Voting … at a minimum - DPChallenge Forums

09/23/2008 10:42:58 AM · #1

I've been submitting to challenges for a while now â�¦ but I was just reminded that non-paying members cannot vote on Member challenges. This seems weird to me. People can view all the images and make comments - but not vote.

So I guess I'm wondering what is the philosophy behind this? That people will pay to allow them to vote more? It seems that there is much more voting going on with "open" challenges.

What spurred this thought is that the Long Exposure challenge doesn't seem to be getting too many votes.

citymars

Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED

09/23/2008 10:57:51 AM · #2

Originally posted by metatate:

So I guess I'm wondering what is the philosophy behind this? That people will pay to allow them to vote more?

Believe it or not, that's the first reason I was prompted to purchase a membership -- I wanted to vote on member challenges.

As for a dip in number of voters, I've got no idea as to why.

pawdrix

Nikon AF Nikkor 85mm f/1.4D IF

09/23/2008 11:17:30 AM · #3

Originally posted by citymars:

Believe it or not, that's the first reason I was prompted to purchase a membership -- I wanted to vote on member challenges.

???

citymars

Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED

09/23/2008 11:27:06 AM · #4

Originally posted by pawdrix:

???

Uh -- you gotta problem wid dat, pal? ;-)

Melethia

Canon EOS-80D

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

09/23/2008 11:31:34 AM · #5

Believe it or not, that's why I first bought a membership, too - to vote in member challenges. I so enjoyed seeing them that I figured I may as well vote in them while I was at it. I wasn't at all confident enough to buy a membership to enter member challenges!

09/23/2008 11:37:19 AM · #6

Oh MAN, you cats are NOT going to be lobbyists for my "Let's let everyone Vote!" committee ;)

Originally posted by Melethia:

citymars

Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED

09/23/2008 11:38:11 AM · #7

Originally posted by Melethia:

I wasn't at all confident enough to buy a membership to enter member challenges!

My feelings exactly!

Originally posted by metatate:

Oh MAN, you cats are NOT going to be lobbyists for my "Let's let everyone Vote!" committee ;)

:-D

Message edited by author 2008-09-23 11:39:09.

Strikeslip

Canon EOS-5D

Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS

09/23/2008 11:44:08 AM · #8

I usually want more people to vote if I'm scoring low, and fewer people to vote if I'm scoring high. ;-)

Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM

09/23/2008 11:46:38 AM · #9

Or the opposite if you want to improve your average vote received.

Originally posted by Strikeslip:

I usually want more people to vote if I'm scoring low, and fewer people to vote if I'm scoring high. ;-)

ace flyman

Canon EOS-5D Mark II

09/23/2008 12:00:27 PM · #10

Why not? The Free Study is a perfect example of low voter turn out. We get around 30% turn out. A lot of members don't like to vote on challenges they are entered in. I think it's worth looking into..imo

edit; sorry metatate, misread your response.....lol

Message edited by author 2008-09-23 12:05:09.

Nikon NIKKOR Z 24-120 f/4 S

09/23/2008 01:06:27 PM · #11

this image:

137 votes

This

327 votes

Message edited by author 2008-09-23 13:06:41.

bassbone

Nikon Z8

09/23/2008 01:12:48 PM · #12

Originally posted by metatate:

this image:

137 votes

This

327 votes

A second component of this is the number of entries - Immovable only had less than 55 entries. If you notice, the Shallow DOF Blue had about 190 votes. Yes, Open challenges have more voters, but it is not over 2 to 1 on a typical challenge.

Melethia

Canon EOS-80D

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

09/23/2008 01:19:34 PM · #13

Those two shots together make a rather interesting pair.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled discussion on who can vote...

violinist123

Canon EOS-6D

Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM

09/23/2008 01:58:10 PM · #14

Originally posted by metatate:

I like it. I find the whole caste system approach to a community to have a lot of benefits.

Notice the much larger number of entries in open challenges which non-members can enter. The quality of submissions does not increase in these challenges, rather the number of entries which should have been sent straight to the recycle bin goes through the roof. I think this is a good indicator of the kind of riff-raff being kept out by the members-only challenges and their voting restrictions.

All in all, the elitist system perpetuated by those who run the site works for me. If anything they should think of additional ways to leverage the concept.

