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Thank you for your input Walrus, your suggestions were in fact made earlier, though have become buried in the mire that this thread has become.
I agree, a small ammount of advertising wouldnt hurt the site, nothing in this life is actually free.
As for your contest suggestions, yes, have been submitted here already, they all seem to be trashed by the more popular,(and I mean popular, and not necessarily
talented). members....Those who rely on their friends "pity" votes to win.

Contest Inprovements

I think we'll start here...

What we have discussed:

Poems should all fit into the same critiquing process....for example
1-Form
2- consistancy of topic
3-meter and rhyme
4-effective use of metaphore
etc............Just my thoughts

also

How about you have to rate three poems from the contest random generator before your poem becomes eligible for the contest?

There are mixed feelings about Judges. Pros and Cons anyone?

I also mentioned maybe we should spawn another contest along side the one going now. Maybe we could even do a test run with some ideas we come up with to see how it goes. If we need a prize, we still have a stack of books here. I could toss one in.

-Papa Paczki

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The above things are as I suggested LOL, I think the Biggest and Best way to improve would be poems being submitted for judging anonomysly
And As I have suggested, A panel of judges chosen from members on a monthly basis, Judges never know whose poem they are reading, and any correspondance pertaining to an entry is sent to ALL of that month's judges.

Last edited by edwinmeyer1963 09-08-2010 at 12:24:28 PM

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Provided that it stays anonymous, I think a panel of judges would be a great idea. My doubts are in the ability to retain the anonymity and in the ability to actually choose judges who are qualified. There are only a small handful of people on this site who I've seen give an actual "constructive" critique. I'll gladly listen and learn if I think I can learn something useful, but Edwin seems to believe that all poems need to have perfect rhyme and metering to be considered a poem and that's simply not the case. Free verse is a well respected form and to ignore that is only narrowing your own view.

I agree whole-heartedly that the submissions should be limited to one or two per poet/per week. This would make the process easier for a panel of judges OR for the casual reader who chooses to rate the submissions in hopes of finding the next winner.

I stand strong in my thoughts that the rating system should be tweaked, not the entire system changed. I believe that to revamp the entire process would be terribly painstaking on the administrators of this site and at the end of the day, you'll have just as many dissatisfied users as there are with the current process. I think it was Artie, in an earlier post, that suggested switching to a cumulative process, which is, as I see it, a step in the right direction. Implement the "rate 3 to get a spot in the contest" idea and it opens up opportunities for the user with fewer friends, also. Just my thoughts.

Edwin, I have around 150 friends on this site. Most of those friends aren't even active, and the majority of those that ARE active, were attained AFTER my weekly win back in March. While in most cases, I agree that it IS a popularity contest... you have to have some level of talent to gain that level of popularity. We're all here to support each other, not to throw stones.

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I think one entry per weekly contest is reasonable

I think one win per year is reasonable

I don't know about the critiquing system...kind of reminds me of the Dr. J. Evans Pritchard thing in Dead Poet's Society. The only thing I ever look for is if it flows, makes me think differently about something, and/or if I can feel it.

Trying to keep up with judges would be a full time job for you Papa, so you'd have to have an easy system to manage it. You'd still get whining about bias and such.

The rating three other poems before yours is qualified is my idea, but I have a feeling with the atmosphere these days, the person would judge it against their entry and down rate them. So you'd have to judge three poems for the week prior to entry. That seems kind of hard to program.

You could do it two tiered where the top ten for the week show up on a page where one is voted for or something to that effect to get more people visibility.

I wouldn't blame you for just keeping it the way it is and telling us all to shove off.

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So if the contest were set up this way, all we would need to do is submit our poetry to contest, and wait for the results?

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I dont have many "friends" on this site yet, I happen to think my works are qualified as "somewaht talented", but lack the time to spend here cultivating my friends list LOL
Lots of good ideas being floated around, but as stated here by others, It is not our goal to make the management of this site any more difficult than needed.

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This is actually a popular way to do things around the internet. I often wondered how well it would go if implemented here. I actually like the idea. You earn "credits" by leaving meaningful critiques. The only thing would be you'd have to control it somehow from people just blasting poems with "AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!".


-Papa Paczki[/quote]

Since we can't actually see the scores, maybe a check box on the quote should be marked by the poets receiving the comments in order have it used as a qualifying comment. Of course, I guess ones deemed unflattering would never get checked....I don't know.

