The contest results are bullshit

Alright, let's see...
First things first: I'm not mad that I'm not in the top five. I'm just utterly disappointed and angry for these winners. I'll probably offend most of the winners in this post. I don't give a single shit.

First of all...

We are kind of looking for something created for this contest. Stuff you already work on is fine but projects created just for this competition will be looked upon more favourably.
EhytFA.gif

Yeah, sure. Four of the winners aren't bounty projects.
And you know, what's even better?

In previous GBAtemp bounties, we have called upon our members to code projects for various devices. This however, left a lot of our fellow Tempers out in the dark, as not everyone has the knowledge or skill to code apps and games.
[...]
Projects can literally be anything; are you good with art? Draw, paint or craft something for us to see! Maybe you are creative with woodwork, an avid gardener or like photography? You can also enter!
The usual coding entries will still be accepted, but this time we wanted to make it possible for as many members to take part as possible!

Anything, you say? Really? Yeah. Anything's accepted. Too bad not anything's appreciated. Four of the winning projects are coding projects. Makes you think, ey?


Alright. Now, I'm gonna comment on all the winners, and why they should or shouldn't be on the list. The first place is pretty rant-y, I know, but I'm pretty angry about it as well, and you'll see, why.

#5 newo: NewoSky - $25 Amazon Gift Card
NOT a Bounty project
This has been in the making for around two years.
Interesting idea, but still not made for the contest.

#4 Asia81: HackingToolkit9DS - $25 Amazon Gift Card
NOT a Bounty project
This is an around 1 year old project, that is already well-known and widely used piece of software. This feels like as if someone entered FBI or freeShop. It's just not right. Software like this basically gets a head start, which is really not fair.

#3 Dr.Hacknik: SimpliiU - $50 Amazon Gift Card
NOT a Bounty project
This tool, while useful, presents nothing original, and is just a programme that copies stuff to your SD card if you're too lazy to do it yourself.
This should not be on the list of winners.

#2 cracker: DIY PCB etching / Arduino controller shield - $100 Amazon Gift Card
Bounty project
The only project that was made for the Bounty. Are you fucking kidding me?!
This one's pretty good. It should honestly be first place out of these five. It's really creative and has a lot of work put into it.

#1 Voxel: Stick Magician - GBAtemp Bounty Demo - GPD Pocket
NOT a Bounty project
Oh, boy. OH, BOY! This should NOT be first place!
This is also a VERY old project. And you know, what's the worst thing about it? It has nothing to do with the Bounty! What's this? A test level made for his game, that he's already been working on for quite some time. The Bounty might've motivated him to make said test level, but this is something he would've done anyway in some time. Not only that, but (according to unnamed sources) it mostly just uses Unity's built in stuff, and excluding the art assets, this can be made in a couple of hours. Also, according to my experience, said art assets can be made in ~30 minutes!


Now, what can we do to avoid this in the future?
More attention to stuff other than programming
If you're gonna advertise this "anything, not just programming" shit so much and then ignore it for most of the list, we need a different system. There shouldn't be five winners from any category. There should be a couple of fixed categories, and there should be one winner per category. This would not only encourage people to make more varied submissions, but would also prevent shit like THIS.

Fuck the mods and Patrons-only system
It should either be
Just mods: so we can have some responsible adults thinking about the distribution of basically 700 US Dollars,
or everyone: if we're gonna have normal people voting basically just for stuff they like, it shouldn't be just a couple of them.


I'm actually angry at this contest. Even by just looking at the first two places you can see the problems. One is clearly much better and more creative than the other one, yet it didn't win. What the fuck?!
I'm so furious, I could literally flip my table with my laptop, phone and Wacom tablet on it. Fuck this shit!