Message edited by author 2008-09-23 13:58:26.

Tamron AF 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 XR Di LD Aspherical IF for Canon

09/23/2008 02:00:35 PM · #15

Originally posted by bassbone:

SDW

Canon EOS-60D

09/23/2008 02:04:46 PM · #16

Originally posted by metatate:

I believe there are two reasons why registered users are not allowed to vote in member challenges.

1. It's a members feature requiring membership to enter and vote, one of the reason I became a member. Registered users are able to view and comment as a learning tool The site hopes this will help converting some registered user to a paid member. After all this site does cost money to maintain.
2. To ward off most friend voting by keeping dishonest people from creating multiple accounts or having their friends doing it and voting high on their image and low on others. By having to be a paid member to vote in a members challenge, it makes this "fraud voting" less likely to occur.

Yes you will have more votes usually in an open challenge because there is a 29:1 ratio between registered voters and members respectively. For every 30 users on this site only 1 is a Member and if you look at it in the way of percentage then per user, members challenges have a higher percentage of voters than open challenges.

An example would be challenges 918 (Numbers) and 916 (DOF IV).
Challenge 918 had 125 entries but the most people eligible to vote was 2372 and 16137 votes were cast. If you divide the amount of votes by entries you get an avg of 128 votes per entry. Now divide the amount of avg vote per entry by eligible voters, you get 5.29% participation.
If you do the same formula for challenge 916 even though there were 58,571 votes. You get 183 votes per entry but the participation level was only 0.025%.

Summation: Opening member challenges to allow registered users to vote could and most likely would result in the risk out weighing the benefits. From the stats above, and if it holds true to all challenges, it would raise voter pariticipation by less than 3/100ths of a percent. Not enough to open a back door to possible vote fraud.

Just my 2 cents.

Message edited by author 2008-09-23 14:08:55.

klkitchens

Pentax K-1

Pentax FA 50mm f/1.4 AF

09/23/2008 02:37:15 PM · #17

Originally posted by metatate:

True.
And to be fair since the "Sunday" challenge is one challenge rather than two, it has the potential for more votes â�¦
the "Tuesday" challenges are more likely to have the votes divided among them.

So in terms of voting, it makes sense the way it is broken up.

It definitely stinks though that "special" challenges never get the votes of 'non-paying' members.

Originally posted by bassbone:
A second component of this is the number of entries - Immovable only had less than 55 entries. If you notice, the Shallow DOF Blue had about 190 votes. Yes, Open challenges have more voters, but it is not over 2 to 1 on a typical challenge.

Might be interesting to allow them to vote anyway. But only count the member votes for ranking, but just like we show the participant, commenters, etc... Could see votes by non-members.

Trivial sure, but might be cool.

tnun

Ricoh GR III

Pentax DA 18-135mm F3.5-5.6ED AL [IF] WR DC

09/23/2008 02:37:33 PM · #18

I'm trying to think if I am less of a riffraff since I became a paying member; on the whole I suspect that I have submitted probably more photos that should have been binned than when I was a riffraff.

Tamron AF 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 XR Di LD Aspherical IF for Canon

09/24/2008 05:23:46 PM · #19

I looked at the challenge history and it seems like the number of votes per challenge has pretty much stayed the same. Since 2002, I can't really see an increase or decrease in votes per challenge.

I'm not sure what to think of that - other than since the site hasn't improved much, it makes sense that there isn't more activity (don't get me wrong, this site is on of my obsessions - so I'm not knocking it).

SDW

Canon EOS-60D

09/24/2008 05:43:51 PM · #20

Originally posted by metatate:

I have to agree with you

metatate on the issue that votes per challenge have stayed pretty much the same.

It think, and this is my opinion, the site needs pruning like a bush. Sometime pruning a bush helps it to grow not necessarily bigger but better. I think DPC needs to prune all these open accounts that are not being used; not paid but registered. There is a big problem when out of every 30 accounts only 1 is a member. That's a 29:1 ratio, not good. DPC should be looking at ways to raise that ratio. Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of good photographers here that are registered users, I am not knocking them. They are very valuable to this site and contribute a lot. What I am saying is the sites model may be in need refining to make more of those registered user want to become a member and then give member an incentive to vote and comment such as points, etc.

Message edited by author 2008-09-24 17:45:54.