Last edited by castlemist 09-08-2010 at 01:26:20 PM

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RE: Limiting Entries 2.0

Well I'm glad all the mucky muck is over. @MindNumbing - I don't think Edwin is suggesting that ALL poems need a perfect rhyme and meter, I think he is just in an early stage (as are we all) of setting up some sort of tools by which to judge the poems. I, like you, practice free verse so there really isn't much rhyme or meter to my poems either. I suggested earlier, when he first brought up the idea, that we could have a rating of n/a for situations like you're describing. That way, if the poem is free verse, the rhyme and meter category would get an n/a rate. I wanted to bring back up an idea I suggested earlier and see if anyone agreed. What about a monthly contest of say 40 poems that eliminated 10 each week? This would add some drama to the contest and could also be a way to incorporate Wallruss's idea of multi-tiered winners (3rd place, second place, etc). Or maybe different 1st place winners for different poems or best in certain categories. For example Best Free Verse, Best Haiku etc. OR Poem with best rhyme scheme or best metaphors, etc. I like the idea of judges. How to do it? I still like votes based on people's opinions of other’s poems. Like the contest, we could have an anonymous 'Be a judge contest' every X amount of time. People submit one anonymous poem, people vote anonymously on them, and the top ten people that everyone considers 'the best' could be judges. I understand that people are concerned with this, the whole: those who can, do; those who can't, teach; and those who can't do anything, become critics. However, like film and food critics, you need to know something about the topic you're critiquing. Yes, poetry can be like art and simply strike a cord with you and that's why you like it; probably in most cases, that's true. I don't think people buy art or like a poem because the painting had the best use of hues, color saturation, and vanishing points. That being said, we're the ones on the site so we're going to have to be the judges if we decide to have them. An anonymous contest seems the only fair way given the disaster that previously ensued. Anyone have any better ideas on how to select a panel of judges if we go that route?

Just spilling the milk and seeing what shapes form.

Scott

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The only thing would be you'd have to control it somehow from people just blasting poems with "AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!".

-Papa Paczki[/quote]


LOL- we already have some of that

Here's what I like-
I have a copy of the book, and I see a collection of poetry from all types of writers, from many different styles, and different levels of skill. I have handed the book to other writers I know, and they actually give credit to the site, for publishing writers that dont fit into the elite, and perfect category.

I really do like the idea of having to read to be in the contest. It sends the right message that participation is required.
I also like that the more you read the more entries you get.
I have seen manyy writers, including myself, improve greatly from just reading others poetry.
Let's face it, getting people to read, is why we write.
In the beginning I'm sure there will be the quick commenters, but from my time on this site, not many do that.
I also like the accumulative point system, because I think it will give people the opportunity to give a more realistic score. I have seen before, if you are trying to actually win the contest, and give out anything less than a 10, you will get that same rating back, which can kill your score. I know, I've seen it, and heard it from many others.

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I know my ratings of other peoples poems may seem a bit harsh, I dont give out 10's unless the poem in question is truely a great piece. and NO I wouldnt even give my own work 10's...I am likely my own harshest critic LOL
So please dont expect me to pass out 10's just so that I can recieve one myself , When we vote....we should do so honestly.

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Another thought-
If we were to do random reads, we could simplify this contest down to its core, and just have a very simple -

Do you feel this poem should win?

__Yes __No

Then tally the yes' and there's our winner.
It would also be cool to see where you placed - Your poem was 1469 out of 85632

And if you really wanted to have Judges, they could choose from the top 100 or something like that.

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We could also have two winners per week.
The popular winner, and the critic's choice.

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Lol Dave-

That's all I'm doing is tossing in ideas.
There are a few trains of thought here, and all appear valid.

RE: Off track...

Is it just me or does this thread seem impossible to keep on track of theme?

S.

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Theme?????? track??????? there you go assuming we have a measurable attention span LOL
Actually, I do believe the subject has been exhausted for now.

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Agreed.

Outie.

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Will eventually be ressurected I am sure LOL

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@Edwin: Hopefully so. It would be cool to see some constructive change in the system.

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Some constructive changes? Excuse me, perhaps you need to find another website that is more to your liking. As for you Edwin, you're too busy to read other members poetry but you seem to have plenty of time to spend here on the forum.
And you, Stu....you have insulted one of our most beloved poets on this site, no one here will ever respect you, your poetry or take your opinion seriously, you might as well disappear.

Walruss, you seem to be okay...thank you for your voice of humor and wisdom...but please use spell-check.

Papa C - I've been here over a year. I've learned a lot. I've participated in Poetry School. I'm a better poet because of OP, because of the poets here, so thank you for the gift of this website, dear friend.