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New Policy for Competition Free For All - Read Before Posting a Contest!


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#1 Faken

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Posted 25 February 2007 - 08:02 PM

Hello everyone,

In an effort to protect our members and community, I would like to announce the following policy changes in regards to posting competition announcements in our Competition Free-For-All forum. For those of you that don't know, P2L has a FFA forum dedicated to people that want to run competitions and advertise them on our site. Unfortunately people have seen fit to take advantage of this free service and run contests to score themselves free labor and not deliver on their advertised prizes.

From now on, anyone looking to announce or run a contest on our forums that involves a prize consisting of cash or goods must do the following:

1. Contact me (Faken) via email or PM to advise me of the contest you wish to run with a complete breakdown of the contest (Theme, timeline, prize(s), rules etc...) before you post anything. Unless you have permission from me, do not post a new contest.

2. In some circumstances I will allow you to run the contest with no further questions asked. This will be based on your reputation. If I know you well and feel I can trust you, you will be able to post your contest.

3. If I do not know you very well or do not have 100% trust in your ability to pony up the prizes, you will be asked to use me as an Escrow service. This means that if you are offering cash, you will be expected to send the funds to me in the form of Paypal or certified check or money order. If you are offering goods that you will be shipping to the winner, you will be asked to send the item(s) to me to be held until the winner is selected. I will then ship the items directly to the winner or make the payment. I will require the prize money or items in my possession BEFORE any contest is announced.

If you are asked to use P2L as an escrow, don't be offended... we're here to protect you and the other members of this forum to ensure that all future contests are held with integrity and in a manner that is trustworthy and reliable. If anyone has any concerns or questions about these rules, please contact me directly or post below.

Thanks,
Dan

#2 Canen Art

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Posted 25 February 2007 - 08:14 PM

I think more people will feel safer to do some of these contest with prizes if they know that the contest holder has to follow a set of rules to ensure the winner gets there prize.

Regards,

Jason :)

#3 Donna

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Posted 25 February 2007 - 08:31 PM

Thanks for posting this it's much needed. :)

Have also added it into the Announcement at the top of the Comp Forum.

#4 Bug

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Posted 25 February 2007 - 08:52 PM

Hey, great idea, Faken!!

Hopefully this should all go a lot smoother now :)

#5 Dance

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Posted 25 February 2007 - 09:27 PM

Does this meen that if the prize offered consists of goods there are going to be a dubble shipping cost geting the goods both to you and from you after the contest winner is selected? Because if the prize is a 7kg PS3 box and both the award winner and the contest announcer lives in, lets say Hongkong. The shipping costs could get nasty. Or is there away to get around this?

Edited by Dance, 25 February 2007 - 09:27 PM.


#6 austen

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Posted 25 February 2007 - 09:45 PM

This policy has needed to be instituted for quite a while now, nice job.

-austen

#7 Faken

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Posted 25 February 2007 - 10:04 PM

Does this meen that if the prize offered consists of goods there are going to be a dubble shipping cost geting the goods both to you and from you after the contest winner is selected? Because if the prize is a 7kg PS3 box and both the award winner and the contest announcer lives in, lets say Hongkong. The shipping costs could get nasty. Or is there away to get around this?


Thant's the way the cookie crumbles I'm afraid.

#8 dEcade

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Posted 25 February 2007 - 11:10 PM

This policy sounds good to me. I think it will work out well.

dEcade

#9 Hoot

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Posted 26 February 2007 - 10:51 AM

Dan's house will be full of other peoples stuff :ninja: Anyway great idea Dan, I am SURE this will make people feel a lot better entering contests.

Hoot

#10 α∂αмяoss

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Posted 26 February 2007 - 01:45 PM

This will hopefully give people a second thought on joining in on some of these competitions. i know alot of them are extremely fun and totally worth the time until the contest owner vanishes from the face of the earth. I hope this new policy really works for the best. Knowing that you trust the contest owners makes me trust them too.

Have a nice day,

Adam Ross

#11 Matthew.

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Posted 26 February 2007 - 02:10 PM

Some good some bad points imo.

Contacting you to create a new completion...good.

Using you as an escrow service...i could live with it but no offence i wouldn't have full confidence in doing it. (I do not like the idea of sending my money to a third party to be 'held')

Sending actual prize goods to you...that's ridiculous imo. That's double postage, that's trusting a third party with an actual item and regardless of the fact i don't mistrust you...there's no way i would go that far and i wouldn't be surprised to see other people take that attitude. The item would have to be insured to you (which from here in the UK would cost a stupid amount for something like a games console), and besides that you yourself are leaving yourself liable if the item is found not to work after being reshipped to the winner. Again you shipping the item would be something i would not be willing to leave with you as could not guarantee it would have been send nor could i have any direct input if there was a problem. It's like asking a homeless guy to hold your wallet. I don't know you any more than i know anyone else on this forum, the idea of shipping anything tangible (valuable) to you certainly doesn't appeal.

Also what if these competitions are to be held cross forums, would prizes be sent to you then? I am sure the contest holders would want the contest held at both their own site and p2l...I wouldn't want to have you hold anything in that case.

I would quite happily welcome a fee to post in the contest sections over these rules, it may not deter some people from attempting to post fraudulent competitions...may depending on the size it may deter most, certainly those not 100% serious about the competition.

