MyBroadband Competition Rules

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Inevitability

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if i have my own competition, can i post in this section?
EDIT: I'm not a company or anything... just wanted to see if someone can draw something for me and then I'd make the best drawing a winner
EDIT2: And I'd give away something as a prize, of course
 
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bwana

MyBroadband
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if i have my own competition, can i post in this section?
EDIT: I'm not a company or anything... just wanted to see if someone can draw something for me and then I'd make the best drawing a winner
EDIT2: And I'd give away something as a prize, of course
Any competition would have to have rpm's seal of approval before it gets posted.
 

nanonyous

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With the current winner-choosing structure, how are irrelevant posts handled in the event that the chosen post happens to be off-topic in the competition's thread?

Example, in the current iPad4 competition's thread, there are many off-topic posts. Will you guys simply choose a random number generator in its stead?
On the same note; could culling of irrelevant posts in competition threads to eliminate post-padding as well as attempts at rigging not be eliminated?

Example scenario, John has five different accounts with which to post, all of which meet prerequisite post counts, are registered with different usernames+passwords, to different email addresses and are each logged into via a different proxy. John is excessively thorough. John is so excessively thorough, that he will try to get the last post into a thread, realising that by having the last post, he would automatically have a 1/6 chance on average of winning as his 'last' post's number is one of the basic numbers chosen among for a winner.

Also, the basic number structure is broken.

If the total posts is between 300-400, then the basic numbers will always be something like;
*
*
*
**
**
3**-400

This quite effectively eliminates the chance for anyone that has posted in the 100-3**(excluding final post number) range from EVER being picked. If the total post count is in the 400-500 range, that expands to those in the 100-4**(again excluding final post number) range having zero chance of being picked.

It would take the total post count for a competition thread exceeding 1,000 for there to be anyone picked in the hundreds' ranges. 1234? 123, 234. 1530? 153, 530. Etc. That being said, there would still be a massive disparity in the spread, since now the structure looks like this;
*
*
*
*
**
**
**
***
***
****

In other words, there's always a bias towards those within the first 10 posts of a competition to be among the winners, for a center spread, and then whoever arrived 'late' has the least chance. I can see it encouraging people to get their posts in asap which could result in a great burst of activity, but at the same time not so much; people could start babysitting the relevant forums for competitions to crop up, post an empty post and then just edit it afterwards with whatever the post required as content to be eligible.

Also, bear with me here, but if my brain is plugged in correctly, with a four-digit total post count, if the example of 1530 were to be used, wouldn't that effectively eliminate anyone in the 531-999 range from having a chance? Similarly, if the total post count happened to be 1001, wouldn't that eliminate everyone in the 101-1000 range?

Unless I'm missing something here.

*disclaimer, I did not brain properly for this post, I'm running on gut feeling here*
 
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powys1988

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I used Dragon Naturally Speaking for years on my PC. Switched to an IMac. Dragon for Mac leaves a lot to be desired - training, recognizing, editing. Any suggestions about how to improve performance or other voice recognition software for Mac users? I dictate a lot of reports using MS Word.
 

Hemps

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Can people win more than once?
I won a tablet in January, am I still eligible for another prize this year?
 

R13...

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There's no rule against multiple winnings. In fact, it looks like once you join the winner's pool you're more likely to win again:p
 

nanonyous

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Can people win more than once?
I won a tablet in January, am I still eligible for another prize this year?

Would be kind of nice, in a sense, for people who have won similar prizes to what's on offer to not be eligible for a year's period - in this example, if you won a tablet in Jan 2013, you don't get to win any other tablets till Jan 2014, but are still eligible for anything else (such as a laptop, desktop or even a Lamborgini if it comes to it - just not another tablet)
 

Hemps

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Would be kind of nice, in a sense, for people who have won similar prizes to what's on offer to not be eligible for a year's period - in this example, if you won a tablet in Jan 2013, you don't get to win any other tablets till Jan 2014, but are still eligible for anything else (such as a laptop, desktop or even a Lamborgini if it comes to it - just not another tablet)

This is a tech website essentially, so i think there should be a rule like that BUT it should apply from when the tablet was released to the public, the device I won was released in 2011 and has only a 160k screen, that's ancient in terms of tech.
 

nanonyous

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This is a tech website essentially, so i think there should be a rule like that BUT it should apply from when the tablet was released to the public, the device I won was released in 2011 and has only a 160k screen, that's ancient in terms of tech.

Irrelevant imo; if you opt to try and win it, that implies you want it (whether to sell, give away or use). If its age and tech has any short-term problems for you, then don't enter.

Otherwise, what would happen in the event that someone wins, as an example, an i7-3770 in January 2013 (released Q2'12), and then a few months later in current time, such as in April (then Q2'13) its successor has come out? It's still an expensive prize, it's still a well-performing prize and you only just won the one you got, which you wouldn't necessarily have had otherwise. Just because it's newer and better doesn't mean people should automatically be entitled to winning 'again' just because what they have is older. Not in my opinion, anyway.

Hell, for a more direct comparison, let's talk iPhone 4 vs iPhone 4S as prizes for two different competitions run in a relatively short span of time. "I should be allowed to take part because my iPhone 4 is old!"? Nein danke.
 
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