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The high council of a PMSing rat, my mom, and some dog selling aged corndogs, do not like or approve of my idea.

Concept: Summer contest, beginning June 1st, will have a deadline for submissions somewhere around the end of summer. Then everybody does nothing out of the ordinary - weirdos that actually read and review games will do so, normal people that dont read will do so, mods that feature comments because they're good reviews will do so, etc. There is no assigned panel of judges - your games are judged by the community, as they always have been and always will be.

Around November the contest winners will be decided upon by analysis of the general vibe of what story is the best, CYS will with near complete certainty lean more toward one game than others regardless of individual opinion. Supposing there are two submissions where everything is near-equal and it doesn't "feel" like CYS leans one way or the other, then I will be the tie breaker because it's my contest.

Winner gets to pick from a short list of charities for a donation of $X00 to go to in a name of their choice (ie Sherb Sherbington or CYS Real Ones or Penis).

Maybe other top placers get lesser prizes. Maybe not. Thoughts and suggestions welcome. If it makes the culture lords pissy then it's going to be an illegal contest and I'll throw in celebratory blackjack and hookers.

The only thing I like about this is the charity thing. Everything else is just how they have been for the last 10 years.

I mean if me going "idk, kind of leery of creating expectations around cash prizes and also people don't necessarily read" is some kind of big dramatic condemnation and now you're the cool rebel mod, that's pretty neat, have fun.

We've had contests with prizes before. The charity idea is a new addition to this and not what was even being discussed last night. I think I'd rather see the money go to the winner, but my concern was that unless the best story is as obvious as it was in this most recent case of Sherb vs everyone else it may create salt when the way the winner is defined is so vague. (If we were going by detailed positive comments, Sherbet would not have won.)

If this has been, "I, Ford, will read the stories and determine which one I like best and give a prize" that would be ideal, but you seem determined not to read anything. I guess at the end of the day it's just getting left up to the mods either way though so whatever.

Another issue is that you said the other day that you haven't given any thought to how the money will be given out.

If Darius or Mystic wins, can you tell us the method you'll use to pay them? Or what if it's a minor? With a prize on a level higher than "will buy a $20 Steam game" you need to have a clear answer to that going in.

Charities if we go that route I think would need a level of research beyond what you'd be willing to do, to make sure they're effectively using donations and aren't scams or aren't run by a CEO giving themselves a million dollar salary, or a cult hoarding billions in Utah.

Last question: are you going to remember any of this by November?

The work of charity research has already been done for me, it requires only that I find the list. And yes, I have thought of how to pay eurocucks and minors - I said I'm not sure how much money, not how to give money. There's lots of ways to give money and it's still being decided but none of the suggestions of "pay directly", "steam/amazon gift card", or "charity donation" are at all confusing on how to do so.

The world has already created ways to do this and I'm not in any need to reinvent any wheels or create a vehicle, if we go charity route there's no need to pay anyone anyway.

You get proof of donation upon giving to charity online which includes the name you donated with.

I think it is cool to try new things.

Easy enough to make sure the op sets appropriate expectations (i.e., contests are usually a no-money affair, but this is different. Don't expect to see more of this).

As Mizal mentioned, vetting the charities might be more work than people want to put in, but it isn't like it can't be done.

Having the winner decided by site vibes can have issues, but if it isn't rushed I think most pitfalls can be avoided. Make it clear in the op as well. I don't think people being salty about losing (a close race where money is involved) is a reason to dismiss the idea.

Then again, I wouldn't be the one dealing with any potential fallout.

I suggest running two contests simultaneously, one with a money related prize (charity, payout, whatever) and one without. Then, at the end, you surprise everyone by swapping which contest has the prize! Woo pandemonium! Then people won't be salty about losing, they'll be salty for an entirely different (and I'd say more justifiable) reason.

DICLAIMER -- The above paragraph is (probably) a joke.

If the money doesn't go to the writer then they're salty about their charity of choice not being picked which is some weird bitch salt to have. If the top two were going to pick the same charity by chance then there's nothing to be salty about. It's not a list of charities full of politically dividing things either. iirc there's no kid hungry, st judes, humane society, gamers outreach, etc. Essentially going for a list of you either benefit sick children, wildlife, or forests and ecosystems. No veterans, no alphabet garbage, no renewable energy, or really anything that people could realistically be like "yeah I'm against that for [personal beliefs]".

The list is already created I just need to search around for it, but I know it exists already cause I've seen it before. And if you win and cant find a cause among aiding children, wildlife, or trees that you prefer then dont make a choice - I'll let second place pick or put it to a vote or split it on the list or something.

Hookers?

Hehe

yes

Im confused by the concept of Ford putting in effort to run a contest.  This sounds suspect to me.  

However, I like the blackjack and hooker idea.

Hookers is the actual challenge in setting this up

I like this idea if only for experimentation reasons

It's an interesting concept. I like the idea of donating to charities, though the part about letting comments decide the winner may be potentially problematic, as Mizal pointed out. Iirc End once had to replace judges several times in a contest because it wouldn't be fair if different judges read different stories. Also, people most often gravitate towards the shorter ones as the current contest seems to prove.  

This might potentially work if contestants are required to review at least three (or all) of the stories, but I'm not sure how many would actually do so. Anyhow, I'll conduct a small experiment on whether people read as a feasibility test. 

Tl;dr

"It's an interesting"

thanks! I presume the rest of this post is similar.