I personally don't want users having the ability to vote in the pet contest at all because I think in general users are going to be biased. It's been shown in the past with user based contests that in general they do end up becoming popularity contests.

Anonymity allows users to be judged fairly and staff are usually far enough removed that they can judge with limited bias; that is not the case with users who who will likely vote for pets from popular users though even if another pet is better qualified. Furthermore, there's just the simple fact that less well known users tend to get passed by because not enough users know of them even though they might have really good pets that qualify for the spotlight.

That said, critiquing or a checklist of general concerns I am for though.

That's a very good point - is the queue going to be cleared to start afresh on the new system, or are all the pets that are in the "winning queue" going to stay, whereas those that haven't yet been checked over will be cleared, or....?

I'm not sure how the voting could be anonymous, as a lot of pet profiles have the pet name as part of the image, and not just the standard .pet_name bit that maybe could be hidden when voting.... Maybe if that was implemented, the voters could be shown a random pet profile each time, so we couldn't search for a specific pet (or have to do x random votes before we can search for one pet to vote for that) - that way it could be less "person X has 200 friends and they all voted for their pet"?

While I like the idea of having the community more involved with the pet spotlight, others have stated (in much more reasoned terms than I can) that there is an uncomfortable amount of potential for abuse.

I would like to suggest the following:

1. Before users can nominate their own pet, they have to rate at least two pets. This way, there will be a balance between nominated pets, and "accepted/rejected" pets.

2. Users cannot go directly to a pets page and vote, a queue of nominated pets will be presented and they have to go through each pet before they can move forward, no skipping! (randomly shuffled, maybe??) I suppose a prize will be in order for every completed pet, (or every 2,3,5 etc. Perhaps make it an achievement?)

3. Not only do users have to tick certain, relevant boxes, but they also have to write at least 50 words. (I checked, it's approximately a paragraph.) Abusers, (those who copy paste words and garble) will be banned. (perhaps for a period of time?)

4. In order to prevent popularity contests, maybe put a rule in place to ban the advertisement of pets? Not a great solution, but it may help to deter most from "vote begging"

All in all, I really like the fact that the pet spotlight is being revamped. I just started working on my pets, so I'm not as invested as others. But I do feel as if creating stories/profiles/art for them is not only a vital part to inspiring creativity on sight, but it also a mini-economy within itself. Look at the art forums, that's a boatload of opportunity there for lots of people with the time and inclination.

Looking forward to seeing what you are going to do! c:

While I do agree that it's better if the user does something I think it's odd if you leave the profile when the user doesn't credit themselves. It's not obligatory to credit yourself and I personally don't do it when it's my own pet and know a lot of users that don't do it either. And I'm pretty sure the majority of users does work for their pets but you don't see it in the end. Like designing a HA that matches the character so they can get art of it or writing a story draft and asking someone to turn it into something nice (especially if the pet owner is a non native speaker whose grammar wouldn't be up to subeta standards). And a friend of mine makes little mockups for the profiles when she gets them comissioned. Not all users that apparently have everything done by other users have done nothing themselves. I don't add my story drafts or ugly pet edits that I show artists to a finished pet's profile because it doesn't fit in my opinion.^^

But maybe there could be a list that shows what the user has done themselves when it's in the voting queue so other users can see what the owner has done even though not everything made it to profile?

I feel like there should be a searchable database of winners. Why? Because you could make the win queue automatically "winners" without the hassle of waiting for a day to spotlight the pet. Your pet wins? It's automatically entered into the winner database. This would also allow more long-term exposure/recognition (otherwise, why is anyone really entering the pet spotlight if they can just screw the rules and contest altogether and work on their pet just the same?). This way also eliminates the entire concept of users voting. Get a committee of mini-mods to approve who is in the win queue or not (and cite reasons for rejection). Still have the spotlight, but always link to the database from the news post.

