Contest sites - opinions?

[pixelposeur]

I'm curious about what others think about the profusion of
"theme" contests on the web. I recognize alot of the names
around here on many of the sites, so I was curious as to
what other opinions were. I find that I rarely go
out and shoot a picture to fit the theme, rather I usually
find something in my collection that already fits and post
it. I don't think this really matters one way or the other,
the important thing is that it fits the theme.

Regarding the "voting" process, though, I have alot of issues.
First of all, take PhotoFriday for example - it is one of the most
popular sites, each weekly contest gets upwards of 500 entries.
How in the heck are the votes actually tabulated in a meaningful
way? Im really curious to know just how many votes the winning
(er, "Noteworthy") entries actually receive as opposed to others and
how those entries attract votes in the first place when noone can
see the images (thumbnails would be nice), all you get is a name.

It doesn't seem likely that everyone who votes is actually reviewing
all 500 entries. Personally, I ususally click on names that I recognize
or sometimes just select a few at random, but its hardly a representative
cross-section of the entries. When it comes time to vote, I just
vote for myself and leave it at that, at least I know I'm getting one vote!

Another big complaint I have is that some sites (lensday comes to mind here)
seem to get alot of entries that have absolutely nothing to do with the
theme and are just random, despite the fact that the theme is clearly posted.
I emailed the webmaster over there once to ask if they ever considered
screening images for topicality, but I got no response.

Anyway, I continue to enter, mostly I prefer lensday, photofriday, and pxite.
My motivation for entering is mostly to get exposure for my site and my
photos, but it would be more exciting if the voting systems were not
completely bogus.


My suggestion for these sites would be to have the webmaster reduce the
list so that there are maybe 10 or 15 finalists every week and let people just
vote on those, it is just ridiculous to have to choose from 500+ pictures (
even 100 is too many). The person (or people) choosing the finalists should
be consistent and the criteria should be fairly well defined and posted so
everyone knows what is expected.

Sorry, this got sort of long-winded, but I am geniunely curious to hear what others think.

[blinking8s]

I think it should be a judging panel of bigger names or pro's or something, I can't stand the voting process that's in place, and many of the photos are not good at all, which is fine to be entered because some are still learning ect, but it's not really needed for everyone to plow through

I enter every once in a while, a few of my links are actually messed up on photofriday so if you come across something that is just WAY off the theme, I promise its something that got messed up way back when and it will eventually get fixed, but the ones that actually pick up traffic I made sure to have corrected

But no, I don't like what these themed things have turned into, pxite.com is ok but I only pay attention to editors choice really, cause I'm just too dumb to figure out the voting process, and traffic seems so low, I recieved two hits on the last one I entered or something...2...lol

I also think if you're going to be running "themes" that the photo should be shot for that week, but that's just me...

[pixelposeur]

I agree about pxite, I think it has pretty low (relative) traffic. The "winning"
entries sometimes have less than 10 votes. I've had some with as many
as 6 or 7, and the winners had only a couple more.

Basically, the voting systems are completely broken. It would be easy to get
a bunch of your friends to vote for you and push you into the winning
category by just emailing the link to lots of people and having them click on
it. Im guessing they have IP and/or cookie controls so that a single
site/person cannot vote more than once, but nothing stopping you from
getting your friends to vote from different computers. Not that it's really
worth the effort, though, there is no prize other than recognition which leads
to more visitors (which could actually lead to $$ if yous site has ads and
sufficient traffic).

Someone should start a site that has a small panel of moderators that select
the finalists that are eligible for the weekly "noteworthy" status. The prize
would be visibility on the site. The moderators could just be other
photobloggers, it doesn't have to be a "big name" or anything, just people
with a critical eye who enjoy photography. Im considering something along
these lines, but I just don't have the time.

[dannisnokiller]

i don't like photofriday - its waaaayy too popular, and the chance of someone looking at my link, i'm in no way a 'real' photographer, mainly the compitition is too stiff. i'm trying out pixite this week. once my film gets developed i'll have submitted my first challenge.

[skennedy1217]

I agree with the complaints you all have mentioned regarding the contenst sites and voting processes. The last time I entered Photo Friday I received a lot of hits, but I think it was because of where I fell on the list. If you get on early or late it helps. But to be stuck somewhere in the middle...I've never had the patience to go that far down the list.

The voting can easily be made fraudulent. It is almost a popularity contest. Sometimes I agree with the winners; other times I walk away scratching my head. I like the idea of having a panel of voters, or perhaps narrowing it down to a subset for voting. Maybe some sort of voter registration, too, but one could probably just create multiple identities and still cheat?