Contest Nominations Page & Praised Comments

We have several members returning or becoming active again and there seems to be a bit of confusion as to the weekly contest. I'm putting this explanation out here to help everyone understand the "new" process.

A couple of years ago we had Janis change the contest page. It used to be that judges voted during the week and their votes moved nominated poems up the nominations page.

In order to prevent the judges from knowing how the others were voting we had Janis set the nominations page to list the poems in random order. That change brought a whole new order of problems, since the judges would select the poems, but then had to search through all nominated poems for their selections. When Janis changed the site we had him leave them static, so now the poems are ordered in the sequence of nomination.

Also, under the rules we established at that time, judges do not vote until the weekend. Additionally nominations are blocked beginning Friday night at midnight (PnQ time) and remain blocked for the weekend. This allows the judges to read all nominated poems before voting.

At the same time we did away with the term "senior member" and replaced it with "nominator status" which enables that member to nominate poems to the weekly contest. Nominator status, reflected by a gold C badge, is achieved once the member has earned 10 praised comments.

Finally, we tightened up the criteria for approving praised comments. Mere glowing praise for a poem, however long, should not be approved, even where the poem is extensively quoted. There must be some cogent analysis, some meaningful feedback or at least substantial suggestions for improvement. Each comment is assessed on a case-by-case basis. With seven mods and since it is a subjective process, the results must vary.

If you wish further conversation on the matter, please feel free to comment.

**

Bumping again :)

Nice

Is it just me or should this be a sticky thread?

One request to make, try to focus on new members, especially those who are not supported a club or a friend. A good piece always worth voting and Winning as well.

You can tell if you are nominator status if when you read a poem there is a message below it that says:

"As a member of P&Q who has reached nominator status, you can participate in choosing the winners of weekly poetry contest. You can vote for 3 poems each week.

Weekly contest : [VOTE]"

Figure this should be somewhere easily accessible.
List of the awards, what they mean, and the criteria for getting them:

***
F award - How many people have you on their favourites list.

Pink - 5-19
Blue - 20-49
Gold - 50-99
Platinum - 100+

***
C award: Critique award: How many praised comments you have.

Pink C - 50+ comments
Blue C - 3-9 praised comments
Gold C - 9-29 praised comments
Platinum C - 30+ praised comments

(Note: You need 10 praised comments to gain nominator status, i.e. to get the ability to nominate poems for the weekly contest on the front page.)

***
P award: Number of poems posted on your account

Pink P - 30-99 poems
Blue P - 100-199 poems
Gold P - 200-399 poems
Platinum P - 400+ poems

***
D award: Discussion award (number of posts made in forums)

Pink D - 50-199 posts
Blue D - 200-499 posts
Gold D - 500-999 posts
Platinum D - 1000+ posts

I wholeheartedly agree.
As a "newbie" here who only signed on just yesterday, I find myself staring at those colored letters in tiny boxes beside many member names, saying, "I wonder what those are for?"

I am so glad I found this, even if its by accident.
As a new member I had no idea what the awards were for or the nomination thingy.
I agree this info should be on an 'about p&q' on the front page, along with info about nominations and the requirements.
Like I said I found this by accident, but had earlier sent a message to moderators to ask these very things.
Thanks
PPx

With all the changes, how do we praise a comment?
Ive noticed a few people have been putting in depth comments on things and been wanting to praise, but havent seen the button?

There's a button that says praise that appears under the comment.

Thanks :( i just cant see it appearing for me

are you on mobile or on a computer?

are you happened to be zoomed in or zoomed out?

this is how it looks on pc: https://gyazo.com/e9a8f287d4490bde129af1cb66313f93