See? Everyone is happy. X) Right? I tried, please don't kill me ;O; I know this suggestion would only work in an ideal world where good coding hangs on trees

I probably should've specified... I don't really need to see a self credit to the user. Though honestly I would rather because the one pet spotlight I saw that wasn't self-credited (or credited to anyone) happened to be all stolen, so better safe than sorry, I guess? You can't always assume just because there is no credit that the user themselves did it, because this has happened before. >.>

What I mean was... if I see "story by xxx, profile by yyy, art by zzz" and the user is 123, I'm kinda like "Uh where were you when this pet was getting made?

Now that I actually got a laptop and time to write out my thoughts, a more indepth post.

I feel like there might be problems with this based on what pet owners do with their pet.

1. If you commission your art, story, profile = you did nothing for your pet, "downvote".
2. you got no art, no super fancy profile and no elaborate professional art= you also did nothing for your pet, also "downvote".

Because there are people in both camps (and loads people in between, obviously) who either think you need to have the top notch of everything with a degree in English and graphics design to meet the base req's for spotlight and on the other side those who dislike that everything is super professional and want most done by the owner.

Next: And I have a huge concern towards non english players. I write all my pet stories myself and English is my third language. I have my stories spelling checked and grammar checked by a friend who does have english as mother tongue, but my story will never be as fluent as a native speaker theirs. It won't have spelling mistakes anymore nor huge grammar mistakes but it won't be at the level that many players here consider the standard because they speak English as first language and forget that English is not the only language on the earth. I'm seen several people act like total assholes because they don't understand what it's like to speak another language than English, and i'm scared that it will come to play here :(

So I'm basically scared for myself that with users judging they'll be far more harsher on my rather minimalistic profiles and more simple stories while they do meet the requirements for the spotlight, but it doesn't match their idea of a worthy winner. And I'm scared for my friend who commissions her art, story and profile: it's still her character, she came up with it, she made the tc and thought out everything of it...yet there will be people who down vote because of the idea they have of a worthy winner.

Hm but if there's no credit to other users that have really done those things that user is breaking the rules. Since I usually assume that people are honest and respect the rules I trust that if they don't credit something they've made it themselves. And crediting themselves can't really avoid that since those users could still credit themselves for something they haven't done I think (though they could be better punished because they can't claim to have forgotten to credit another user and are actively lying then). It would be lovely if users just didn't lie about stuff like that but well, I guess that will never happen.

I do understand your problem but I think most users do quite a lot for their pets. Take one of my pets as an example (x): The story was written by someone else but I wrote the first version of it and wasn't happy with it because I'm no native speaker so I comissioned someone to rewrite it to something more readable. I was really specific and wanted the story elements to be kept the same just a nicer wording and grammar. I didn't draw the art either but I had a very specific idea on how it had to look and made a lot of refs for the artist. So I did more than what's left on the profile but I don't write it on the profile because it wouldn't feel right to me or like I'm trying to take credit away from the other users but that's probably just me xD So maybe users should just note everything they did somewhere so other users don't think they've done nothing?

But you still coded it yourself. Even if you credited the coding to yourself, that's fine. I don't care. You did /something/ and that's more than some users do on their pets. (and honestly, some of these users are the same ones that bitch about how "ugly" pets are that win pet spotlight when people do all the work themselves and the profiles are nice and simple)

Do you see where I'm coming from?

Yeah, I see your point but I mean that if I hadn't coded it myself you could think that I didn't do anything for my pet when I have in case done a lot. And I think a lot of users don't credit themselves for the ideas behind the pet which could lead to other users thinking 'why did this user win? it's just the work of other people'. So if people had to do some parts themselves maybe there should be more sections like story draft or character design? But users could lie about this so I'm not sure.. I didn't really think there were users that didn't do anything at all for their pets, I think that's something that shouldn't really win then but I don't know if that can really be checked somehow?

