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	<title>Comments on: Cheating, lack of accountability &amp; lack of enforcement in online contests</title>
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		<title>By: Rick Carufel</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-4/#comment-202200</link>
		<dc:creator>Rick Carufel</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 06 Sep 2011 16:10:54 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-202200</guid>
		<description>I am having similar problems with a writing site.  They promote their contest as skill-based writing contests but the ten finalists are chosen by member voting and they encourage entrants to get friends to join the site and vote for them.  The final ten are judged by a panel of judges for the prizes.  They also allow older members with huge friends lists to promote their and freinds books with mass PMs in the area of 800+.  I have complained about how unfair their contests are, which pay $600 for first place and I have been told if I say anything else negative on the site I will be banned.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>I am having similar problems with a writing site.  They promote their contest as skill-based writing contests but the ten finalists are chosen by member voting and they encourage entrants to get friends to join the site and vote for them.  The final ten are judged by a panel of judges for the prizes.  They also allow older members with huge friends lists to promote their and freinds books with mass PMs in the area of 800+.  I have complained about how unfair their contests are, which pay $600 for first place and I have been told if I say anything else negative on the site I will be banned.</p>
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		<title>By: Brandon</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-4/#comment-166462</link>
		<dc:creator>Brandon</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 07 Dec 2010 17:59:39 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-166462</guid>
		<description>please vote for my daughter. I am experiencing the same thing and she was at top till one day a baby picture generated 560 votes within matter of hours. http://www.gerber.com/photo/?entryid=217038&amp;/#/detail/</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>please vote for my daughter. I am experiencing the same thing and she was at top till one day a baby picture generated 560 votes within matter of hours. <a href="http://www.gerber.com/photo/?entryid=217038&#038;/#/detail/" rel="nofollow">http://www.gerber.com/photo/?entryid=217038&#038;/#/detail/</a></p>
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		<title>By: Kelly</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-4/#comment-163296</link>
		<dc:creator>Kelly</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 15 Nov 2010 05:44:47 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-163296</guid>
		<description>I was wondering the same thing about the Gerber contest.  I&#039;ve been keeping tabs on the babies with more votes than mine and I&#039;m very curious as to how several of them suddenly had hundreds and hundreds of votes.  I&#039;m hoping that if you find out anything more you will post about it.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>I was wondering the same thing about the Gerber contest.  I&#8217;ve been keeping tabs on the babies with more votes than mine and I&#8217;m very curious as to how several of them suddenly had hundreds and hundreds of votes.  I&#8217;m hoping that if you find out anything more you will post about it.</p>
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		<title>By: Kim</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-4/#comment-160214</link>
		<dc:creator>Kim</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 19 Oct 2010 12:54:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-160214</guid>
		<description>Jocelyn,

A friend of mine entered a contest recently where there was cheating but luckily the company hired to run the online contest had some of of knowing and disqualified the cheaters.

Good luck to you, it really is a shame people don&#039;t have better values.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Jocelyn,</p>
<p>A friend of mine entered a contest recently where there was cheating but luckily the company hired to run the online contest had some of of knowing and disqualified the cheaters.</p>
<p>Good luck to you, it really is a shame people don&#8217;t have better values.</p>
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		<title>By: Jocelyn</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-4/#comment-160188</link>
		<dc:creator>Jocelyn</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 19 Oct 2010 06:04:21 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-160188</guid>
		<description>My daughter is currently in the Gerber Generation photo contest, I started keeping tabs on the competition and by the first 2 weeks of the contest one kid surpassed the 1000 vote mark, and now by this 3rd week 2 others have also. I have done research online and I have found that people are PAYING people on freelance websites for Gerber votes. I hope Gerber investigates b/c its really not fair to those of us who use honest means to solicit votes. Its really unfair b/c no matter how hard you try you can&#039;t really catch up. I&#039;m just in it for fun now and in hopes that in the end the cheaters will be found out. I agree people need to be held accountable for their actions! What kind of tone would companies like Gerber and others be setting by rewarding cheaters. They can check IP addresses and have limited the vote to one vote per computer per email today but it really has done nothing to police and limit the cheating. But in the end will they really check and go through such extensive investigation? It&#039;s really sad when people stoop so low as to cheat in an online baby photo contest : (</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>My daughter is currently in the Gerber Generation photo contest, I started keeping tabs on the competition and by the first 2 weeks of the contest one kid surpassed the 1000 vote mark, and now by this 3rd week 2 others have also. I have done research online and I have found that people are PAYING people on freelance websites for Gerber votes. I hope Gerber investigates b/c its really not fair to those of us who use honest means to solicit votes. Its really unfair b/c no matter how hard you try you can&#8217;t really catch up. I&#8217;m just in it for fun now and in hopes that in the end the cheaters will be found out. I agree people need to be held accountable for their actions! What kind of tone would companies like Gerber and others be setting by rewarding cheaters. They can check IP addresses and have limited the vote to one vote per computer per email today but it really has done nothing to police and limit the cheating. But in the end will they really check and go through such extensive investigation? It&#8217;s really sad when people stoop so low as to cheat in an online baby photo contest : (</p>
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		<title>By: Tracy Rose</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-4/#comment-136861</link>
		<dc:creator>Tracy Rose</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 08 Mar 2010 22:33:14 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-136861</guid>
		<description>My son in currently entered into the Next-Direct modeling contest. Grand Prize...100k college scholarship. I am having the same problem...no matter how many votes I get in a day..it seem we can&#039;t catch up.. something fishy is definatley going on. But I&#039;m determined to keep trying the honest way...
