I don't know about anyone else but I got a big problem with the whole voting as many times as you want thing. Seems super unfair to let people vote for their own designs as many times as they want, which of course is what they are going to do. Anyone else got issues with this. It should really be one vote per person, thats about as unbiased as you can get and the most fair thing to do in my mind.

Hey Crylic,
Our #1 priority is to be fair.

Man, I'm really sorry that you're not liking the way we set this up. Fair voting is something we discussed at length here. It took a very long time to develop a solution and I promise you that we've taken similar concerns about the voting process into consideration.

We'll address the issue later tonight in a new forum post for everyone to look at.

Woah! Let's take a step back and relax for a moment folks.

We've put a lot of thought into the voting process... trust me.

The result is that we have developed a system that IS TOTALLY FAIR.

We are currently drafting an explanation of the voting process that will explain how unique IP addresses (read: unique voters) count toward your final score.

While we strive to be fair and transparent in our processes, we've been hesitant to post the exact voting methodology until now out of fear that some participants may figure out how to rig the system if we reveal too much. HOWEVER, your concerns have convinced us that we need to further clarify the voting methodology.

I apologize for not having this information readily available. Like you, we have day jobs - we will post this information as soon as possible.

Thank you for your patience,
Kreplech

I think that only registered people should be allow to vote, would this be perfect? NOP but at least it would be a bit more real and less tricky. I guess some will create new users to vote, or to ask friends to do that, I guess that its harder to control but the present system seems very unfair and I couldn't help but wonder, would the results reflect quality or popularity or and other ity?
cheers!

Hello Aartists!

First, we would like to thank everybody once again for this tremendous turnout. We've had a ton of fun so far, and we hope that you're enjoying the contest as well. Now down to business. As promised, we are presenting the voting system methodology to you.


There are three categories by which each submission will be evaluated:


1) Average rating per vote. (sum of all ratings / total voters)

We reward tenacity. By allowing you to vote for a submission once every 30 minutes, we are encouraging you to participate continuously throughout the voting period. After all, it's the Aarting community that is choosing the contest winner. A design's average in this category is determined by dividing the total number of all ratings (vote points 1-5) by the total number of voters.


2) Average rating per UNIQUE vote. (average rating per IP / unique voters)

We encourage diversity. By averaging ratings per voter we are limiting the value of voters who simply vote for themselves every thirty minutes. Remember, this is a community. We all depend on your honest
opinion of EVERYBODY's submissions. A design's average in this category is determined by dividing the total average rating per IP by the total number of unique voters.


3) Total number of votes.

We encourage honesty in voting. Our system prevents malicious voting such as scoring 1's for your opponent as often as possible. Any attempt to change another designer's averages in this way would
actually give your opponent an edge in this category. We're not saying, "Don't do it", we're just trying to keep things fair.



This system captures the best of all worlds: unique votes AND repeat votes AND popularity. The winner is determined by the highest average of the three categories. A tie is virtually impossible. Cheating is virtually impossible.

Now get out there and vote for your favorite Blankie!

Yours Truly,
Guru & Kreplech
The Aarting Admins

Good point Kate, but this I think is fair - because if you spend much time into different designs you still design good or better designs which could be voted on. And if I upload 10 not so good designs and spent 10 hrs for it and you throw in one killer design you spent much time into then you still be able to hit the taste of the world and win this.

so lets see what happens...I either don't have the time to vote every 30 minutes nor does any of my friends - so for sure my designs (I didn't think I'm going to win this anyway) won't recieve a higher score.
Maybe my english isn't good enough to understand your explanaition about why your system should be totally fair - I really don't get it.

I thought the nicest design would win which is something like McCoy or Menilla who did an incredible job - and I don't see them winning with this votingsystem unless they take care on their voting and have a bunch of friends with lots of time...

Just think about the collectors/buyers of blankie - Let's say you get 50 people vote on your design but when it wins - maybe 2 out of those 50 are going to buy it afterwards - but the design is not that good so everybody else would not buy it...so is it a fair winner then?

Don't get me wrong but I don't think all designs are on the same level (for example my 2face gangsta comparing to such an incredible job of MENILLA) - so with this system I feel like competing on a lottery - which would've been okay if I would've known before I started to throw my time into this.

Well, anyway - we'll see what happens...and I learned my lesson ;O)

Good luck to all of you but I hope Menilla or McCoy wins - those are the ones I would buy.

regards
VISEone

http://www.aarting.com/forum/yaf_postst155_How-will-the-voting-work.aspx


and besides that, lets look at this realistically. the half an hour window is a smart idea. how many people are really gonna sit at their computer and be like, "oh, 30 minutes is up! *click!*" i have many friends and family who are supporting me, but i don't think any of them are going to be jamming the votes for me. i actually encouraged them to vote for other people as well. i mean, with the "vote for any or none or all" method, i'm really hoping that all of my friends and all of your friends and all the dogs and cats in the world are not only voting for you, but also see some other cool idea and vote for them too.

you guys forget, we can all vote for multiple entries.



and besides the fact that this is a brand new site, put out by what i assume are people who have never done this before. this is a learning experience for everyone. to have the chance to put my ideas out here on a public forum that all can see is way cooler than winning, and hopefully, if these people do another contest (and i hope they do) then maybe they'll change it around, now that they know what has worked and what hasn't.


i mean, honestly. make a mountain out of a molehill. damn..... give these guys a break.

I am glad to see everyone discussing this, I am not completely comfortable with the voting method. It does seem to favor those with a lot of time and many friends, but I haven't heard anyone come up with a better solution. I like the idea of limiting everyone to one vote. This could backfire and may discourage people not involved in the competition from voting if you would require them to register. There are a lot of great designs any one of which could be a very nice toy, heck there are enough to do a really interesting series.
I liked the point Viseone brought up about people voting for a design and then never buying one. What if the voting was done as a pre-order? Each person registers and basically makes a pre-order for the design. The winner would be the figure with the most pre-orders. I quess most of these ideas and suggestions would be for Blankie2, I wouldn't expect Guru or aarting to change methods this late in the game, but maybe for the next figure.

I posted about 6 different designs and some of them are crap so I don't expect any high votes on those - but like you said it's always a good offer to throw in more than one design which gives the community a bigger range of designs to choose from.
It is not neccessary to be a pro in illustrator - I think you can point out a good design/idea even with a semiprofessional skribble. If everybody likes this one then you can work on that later or let someone transfer your skribble in a clean illustrator drawing.
So nobody should hesitate to send in his ideas even if he/she is not as good as other designers. It's the idea that counts...

So for this voting system here - I really didn't want to attack anyone but it was defenitely not totally clear upfront.
So I hope you guys at aarting will work on that voting system and bring it with the next BLANKIE...
I like the pre-order system by incorrectlyguessing - worth to think about.
And I totally agree that there are enough designs to think about a series like the DUNNY series. So who knows...maybe more designs will make it on blankie in the future as we know by now...

regards
VISEone

That's an interesting idea. You like this concept?

I have been to the Patchtogether site and I like their preorder system. By the way I like the dragon Viseone - One other way to encourage the preorder system would be that if the design you preorder did not win, you could switch your preorder to the winning design and get a small discount. A switch-count coupon. Members and competition entries would get one vote (nonpre-order) and then if they wish to vote further they would have to pre-order like everyone else.