Yea, I see what you mean. Honestly, I just want to see one stupid little doodle or a little poem or something by the user if they commissioned everything else. Just something in the final result besides ideas. shrug

Because I could come up with a wonderful idea for a painting, but if I pay someone to paint it for me and enter it in a contest, why should I get the trophy?

Haha , maybe you're right :D As long as the user is not required to do something huge and amazing to be qualified for the spotlight I'm fine with it.^^

I don't like this. I prefer staff review and would hate for it to turn into a popularity contest. Also I'd really hate to see spamming, whether that be of upvotes OR downvotes.[/quote]

I just TOTALLY agree

P: I'm responding directly to you because I know you're not likely to take this the wrong way (dere is respect between us!)

I'm personally VERY against this apparent need to credit one's self on a pet profile. That one talent of mine isn't something I want EVERYONE knowing about, and if I had to put it on my profile, well... then its out there. I'd rather just leave it blank in the event that I manage to do it myself. (This is actually why I was rejected when I applied to Menagerie... Because I didn't credit my own work to myself, which is stupid in my opinion.) Do I have to credit all of Cake's photos to myself since I took each and every one of those? Do I need to credit my graphics that I made for myself, even if I have someone else code? I mean... I can't code, but I can somewhat do my own graphics. (Something most people lump together, and I'm not fussed over it as much as other people apparently are.)-- Look at the profile that you're coding for me. My own graphic chemistry, but your know-how and coding. :) I do this a LOT. I really enjoy putting graphics together, and have done so for a while now.

is saying how I feel-- Ideas are important. These users put in more work than I think most people think about. They have to have a general idea, color scheme, story idea, etc.

brings up a good point: it only takes one person, probably clicking because someone asked them to, to nominate a pet for the spotlight - why not require 2+ different people nominating before the pet actually makes it in for review?

As I mentioned before, there was a spotlight winner without credit, so it was assumed they did it themselves. But that wasn't the case.

It just seems safer to credit everything, esp on something that is being "awarded".

With photos, well you're getting into copyright things, so fuck yea, why wouldn't you self credit?

Not a big fan. Popularity contests have not worked out well on Subeta in the past. Ever. EVER. Not sure why we would continue to fail to learn from that. Even random voting, with usernames hidden, has not gone the greatest (Morostide and other HA contests) but it would ultimately be more preferable.

I haven't really gotten into the Spotlight yet, but it's something I've always hoped to do in the future. This would make it an entirely different contest/trophy than for those who've already won. I get that it's resource intensive, but so is running and staffing an income-making, growing pet site.

I really want to know what the staff wants to achieve through this revamp (maybe I missed some of your posts on previous pages, and please point me to them). Without clear objectives, things can go sideways pretty fast.

• If you just lack the manpower to go over the queue, I think the most pain free way to do it is to hire mini-mods/volunteers. If you insist on using the user base, try to make them vote/rate on less subjective and simpler things off a checklist (eg. if the pet is breaking rules, if it has a profile but not if the profile looks good, if it has a story with a certain length but not if the story is well written). Also somehow make the voters accountable for their votes (eg. don't make it anonymous; have mini-mods monitor any irresponsible voters). However, it's going to be hard to monitor things like that, and it is going to be hard to make everyone judge based on the same standard. No matter how clear the guidelines are, people will always mix in a lot of very personal views. Basically, drama will likely arise no matter how you try to make this thing fair.

• If you want to make pet people interact with each other more in a friendly way, just don't make the bet on things like the pet spotlight. Personally, I know some users don't want to have an open discussion on things like if you have a typo in your story, or if you should make your background color a shade darker, or if you should change things based on certain arbitrary rules set by somebody else. A lot of us just want a place to hang out and casually talk about our pets and how we want our pets to be without the competitive edge. Go compare the topics in the pet forums before the pet spotlight and a few years after, and there's definitely a clear shift of focuses. Anyways, pet spotlight is not the best way to bring out the friendly and chatty side of people. Having a voting system (aka popularity contest) will destroy it even more.

