so let me get this straight...

a rating of the public will not affect the vote count, but shall be used in case of a tie?

Thats the one G, so basically us members can get a feel of what joe public thinks, and only in the case of a tie, will it actually mean anything in relation to the contest. As you say, the tie-breaker.

I think the data Greg provided is very interesting, I can see the desire to restucture the site for a more open, public-friendly experience.

As mentioned in the latest grounding note the core simplicity of PSC is what attracted me and many others to PSC in the first place.

I would recommend staying close to the orinal pinnings of PSC and roll out a 2nd concurrent contest. You could view this as a beginner or peliminary contest that anyone could enter...new and charter members alike. Although it would be structured like the familiar legacy contests, new users or casual vistors could particiapte immediatly and cast votes.

A separate yet comprehensive stat page could be created just as the current structure provides. In time...say after 10 inital entries, users could graduate to the current contest system.

The new parellel contest would not offer prizes, just a bragging rights and a path to a formal membership at PSC.

i'm happy with how things are at the moment, but i don't think Alternate Public Voting System 2 would detract from the site, and would give non-members more interest. you can attract more visitors without selling out

i'd be dead against letting non-members vote like members can, even at a reduced weight

i like to see votes cast by people who know what they're talking about. because of this, if i was able to to choose a way to change the voting, i'd make it so that people with higher vpp's had more weighty votes

but back to the point - alternate public voting system 2 would be my pick

Reading this thread brings on headaches..

Boiled it down.. Thank God for Billtv... Great insight
Splodge.. If it ain't broke don't fix it and
Scion... He said something really intelligent If I didn't have such a headache I would say it again.

Please for the sake of us sensitive artists that have a hard time with change..


STOP already!!!!!!!

I stand behind "if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it".

The site has to be more user friendly so that it keeps bringing in more and more people?

I say leave the site as it is; some new members adhere, some lose interest and go, but if the number of active members sort of stays the same, I think it’s perfect that way.

Will it make the site and community more interesting to have more members, to allow any JoeBlow to vote and to have countless numbers of entries in contests?

I understand your desire to grow, but there is such a thing as sustainability. If this site keeps growing, I think it will loose a lot of its interest. Who will have time to look over and vote on 150 daily entries? One thing I like is having the time to look over every entry, even the ones from the newest members. It is something I haven’t had much the chance to do much lately due to lack of time and having more entries to look at won’t help.

The current version of this site is clear enough about how the voting works and fair enough about having to post 10 times before being allowed to vote. I never felt like it was a problem not to be able to vote when I was a newbie. People who can’t vote can always leave comments.

Instead of messing it all up with this site, I have an idea for expansion: flashcontest.com.

STOP THE MADNESS!....good summation, Kansas! This site is so attractive because we invest time/advice in one another. I say you like PSC, plunk down 10 chops before you get to type, "I like the pretty colors."

this is coming up over and over...

again, we are not planning on allowing non-registered users to vote and enter contests.

Please read the first post of this thread, particularly "alternative voting #2" That is the direction I am heading in.

It will not affect or change the existing voting system, but rather be an additional feature available to those who do not wish to register, but want to interact. It will also serve as a better tie breaker, etc, etc.



if I have been following that we would not even have this forum to talk about this in...

Progression requires constant thinking, debating and shaping. Some super ideas have come out of this so far and they have been noted, as well as all of your feelings on the subjects.

amen to that

What 202 said was interesting.
I feel that and the rating system still seem to mimic other sites, whereas jmh has always managed an incredible level of unique innovation.
Ok, one more idea?
Public voting,for interested parties, no chops entered necessary..
a seperate vote..
I sure wouldn't mind say winning a contest w/ sixty votes AND
having the bonus of having won also as the "public favorite".
It could be the exact same vote box we have now, just repeated below existing area, followed by the usual comments.
What would be cool is when ya loose, and ya feel gypped and then ya find ya got the most public votes.
It'd just be one more stat that fits right in.

We could call it 'the popular vote".
new people looking at chops for the first time can jump right in..vote..vote comment..get all excited.

Some things that ran through my head reading this thread.

• Could you make a seperation between "Contests" and "Daily Submissions". If the user is not a member, keep the "contest" talk more as a "perk" to becoming a member. Call them "Daily submissions" or something less "competitive" sounding.
  