Right idea, wrongly executed in regards to the actual prizes, to me.

Matt

Edited by Matthew., 26 February 2007 - 02:16 PM.


#12 Donna

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Posted 26 February 2007 - 02:38 PM

It's like asking a homeless guy to hold your wallet. I don't know you any more than i know anyone else on this forum, the idea of shipping anything tangible (valuable) to you certainly doesn't appeal.

Your right you don't know Dan from a bar of soap but a simple search on the web would show you if he was a scammer, this is being done to protect members not to abuse and scam them, am pretty sure Dan will automatically okay the majority without them having to do anything or sending any goods, this is mainly directed to newer unknown members whom post up submit tutorials/logo comps etc they take the goods and ideas and make a profit from adsense etc and never pay up the prizes and this is happening more and more so good members like yourself are being used.

Also what if these competitions are to be held cross forums, would prizes be sent to you then? I am sure the contest holders would want the contest held at both their own site and p2l...I wouldn't want to have you hold anything in that case.


Majority of them are held off site and P2L is used as advertising them etc, many times in the last few months members have been scammed from here, paying a fee is a good idea but it doesn't work 100% on other sites I've seen fee or not.

#13 Matthew.

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Posted 26 February 2007 - 03:12 PM

It's like asking a homeless guy to hold your wallet. I don't know you any more than i know anyone else on this forum, the idea of shipping anything tangible (valuable) to you certainly doesn't appeal.

Your right you don't know Dan from a bar of soap but a simple search on the web would show you if he was a scammer, this is being done to protect members not to abuse and scam them, am pretty sure Dan will automatically okay the majority without them having to do anything or sending any goods, this is mainly directed to newer unknown members whom post up submit tutorials/logo comps etc they take the goods and ideas and make a profit from adsense etc and never pay up the prizes and this is happening more and more so good members like yourself are being used.


I completely agree, i do not think Dan act in any way but honestly but to take a real life example...Tysoft (serverseed for those who don't know) was a friend of Dan and i remember Dan posting several times that this was unlike him.

Sending valuable goods and large sums of money to be held is beyond the limit i have on trusting people i don't know :closedeyes:

Matt

#14 Faken

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Posted 26 February 2007 - 03:37 PM

Then quite seriously, don't advertise your contests here, it's that simple. If you want to use P2L as a springboard for your contest and I don't know who you are, then you'll need to pony up the goods so we know you're legit.

I understand that it logistically causes problems, but I'm sure anyone that has already been scammed on here by contest operators will see where I am coming from, and you can bet that you will get a lot more participation from this community if they know I have the actual prizes ready to go in-hand.

Btw, if someone wants to offer up a gaming system or something, I can actually pick it up locally and I can cover shipping if required, doesn't bother me. Then you just have to cover the cost of the purchase.

Dan

#15 Donna

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Posted 26 February 2007 - 03:43 PM

It's like asking a homeless guy to hold your wallet. I don't know you any more than i know anyone else on this forum, the idea of shipping anything tangible (valuable) to you certainly doesn't appeal.

Your right you don't know Dan from a bar of soap but a simple search on the web would show you if he was a scammer, this is being done to protect members not to abuse and scam them, am pretty sure Dan will automatically okay the majority without them having to do anything or sending any goods, this is mainly directed to newer unknown members whom post up submit tutorials/logo comps etc they take the goods and ideas and make a profit from adsense etc and never pay up the prizes and this is happening more and more so good members like yourself are being used.


I completely agree, i do not think Dan act in any way but honestly but to take a real life example...Tysoft (serverseed for those who don't know) was a friend of Dan and i remember Dan posting several times that this was unlike him.

Sending valuable goods and large sums of money to be held is beyond the limit i have on trusting people i don't know :closedeyes:

Matt


Serverseed was offering a service not a competition, quite different and as you know the best of us were caught up in that.

I'm 100% sure Dan would not risk his reputation and site all for the sake of a measely $2-300, anyways as I wrote I'd say the majority will be approved without having to do anything.

#16 Canen Art

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Posted 26 February 2007 - 07:20 PM

I look at it like this. If you are willing to spend $300 to $600 or even more on a prize then shipping any where in the world shouldn't be an issue, if you are legit about your contest. If shipping is a big deal then put restrictions as to where you will only ship to and only people in these areas can be a part of the contest. It's just that simple.

Regards,

Jason :)

#17 PixelHiveDesign

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Posted 27 February 2007 - 12:08 PM

I think the policy has worthy intentions and it says a lot about how much P2L cares about it's visitors. However, the competition postings are not frequent and they rarely (I can't remember ever) offer physical prizes. So, I'm not concerned with shipping costs but the extra step will probably turn away potential contest hosts from an already slow topic.

Here's what I think:
Make a real contest system. There is a lot you could develop but at bare minimum, give contest hosts a standard form to fill out with required fields. Then stick a shiney icon on your navigation and watch your contest community explode 2Life! Think about it...

#18 Bug

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Posted 27 February 2007 - 04:47 PM

They're probably already secretly doing this as we speak <3

#19 drcrazy4

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Posted 28 February 2007 - 03:43 PM

So how long does a PM reply take?

#20 Rony

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Posted 12 December 2007 - 03:27 AM

nice initiatives. i need to start an contest. PM sent to FAKEN




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