so, I would love for you to help out by voting for my 5 yr old son eli!
http://apps.facebook.com/next_direct/gallery/show_entry/21193

Thanks a bunch!</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>My son in currently entered into the Next-Direct modeling contest. Grand Prize&#8230;100k college scholarship. I am having the same problem&#8230;no matter how many votes I get in a day..it seem we can&#8217;t catch up.. something fishy is definatley going on. But I&#8217;m determined to keep trying the honest way&#8230;<br />
so, I would love for you to help out by voting for my 5 yr old son eli!<br />
<a href="http://apps.facebook.com/next_direct/gallery/show_entry/21193" rel="nofollow">http://apps.facebook.com/next_direct/gallery/show_entry/21193</a></p>
<p>Thanks a bunch!</p>
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		<title>By: Adam Ray</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-4/#comment-128678</link>
		<dc:creator>Adam Ray</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sun, 06 Dec 2009 04:44:27 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-128678</guid>
		<description>On the bright side those cheaters who won may have a brilliant career in Climate Science.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>On the bright side those cheaters who won may have a brilliant career in Climate Science.</p>
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		<title>By: Graham Strong</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-3/#comment-127263</link>
		<dc:creator>Graham Strong</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 01 Dec 2009 21:29:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-127263</guid>
		<description>The Class Act Canada contest is now history….and I guess the outcome was rather predictable…. The judges were faced with an unenviable dilemma. Having failed at the outset to recognize the vulnerability of the voting protocols to contamination from mechanized voting; having failed to explicitly identify this behavior as “cheating” with concomitant penalties for offenders; having provided so-inclined contestants with two preparatory contest phases over which they could hone their voting protocols; having failed to redress such inequitable practices during the final phase of the contest; with so many contestants having obviously availed themselves of this data-embellishment opportunity; and having publicly boasted that the contest attracted  4,340,441 votes (with legitimacy implied); Class Act Canada is left with no ethical high ground from which a compelling adjudication could occur. It becomes impossible to discount the manifest vote numbers without publicly conceding the vulnerability of the voting process to automated manipulation. Having done this, the logical damage control options would be to dismiss this factor as inconsequential “noise” in the voting process; or to suggest that there was a level playing field because all contestants had identical opportunities to “cheat” the system; or to suggest that the profundity of some contestant presentations was sufficient to overcome huge voting disparities.  In the end, I suppose each of the judges was left to select the “Class Act Canada champions” based on her or his personal adjudication of everything that occurred safe in the knowledge that the results are immutable.  I gather that winners are “required to correctly answer, without assistance of any kind, whether mechanical or otherwise, a time-limited mathematical skill-testing question” in order to claim their prizes. May I suggest the following question? 
Calculate (1+?)
I expect that some of the “Class Act Canada champions” may correctly respond that the answer is 4.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375105820974944592307816406286208998628034825342117067982148086513282306647093844609550582231725359408128481117450284102701938521105559644622948954930381964428810975665933446128475648233786783165271201909145648566923460348610454326648213393607260249141273724587006606315588174881520920962829254091715364367892590360011330530548820466521384146951941511609... 