Also, wow. I've apparently taken more than an hour to write this shit. Phew.
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Comments

@smileyhead srry man thats how witch hunts work :tpi:

But we can get the logic behind the post, but ranting/disrespecting mods and junk about how the voting went down and about who won dosent solve anything. Dont get me wrong, were not saying you cant voice your opinion, just, cmon, this sounds a bit TOO salty
 
I suppose maybe it would be okay to take a survey to see what is something people would like to see in the bounty (Hoping people be realistic about it and honest) You can decide what to make from the results. I kinda understand about the coding, hacking, homebrew thing being prioritized but it shouldn't stop people from trying. Last year when they had that contest for christmas, someone who made a youtube video won, that was nothing about coding anything, maybe a simple film edit in some software. :)

Not all contest people are gonna think is fair, is a contest, some are gonna be favored than others for various reasons. The thing I fear in contest is unfair votes, people who vote on the person's popularity rather than the actual content and purpose of the contest. But we have to remember not all contest are about those things. Some contest is about getting victories such as sports tournament, some are contest of smart decision making and being a step ahead of competition, some are about being lucky (which i suppose is subjective) Still is not a reason to give up.

I can't really comment on much since I hardly know anything about the GBATEMP bounty, but after reading 7 pages of comments here, apparently it was a contest held to allow community to spotlight their projects and also gift them a prize for their work being voted on, kinda like a school science fair. I could have submitted something, won and be happy, or lose and feel like trying again but do better or just not worry about it.

I'll be honest, I'm no genius either, I don't know anything about coding, nothing about C++ Python snakes, ASM assembly, I know a bit about hex and binary but is not really much for a complete impactful project. Now Something I could have done maybe a Tool-assisted video of a game someone hasn't done yet but wanted to see, either speed run of a goofing around comedy. I know how to play a game, but not talented in video editing, photo shopping art and other stuff. So I mean just think about a survey next time to help decide what could be a good submission.
 
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The dude's not tactful, but he's got some good points. It's pretty lame that four of the five winners were projects that weren't even made for the contest when it was explicitly stated that projects made for the contest would be favored. Not cool.
 
G
When I saw this blog post this morning, I hoped you were making a joke.
 
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Seriously people, I go get some sleep and wake up with 6 more pages of comments, lol:wacko: Trying to get through them but most are so boring...
 
B
I think everything that could be said has been said at this point. Everything else after is just going to be funposts and redundant comments.
 
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So here is my two cents.

I don't agree with the outcome, I do agree its very bias. But as it was mentioned, this was an attempt ( failed one ) at giving prizes to all members. To me it shows an effort to give everyone a chance, and I commend them on that. Yea, I sure thought I was going to place, but I'm not the only one that thought that they were going to place. Before I became a member I would visit this site a lot and I remember a bounty for everyone, and everyone was able to vote also, it was for a Nintendo Switch. Well, there was a lot of corruption when they tried that, so they cant open the voting to everyone. Its really a shame, it seems to me that they try and it backfires at them, I just hope they don't give up on the whole bounty thing because people cant accept the results.

I think the problem was that the people voting had a " lack of empathy " for lack of better words. They all deal with the sort of things they voted on, and don't understand the difficulties / skill required to do the projects that don't require the same skill set that they have. I built an entire machine, but I saw a cap that was knitted. That cap was amazing to me, I couldn't do something like that, and without a guide.

However, I do appreciate that there was an attempt to let everyone enter, and I was grateful to see what skillsets everyone had, regardless of the outcome.
 
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well as much as you may not like the results, there has been a fair vote, the staff & backers have examined the results and given their vote, that's all.

that being said, we know this first edition of the new bounty was not a total success, rest assured we will learn from our mistakes and we will improve next time.
 
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I dunno what is more shocking, the fact that the post was kinda mean without intention to be or the staff handling it with proper care. Either way, I wanna say I feel safe trusting this site. :)
 
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B
how the fuck did hackingtoolkit3ds and simpliiu win
 
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The mods nowadays are very mature in the way they handle things. Anyone stating otherwise has blown it way out of proportion.
 
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