Separate Section for Set Contests

[Demeter]

Ok as weird as it is, I'm not particularly for the post count to be put down in the contests section. Why? Because I think that if this section was working as it should be working, meaning holding contests and not chatting, there would be no need. Let's imagine we disable the post count and allow spam. And then what? As I said, in some "contests", I had the feeling I was in Community Cafe, well I'm sorry but there're two sections for a reason. If people want to have "a contest" while chatting, then they can do so in Community Cafe or in the game section. I'm sorry, but you want to chat, you want to talk with your friends? This forum has pms, vms, groups, Community Cafe, blogs, and now it must also be the Contests section? I don't get it

[Artemis Moonsong]

Ok as weird as it is, I'm not particularly for the post count to be put down in the contests section. Why? Because I think that if this section was working as it should be working, meaning holding contests and not chatting, there would be no need. Let's imagine we disable the post count and allow spam. And then what? As I said, in some "contests", I had the feeling I was in Community Cafe, well I'm sorry but there're two sections for a reason. If people want to have "a contest" while chatting, then they can do so in Community Cafe or in the game section. I'm sorry, but you want to chat, you want to talk with your friends? This forum has pms, vms, groups, Community Cafe, blogs, and now it must also be the Contests section? I don't get it

Well, it's just more fun if you chat during a contest! Contests are boring if it's just a straight litany of people guessing XD

I suppose that's just a matter of opinion

Plus as long as it's okay with the contest holder, why not chat and keep things fun and interesting?

Why am I camping out in this discussion

[kireipan]

Ah, Deme, this is where I disagree ^^; I think contests should have some chat in them to liven them up. I'm not talking about spam - completely unrelated chat that has nothing to do with the contest - I'm talking about chat where the subject is the contest itself. Like joking over funny answers, commiserating over wrong answers, moaning over the lag monster, stuff like that ^_^ My favourite contests are the ones where everyone gets excited about the contest, they enjoy playing it with everyone in the thread, and generally have loads of fun. This is a forum to meet people and chat about similar interests, right? Well, for a lot of us, one of our major interests in aarin are contests Where better to chat about contests than in the contest section?

Most of the people I've met have been through the contest section and that has only happened because luckily the contest section has always been a sociable place. Taking the chat out would be taking a lot of the fun out of it >__<

I don't want to see the contest section turn into a no-nonsense dry place where you go just to earn points and test your trivia a little ;___; I don't want to encourage unrelated spamming, I hate that as much as anyone, but I do want to keep the 'contest chat' in.

[commonlogic]

Well, it's just more fun if you chat during a contest! Contests are boring if it's just a straight litany of people guessing XD

I suppose that's just a matter of opinion

Plus as long as it's okay with the contest holder, why not chat and keep things fun and interesting?

Why am I camping out in this discussion

Because you love the contest section lots and lots, Artie ;D <3

I'm sort've on both sides of the fence in general when it comes to contest spam. There are some contests that are, in and of themselves, spam. Like, for example, the treasure-hunting games that Sierrasdemon was running last year. The person who was in charge of leading your team at any given moment was posting very, very often in order to move your team around on a board. You could consider that spam. Yes, it's related to the contest, but it also inflates a user's postcount in a way that one could call unnecessary.

I don't mind some friendly posts here and there between contest participants at all, but I will admit that it can be hard to join in on a contest when you have to read through 20 pages of small talk to find out what's going on. There has to be a healthy medium somewhere.

That said, I also don't want to get into trouble for making two fun, but totally unnecessary posts in a friend's set contest. I think a clear line just has to be drawn somewhere and because it's difficult to define what spam is in the contest thread, it might be a good idea to just take all the guesswork out of it and leave it post-countless.

Edit: Just on the removing post count affecting spam levels, etc... I think this more has to do with a reaction to clamping down on spam in general than removing post counts. As I said earlier, I think the majority of people who post in the contest thread don't much care about how it affects their post counts. What it likely is, is a reaction to what most probably view as a punishment. "Well, they've removed something that might be a benefit to us so I guess we should stop spamming." Does that make any sense? I think people are probably just afraid of getting into trouble more than anything else.

