Before Stella could answer, Effie turned her computer so Stella could see it.
Dear Yellow Sparks Content Team,
It’s that time of year again! SPRINT WEEK!
For anyone who’s new to the team, Sprint Week is a one-week competition where every content writer and quiz writer creates twenty posts as quickly as they can. These posts can be our typical list posts or quizzes, regardless of your title, so this is a great opportunity for quiz writers to try out their craziest list ideas and for the content writers to have fun with quizzes. No matter what you post, once you make your twenty posts, you’re done for the week.
That means if you do all your posts on Monday, you’ve just earned yourself a six-day weekend!
Now, while we of course want you to be quick, this is a competition! And this year there’s a twist. To be qualified into the competition, you have to use our new AI tool, Sparky, for all of your posts. Not only will this help you finish your posts quicker, but we’ve also got a bigger prize for you all.
This year the person who gets the most traffic during Sprint Week will receive $10,000. That’s right, $10,000!Second place will receive $5,000, and third place will receive $1,000. And again, to qualify for entry into the competition, you must use Sparky for ALL of your posts during the week.
My hope is not only that Sparky will help you all get through your posts quickly so we can have a nice long weekend, but also that this will lead us all to better understanding Sparky and guide us in using it going forward.
If you have any questions/concerns about Sprint Week, please don’t hesitate to reach out to your editors. And if you have any questions about Sparky, I’ve CC’d our AIX rep, Rashid, on this email, and there will still be office hours on Monday.
I’m very excited to see what you and Sparky come up with next week. This is the time to get creative, get wacky, and ultimately have fun. Good luck!
Best,
Miles
It took a moment for everything Stella just read to fully sink in.
When she finally digested all of the info, all she could say was, “Ten thousand dollars?!”
“Yup,” Effie and Katy said in unison.
Stella looked at both of them in disbelief.
“For Sprint Week?” Stella asked.
“Yup,” they said again.
During the last Sprint Week, the prize was a five-hundred-dollar Visa gift card and ownership of a little red sparkly cowboy hat that was known as the “viral cowboy hat.” Stella could see it right now, sitting on the desk of Aja Coates, the reigning champ of Sprint Week.
“He must really want us to use this Sparky thing,” Effie said, shaking her head. “How is it that he can afford to do a total of sixteen thousand dollars in cash prizes for this but we couldn’t get any swag for Christmas? Or better yet, why isn’t he paying us more?”
“And that’s the ten-thousand-dollar question, isn’t it,” Katy said, shaking her head.
“This is insane,” Stella said. “And if we don’t use Sparky, what? We still have to participate, but we don’t get a chance to win the money? Even if we bring in the most traffic?”
“That’s what it seems like,” Effie said. “Although I guess we could ask Melanie to confirm.”
“Ugh, she was just trying to get me to use Sparky for one of my posts earlier,” Stella said. “I know where her loyalties lie.”
“Well, unfortunately, he got me,” Katy said. “I want that ten thousand dollars, so I’ll give the little robot a try.”
“Katy, no,” Effie said. “Once we start using it, it’ll get stronger.”
“Perhaps,” Katy said. “But look around. Do you really think no one’s going to do it? I’m sure there’s at least a couple people who have been using Sparky already, even if they won’tadmit it. Everyone here’s going to want that money, and if we don’t use Sparky, that improves the chances for those who do. Even if we all don’t do it, if one person does, they automatically win.”
“Wow, this may be the most competitive Sprint Week we’ve ever had,” Stella said, looking around the room.
She could already see people eyeing each other, whispering, and typing away furiously. It was like whatever solidarity they had in agreeing not to use the AI tech had shattered as soon as Miles’ email hit their inbox.
“I have to hand it to Miles,” Effie said, blowing out a breath. “This may be the smartest thing he’s done since launching Yellow Sparks. It almost makes you wonder if it was his idea.”
