Please post here the different proposals of adjusments concerning the New Submissions System (Rating system - Deletion - Moderation - Number of admitted shots/day - ...).
Idealy, it should be a syntax of your different thoughts, so please try to use clear and consice sentences, that our Almighty Creators could read easily and use for the new upgrades. Even if you have the same idea than a preceding reply, please post also, writing once again the idea you want to support.
- Hiding voting-stars to off-set recent popularity of bad-rating; - Admins having the final word with deletions; a shot gets 5 votes, it's not automatically deleted, as is now, but needs an admin to physically remove it.
- Admins having the final word with deletions; a shot gets 5 votes, it's not automatically deleted, as is now, but needs an admin to physically remove it.
Possibility for the shots that dont go through to go in some kind of "Hall of shame", or not been totally deleted so at least maybe some can be revoted in and for the others we could at least get the solution. I have for instance added some that I really liked to my favorites, they didn't go through, I have no way to find out which movie it was or even who posted it to ask. That's a real shame...
i agree with themooch and chogori but as zythux pointed out somewhere earlier, shots in the "waiting to be judged" section should be invisible to wtm players, and their time countdown (48 hours) should be stopped so that moderators can take their time for the decisions
One thing that needs to be remembered is that WhatTheMovie is that there are currently no Executive Producers (other than admins). The rules for this site are good, and don't need to be changed. We just need to wait until those of us earning our 300 WTM bucks per day become Executive Producers and can therefore protect good screenshots from deletion.
Would make no sense at all. People who solved a shot have more chance to give a suitable rating for a shot. The problem is there are too many people that give all shots they know a 9/10 (At least that's what I think seeing some ratings for quite average shots).
But if people who didn't solve it count more, some shots won't make it while they say almost everything. for example http://whatthemovie.com/shot/21180 . I'm sure this shot only made it because it's a well-known movie, so people know the role of it in the movie. I'm sure the rating of people who didn't solve thisone is way lower than the rating of people who did.
Besides, if people who solved it count less, people will vote high for shots they know, but don't solve it. When it's in the FF they will solve it.
- Hiding voting-stars to off-set recent popularity of bad-rating; - Admins having the final word with deletions; a shot gets 5 votes, it's not automatically deleted, as is now, but needs an admin to physically remove it.
I fail to understand why it was decided to have so many New Submissions prevented from going through to Feature Films. The FAQ says the 'best shots' go through. But in reality very many of the others are pretty good as well. It's not that 60% of the submissions show unsharp and deformed headshots of famous actors with black bars all over the place.
Part of the fun of the game is to try to be the first to solve a movie and thus occasionally beat the SnakePlisskens of this world. I've been spending some time on that the last two weeks. Of the 15 movies I solved first 2 are still in New Submissions, 3 went through to Feature Films and no less than 10 simply disappeared. I'm sure most of the readers here have similar statistics. Why are we all spending so much time and energy for nothing? (Not to speak of the time and energy of the people selecting and uploading shots that don't make it, even though nothing is wrong with them.)
So my proposal is - apart from adjusting the voting system along the lines of the proposals above - to have a much larger percentage of stills to go through to Feature Films.
1) The requirements for reaching the feature section should be drastically lowered. I'd suggest an average score of 5+ stars.
2) Uploaders should be required to add at least 2 appropriate tags to their shot.
3) Admins having the final word with deletions; a shot gets 5 votes, it's not automatically deleted, as is now, but needs an admin to physically remove it. *agreed*
I agree on # Antituur on the percentage, the problem is that it is not even a percentage as I understood, it is just the first 20 of the last 24 hours, no matter how many are posted. The problem also is that there is too much luck involved, if your shot is quite good and has a descent rating around 6.5 (which is not bad imo) and the shots around you are much higher than yours will despear. In contrary, it might go through if the others are bad rated.
The luck factor is only a problem when you look at the situation from a personal point of view. The system works for the site overall because what's important is that every day there are new shots and these should be good enough. It doesn't matter (to the site) which are taken amongst a larger set of "globally good" shots.
