Howdy, patriots, photojournalists, and paparazzi! What's this? A stateball contest?!?! That's right, everyone, spread the news!

Speaking of the news - for this contest, we're asking you to make a comic about current events!

In other words, get inspired by something hot off the press - the total opposite of our last contest, Hot Hot History!

Specific contest rules

• Go to a regional (state/province or city) subreddit for a region of a North American country (preferably US/CA/MX) and choose a post from no earlier than June 1st, 2022 (AKA June 1st or more recent). (We'll allow for wiggle room on timestamps if it was from exactly June 1st, 2022.)
• Make a comic inspired by the post you chose!
• Link the post you made a comic about in a comment on your r/stateball comic. Otherwise your entry will be disqualified.
• You are strongly encouraged - but not required - to crosspost your comic to the subreddit from which you chose your inspiration. If you choose to do so, ensure you are following all rules from the subreddit you xpost to.

Please note:

• You are encouraged - but not required - to choose a post about local/regional rather than national topics.
• The post you are inspired by doesn't necessarily have to be "news" so long as it was posted recently, as stated in the rules above.
• Do NOT use this contest to spread misinformation, rumors, or hate speech.

General Contest Rules

• You must follow the official Stateball Tutorial.
• You must follow the official Constitution of Stateball.
• The comic must have a minimum of 3 panels and a maximum of 8 panels.
• The comic must have been written and drawn entirely by yourself.
• No animated GIFs accepted.
• No photorealism.
• Post your comic to the subreddit with the blue "Contest Entry" flair.
• You may post more than one entry, but only the highest performing of your comics will be able to qualify for a gun award. For example, if you post two contest entries and they get 1st and 3rd, you do not get two sets of different guns; you would only get the Golden Guns award.
• The deadline for submitting your entry is July 25th at 20:00 GMT

Choosing the winner

After all of the entries have been submitted and the deadline has passed, the moderators will take a private vote to decide the first, second and third places. All entries will be ranked from 1 to 10, with the final score being the average of all votes. The winner of last month's contest will also be allowed to vote on this month's entries.

Once all of our votes are tallied, the full list of results will be posted in an Awards Ceremony thread. The artist who receives the highest score will be awarded the Golden Guns, which they will keep next to their username for one month until the end of the next contest. The Golden Gun recipient will also be able to vote with the mods on the entries for the next contest.

The artists with the second and third highest scores will receive the Silver and Bronze Gun Awards, respectively, which will act in a similar manner.

And now for the announcement!

Everyone welcome u/magicalgirldittochan to the r/stateball mod team!

As you've noticed, our current mod team has been stretched pretty thin, and we haven't always been on top of everything, so hopefully things will get better with this new addition! Also, we promise we won't force future contest winners into becoming mods. Just because it happened in the last two contests doesn't mean anything. Honest. We swear.

Good luck, everyone! Here's to breaking the news of your contest victory at the end!