The shining story to follow 'Descendants of the Sun' and 'Owl'...

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korea Creative Content Agency will accept entries for the "Korea Story Contest" online (Storyum) from the 17th to the 26th of next month. This is the largest government award program in Korea aimed at discovering original stories that can be commercialized across various content fields. Anyone with Korean nationality, whether an individual, team, or corporation, can participate.

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The submission categories are ▲Performance ▲Comics (Webtoon) ▲Animation ▲Video (Drama and Film combined) ▲Publishing. The Korea Creative Content Agency will focus on originality, completeness, marketability, commercialization potential, and field expansion during the evaluation. One Grand Prize winner (President's Award), four Excellence Award winners (Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Award), ten Merit Award winners (Korea Creative Content Agency President's Award), and one Special Award winner (Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Award) will be selected and awarded in November.

The total prize money amounts to 325 million KRW. If commercialized, customized promotion and marketing support will also be provided. A representative from the Korea Creative Content Agency stated, "We are promoting a project that supports the entire cycle from story discovery to commercialization and distribution," adding, "We already provide winners with prize money as well as business matching, residency at creative centers, and additional points for support projects."

A notable success story is "Doctors Without Borders," which won the Merit Award in 2011. It was reborn as the drama "Descendants of the Sun," exported to thirty-two countries, and generated over 3 trillion KRW in economic impact. The 2013 winning work "Owl Boy" was released as the movie "Owl" last year and ranked number one at the box office for three consecutive weeks. Last year's winners, including "Memory Goblin" and "Beyond Memory, I Will Go to You," have also recently been published as books.

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