The downside is that the uploaders feel bad when their shots are not accepted. Note that only very few shots are actually rejected. Most of the others that don't make it in the Feature Films were considered good enough but there simply were too many uploads to accept them all. You have to see the selection process at the global level, not the individual level.
Only a few dont make it? I dont think so, I think about half of the shots dont make it to the new features part, at least (look for instance at the number of shots in the new submission these past 24hours! only 20 will make it!). I simply think that there should be a percentage instead of 20 per 24hours because that doesn't take into account that some days more shots are posted than others I dont see it as a personal thing, my shots are not doing too bad so far... but I think it should be more fair for everybody
Chrisy: The point is precisely to only accept a constant number of stills per day, so that the site isn't flooded by the new uploads as it was earlier. There are more and more users every day, and it was considered better to keep the number of featured films to a reasonable amount. Obviously that means that a greater proportion of uploads are rejected, but how is that a bad thing from the point of view of the web site ?
If the number of uploaders increases, eventually you will have to increase the number of shots that can go through otherwise the chance of having one of your shot posted will just get smaller and smaller. This has to grow in the same time as the site grows otherwise that doesn't make sense... That's why I think having a percentage instead of a constant number will work better. And with a percentage you can manage to keep a reasonable amount of shots and keep the very bad rated out!
@Zanapher: OK, I'm not sure whether I agree, but I can imagine you guys considered 'flooding' a problem. That's under control now, but only for the Feature Films section. The New Submission section is still having the 'flooding problem' - and I suppose that's where most people hang out and certainly the real fanatics. And due to the growing success of the site this flooding gets worse. And worse still: as the majority of the New Submissions stills simply disappears after two days we're all sort of wasting our time and energy... Or should the New Submissions section be understood as a sort of laboratory space, entered at one's own risk, possibly not giving satisfaction but rather frustration? Is your advise to players to retreat to the Feature Films section?
We could increase the number of feature shots per day, and that should be discussed. But no, a percentage is not a better idea. What people don't seem to understand is that the purpose of the game is not to have as many of your uploads accepted as feature films. It is for the vast majority of users to try and solve still shots in the feature films section. For this reason, the number of new shots per day on the feature films is important to control. Having more and more uploads per day simply means that the images will be selected amongst a larger number of possibilities, hopefully resulting in a better overall selection (that last part being up to the users who vote obviously).
If this means "not accepting" (again, it's not "rejecting") a huge proportion of stills, well, that's a shame but it has no negative impact on the feature films section. Eventually, either uploaders don't mind their shots not making it to the th feature films, or they decide to upload a bit less shots because they are angry and the proportion of accepted shots will rise again.
I think if it stays like this with at least not an increase of number shots which go through, eventually the overall quality of the feature film part will decrease. By quality I mean variety and a good balance between known and less known (or unknown) films. Less known movies often go through with a rating around 6 or 6.5 luckelly because there are still some people who rate based on how good the shot looks but unfortunatelly many who rate bad a movie simply because they dont know it. These shots will have less and less chance to go through and therefore it will decrease the overall quality! I understand your point, but I think this balance should be maintained somehow. Because there are several reason why this game is fun: finding easy shots or hard shots from a famous movie is rewarding but discovering movies you have never suspected the existence is also part of the game, at least for me, I must say this is one of the most important thing, I love discovering movies, and it would be sad to see less these types of shots!
In 5 months or so, current users earning 300 WTM Bucks a day will become Executive Producers, at which point they will be able to protect Screenshots, which guarantees they will go to Feature Films.
Will these be included in the stills per day count?
I think a lot of us are disappointed with the democratic process, which gives much different results than the former dictatorship of the admins (at the expense of their time). I think once regulars attain EP status, they will become the new dictators and the submission process will be back to the way we like it.
However, if this is the case, then it will render regular users' votes in the New Submission section useless in directly deciding the fate of movies. However, the vote count can be used as a guideline for the new dictators. And voting will continue, as it's the easiest way to get WTM Bucks and become a member of the oligarchy.
In the meantime, I think we have 3 choices:
1) Suffer through the current system until the revolution is complete (can we survive 5+ months of Johnny Depp?) 2) Change the system, then suffer the consequences of messing up what should work well once the new dictators are in power. 3) Grant the most active users early executive producer status to get things started now.