• Could you allow submission of a "Daily Submission" to any visitor or member (not logged in) alike. A daily submission would not be included in a daily "contest"
  
• Could you allow browsing the daily submission by rating, day, eternity, random or by "registered member" AND by member votes. Subcategories of member votes could include all of the current voting categories we have such as humor, originality, etc. For example, when viewing an image, below it would be the current rating by visitors and current votes by members.
  
• Allowing the public to comment seems like you're just asking for spammers to spam. This could possibly result in tons more spam posts promoting porn sites, viagra, etc. Only Reinman would benifit from these
  
• Is there some way to stress the "Contests", prizes and daily, as a perk of being a member. "Enter a contest to win prizes such as...", "Track your votes and those of others along with many other ratings besides 1-10", "Be graded by your peers and regular members of the site", "Receive comments, support, and votes from other registered members", etc.
  
• As said before, define the site better up front. Define the "Daily Submissions", what's allowed, what isnt, explain the 1-10 rating, etc. Define Advantage, voting, # of entries before voting, etc prior to someone becoming a member. Somewhere clear and concise. This could be done with links to some sticky forum threads. This also gets them in the forum looking around. I don't know how or where, but I do agree with Userguru that these things are lost around all of the pictures.
  
• Include all member contest entries as a "Daily Submission" and allow it to be rated by any visitor. This DOES mean that a member could enter a "contest" entry while logged in and a "Daily submission" while logged out... but so what! The one entered while logged in would be recorded in their portfolio with the "visitor" rating it receives...also adding to the "Average Visitor Rating" stat that could be kept for each member.
  
• We could add "Visitor Rating" to a registered members profile and allow the public and registered members to search by this "rating"
  

one other thought...maybe someone already mentioned this...
Moderating? YIKES!! imagine the work when ANYONE can enter an image. You could have a couple hundred entries on any given day which could (and probably will) include all sorts of ads, porn, etc. How strict will you hold to the "manipulate the starting image" idea with the public being able to just enter any old photo or image they find on the web? I hope some thought is given to this before something is launched.

Anyway, I see the desire and understand how you would want to promote it in new and broad ways. I'm really partial to the way it is now and don't think its that hard to figure out really...but go for it. Should be interesting...

*cough gasp cough*
you mean this would NOT just be another ego trip for us egotistical freaks you keep complaining about??

and I can't help but wonder, if site info such as how the contests work, how voting works and just what advantage is was in a more visible location and easily spotted, would there even be an issue?

Could you just define the top 5 things a prospective member would want to know and put them somewhere "up front", would that solve some of the issues?

See that? Ya got a laughy!
When Mr.Technical perfection chop whips Mr.CrazyIdeas chop, but Mr.CarzyIdeas wins the popular vote, then Mr.CrazyIdea feels vindicated AND as an added bonus encouraged..all at the expense of making shy, hesitant people feel slapped on the back and welcomed in.

Hi Again,

Ok... some of this discussion has gone way off topic. The problem isn't so much that you have to register and ubmit 10 photos to vote, the problem is that the average user doesn't know that. Actually, the average user doesn't exist, we are all so different.

You guys should take credit that you are all intelligent web users... you know how to register and vote... the point is that dumb users won't figure it out.

TofuTheGreat (going by memory) has got the point. My report didn't say that the voting system needs to be changes, I think it is great how it is... what needs to be changed is the navigation options and the way things are worded. The FAQ mentions nothing about submitting 10 images, our 3 testers (professional web users and developers) didn't see that info. Where is it? What does Advantage do when clicked? TofuTheGreat's suggestion was spot on... change the link to Why Register? or something, so it makes sense to any dumb idiot that surfs along.

Our testing group loved this site, and we would hate to see things butchered to please the masses... all that is needed is a little thought.

For anyone interested in finding out about developing for real ease of use, I highly recommend a book called: Don't Make Me Think, by Steve Krug. It is very readable, short, funny, and right to the point. Reading that book resulted in my spending hours changing things on some of my own sites. The results were a massive increase in traffic and membership.

Don't get sidetracked trying to redesing the whole site, or create complex new functionality... just think about what you already have, and make it easier to use.

Oh, and by the way... it is broke... just not as severely as certain other sites.

Greg