“Entries that clearly exist to derail and undermine future contests will be allowed on the boards but excluded from future polls. Mocs will be excluded when the majority consensus judge it as such.”
Obviously easier said than done but I don’t think you’d get any serious backlash for trying to make some new rules to treat your contest seriously. This first contest however should be the one and only time to amend the rules and get the kinks ironed out. Like a trial run.
I’ve always heard the opposite so I dunno if I’m right here but since its something I heard from several people before so I don’t know where you gets that from.
First and foremost since when did g1=01 either way I was referring to mainly the finalist build. Most entries I felt was more like g1 has all been voted out by complex hybrids between System/ccbs and g1. However one of those entries feels more like g1 than the others even tho I feel there was plenty of other g1 like entries that should have made it further.
I understand that the wording of such policy is difficult. Specifically for the entry in question I would say that it doesn’t abide by an already existing policy of being “recognizably within the BIONICLE world”.
And yes I would trust you with that.
Ya. Hoseryx has been very fun but anyone who wants 20 more joke entries to win is not someone to be listened to.
This is a good proposal for a wording.
The polls are still being filtered through for dupe accounts, and other “illegal” votes, and the actual position of the entries being determined. Street that, the final poll will go live.
There are plenty of entries which just aren’t very good, and they didn’t get voted for, and that was that. Even if the creator of noodle Helryx entered it sincerely, which I find very hard to believe, it’s still being voted for because it’s a funny meme. The entrant didn’t do anything wrong, they just did a funny joke. Even the people making the memes and everything can’t really be blamed for getting in on the joke. It’s the taking the entry seriously when it clearly isn’t that is going to cause damage. You can bet that after this, the Artahka contest is going to get a dozen joke entries. How you handle this one will define how the rest of these contests go. This kind of stuff didn’t tend to happen back in Bionicle’s heyday, but that was ten years ago. We are living in the era of r/prequelmemes now. We’ve got to be able to handle this sort of thing
Then what is your suggestion?
Knock the entry out. If you can’t tell the difference at first between a joke entry, and a sincere bad entry, it’s okay to let the community have their fun, and knock it out later. You don’t have to stop everything at the door.
I know there’s a very teeny tiny risk that the creator of this entry was serious, and you’ll hurt their feelings, but that’s the kind of risk you have to take when you show strong leadership. You can look at who’s voting for it, look at the reasons they cite as to why, and look at the swath of Hoseryx memes all over Reddit and say this is clearly a joke. You can make that firm judgement call. You don’t have to be able to prove it to a jury.
The Artahka contest will get joke entries. I guarantee it. But how you handle this, and how you handle those, will set the tone for the rest of these contests. Contests which Greg has agreed to let us do, even though this has not been his job for ten years. Please don’t make this his problem. Please don’t make him regret it.
So your solution is to disqualify the entry because you don’t like it?
Greg said if the community wanted them, he’s down. Greg hasn’t been not allowing contests for ten years. The community has just shown interest in them again.
I think companies running a contest like this would have a clause in the T&Cs something like:
The organisers reserve the right to disqualify entries that are not in the spirit of the contest, at our discretion.
I’d suggest making some statement like that before the next contest and using it sparingly to weed out obvious joke entries at the later stages, if necessary.
I’d also suggest doing the same for the current contest, even though that means a midway rule change. The performative outrage of a minority is less damaging than the impact to the community’s reputation if an obvious joke entry is sent to Greg.
Edit:
And yet we all know that this is just playing devil’s advocate, rather than a genuine belief. Which to me proves the point that joke entries can easily be distinguished from genuine ones and removed.
I’m hearing people suggest a lot of the same solutions to this issue
Not because I personally don’t like it. Because it was entered as a joke, and you have no obligation to give it the benefit of the doubt. You are being trolled, and you don’t have to fall for it out of politeness or obligation. Several vocal members other than myself are calling on you the staff running the contest not to allow a troll entry to a. become canon, b. represent the attitude and behaviour of this community and c. disrespect Greg and waste his time.
There are plenty of entries in this contest that I don’t like, but none of them are an actual troll post being brigaded for the meme. Anybody can see that that’s what it is, and pretending that it’s not is allowing yourself to be trolled.
I must say that these conversations often leave me disappointed. I expected a lot better.
We are nearly done sifting through the polls and will be putting the final round of voting up later today. Thank you all for your patience.
I don’t know what disappoints you about several members of the community coming to you to respectfully and articulately air the same grievance, support each other, and empower you to take action against a troll movement which does not respect you or us or the community.
Here’s a compromise if you don’t like the idea of rules that require your own judgement:
Make it so that for future contests, only accounts existing prior to the entry cut-off date are eligible to vote.
This would disadvantage very few community members, given the contest and rule would be publicised well in advance. Anyone who genuinely cares about the contest could sign up in good time.
However, it would stop pranksters / brigaders who only sign up after seeing a meme entry that they want to vote to the top.
Just chiming in that you’re kinda painting the majority of the Hoseryx voters with a broad brush here. Insinuating that however big a chunk of the new accounts were explicitly troll accounts when there’s plenty of people who didn’t know of this place prior to the contest, seems a bit biased imo. Were there some trolls, yes, but I mean, can you really discern whether or not they are fans of Bionicle just because of the site they come from? Insinuating there’s a lack of respect because they didn’t pick the model you wanted sounds a bit disrespectful itself. This is coming from someone who discusses the toyline on multiple platforms.
That’s not the point tho I believe yes there were people who gave it their genuine vote however then it still prolly had its basis in the meme. The problem however with “Hoseryx” isn’t the voters its the offensive nature of the moc if it wins. Not because it looks offencieve but it ruins credibility not just for the contest but Greg while even disrespecting g1 set designer, previous contest winners and its genuinely a bad influence for the community and canon.
Again the voters and what they picked isn’t the problem. While yes I don’t like most of the entries that went forward because of concerns for keeping a cohesive canon and not because of the people that voted on them. Most of the finalist mocs looks amazing but I don’t personally think they fit. Other might and that’s okay I’m not arguing that those peoples votes are worth less just that I’d like to have seen.different results.
Assuming others hate on something because they took votes away from other mocs is equally disrespectful.
See, you already have a personal grievance yourself with the moc. I could say that the mocs using heavily system or CCBS comprosed builds are an insult myself if I felt so inclined but I’m not putting my own tastes into the matter. To say it’s disrespectful when it’s promulgated so much fan art and now revamps since it’s ascension I find rude personally. Implying only trolls care for the moc or it’s an insult while the fan engagement surrounding it is some of the best stuff I’ve seen in months from people just comes off as bitter and not nuanced at all. Also, the last bit, “took votes away”, just comes off as entitled. You have no way of knowing some would have even engaged/voted for any of the other entries at all if Hoseryx wasn’t a choice. Maybe they would’ve found nothing they liked at all in the other mocs.
Ultimately my point stands its not the voters that is the problem here its what a meme creation winning represents that makes it problematic.
If you voted on “Hoseryx” that’s fine because you liked it, if someone else did so that’s fine too but you can’t deny that the majority vited for it just for the memes whether you want to accept that or not. People can vote on whatever they like but being ignorant to the effects of “hoseryx” winning on the community, g1 and the canon overall is just not understanding the situation.
You can vote on whatever but the result is gonna have an permanent impact on something beloved by thousands of people. We can’t say for sure what will happen if “hoseryx” wins but it will most likely be just like spraying graffiti over a work of art