/29/09: Added votes for two people.

7/28/09: Added votes for one person.

7/27/09: Added votes for two people.

7/26/09: Started voting for the second competition. I also voted. Added votes for one other person.

7/25/09: One site entered.

7/24/09: Added a counter. Removed buttons from a site that closed because they were deleted. Six sites entered. Got listed in one directory. Added two affies.

7/21/09: Two sites--both mine--entered.

7/19/09: Closed the first competition and put up results. Compounded "guides and tutorials" into one category and added the category "Entertainment"--screenies can now enter. Began competition two. Entered one of my sites that had undergone a revamp.

7/18/09: One new affie. Created a petpage directory, Smiley Central, and added this page to it. Added votes for one person.

7/17/09: Added votes for one person.

7/15/09: Added votes for two people.

7/14/09: Added votes for six people. One button request was completed. I'm also revamping my FAQ; it has a section on Genericizing that you may want to check out if you've got questions.

7/13/09: Added votes for two people.

7/12/09: Voting in our first competition started. I removed two sites because they had failed to link back to me and one site because there was only one site in its competition. I added votes for three people.

7/11/09: I posted on Flare, a noticeboard site--check it out if you're not sure what I mean--about Genericizing. I also removed Kaliiox's link back button because people kept using it to link back to Genericizing. I added my own sites under affies. I got listed in one new directory. Two sites entered. I also Neomailed all contestants that had not linked back to me. One new affie.

7/10/09: A button request (I forgot to update after making it) was completed, and the button maker was nice enough to make two buttons with different fonts. Three new contestants. One site has been removed because the page is no longer there. Investigation shows that the account it was on is frozen. Since I don't know any sides I could contact, I will just remove the site.

7/8/09: One site entered. One new affie.

7/7/09: Requested a button. Got listed in a new directory. The addition of another button to that section causes my Secret Observer button to run away, but I'll fix that later. I added one new affie. One site entered the competition.

7/6/09: One new affie. One site entered.

7/5/09: I'm planning to mess with the categories after the current competition. The user bunny_digital has asked me to let her know if I add a category for pages about pets (I'm putting this here so that I remember). I also got one new affie and requested a new button, and it was completed. And one site entered.

7/4/09: Happy Fourth of July to everyone in the U.S...and I guess late Canada Day for any northern neighbors. One new affie. Also, I fixed my unupdated "slots open" numbers for two categories.

7/3/09: Four new affies. I was also notified that this layout does not work in Opera, specifically the anchors. I'll have to look into fixing that. Four sites entered. I also added a bit under enter because a lot of people were getting the "pet" field incorrect.

7/2/09: A second button request was completed. Two sites entered. I also got listed in two directories.

7/1/09: I added all content to this page. I also requested two buttons from a friend's site and added both of that friend's sites as affies. I decided to enter my own sites in the first competition. Besides my own sites, I added three entrants. One button request was completed.