How many votes in a typical fest?

Shawn Philip Nelson

Shawn Philip Nelson

Veteran
I am very curious, could some mods please let us know how many people voted in the last three festivals? I'm curious if we are dealing with 100 votes or a 1000 or 5000.
 
I think it's usually in the 100 range. And that is high. It's kind of what makes the voting bogus. So very few votes can change the outcome.
 
Mark Harris said:
I think it's usually in the 100 range. And that is high. It's kind of what makes the voting bogus. So very few votes can change the outcome.
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Dang it! I knew my small amount of DVXUsers working on my movie (4) was going to bite me! I was hoping the vote was at *least* in the 500+ range.
 
dunno, maybe it will grow, but when I started doing fests in 2006, some fests had fewer votes than entries :)

I only have three on my team.
 
Guys. Whole new voting system this time. I'm not trying to be a tease but more will be announced about this later. This will make much of this discussion irrelevant.
 
Cool, this should be interesting then. I'd still be curious to know the typical number of votes just out of sheer curiousity.
 
Also, remember, in LoveFest Jason Ramsey was a crew of 1 and still came in second. It's not about the number of people in your crew, but the quality of your entry.

And, we are very interested in ensuring that these fests are as fair as possible. I am constantly re-tooling the back end to improve performance/features/etc and in that process we continually look for ways to make the fest fair and fun for all.
 
Larry R said:
Also, remember, in LoveFest Jason Ramsey was a crew of 1 and still came in second. It's not about the number of people in your crew, but the quality of your entry.
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Oh I was just having a bit of fun, I guess I should have put copius smileys around my post :-).

Though I think the more votes the better. Hopefully we'd get a minimum of 5x votes as there are entries.
 
What Jack said. Just yesterday Barry, and Larry and I were just hashing out a new system we want to implement this time around and then tweak it from there.

It should be a much more effective voting process in more ways than one. The voting process for you guy will be very simple.

Later,
Jason
 
Once suggestion that I'm sure most would agree with... why not have them judged by a panel or outside source? It would help to avoid any popularity contests.
i.e. Friends voting for friends.

Just a suggestion that could be looked at.

Mike
 
Just thought I'd chime in and say I do like the "Top Three" way we are/had doing it. It's hard to pick just just one.:embarasse
 
Michael Anthony Horrigan said:
... why not have them judged by a panel or outside source? ...
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All suggestions are up for discussion. However, my initial concern with this idea is that the DVX Fests were created to be of the users, by the users, for the users. The idea was not to create the next Cannes or Sundance, but to create something that first and foremost would get the users here at the site out shooting films rather than sitting in here all day talking ABOUT shooting films.

The ultimate prize really should be having a completed film to show to any and all that want to see it; and the feedback. Sometimes it is hard to be objective about our "masterpieces" and to clearly identify what works, what doesn't work. But by having these contests the work is exposed to objective parties who, for the most part, have your best interest at heart. They, like you, want to make great films and are excited when you succeed. And the feedback they offer can help you see if what you thought would work really did work and identify areas that you may be weak in so you can focus on that for the next project.

Winning, Placing, or Showing in the contest is, or should be, secondary to that. We have been inundated with fantastic prizes thanks to our generous sponsors and the tireless work of Jason knocking on doors to collect gifts to bestow on you to encourage you to do the best you can. But you should be trying to make the best film you can, not trying to "win a prize".

That's why I personally like having the users vote. In my opinion it goes hand in hand with the personal feedback each film receives. Yes, there are some who may not vote impartially, and that is a shame. Because of that we are continually looking at ways to improve the system to ensure everyone gets a fair shake, but all in all I think the cream has risen to the top time and again. Perhaps you think the top three should have shaken out a little differently, but I would venture to guess that most people agree with the top three, if not than certainly would with the top five or so.

We will continue to tweak the system to improve it and are always open to ideas/suggesstions that might improve it. This was not to say no to panels/jury's, but to explain why, in my opinion, we haven't done so up to this point.

Good luck on Time Fest! :thumbsup:
 
Larry R said:
All suggestions are up for discussion. However, my initial concern with this idea is that the DVX Fests were created to be of the users, by the users, for the users. The idea was not to create the next Cannes or Sundance, but to create something that first and foremost would get the users here at the site out shooting films rather than sitting in here all day talking ABOUT shooting films.

