I follow what's been said, but I'm not sure I totally agree with all of it. For a start, if I had to choose between a poll and a 'points system e-mail vote' then I'd probably go for the latter. I remember the first few rounds earlier last year were done this way. I think we went for the poll because it seemed easier than sending an email, but we only had about 20 members back then! With so many entries now you really need a while to create the vote page each month and the more members, the more unfair it is to single out a particular photograph at the expense of so many others. I prefer the idea of a points system because often it is too difficult to single out one photograph from perhaps 5 or 6 'equal standard' entries.
The idea of voting by photographer is where I take issue with this. By the very nature of this competition we are trying to decide which is the best photo of the month. The quality, or lack thereof, in each entry should not be related (at least in terms of the voting structure) to the overall quality of entries from one person 'averaged' over time. If a photographer is generally quite good, their photos will reflect this ability. But it is the best quality photo of that particular month irrespective of who took it that we need to consider. For this reason, it would be hard to argue that a points system would not be advantageous. Furthermore, it also means two polls per month instead of one, and with increasing numbers of entries this will become cumbersome!

That wasn't supposed to be a rant - I just haven't posted much on the forum lately so time to get my typing fingers going again!

I don't mind the points based system but my problem is that the result is not known until the end of the month. I like the poll as you can watch the votes coming in and see which way the trend is going.

It's similar argument that was used in Ireland over the last few years when our government bought electronic voting machines to replace the pen and paper. Using the machines the result of all elections would be known half an hour after polls closed instead of our present system where different constituencies give their results at different types. It adds a bit of fun and drama to it. Just my two euro-cents.

Csalem wrote:

I don't mind the points based system but my problem is that the result is not known until the end of the month. I like the poll as you can watch the votes coming in and see which way the trend is going. It's similar argument that was used in Ireland over the last few years when our government bought electronic voting machines to replace the pen and paper. Using the machines the result of all elections would be known half an hour after polls closed instead of our present system where different constituencies give their results at different types. It adds a bit of fun and drama to it. Just my two euro-cents.

I suppose the next best thing to voting by email (which I would still prefer) is if it was possible to allow everyone to vote say, 3 times each, in the poll, for 3 different photos. One way to achieve this would be to 'copy and paste' the voting screen twice more. So there would be 3 identical polls running at the same time. We each take our 3 favourite photos and vote once in each of them. Unless we accumulated hundreds or even thousands of total votes, it would still not take much effort to work out the winner. This way you can see the voting in 'real time' which as Csalem says is nice. You also aren't restricted to tying down your favourite to a single photo.

Csalem wrote:

I don't mind the points based system but my problem is that the result is not known until the end of the month.

My view is that this (voting 1st, 2nd and 3rd) is a better, and farer system. Once a few votes come in, many may vote for the leaders, rather than for say a photo with no votes, simply because they think 'there`s no point voting for that one, it won`t win, so I`ll decide out of the three leading photos.......' for example??

Csalem wrote:

I like the poll as you can watch the votes coming in and see which way the trend is going.

Yes, but does that sometimes sway the voting???

Yep, I'd agree with you on that Jason. I have been swayed more than once by existing votes when casting mine.

Darryl wrote:

Yep, I'd agree with you on that Jason. I have been swayed more than once by existing votes when casting mine.

I've been guilty of that on other forums, which is now not possible for several reasons:

1) All entrants are limited to one photo per month, but then this is a competition where the subject is given at the start of it and the photo does not have to be from that month.

2) In any case, voting only lasts for 7 days on a timed poll.

3) The results used to be viewable before voting, which allowed for influence to be taken from those. These results are now hidden and the results announced soon after the poll closes.

So from that we could use a timed poll (as we did on The Most Beautiful Train some time ago) and we could hide the results until the poll has closed. I don't know if freeforum lets you do this though. The forum on which the above is used uses vBulletin as their software. It's pretty impressive looking, but is still prone to failures.

As for a points system, that could work well and is my favourite method thus far.

I will admit I do like the 3,2,1 system as it can lead to a fairer spread. If we did go back to that then may I suggest we reduce the voting time period from a month to a week? In all fairness most votes are cast in the first week to ten days.

Csalem wrote:

In all fairness most votes are cast in the first week to ten days.

Very true................

It is interesting to read all the comments.
It was only an experiment anyway. and it's still a step forward even if we try something that does not work.