Yes.
As someone who agrees with the local anti-contest group’s devotion to canon, I can tell you that just ignoring canon kind of defeats the point; if I wanted to pick and choose parts of a story, or create my own story, I wouldn’t be following this one.
I clearly disagree with the anti-contest group on how to deal with unknown parts of canon when following canon to the letter, but I agree with them that we can’t just ignore canon whenever it’s inconvenient.
In Poland, there are many BIONICLE fans like me, who form a unique BIONICLE community, and most of them don’t want the contests to continue. We could go back and forth forever about that.
The important thing is, if you are a part of a community that is in favor of these contests (like TTV), then you might get an impression that the majority of fans want the contests to continue (and vice-versa, if you are in a community that is against those contests, you might think most fans don’t want that).
I think it is impossible to say whether the majority of BIONICLE fans are in favor of these contests or not (there will always be some kind of bias based on which community you are part of), unless we hold a poll. In my opinion a poll is a better way to get those people who are against the contests to participate in the matter than discussing it here. As for why, let me move on to my next point:
Because arguing against anything that the majority of community is in favor of here is a colossal waste of time. No matter what arguments or points you make, most of the TTV users want these contests to continue, so any different opinion will be disregarded as “minority”, or Eljay will show up and straight up say “Yeah, no. End of discussion”. It’s happened before and it’s not really encouraging for people who are against these contest to voice their opinion here. Voting in a poll is much easier, as it requires less effort and less interaction with a community that has opposing views (and isn’t really open to different opinions).
I’m pretty sure they would… if there were any.
I’d say that’s purely a coincidence, but here’s one thing: people’s opinions change. The fact that majority of people voted in favor of the contests in the initial poll doesn’t matter, because many of them could’ve changed their minds after seeing how these contests are actually held and what the results are. I, for example, was largely in favor of these contests, but after seeing that awful abomination that became the canon Helryx, how long it takes to move from one contest to another and the endless arguing over the most pointless of details (“Does the inorganic Suletu have scales or not? What is a Metru build?”), I can tell you in no way I want these contests to go on. I’m just one of the few stubborn people who are actually willing to waste their time arguing over it here, even though it likely won’t change a thing until actual polls are held.
If by this you mean “TTV can look at the results of the polls and rightfully ignore them because they’re not held on their forum”, I completely disagree. They don’t have to camp in other communities and watch what the prevailing opinion is, but as I said before:
Granted, I would argue this exact thing. But Greg’s answers post-2010 have rarely confirmed major details about character appearances, which doesn’t make the two totally comparable.
I see. Thank you for writing this. 
I could get understand why the opposition people don’t speak so much on the board.
I’m certainly in favor, but this is quite reasonable.
And surely, as a result of my decision to participate in the discussion in earnest in the last few days, I was able to put into words the thoughts that I had in my heart, but when I will look down on the situation, after all, I realized that I couldn’t solve anything.
(As a newcomer, I feared that I would not be able to argue without being disrespectful to those who have been speaking and discussing on this site for years. Since I came to this site, still a year yet.
However, I felt that it would be simply cowardly not to say anything, even though I am on the site and have seen what is going on, so I decided to express my opinion. After all, it didn’t works well though)
It may have been a waste of a finite life. Instead, I realized that it might be more meaningful to make MOCs for future contests (whether the contests continue or not) and have fun chatting with friends in the community.
(Even if the contest is cancelled, making MOCs and show it on this site and elsewhere may be far more constructive than just fighting over them. Above all, it is fundamentally creative.)
I feared more than anything that I would turn into a mere verbal beast, and I thought I had participated in the discussion carefully enough to prevent that from happening.
But after a break, I took a look at what I had said and realized that I had come very close to becoming an “A monster who is not aware that he is so”.
(My desire to continue the contest has not changed, though)
I’ll have to wait and see how things go. 
Hi, I don’t make posts very often (my English is not that good) but I want to say what’s my opinion about all of this. I’m in favour of canon contests because I like to have an image of important characters I can visualize in my mind (if I can’t “see” someone or something, I find it difficult to write stories about it), I like to see cool mocs and I like the fact these contests brought new life to the community in general. However, I also understand the reasons of those who oppose the contests regarding the whole headcanon stuff, as I am myself quite scared by the possibility of mocs I don’t like becoming official. And, no matter what people can say, if a character has an official artwork and I want to stick to the canon, I cannot bypass it.
