How to improve the photo contest

Not different levels of competition, but having too attain a certain level of general membership on the site as a whole, before being permitted to participate. Similar to how you can't post an ad for sale until you have become a full fledged member. This also encourages newbies to become involved in other aspects of the site.
That's an option. New members can't vote in contests, but we do currently allow them to enter the contests. I think that too has the potential to encourage new members to become more involved. I guess the big question here is which approach would do more to motivate new members to participate: allow new members to enter photo contests or require them to wait until they have normal site permissions?
 
That's an option. New members can't vote in contests, but we do currently allow them to enter the contests. I think that too has the potential to encourage new members to become more involved. I guess the big question here is which approach would do more to motivate new members to participate: allow new members to enter photo contests or require them to wait until they have normal site permissions?
In my opinion, make them wait. If they want to participate they will be a little more serious about it, and will be willing to wait.
 
I analyzed how my work progressed during the most recent reduction phase and I do believe that some additional help would be very beneficial.

The reduction phase includes multiple rounds of grading and comparing. In each round I grade the remaining photos on various elements and then use those results to reduce the overall count. This repeats until the entry count is ~16. I can usually get everything organized and progress through the first round in less than an hour. After that initial round things really begin to slow down as the difference in quality of the photos becomes more subjective. It is in these later rounds especially that I could use a trusted second opinion to speed things up. I'm going to focus on that for now as a means to improve the reduction phase and see how that works out. I'm also going to implement some of the other suggestions made in this thread and hope we can continue the discussion.
 
In my opinion, make them wait. If they want to participate they will be a little more serious about it, and will be willing to wait.
I'm not really sure which option is best. Anyone else?

If the goal is to attract participation from new members what option is best?
  1. Allow new members to enter photo contests. The thinking here is that entering a contest helps new members become involved at a faster rate.
  2. Only allow regular members to enter photo contests. This could potentially provide incentive for new members to participate so that they can then join the contests.
 
I'm not really sure which option is best. Anyone else?

If the goal is to attract participation from new members what option is best?
  1. Allow new members to enter photo contests. The thinking here is that entering a contest helps new members become involved at a faster rate.
  2. Only allow regular members to enter photo contests. This could potentially provide incentive for new members to participate so that they can then join the contests.

I don't personally have an issue with new members participating, it is just frustrating when they obviously have not read the rules and just post a bunch of pictures in a row of their new chameleon. I think that a pop up alert for new members might be a good idea, but at least the alert for multiple pictures asking if they would like to replace their current one with the new entry would at least give them the idea that they should choose the best picture. At least they would have an idea that the quality of the picture matters. As for incentive to participate to become a regular member... it doesn't seem to work that way with the classified section. (Also obvious that people just don't like to read the rules :rolleyes:)

:coffee:
 
Here is the first draft of a notice that will come up when members try to upload photos to the contest category. Unfortunately, because the category is currently closed to new uploads members can't test it until August. Let me know if you have any suggestions on how to improve the text or overall message.


notice1b.png


Adding the user's name to the message might help: "Brad, try for professional looking calendar quality photos".
 
If the goal is to attract participation from new members what option is best?
I thought the goal was to cut down on the time involved with sifting through all the crappy pictures to find the ones worth voting on. Allow newcomers to vote, so they can feel like they are involved, and then once they attain a higher level of membership, hopefully by then, they will have read the rules,let them enter. It's not to disclude (sp? Is this even a word? But you know what I mean! o_O) anyone, but to give them time to understand the idea of the photo contest.
 
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Here is the first draft of a notice that will come up when members try to upload photos to the contest category. Unfortunately, because the category is currently closed to new uploads members can't test it until August. Let me know if you have any suggestions on how to improve the text or overall message.


View attachment 186338

Adding the user's name to the message might help: "Brad, try for professional looking calendar quality photos".
I like the idea, just not the wording. "Professional quality" will open up a great big can of worms for some people.
How about:
"Brad, thanks for uploading your photo! Here are a few things to check off the list to increase your chances of winning a spot in the Chameleon Forums Calendar!
Are there things in the background of the photo? (Cords, tv screens, etc.)
Does your cham appear to be happy/healthy?
Does the photo look "naturalistic"? (i.e. is it an out door setting? Or are you standing in your living room or bathroom?

You can tailor that list any way you like, but I think it's a slightly more delicate way of getting the point across without offending people. But let's face it. You will never please ALL people ALL of the time!
 
I thought the goal was to cut down on the time involved with sifting through all the crappy pictures to find the ones worth voting on.
I would actually like to see a slow increase in total entries. Also, removing low quality images during the reduction phase is usually easier than removing images of higher quality. I do of course want to improve the quality of entries and the contest in general, but my real goal here is to improve the efficiency of the reduction phase. It may seem that the best way to do that is to reduce the number of entries, but that is not really the case. Once we get an entry count over 30 or so, the total number becomes a less significant factor. Dealing with 100 photos compared to 50 during the reduction phase might increase the time needed for me to reduce them by 20%-30%. The most time consuming part for me comes towards the end of the process where I have, for example, 15 good photos left to reduce but only 5 available voting slots. I want to be fair to everyone, but most of the remaining decisions at that point are subjective and that creates a lot of indecision. I'm the type of person that can waste a lot of time being indecisive if I'm not careful. One solution we're going to try is to bring in someone else to help me with the process, especially those final decisions that often take too much time.

Allow newcomers to vote, so they can feel like they are involved, and then once they attain a higher level of membership, hopefully by then, they will have read the rules,let them enter. It's not to disclude (sp? Is this even a word? But you know what I mean! o_O) anyone, but to give them time to understand the idea of the photo contest.
The main reason we block new members from voting is to curb cheating. People will create new accounts to vote for their photos and we thought that by blocking those votes we could add integrity to the contest.
 
The most time consuming part for me comes towards the end of the process where I have, for example, 15 good photos left to reduce but only 5 available voting slots. I want to be fair to everyone, but most of the remaining decisions at that point are subjective and that creates a lot of indecision. I'm the type of person that can waste a lot of time being indecisive if I'm not careful.
Perhaps this would be an appropriate place for a tournament-style voting process? Or perhaps not. I dunno.

The main reason we block new members from voting is to curb cheating. People will create new accounts to vote for their photos and we thought that by blocking those votes we could add integrity to the contest.
Unfortunately, dishonesty is a reality. And it shouldn't be, but it is. Maybe make the new members sit out for the first month before allowing them to vote. Then established members (and up) are the ones permitted to enter photos. This is possibly a good place for "hiding" the entries until it's time to vote?
 
If members are required to vote on a contest before they can enter a contest they will have seen examples of the quality that they will be up against. Sorry that doesn't help with the reduction phase.
 
"This is a photography contest. Not a popularity contest or a place to just show us your cham."

Just my suggestion on the wording. Maybe I'm a pessimist, or really blunt, but I think this gets the point across better. People don't read. And when they do read, they usually don't listen.
 
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