Here’s a pretty brilliant idea for fiber artists with unfinished projects languishing in a corner: Compete in a Tournament of Nerdery with like-minded geeks.

Nerd Wars is an ongoing competition amongst Ravelry members which features monthly challenges “focused in the areas of intellectual, scientific, technical, philanthropy, nerd culture and geek pride.”

Teams (each team unified by their geekery. For example, a person might be on the DC Comics, Dr. Who, or SCA team) “compete” by completing knitting/crochet/whatever projects that answer a set challenge (there will be a few challenges each round to choose from).

Each project you complete earns your team points. At the end of three rounds (each round being about a month long each), the team with the most points wins.

What do they win? Bragging rights, a sweet badge for their profile or a Ravatar. And, prizes!

The tournament is hopefully going to be a way to motivate people to finish projects on a (ultimately arbitrary by real life standard, but totally helpful and fun here) deadline, and also meet other Ravelers with similar geeky interests and form friendships with folks.

You can choose to join teams with names like “Brass Octopus,” “Hellmouth,” “Hogwarts Express,” “Iron Throne,” “Macabre,” and many others (Team Hellmouth and Team Browncoats recently joined up in a “Children of Joss” event to make projects inspired by Whedon’s characters). You can also join in the “Ninja Warrior” category, in which your points don’t count against other teams; ninja warriors only challenge themselves.

If you need an excuse to start a crafty project (I, myself, have a Doctor Who Fair Isle pattern that glares at me balefully from the closet) or just want to meet like-minded crafters, this sounds like a lot of fun. (This does require a Ravelry account, but registration is free.)

(via Jan)