This being said, I don’t get the true reason we cannot get a poll to decide wether to continue these contests or not. The poll-opposers’ main argument seems weak to me (“if someone doesn’t like them, he can come here and tell us”), because a discussion among some message boards members, be they 10, 20 or even 50, will never represent the whole number of people who might vote in a true poll (I, for instance, can barely write a post in English to support my point of view, and I doubt I am the only one over here). I know this kind of poll has already been held in the past (and, as I said, I want the contest to continue), but many things have changed since then and I’m sure at least some people changed their minds as well. When a big community like ours has the opportunity to add new elements to a lore we all feel strongly for, the most important thing is that the majority of us is in favour of such an action, and we can find out if that’s the case only by voting. At the same time I understand we cannot hold a poll every time a character’s contest ends, but at this point, after (almost) three important contests, I think most of us have a clear idea on why each of us wants (or does not want) these contests to take place, and each of us isn’t likely to change it. So, why not vote? Why say “just no, that’s it. Now stop talking”? Let the whole community decide. That being said, I hope the contests will continue, and I want to say that’s just my personal opinion; no one should feel personally attacked by anything I said.
I saw what you said before and I still hold to my statement. When you’re the one struggling to keep a forum afloat, making communication with Greg, managing a canon contest for the canonization of new elements, you’re very much welcome to ignore the opinions of people who aren’t even on your site telling you what to do. TTV is aware of the polls, and aware of their results, and it will not further influence the decision they’ve already reached about when and how to host the cancellation poll.
Do even the first prerequisite and you’ll have much better leverage to tell TTV what matters.
However the potential for major changes in character appearance exists, like in the topic you made where Greg more or less confirmed genderlocking could be completely ignored. That’s pretty big, considering the topic, and much bigger than what Helryx looks like IMO.
When something as big as going back on the biggest restriction in Bionicle is allowed in the Ask Greg topic - and draws no issue from any parties involved - it’s just a teensy bit hypocritical to protest the contests with such vigor and ignore the Ask Greg topic entirely. It’s changing canon in bigger ways than these contests are and that’s okay, but these aren’t.
Get on the Ask Greg topic and demand its closure, and I’ll retract my argument. But don’t cherry pick.
If they can’t do that, that indicates an infrastructure issue and they need to get more people on board to help them. It’s all well and good empathising with TTV for having to manage something this large, but conceding that there’s nothing else they can do about it is quite fatalistic. It comes across as though you’re arguing that there’s no problem with an echo chamber.
To be fair, that example doesn’t actually change character appearance since gender is purely psychological.
I mean, that was four years ago. Am I not allowed to change my mind about something?
Not sure what you mean by this. I haven’t been ignoring it.
Maybe I’m wrong, but this just feels like ad hominem. Besides, Greg hasn’t answered any actual lore questions since early last year. No reason to argue against something that’s essentially defunct.
I think toaskello said it nicely:
You tell the people who are against the contests to come here, even though discussion about cancelling them is repeatedly discouraged and shot down. There just isn’t any actual means of telling TTV we don’t want them to continue without a proper poll.
…That’s been known since Orde. The gender choices for each element are just factory settings chosen by the Greg Beings, but nothing says that setting couldn’t be changed.
Since gender is merely programming (as opposed to being directly linked to their elemental power), is it hypothetically possible to build, say, a Matoran of fire with female programming?
The Great Beings could have done that, had they chosen to, yes.
I don’t know where this idea came from, but there wasn’t a cancellation poll after Helryx. The only poll was the “who’s next” poll.
Here’s a topic for official feedback. Wherever you are in the community, you can come here to speak your peace, no matter your stance or affiliation. TTV is not required to care about anything outside of it, but what is here, they are required to listen to.
You want to make your voice heard? A discord poll is not the way to do it.
Glatorian would desire to disagree… Although no, nothing about character appearance changes. It’s just the biggest rule in Bionicle being casually revoked.
Definitely not an equal comparison, I’ll admit, between determining the appearance of Artakha’s hammer and rewriting the rules of the universe.
Have you not changed your mind about the Ask Greg topic and its rewriting of canon in greater leaps and bounds than the canon contests could ever achieve? This is character appearance and the design of a few masks; that is Greg reshaping the most fundamental aspects of how Bionicle has worked thus far.
I will repeat: it’s a little hypocritical to argue against the canon contests when something with incredible potential for upsetting headcanons exists and has been more or less approved by everyone not only on the site, but in the Bionicle community as a whole. Yes that’s hyperbole.
I apologize as it was not the intent.
As for defunct, the canon contests weren’t defunct even though there was a six-month pause. Greg has answered questions during that time, if not necessarily lore ones, so it’s not like he’s abandoned the forum. Plus, he’s taken breaks like this before.
Because the answer is always the same - “Cancellation poll NOW” - and TTV has already made the decision to host it after the Lariska contest. I’m not saying everyone needs to come and have a debate over the contests, I’m saying it’s hardly too much work to casually post about how you are more or less opposed to them. It can be done quickly, politely, and there’s no prerequisite to stick around and get in heated debate.
They’ll end up making accounts to vote in the poll, so why not do it a few months in advance and provide some feedback TTV is guaranteed to care about?
