AWA Professional Awards 2017 Category Selection

[SeanPNG]

People fundamentally changing / impacting the nomination and voting process of the Pro contest is a problem if you ask me... it has to be incorporated into the contest or defined in the rules at least.

Right and I understand how that can be a fear, which is why im offering to help Jingoro make it official.
Jingoro joined the discord chat about maybe halfway through the contest and i greatly appreciated it as it made things much easier for everyone. people were able to ask him a question or for clarification on rules/categories and recieve and answer [sometimes] within the hour.
combined with ilieas idea for moderators we could have a number of people moderating this chat in an official way.
I would be willing to help Jingoro set up the chat, making sure he has acess to the chat first and foremost. after that it's as easy as him posting it in the forum or attaching the link to the email he sends to every participant.

[MaboroshiStudio]

People fundamentally changing / impacting the nomination and voting process of the Pro contest is a problem if you ask me... it has to be incorporated into the contest or defined in the rules at least.

Right and I understand how that can be a fear, which is why im offering to help Jingoro make it official.
Jingoro joined the discord chat about maybe halfway through the contest and i greatly appreciated it as it made things much easier for everyone. people were able to ask him a question or for clarification on rules/categories and recieve and answer [sometimes] within the hour.
combined with ilieas idea for moderators we could have a number of people moderating this chat in an official way.
I would be willing to help Jingoro set up the chat, making sure he has acess to the chat first and foremost. after that it's as easy as posting it in the forum or attaching the link to the email jingoro sends to every participant.

Don't get me wrong Sean I think the discussion here has been good... we all want to improve Pro and have less drama. I like ilieas proposal as I think mentioned to someone else before the stream / discussion has to be more official a part of the contest / AWA site. I see the group debate / discussion / consensus as a all or nothing proposition almost imho it has to be integrated or banned. If it is an official integrated part of the contest if you opt out that is your choice and it is on you... I would have no issue with this.

Still until it is a part of the contest group debate / discussion / consensus fundamentally changes and impacts the nomination and voting process of the Pro contest...

[SeanPNG]

And i agree with you on that, thats why i think it's important that Jingoro get his hands on the Discord link first so that it can be official and open.

Another idea I just had is i could make a quick and easy video tutorial on how to use Discord for Jingoro and any potential moderators as well.

[Rider4Z]

I like to think we're a little more diligent and thorough compared to the Oscars. I assume we all actually WATCH everything.

Xophilarus graciously invited me to join the stream this year but I respectfully declined. I didn't object to the process (at the time), but I chose not to partake for 2 reasons. 1, I feared I would accidentally reveal or give away which entries were mine either thru a lewd comment, emoji or better yet, silence to someone(s) who may be paying particular attention (whether that's justified is open to debate), and 2, I believe very much in the power of influence and I wanted to develop my opinions on my own. I like making my criticisms independently and then finding out later whether other people felt the same way, I don't want my opinions to affect others. And sometimes it takes 2 or 3 watchings for me to develop a good understanding of a video. Some people get it in one viewing. If I were to join in the discussion then I fear my opinions would ultimately fall in line with "everyone" else thus parroting the mass vote and rendering it superfluous. The whole point of a vote is to pull in various opinions. And live discussion potentially pulls in the heard leading them in one direction. (Btw, who the hell is Ken Burns?) But lets say the live discussion stays, why leave at just a discussion? Why not take a live poll and have everyone vote out loud then and there? Well obviously cuz we want the winners to be a surprise during the awards ceremony but you get where I'm going with this.

This all really is just me and where I stand. I'm not trying to convince anyone otherwise because you all seem very passionate about the discussions and not for the wrong reasons. For me, myself, however I will likely not partake in them before I've formed my own solid opinions, and if I feel this way then it's possible there are others who do as well.

I'm pretty

Get over yourself Shin geez

[AMV_4000]

This year nudity and Graphic intensive videos were saved until the end of the stream and were not treated as mandatory (neither were any videos in the stream for that matter). As for the quality being affected by the stream it is still IMPERATIVE that the videos be watched on their own in addition to the stream to test for quality. Stream will not and should not be the only time participants view all the entries so bugs and frame drops should not affect the final impressions of the videos just because of the stream.

Okay, well I have no idea why someone would want to watch a stream if they're supposed to watch the videos on their own. Just so they watch each video multiple times? It seems like it would present more issues of people coming in and either trash talking videos or trying to convince others to vote how you want. Maybe I'm missing the point of it?

[ngsilver]

Also if you could get the last contest on VHS that would be an amazing feat lol...

/me raises hand

[Rider4Z]

This year nudity and Graphic intensive videos were saved until the end of the stream and were not treated as mandatory (neither were any videos in the stream for that matter). As for the quality being affected by the stream it is still IMPERATIVE that the videos be watched on their own in addition to the stream to test for quality. Stream will not and should not be the only time participants view all the entries so bugs and frame drops should not affect the final impressions of the videos just because of the stream.

Okay, well I have no idea why someone would want to watch a stream if they're supposed to watch the videos on their own. Just so they watch each video multiple times? It seems like it would present more issues of people coming in and either trash talking videos or trying to convince others to vote how you want. Maybe I'm missing the point of it?

omg that was so funny

[Xophilarus]

Okay, well I have no idea why someone would want to watch a stream if they're supposed to watch the videos on their own. Just so they watch each video multiple times? It seems like it would present more issues of people coming in and either trash talking videos or trying to convince others to vote how you want. Maybe I'm missing the point of it?

Because they enjoy the GROUP and CONNECTION aspect, and actually I feel like people should watch videos multiple times anyways... Shin went into great depth about the "point" of the stream so if you want to know, go reread that. It is fine if it isn't your type of thing or something you want to do, but those of us who enjoy doing it do it for purposes beyond those reasons ^^.