An alternative version of #3 is to set a sliding scale for WTM Ranks until 2010, where the users' jobs are based on rank compared to others. For instance, if the top users has 10000 WTM_BUCKS, then anyone with 9700 (top 3%) would be Studio Bosses, anyone with more than 9500 (top 5%) would be Directors, anyone with more than 9000 would be Producers, etc.
I thought there were already users who can protect shots? or am I mistaking? Or is it still the creators who once in a while still use their power? I would go with option 3, there should be more people who can do this imo
@Chrisy: ex-dictators still have this power (but use it sparingly because the new system is so much better ;)) @astrododo: you should really have come to the forum during version 1... At that time, there were plenty of topics complaining about the stupidity of moderators who were incapable of judging correctly the adequacy of the snapshots. At that time, people on the forum were predicting the demise of whatthemovie, caused by moody moderators who only picked shots from uninteresting movies that everybody knows... Sounds familiar ?
The problem is that happy people don't post on the forum to say that everything is fine, there are only posts about how bad everything is. I'm not saying everything is fine, but really it's not that bad.
I went through a good segment of the feature films section the other day (didn't play for some days before) and I don't think all shots are easy, boring, featuring Johnny Depp or some other famous Hollywood actor, etc. Obviously Hollywood movies are the most represented, but that's a good thing simply because it's the movies that are best known all around the world, and hence better suited for a game that's played by thousands of players from everywhere. But there also are other movies (I recognized some French movies, and I'm sure there are German and Asian ones too), really...
Oh, and lastly, the "Johnny Depp" phenomenon that people are complaining about at the moment is really similar to the "Aeon Flux" one (and "Crank", "One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest", etc.) from before. Again: nothing new, nothing worse...
I don't think dictatorship is the solution: - more opinions = further from any kind of extremism. - many people involved = a site way more alive
Suggestions: - Hide uploader's name while snapshot is still in new submissions. This would prevent from high rankig your friends or the respected members of WTM you do not want to upset. Keep in mind we should only vote for the awesomeness of the snapshot.
- Have a rank that can go up (like actual one)... but also down. Let me try to explain (it is almost like ATP ranking for tennis): # WTM Bucks you earned 30 days ago are lost # If you are at rank i, you need X WTM bucks to reach rank i+1 # Once you reach rank i+1 you earn WTM bucks 1.xx time faster than at rank i. # etc
This way only regular users/contributors have power. One should not be able to have power forever. Currently it is way too easy to have access to new submissions, the requiered number of FFshould be 50 within the last 30 days. Only my humble opinion here, but everything, like the hall of fame, should be 30-days-wide.
I think it would be nice, if it was easier to see the commentary to each picture or just simply make it visible in the top seeing the number of shouts to the shot there have been. Right now you need to scroll down to the very bottom of the site to see commentarys and that's sad!
" Hide uploader's name while snapshot is still in new submissions. This would prevent from high rankig your friends or the respected members of WTM you do not want to upset. " I would not even have thought of that...
I think most of the people who use WTM stay mostly in the New Submissions page, especially those who have been around awhile and are caught up on all the movies. I hardly ever visit the Feature Films. I visit it to see if stills I have uploaded make it which sadly only 1 of 5 have since the new format. Back in the old WTM era where you submitted a still and a board reviewed it and rejected it you could shrug your shoulders and not take it so hard and get back to finding a better still. Now it is much more heartbreaking. You work hard at selecting stills. You watch people solve it and rank it. You wait patiently for 48 hours hoping you will get through to FF cause it is like a rite of passage. You feel good, especially when your still has been solved over 100 times and holds a ranking of 7 and it is a good shot all the way around. Instead, some goober who votes on everything whether they have solved it or not just to get their 300 bucks a day can decide your shot can be deleted. This is unbelievable. It is discouraging to even try to select things for uploading. I think that you can't rank it unless you solve it. And I believe that only those who have solved the still should have the right to delete it. It is especially terrible just like Antituur said to be the first to solve a film just to see it disappear. That is most of the point of this site anyway. To be the first, to solve the most movies, and have a good number of uploads. This new system destroys all of that if most of the shots do not go through, which they don't. Maybe the uploads should go in a que like they are now but they can't be solved and they can't be ranked unless they go through. The people in power can decide just like they do now whether to pass it on to the hungry WTMers who are ready to first solve it or delete it and make me try all over again. Either way, the whole system is discouraging.
