Public questions to cutiebunny

[cutiebunny]

We don't want to add fuel to the fire, but there was something brought up in this thread doesn't make any sense to us:
When we used Zero's software for the 2010 cel awards there was no way of making a vote counting error... the votes were automatically tallied by the software. We are not sure how cutiebunny could have made a mistake as the system is pretty reliable.

It could have been my understanding of the system, but while it does count the votes that an entry receives, it does not take into consideration who won, and it does not assign multiple awards in the event that there is a tie. There is a link where someone goes to "assign winners", and it shows pictures of the entries in each category. When you go to assign winners to a category, it does not show the amount of votes that each entry got. This means that you have to toggle between two screens, and that's how I assigned winners. Accessory had a lot of entries, so was easy to miss something. Not that I'm excusing my error, but that's where it likely occurred.

Once again, I'm not blaming the system, Zero or anyone else. I blame myself for the error. I rushed through it to avoid complaints over award delay that I had seen posted on topics in previous competitions here. Iceman did not have internal access to the site, and as he volunteered for the graphics, I was not going to burden him with the responsibility of checking. Nor was I going to bug Zerospace as she didn't volunteer to work on the project and had already been through enough.

*****

Gabe, unlike you, I have the balls to own up to my mistake and admit my error. The forum is still waiting for your apology.

Can't imagine why anyone hasn't volunteered to do the Cel Awards yet...

[zerospace]

Some perhaps relevant info for anyone who is curious or would like better understanding of the vote counting on the site:

While the site counts votes accurately, it only displays them on a page for the organizers to see/read (the 'vote counts' page). There are quick links (buttons) to assign winners for each category (which link to the 'assign winners' page), but it does not automatically check for a most votes winner, nor does it automatically assign winners. This is just in case any last minute disqualifications occur (remember, to receive an award, you must also vote in all applicable categories -- or at least this is how it worked in the past). If any winner failed to vote, they don't get to win, either. The separation of the winners assignment from the vote counting allows the organizers to handle these situations. Would it be possible to make the site automatically suggest the proper winners? Probably. That might alleviate any mis-readings of the vote counts page.

In a nutshell, Angelic-Lair is correct, it is fairly easy to figure out the correct winners--at least I think it is easy, but then again, I made the site, so of course it's easy to me. The fact that someone else also found it easy, is re-assuring, though. On the other side, the vote counts page is long and could be confusing to some. It displays all of the categories and all entries within those categories that received votes. Often, every entry in a section is represented with at least one vote. It does organize those results in order of # of votes -- most to least -- with ties displaying in random order (within each section, of course). If you glance quickly, you *could* not notice the tie, I suppose. It doesn't exactly denote ties with flashing lights or anything . It also doesn't denote the most votes winner -- you have to go over each section and actually look at the vote counts for each 1st place item and determine from those, which one had the most votes. Simple? Yes, but could you overlook one? Sure -- I didn't make it totally fool-proof, sadly.

So, basically what I'm saying is that both sides on this one have merit. But the site is not all-knowing and cannot be used as conclusive proof. Could CB be technologically incompatible as she says, and have missed some stuff when assigning winners? Sure. Did that happen? With this turning into a public battle between two people who obviously do not like each other, I don't think we will ever really know. Everyone has their opinion, and that's about all we'll ever have.

My two yen: We aren't talking about the Oscars or some world-renown for owning the winning piece in a category. Let it go, and move on.