Deolrin said:
@MH: You've been nominated by three people, and then received what are arguably words of scorn from another member. The minimum to get into the poll is 5. It's okay, MasterHaosis, you're not nominated, there's no need for the wall of text.
Did it ever accidentally felt in your mind, maybe somehow, accidentally, that even those three people are lot since I did not allow anyone to nominate me?
Maybe those three people did not talk to me or asked me or even mentioned that they are going to nominate me. You mind that I could not stop everyone or doing that? Yes, I told in chat to some people not to do that.
Also, if I wrote wall of text, then there is need for wall of text, otherwise I would not write wall of text, logically.
Now lets go ontopic now. About voting system.
Personally, I am also strongly against current voting system also. I am with Deolrin and many regarding this.
I think that Hiveworkshop is overall one of best sites and best managed sites in world. It has explained everything what is needed (well not perfect, but compared to number of members it is), decent freedom for people, nice hierarchy, everyone know what is his job etc... There is only one thing which I think that is quite stupid and retarded in site's system, that is User of the year! I am watching it every year and still cannot why it is like that.
Some people (on staff) just cannot get it that you cannot have moderators in user of the year poll, for following reasons:
1. Obviously because it is
User] of the year, and moderators are not users, they are staff members.
2. Moderators should be helpful and do lot of things because
it is their job, they are chosen to do it, they assigned for that, and yet again, its not user's job to be helpful or to be active at all, but this is for such people, award to remember of those who decided to stay here almost every day and help others/create resources.
So far you have moderator who is chosen to work and yet again you award him for that, disrespecting users to some kind. Yes, you staff members would say ,,Then you do not have to vote for staff member, vote for any user instead" but it is not point. Point is that staff member should not be in list for voting. There should be separate thread ,,Staff member of Year 2013"
3. Ass-licking and biasing. It is staff member vs. regular user. So people would vote mostly for staff member expecting in turn that he do favors to him. ,,If I vote for him, I expect better help from him, what is the most important, faster approval of my resources and other secret privileges" Obviously, in turn, it is public vote, so of course staff member can see who vote for him and have better view to those people. Of course, everyone would say now ,,I am same for everyone, you are wrong". Well officially it is. But it will always be biasing, manipulations and such. It is normal, it is in every single site, it has been for years, and it will be. Just can be very reduced by removing staff members from list of regular user of the year, but putting them staff vs. staff.
In more simple note, biasing user to user is one thing, but staff to user is another thing.
4. Main goal of such poll is encouraging people to work harder and behave better on this site. Logically. But if user see that he has to pass though moderator (whose his job is to work already) and giving award to moderator can be found counter-productive.
5. Improvisation. I3lackDeath said that poll cannot support big number of people. He is right. But still, its not people's problem. Site wants to be the best, site wants to have bigger numbers of active members by the days. Site wants many things, but Site in turn needs to improvise in turn. Users should not care if system can support big poll or not. If system cannot support such thing, then it is always good old way of manually counting people. Open thread where people will vote, after some period close thread and start manually counting. Take time which you need. One week, one months, two, but after finishing, create list where we can see who voted for who, and give award to winner. You do not have enough people for that? Hire them!
You all expect to have this huge work, giving a great award just like that as easy you can! Of course in turn that you will get such things arguing everywhere. Do not take me wrong, but majority of staff just expects that huge system where everyone get involved to be done in two - three steps, nominate, make poll, close poll, give award. This needs more thinking, more organizations.
6.Short amount of timing. I think that few days for nominating and few days for voting is small. Staff expects that people will hang out in site every day so everyone would read that nominations are on and voting.
Give more time for nominations and more time for voting. Not everyone can be here this week every day, I am sure that many members missed first nominations. I think, 10 days maybe will be enough for nominating, plus 10 days for voting. or even week, but you need to make public announcement long time ago that people expect user of year nominations soon, so they can stay tuned. Of course this does not mean now, but for further votings, next year because we do not have time now, we lost already lot of time.
So my suggestion:
First, make public poll with simple question: Are you for creating two polls ,,User of the year" and ,,Staff member of the year" ?
1. Yes
2. No
So see, if majority wants two polls, then so be it.
If so, then create two polls, except Users for user of the year should be nominated, there is no nominations for staff members. Every moderator should be automatically included. That is his job to work, so people will then evaluate who worked the best.
As people will evaluate which member was the best in passed year.
So you will have two competitions, two encouraging, one are moderators between selves, second are users between themselves. Majority will decide who is winner.
Deolrin, you see, it is sometimes need for wall of text