When this happens, the judges might question whether a prospective Class Act Canada champion could be cheating. However, it would seem rather late in the game to be concerned about contestant integrity, so I think you should just give them the benefit of the doubt...as you already you have throughout Phases two and three of the contest. On the bright side for Sprott Shaw, you now have some excellent intelligence concerning potential gaps and redundancies in your current curricula at Sprott Shaw. Based on the manifest skill sets of the contest “winners”, you can certainly reduce significantly the amount of time devoted to computing studies. The time freed up might logically be devoted to selected topics in Applied Ethics. These courses typically entail “the philosophical examination, from a moral standpoint, of particular issues in private and public life that are matters of moral judgment.&quot; The first assignment could focus on contrasting deontological (&quot;the ends do not justify the means&quot;) and teleological (&quot;the ends justify the means&quot;) theories with respect to winning admission to Sprott Shaw College. The challenge may be to find someone at Sprott Shaw with the audacity to teach such a course.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>The Class Act Canada contest is now history….and I guess the outcome was rather predictable…. The judges were faced with an unenviable dilemma. Having failed at the outset to recognize the vulnerability of the voting protocols to contamination from mechanized voting; having failed to explicitly identify this behavior as “cheating” with concomitant penalties for offenders; having provided so-inclined contestants with two preparatory contest phases over which they could hone their voting protocols; having failed to redress such inequitable practices during the final phase of the contest; with so many contestants having obviously availed themselves of this data-embellishment opportunity; and having publicly boasted that the contest attracted  4,340,441 votes (with legitimacy implied); Class Act Canada is left with no ethical high ground from which a compelling adjudication could occur. It becomes impossible to discount the manifest vote numbers without publicly conceding the vulnerability of the voting process to automated manipulation. Having done this, the logical damage control options would be to dismiss this factor as inconsequential “noise” in the voting process; or to suggest that there was a level playing field because all contestants had identical opportunities to “cheat” the system; or to suggest that the profundity of some contestant presentations was sufficient to overcome huge voting disparities.  In the end, I suppose each of the judges was left to select the “Class Act Canada champions” based on her or his personal adjudication of everything that occurred safe in the knowledge that the results are immutable.  I gather that winners are “required to correctly answer, without assistance of any kind, whether mechanical or otherwise, a time-limited mathematical skill-testing question” in order to claim their prizes. May I suggest the following question?<br />
Calculate (1+?)<br />
I expect that some of the “Class Act Canada champions” may correctly respond that the answer is 4.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375105820974944592307816406286208998628034825342117067982148086513282306647093844609550582231725359408128481117450284102701938521105559644622948954930381964428810975665933446128475648233786783165271201909145648566923460348610454326648213393607260249141273724587006606315588174881520920962829254091715364367892590360011330530548820466521384146951941511609&#8230; </p>
<p>When this happens, the judges might question whether a prospective Class Act Canada champion could be cheating. However, it would seem rather late in the game to be concerned about contestant integrity, so I think you should just give them the benefit of the doubt&#8230;as you already you have throughout Phases two and three of the contest. On the bright side for Sprott Shaw, you now have some excellent intelligence concerning potential gaps and redundancies in your current curricula at Sprott Shaw. Based on the manifest skill sets of the contest “winners”, you can certainly reduce significantly the amount of time devoted to computing studies. The time freed up might logically be devoted to selected topics in Applied Ethics. These courses typically entail “the philosophical examination, from a moral standpoint, of particular issues in private and public life that are matters of moral judgment.&#8221; The first assignment could focus on contrasting deontological (&#8220;the ends do not justify the means&#8221;) and teleological (&#8220;the ends justify the means&#8221;) theories with respect to winning admission to Sprott Shaw College. The challenge may be to find someone at Sprott Shaw with the audacity to teach such a course.</p>
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		<title>By: Kim</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-3/#comment-111515</link>
		<dc:creator>Kim</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 09 Nov 2009 01:05:00 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-111515</guid>
		<description>Elmi,
I&#039;m sorry you had such a rotten experience, I too am pretty disillusioned with online contest that require voting.  Like Graham said, it sounds like your kids can be proud of your efforts though.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Elmi,<br />
I&#8217;m sorry you had such a rotten experience, I too am pretty disillusioned with online contest that require voting.  Like Graham said, it sounds like your kids can be proud of your efforts though.</p>
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		<title>By: Kim</title>
		<link>http://accidentalmommies.com/cheating-in-online-contests/comment-page-3/#comment-111514</link>
		<dc:creator>Kim</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 09 Nov 2009 01:02:46 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://accidentalmommies.com/?p=15041#comment-111514</guid>
		<description>Graham,
I hope they listen to your obviously intelligent reasoning on this matter and really examine the voting and the trends and the obvious improbability of some of the vote counts.
I hope that you will come back here and report that they chose ethics...sadly I&#039;m not optimistic but I hope I am wrong.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Graham,<br />
I hope they listen to your obviously intelligent reasoning on this matter and really examine the voting and the trends and the obvious improbability of some of the vote counts.<br />
I hope that you will come back here and report that they chose ethics&#8230;sadly I&#8217;m not optimistic but I hope I am wrong.</p>
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