@Demeter -- I, like you, am really disappointed that the contest thread isn't as much fun as it used to be. The contest thread is where I initially met a lot of my aarin friends and I had a lot of fun there last year when I first stopped lurking and started posting. I would love it if it could go back to the way it was before, but obviously the "culture" of the forum has changed. I guess that's why I'm so eager to see some changes made to it -- I'm hoping that maybe the changes will re-invigorate it to some extent.

[tina21]

ok I agree with Kire about that kind of Spamming, it makes a contest more fun.

Also I can understand that having 2 sections with 2 pages doesn't make sense, even when the Set contests are lengthy, like a month or 2, but the fact that there could be more Trivia and such contests if the Sets one weren't there is even considered?

All and all can it be at least considered the Set Contests to move in a section in the One Stop Shop or sth?

As for the SPAM -that isn't the reason of THIS thread, I myself spam little, but I like to do some in the Contests

[argona]

I think having a different section for all the set contests is a great idea because usually most of the contests are about sets and that's a little annoying for someone who doesn't create sets and perhaps by moving it somewhere else people would be more encouraged to fill that section with real contests.

And about the post counts, I do believe that people spam too much during certain contests. I don't like have it removed but something must be done!
I mean there are people who don't have tens of friends or family-like friends around and it's annoying when they try to participate in a contest and they have to go through tens of spam posts talking about something completely unrelated!

For example, I find a short break between my classes and decid to check the contest section but when seeing hundred of posts, I may think it's too late to participate or by the time I have found the right page, I have to go back to class.

So some control is needed as sad as it is to see people who are not at fault suffer!

[Fey801]

On a related note ( spamming), I was just wondering....Could it be that some of the spamming got worse when awards started to be distributed for post count? If the worse of the spamming ceased when the post count was removed from the contest section...then it might be because there were indeed members who were trying to boost their post count in that section.

I will add that I do agree totally with the member who posted that spamming has a lot of grey areas and it's not just black and white. I also wouldn't consider spamming a reply to an answer that was judged strange or downright funny. As long as it's RELATED to the contest.

[makiyuki]

On a related note ( spamming), I was just wondering....Could it be that some of the spamming got worse when awards started to be distributed for post count? If the worse of the spamming ceased when the post count was removed from the contest section...then it might be because there were indeed members who were trying to boost their post count in that section.

I will add that I do agree totally with the member who posted that spamming has a lot of grey areas and it's not just black and white. I also wouldn't consider spamming a reply to an answer that was judged strange or downright funny. As long as it's RELATED to the contest.

The awards banner for post count is most likely a factor. It is a sad thing that a small amount of fun contest related spam and the excessive spam that actually hampers contest participation have to be judged in the same light.

It does seem the spamming issue needs to be addressed; however this thread is meant to focus on the topic of a separate graphics sub-section. Perhaps the spam and post count should be addressed separately in another thread.

[tina21]

@Makiyuki thank you ... how did this go over SPAM i have no clue...!! who first mention it?

[fataltea]

Okay, first, I want to say that I completely support the idea of separate sections for graphics contests and other contests. I know there aren't that many pages of contests, and it's really not that big of a deal to go through them, but if it allowed the possibility of running a long-term graphics contest but still being allowed to run short contests, that would be worth it. I'd really like to hold graphic contests but then I'm all in internal conflict cause 'what if I want to have a short contest too?! OMG I AM IN DEPAIR!' You know?

As far as spamming in the contests section goes.. honestly, the whole issue has kind of turned me off from the contest section. I liked hosting fast moving contests where just a little chatting was allowed (related chatting), because I liked the interaction involved and met quite a few of my AF buddies that way. I didn't consider that to be spam, as long as it didn't get out of hand (and I kept it moving fast enough to avoid much spam anyway). But now, with all of the related drama, I'm honestly AFRAID to hold a contest like that again because I don't know if it'll be considered spam or not. Am I the only one? I'm not afraid of losing post count (I have my own threads deleted on a fairly regular basis haha), but I am afraid of causing trouble. Does that make any sense? I don't think I'm the only person that's feeling unclear on the subject.

Removing the post count doesn't matter to me. I'd probably lose most of my post count that way, but whatever. x3 I just want to feel comfortable holding speed contests again. T-T