"That is most of the point of this site anyway. To be the first, to solve the most movies, and have a good number of uploads." That's not true. The point of the site is to solve movies. Being first is too situational (it mainly means that you check the uploads more often than other people), and having lots of uploads is absolutely not one of the aims of the site. Let me explain this last part. I'm absolutely not saying that it's bad to upload shots, on the contrary. The site obviously lives from the user uploads so it's a great thing and we thank all the good uploaders. However, the number of uploads shouldn't be considered as a goal, and was not considered as such by the creators of the site.
For instance, a good effort has been put into making the monthly solves score (hall of fame from Feature Films) as fair as possible and eliminating possible dishonest advantages and exploits. On the contrary, the only important thing about uploads is that the ones that make it to the Feature Films are good enough. This means that it's absolutely not a problem if some good shots don't make it, as long as the ones that are selected are good too. In that respect, the uploading score is completely unfair because there's a huge random process, and because users might not see the full potential of a shot. But that's not really a problem because this was not one of the objectives of the site.
And you say that most players play in the New Submissions section. If so, they know that the rules are that only the shots that are eventually selected will count towards the score. It's not unfair. If they want a good score and feel like they're wasting their time solving screenshots that end up not counting, then they should stay on the Feature Films list. If you go to the New Submissions (which is good, I do it too), you accept the fact that you're playing mostly on shots that won't have any effect on your score.
I definitely see what you're saying. To be a "first solver" is more of a perk otherwise there would be a Hall of Fame list for it. Not sure if I agree completely with the aim of the site to not have the most uploads otherwise there wouldn't be a list for that either. I don't aim to have the most uploads, I guess I would like to see more of mine go through as would anyone. Maybe it has more to do with the shot. For example: I uploaded a still from "Donnie Darko", a movie that has been uploaded a gazillion times. I selected a scene which didn't include headshots or anything especially familiar about the movie. I selected a shot of Donnie's legs where he is walking up the stairs. The shot was more of composition and selecting something only those really familiar with the movie could solve. It had a low number of solves. The next day, someone posted a very obvious shot from the same movie. Donnie's face kind of cartoonishly showing through one of the portals. A good still, but easily solved by anyone how was vaguely familiar with the movie. Over 100 times. That still got pushed through way before the 48 hours was up, but mine stayed in new submissions the whole 48 hours and didn't make it through. Where is the justification in that?
I also agree with the last part. I didn't think of it that way. I guess you either accept that half of what you solve doesn't make it or you just wait until they all go through to FF were you can get all points instantly for the movies you solve.
"I selected a scene which didn't include [...] anything especially familiar about the movie." That was the problem IMO. I recall the still you mean, and from what I remember it could have been any other movie. I didn't rate it high (like a 5 I guess) because there was nothing special about the shot, nothing that distinguished it from any other movie where someone walks up the stairs. (BTW I'm not saying it's fair that the other shot got pushed through, I'm just trying to explain why this particular shot didn't make it through).
But then the fun for people like me who solve only 5 to 10 per cent of new stills would be totally over ... And I'm perfectly capable of voting a snapshot down because it's not a good one even/especially when I could solve it. For example, there was a still submitted that showed the father character just sitting in a chair smiling a bit - but unless you've seen the movie or recognise the actor you can't solve the movie, nothing special at all. So in my point of view, it didn't qualify as a good shot and therefore didn't get a good rating either.
Maybe's something wrong with me? I'm not fighting for #1 in the Hall of Fame or reaching the highest rank as fast as possible; so I'm rather relaxed and I enjoy the New Submission's section a lot as I don't care so much for that specific point.
"but unless you've seen the movie or recognise the actor you can't solve the movie"
this clearly shows that we all got different oppinions about what a good screenshot is. My idea of good screenshots is exactly the opposite: if you haven't seen the movie and if you don't recognize any actors you shouldn't be able to solve it (unless you get really clever with keywords and filming locations).