You mean the one-time scenario which was done by the Great Beings before the MU was completed and the result of such was to genderlock the element?
Also, the Greg quote is further proving my point about how much more potential there is with the Ask Greg topic. It’s the exact same scenario, except earlier. What’s stopping it from happening again?
Aaaaaand since ad hominem was brought up, it’s my time to go. I’ll be back most likely after the final polls open up for the Hagah. Stay cool everybody 
I distinctly remember there being an option in that poll to vote for cancelling them. I tried going back beforehand to find the poll, but couldn’t.
Again, they haven’t. Eljay has only said they’re open to it. That’s not confirmation.
Yes. If they did it once, they can do it again.
Except the first quote was from 2010 when the story was still going. The thread you posted was from 2017. If Greg had only stated that different genders for an element are possible in 2017, you would have a point (and I would argue it wouldn’t be canon due to contradicting his previous answers), but he didn’t.
It’s here:
But there was no cancellation option. The very first reply is asking for one, to which Eljay says no.
(EDIT: It seems like it’s a restricted topic, which might explain why you couldn’t find it)
No one’s talking about Glatorian. This is about whether *Matoran have to be gender-locked, and Matoran are homogenderous.
Also: doesn’t this gender example do the exact opposite of the canon contests? It opens up more possibilities, rather than restricting the canon
gender…
Maybe if G1 story hadn’t stopped…
I can imagine that a surviving great being could have given MU’s Tribes more freedom of choice.
Remember, Angonce saw Toa and other MU’s tribes as new species.
Of course love is not canon, so love is impossible
I don’t disagree with you from a technical POV. Point is, there are reasons people won’t post here. I’ve mentioned a few before, but another could be that people don’t know they can come here to do so.
I think what Dag did was a very effective way to get voices heard, to be honest. If he’d posted those polls and done nothing with them, they would be much more likely to not reach TTV. But he posted them here, for everyone including TTV to see. So in a roundabout way, Discord polls were the way to do it, in lieu of an official poll.
I think this is where we disagree (or at least anti-contest people would disagree with you). I think it’s much more likely that people will care about how characters look (or at least that they look good) than things Greg tends to confirm/debunk, which tend only to affect fanfic writers. To paraphrase myself, significance is a matter of what people care about most.
As a canon-compliant writer, Greg’s answers do cause massive headaches sometimes, and I know they do for RSG’s writers too. But I’ve chosen not to get into this here because I think visual appearances are what people care about most. Also, I’ve since moved off the ‘headcanon bandwagon’, so talking about Greg quotes has lost its relevance for the time being.
That’s fair. It just doesn’t really feel necessary to argue against it at the moment. From what TTV has said about Greg’s aloofness over email, I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t return to answer questions at all.
I’m inclined to agree with you here. I feel like part of the animosity towards the anti-contest crowd comes down to the fact that its most vocal advocates sometimes sound impolite and, for a lack of a better word, ‘entitled’. Makes it easy for us to be scapegoated. Feel free to lump me into that category but I do try not to be.
Again, some of the frustration from anti-contest people is that they haven’t promised this. They’ve just said they’d consider it. Which I believe they’ve said before and have still delayed it.
I’d argue it’s the fact that Greg quotes deal with canon facts, whereas the contests deal with appearances. And as I said before, I think most people care about the latter more.
I think strawmanning would have been a better word for me to use. That’s what it felt like, at least. Because I haven’t been arguing that the headcanon argument was compelling enough to demand that the contests end outright, which is all the Greg quote argument would really be useful for. And if many months ago I had made that argument, I have since been convinced otherwise.
To argue on Ghid’s behalf since he’s taking a break again: Greg could easily have said Turaga can’t make Matoran of the opposite gender even if they tried. Whether his answer enabled more creative freedom or not is somewhat irrelevant.
Maybe not if the story had continued:
No, it is the argument.
Why don’t people like the canon contests? Because they set one appearance for a character and nothing else is valid anymore. Why do those same people not mind Greg’s statement on gender locking? Because it does the exact opposite, saying that gender bent Matoran are possible.
Ghid argued that those who don’t like the canon contests should also dislike the ask Greg. But his example is one that those who dislike the contests would want Greg to say. Therefore, it’s a bad example that goes against Ghid’s point.
Fair enough. I thought you were arguing why Greg quotes are a good thing. But yeah, not the best example Ghid could have used. It just happened to be a question that I asked Greg, which was why it felt like he was straw-manning me.
Yes, of course it’s a joke.
Love will also be a matter of choice.
and Before the story was interrupted, I think Greg tried to show something about gender of the MU species, in the yesterday quest .
I think chiara and Orde’s characters were a device to show that aspect.
In Zaria’s case, I think him learn about true freedom and responsibility, away from the programming obligations granted to Toa.
There should be a poll to determine if there should be a cancellation poll.
/s