The ultimate prize really should be having a completed film to show to any and all that want to see it; and the feedback. Sometimes it is hard to be objective about our "masterpieces" and to clearly identify what works, what doesn't work. But by having these contests the work is exposed to objective parties who, for the most part, have your best interest at heart. They, like you, want to make great films and are excited when you succeed. And the feedback they offer can help you see if what you thought would work really did work and identify areas that you may be weak in so you can focus on that for the next project.

Winning, Placing, or Showing in the contest is, or should be, secondary to that. We have been inundated with fantastic prizes thanks to our generous sponsors and the tireless work of Jason knocking on doors to collect gifts to bestow on you to encourage you to do the best you can. But you should be trying to make the best film you can, not trying to "win a prize".

That's why I personally like having the users vote. In my opinion it goes hand in hand with the personal feedback each film receives. Yes, there are some who may not vote impartially, and that is a shame. Because of that we are continually looking at ways to improve the system to ensure everyone gets a fair shake, but all in all I think the cream has risen to the top time and again. Perhaps you think the top three should have shaken out a little differently, but I would venture to guess that most people agree with the top three, if not than certainly would with the top five or so.

We will continue to tweak the system to improve it and are always open to ideas/suggesstions that might improve it. This was not to say no to panels/jury's, but to explain why, in my opinion, we haven't done so up to this point.

Good luck on Time Fest! :thumbsup:
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I think because of the fabulous prizes you almost have to have someone impartial judging the movies.

Let me just say this. There was definitely some promoting going on for certain entries last Fest. I won't go into details but I think you are aware of the situation. Why not eliminate any chance of that and have an impartial jury?

it just seems that the time has come for a change. I agree that the real prize should be completing a movie but we all know that the big prizes draw out different crowds.

Allowing the users to vote is really not fair in some instances. If I have a DVX crew of 15 and we all vote for my entry... definite advantage. :thumbsup:
If I'm a long time member and have a lot of friends on the board... definite advantage. It might not always work out that way but I'm sure it does from time to time.

Why not get rid of that scenario entirely?

Just a thought. Thanks for listening.

Mike
 
"Panel" voting is something to discuss in the future. I will say that there will always be some kind of user vote that helps to determine the winners in the regular DVXFests... But, that's not to say that sometime (maybe soon) down the road that we won't have a panel of a few non-affiliated, industry professionals who view, vote and respond to the top x (10, 15, whatever) amount of films picked by the users. The "finalists"... And, maybe that could lead to other things for the users.

Anyways, with the current changes we are talking about implementing, winners are more decided by "averages" if you will, and it will take an awfully large crew to have any notable impact on the averages. And, even then the impact isn't that great. Beyond that, there are other things behind the scenes that we can do with extra data and such that will allow us to more easily identify shenanigans and deal with them accordingly. We will have much more information that we can use this time around to keep an eye on voting trends and look for discrepancies. Some of it ain't for public consumption. Fun is still the key word, but we recognize that with the fests growing in many ways like they have been over the past year, sometimes it can bring out the worst in folks.

It's a shame that some people act one way out in front of people, but once they get in the ballot box, their personalities change entirely. But, by and large (as Barry says) the creme mostly rises to the top.

And, if I ever get to the point that I'm utterly frustrated with conduct of members/voters, I'll just go back to us giving out t-shirts or something. Don't bite the hand that feeds you, in otherwords.

I will be very closely watching, as will a few other key folks, the voting trends this fest as we incorporate this first round of changes to the voting process. Some things are in the works for future fests, but it can't all happen overnight. There has been a lot going on behind the scenes over the last months.

Key is the fest is for the users. I don't want prizes, or the voting process or anything to discourage folks from watching as many films as they can and giving some kind of feedback to as many as they can. For those of us who can't take the time to get off our rears and actually make a film for the fest, at least we can take the time to respect those who did take that leap and respond to their work that they put out on the line for us to chop up.

Later,
Jason
 
Jason Ramsey said:
It's a shame that some people act one way out in front of people, but once they get in the ballot box, their personalities change entirely. But, by and large (as Barry says) the creme mostly rises to the top.

And, if I ever get to the point that I'm utterly frustrated with conduct of members/voters, I'll just go back to us giving out t-shirts or something. Don't bite the hand that feeds you, in otherwords.
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I agree completely. I was just talking to someone else about that via PM.

I'm all for the T-shirts! Then we'll see who is really in this for the experience. :beer:
 
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