This is just a general thing, we want everyone to have access to the stream, not necessarily participate. No one has to. If someone doesn't want to partake, they don't need to, but it definitely should be presented in a way where everyone can at least join if they don't want to because I know we missed some people this year, and to all of those we missed, I apologize. But yeah, anyone that still has issues with this, I will either direct to reread Shin's post, or they are honestly just going to disagree with it forever, which is fine I guess, but I don't like the logic of "the way you enjoy the contest is wrong, but the way I enjoy it is correct" mentality. I think different ways of approaching the experience should be embraced. As long as we aren't doing shady shit, which I feel like is pretty obvious at this point, and everyone has the option to participate, by implementing methods we have suggested. Ileia's mod suggestion will also be GREAT for that as well.

NOW ONTO ALL OF ILEIAH'S STUFF. Honestly, all these ideas are really solid. Part of me wants to say "NUUUH" to the super early deadline, not because of having to finish my video early, but because I am really fucking impatient when it comes to releasing videos, but I can get over that shit xD. I don't like the idea of limiting beta testers, but I think it is good to have a few people there for that purpose. I will say there are two people in particular that enter the contest every year that I always get to beta my videos, and I do not plan to stop that, but they are also people I trust in not giving me any kind of bias or any other unfair judgement, and I do feel like on this subject we kinda just gotta trust people to not be scummy about it. So much of this contest honestly is based on trust, which is something I feel like people need to understand a bit more. If we discover someone is being shady with EVIDENCE, then yeah, we can call them out for being a scumbag, but just pointing fingers every year constantly is not good for anyone. I apologize for the little off-topic ramble there, but it was something I felt like I needed to address. But yeah, I love pretty much all her proposals, and I appreciate she came in and actually suggested some ways to do things. I agree that I feel like a ton of the process just needs to shift or we will be just going through the same conversations over and over again.

BTW I hope everything I said makes sense. If not, let me know. I just woke up T__T

[ngsilver]

Addy brings up a point of view on the streaming that I've seen brought up a number of times by a lot of the 'older' community. As someone who runs a stream for the VCAs each year (or tries to at least, thanks comcrap) I can say I see the plus side of doing a livestream and think I see where the issues are.

True, the quality of a stream is not going to compare to that of watching it on your own. But that isn't the point of doing a stream/chatroom. It is a way of, in this day and age, of people from all around to be able to get together and view the contest in a syncronized manner allowing all discussion to happen in real time and everyone being at the same point during it. It's just easy to sync up this way and as has been discussed is how we can have a viewing party without all living in the same area. So in the end it's more about the social side of things rather then quality, and it's the social side of this that it seems a fairly large group of entrants are looking for now.

As for viewing multiple times, I figured that was expected to begin with. If we are all judging these entries based on multiple merrits it would seem expected to watch and entry more then once in order to accurately judge it on a professional level. You can't notice everything upon a first passing. I'm sure Jingoro doesn't judge the Masters based on 1 pass. Sure the first pass may help narrow down what gets 2nd and 3rd passes, but for the most part I would assume most of us if not all watch entries more then once especially when considering nominations, semis, and finals.

What I see being the issue here is a perceived pessimistic view of your fellow entrants. We've heard from multiple participants in the livestreams that they don't view them as an issue because they don't feel the discussion taints their views. However, those from the outside are seeing the worst possible outcome and in some ways because we don't seem to be getting to a compromise it feels like many of you are painting your fellow entrants as weak minded sheep. You expect that just because discussion happens that entrants are going to use the open floor to taint the view of entries they don't like by putting them down and raise their own entries by pointing out things that others don't see, effectively defending their entry, and as such getting better scores. I'm not saying any of this actually happens, but I see where many are coming from viewing from the outside it seems like this is something that 'can' happen especially since not everyone is there to defend their own entries then that could cause a potential bias and make it more difficult for those not part of it to actually win. But of course this assumes the worst. I can't say this is what happened, I wasn't there, and I don't think this is what happened because I have more faith in my community. I thought the final choices for Pro winners were great and I don't think even if there were (further then normal) bias introduced we would have come up with a different group of winners, the best videos won.

I can't say I have a solution beyond what has been suggested and getting the stream out to everyone giving a chance to join in, but timezones and countries are different and not everyone can join in. Iliea's idea of multiple streams is an interesting one and perhaps a chance to alleviate the inclusion problem. I myself actually LOVE watching videos with a group as well. It's fun to discuss entries and collectively enjoy videos, it's why I run the VCA stream. I would prefer to do it in person but I'm the only one in my area that joins into pro and I don't feel right, due to the feel of the contest as well as the suggestions in the rules, doing a personal viewing party showing these off to my friends in the area before the con. And really that's the only thing I have issue with the stream in the past personally, it's the ability for the stream to be seen publicly. I believe we've covered ways to fix this already, so in the future we should be covered on that.

So did I just restate what has already been said. Probably. Did I come up with a solution? Probably not. Did I try to give perspective to both sides on the argument as I do come from both sides? I hope so. If not...

[BasharOfTheAges]

This year nudity and Graphic intensive videos were saved until the end of the stream and were not treated as mandatory (neither were any videos in the stream for that matter). As for the quality being affected by the stream it is still IMPERATIVE that the videos be watched on their own in addition to the stream to test for quality. Stream will not and should not be the only time participants view all the entries so bugs and frame drops should not affect the final impressions of the videos just because of the stream.

Okay, well I have no idea why someone would want to watch a stream if they're supposed to watch the videos on their own. Just so they watch each video multiple times? It seems like it would present more issues of people coming in and either trash talking videos or trying to convince others to vote how you want. Maybe I'm missing the point of it?

I think you understand the point perfectly.