• If you just want people to focus on pets more, make some examples from the top such as releasing more nice things and features for the pet people. I already like how you are having the chibi pet focus month, and the fact that new vesnali items have good item art for TCs. Keep doing things like this, and let the user base know that the site cares about pets.

[edit] In the end, the staff needs to compare the cost and benefit of having a user voting system from a business standpoint. You guys said you want more time to release awesome items and pets, right? Just don't make the new system cost your more time and $, OK? Because based on what I've read on this post, you need to put a ton of work into the new system, and you need manpower to monitor and maintain the system. You have to consider if the benefit, if any, is big enough to make it worth implementing.

So, here's a few random thoughts (that all string together, not individual stand alone ideas):

1. A user can only have one pet in the queue at a time.
2. A user can actually just nominate their own pet? I finish my pet, I'm content, I submit it to be reviewed. No more need of subtle+ hinting for nominations or the whole "only people with friends get nominated".
3. Pets are viewed in order they're submitted by either staff or the minimod or whomever is going to be reviewing-- they're either approved or rejected. This helps cull any confusement over why a pet hasn't been approved (or rather, unchecked/not booted) as well as the claims of favortism since it's a take a number system. If more than one person is working on it they just take the next one. 3a. The only plausible reason a skip would be in order is because the writing on the profile is extremely long winded. I'm not sure how often this happens but if it became problematic a maximum character limit could be put into place or a requirement of any text over x characters be put under a 'continued' spoiler or offsite and that continued reading isn't judged. (for the record spoiler tags CAN be heavily modified when it comes to pet profiles, it's not the same as the forums!) (most of the pet's linked on my profile have spoilers if anyone cares to see what I mean, I'd link but I'm on a phone lol). Once they win it can be changed. 3b. Rejected pets get checked boxes for issues and go into the "critiqued" pool, where they can request help/feedback from other users. Once changes have been corrected, they go back to the review state.
4. Pets win the spotlight in the order they're approved. This culls the favortism claims, since a user can only have one pet in at a time and this is no longer randomized.
5. While waiting approved pets go into a pool where interested users can go through them and check them out? Also if anyone catches something wrong, it can be flagged so someone can look at it (ie: common kanis verses sun kanis and other easily over looked mistakes). Users can also heart the ones they like, or just casually surf.

Really the more I think about it the less I like the idea of the general population being in charge of voting. And I feel a lot of the current standing issues/drama comes from lack of why pets are rejected/that subeta doesn't 'random' well and that from the outside looking in it's easy to jump to conclusions especially when yours is still waiting. Basically now it's a lottery so if there's 100 approved pets, and 30 belong to one user there's a 33% chance that one user will win. Then in two weeks, there's a 32% chance. However if each user can only have one pet approved and pets win in order.. Then there you go?

I would also like to see changes made to the spotlight in general (ability to remove trophies/renominate after a period of time, one requirement or another but maybe not everything, idk about having to do at least one thing but there's that discussion too, etc),

Ehh... I see that as one of those rare things that the staff should handle if theft arises. However, I don't see how its right to force me to clutter my pet's profile with "Photos by Tarawr, Graphics by Tarawr, Story by Tarawr, Overlay by Tarawr, Coding by Tarawr" etc.

If it has no sources, I know to go, "Oh, so this user MUST have done that themselves. Cool." I know that people can and sometimes do lie... but if someone is out to break the rules, they'll do it whether its allowed or not. Yeah, we can use a spoiler tag, but I think they're tacky and would take away from the aesthetics of the pet's page.

If I'm not mistaken, there is already a character limit in place on pet profiles, which is part of the reason was contacted by to talk about Newbie/The Newbie Guide.

Otherwise, I like a lot of your ideas. Especially the "One nominated pet per user at a time" and the "take a number" system. I feel like that could be a massive help.

I can somewhat get on board with removing trophies, but not sure how I feel about it being at the winning user's discretion. I'm all for it when a pet is abandoned and finds a new home, though.