Oh well, I guess it's only good that we all have different views on good screenshots.
Yes, the fact that you need to have seen the movie to solve a snapshot is absolutely not a problem. The problem is when the snapshot has nothing specific on it so that even when you have seen the movie you can't recognize it.
What I'm aiming at was that a good snaphot in my opinion contains that certain, clever or cleverly hidden element which enables you to enter an educated guess after some staring at or thinking about or meditating over the still and/or additional search so that even someone who hasn't seen the movie can get the green frame. Easiest of course when there's some text or a name shown but sometimes a more subtle clue leaves you "that is exactly the essence of the film". And to catch that moment is what a good snapshot is about, for me, of course ;-) I think it rather boring, however, if there's just an actor or actress depicted because then one'll go over to imdb and just has to enter the filmography beginning to end.
"I think it rather boring, however, if there's just an actor or actress depicted because then one'll go over to imdb and just has to enter the filmography beginning to end."
I agree, that's why I've tried to capture scenes that you should remember from the movies. I don't like making screenshots too easy. That's probably why I've only had 1 of 5 uploads accepted :p
Finding a shot by listing the filmography of an actor is obviously not interesting at all, so these images of a famous actor in a not so recognizable outfit/background/situation are not very good. However, screenshots where you end up googling the information available aren't good either (the ones with easy to search text for instance).
A good shot in my opinion is one that people who have seen the movie can recognize, even if they have seen it long ago, because the depicted scene is very characteristic of the movie. It's not a problem if people who have not seen the movie cannot solve it, but it's best if these people can clearly see that there is something specific about the image (sometimes, without having seen the movie, I can clearly say that if I had seen the movie, I'd remember this image, and that's good).
Somewhere in the rules it was recommended (and maybe still is): The more popular a movie is, the harder has to be the shot. So what about this one: http://whatthemovie.com/shot/22356 ? Everyone who has ever been to the cinema or took part in pop culture life can solve this. But how can I rate it down? It IS a great shot.
If there's a problem with people voting shots higher when they can actually solve it, maybe don't have people solve shots in new submissions. Just let 'em rate the shots.
I've seen some great shots of underground movies disappear because people can't solve em. The shots were good, the movies themselves were classic in the genre. Bloody shame to see those shots disappear.
Also not showing the person who uploaded the shot before it enters the feature films, might solve the problem of people rating stuff high or low when they know who uploaded it.
If there is a set number of shots that go through each day, and shots with a large number of solves almost always have a higher score than shots with a small number of solves, then the feature film section will get much easier (this is already true).
On possible solution is to allow a certain number of shots to go through each day in each of 'easy', 'medium', and 'hard' shots. That is, if 15 shots go through each day, then make it the top 5 rated shots with 100+ solves, the top 5 rated shots with 25-100 solves, and the top 5 rated shots with <5 solves.
Of course, the algorithm would need to be a little more complicated than this, in case there are only 5 shots with 100+ solves. Something like top X% of easy + top X% of medium + top X% of hard = 15 movies, where X varies each day.
I like astrododo's idea. To keep it fun for most players, it might be better to adjust figures, like this for instance : 30 shots each day, top 15 with 100+ solves, top 10 with 25-100 solves, top 5 with 0-24 solves.
I'd like it if an uploader gets an idea WHY his upload was rejected. I've had numerous uploads declined without reason, it kinda takes the fun out of it. It almost completely removes the joy in posting uploads, and the will to do so.
@zeehond Movies submission are no longer moderated and decided by the admins. Instead, they are accepted or rejected based on their rating by users in the New Submissions section (except for those vote-deleted by regular users or protected by admins). This means there isn't any single reason a shot doesn't make it, only that it wasn't rated high enough.
If a shot gets five vote-deletes, then it is rejected early. You can see the reasons users give for voting to delete the still. However, naut and tliff haven't gotten a chance to make the site email you with these reasons once a still is deleted, though they are working on it.
I totally understand your frustration at not having your shots accepted, but I hope you'll keep your chin up.