Stay safe

[gstark]

Last night Leigh and I had the pleasure of attending Scar City for the Lizzie Awards night. For those of you who don't know, the Lizzies are the annual awards for journalists in the IT industry. Liegh's radio show, the Gadget Grill, was a nominee. I was there as the producer and co-host of the show, as well as being a judge for the Business Magazines section.

While we didn't win, we did have a good night, and established some new and strengthened some old contacts, all of which should help to strengthen the show for next year. The upshot of that is that it should help us get some more toys for review throughout the year.

On the subject of that sort of thing, Leigh attended a Canon presentation on Wednesday night - they were sort of reintroducing the 5DII, which had us puzzled: why? Dunno.

For the Nikonistas here, there is a launch event this Thursday. Leigh will be in attendance, as I will be travelling to Canberra, playing the blues with Tony Pedrosa as a Hawk. We have seen talk of a new model, rumoured to be the D5000, which looks like an extension of the D40/D60 body style, and has a flip down LCD on the back panel.

I need to get cracking on the judging of the challenge, that should be completed to the stage where you may examine the images later today.

Which brings me to today: Good Friday. It's Easter. Enjoy some time with your family and friends (in NSW you can't do too much else) and please stay safe through the holiday weekend.

[radar]

Gary,

sounds like a great time at the Lizzies

Looking forward to reviews and the gallery for the challenge.

Have fun in Canberra and safe travels.

André

[ATJ]

OK. Here is another example of where an Announcement didn't appear in View new posts - at least for me. I was only aware of this thread because David told me about it on the walk. I was on the site a few times on Friday and I never saw it. There's something screwing going on with the software.

[gstark]

OK. Here is another example of where an Announcement didn't appear in View new posts - at least for me. I was only aware of this thread because David told me about it on the walk. I was on the site a few times on Friday and I never saw it. There's something screwing going on with the software.

I'm seeing the post in there .... at what time on Friday were you not seeing this? I think that the time might be a significant factor here.

[ATJ]

Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that Announcements never show up in View new posts, but rather that they sometimes they don't. There have been a number of others that I have seen without issues and some that I never saw (e.g. the original March Challenge).

I can't be certain what time on Friday I checked. I suspect it may not have been in the morning but almost certainly in the evening a couple of times.

I know at times I have refreshed View new posts in the early morning (2-4am) only to be told there were no new posts, meaning that I had missed a bunch of them.

[gstark]

I can't be certain what time on Friday I checked. I suspect it may not have been in the morning but almost certainly in the evening a couple of times.

I'm pretty sure that there's a bug in the way that the software interacts with the server, and the server's time and timezone.

What I'm seeing is that at midnight Mountain time (the server is in Colorado), "today's" posts disappear. I think that, currently, that's around 4pm SYD time. Last week it was 5p.m.

Even though there's a parameter in the software setup to tell it what time zone the software needs to be configured for, that does not seem to be respected in this screen. Of course, it could also be a misconfiguration on the server at BH. That would not surprise me at all.

I know at times I have refreshed View new posts in the early morning (2-4am) only to be told there were no new posts, meaning that I had missed a bunch of them.

At which point I just switch to the recent topics view, and look at the last 24 hours view.

[ATJ]

At which point I just switch to the recent topics view, and look at the last 24 hours view.

As do I, but if there are SOME posts, I don't do that. If I remember correctly, on Friday night I didn't have the NO posts situation, but the SOME posts one. i.e. there was nothing to suggest that any posts were missing.

[Pa]

Just wondering are the images for the challenge available for viewing as yet....

[Geoff]

Great question !
Gary?

[Mr Darcy]

At which point I just switch to the recent topics view, and look at the last 24 hours view.

As do I, but if there are SOME posts, I don't do that. If I remember correctly, on Friday night I didn't have the NO posts situation, but the SOME posts one. i.e. there was nothing to suggest that any posts were missing.

Gary,
I have these sorts of issues too. (Must be a Blue Mountains thing ) Any chance of making "Last 24 Hours" the default view in "Recent Topics"

[gstark]

Just wondering are the images for the challenge available for viewing as yet....

The gallery is here, but I still need to add names of the photographers to the images. The judging is well under way; we just need to come to some consensus now.

[phillipb]

At which point I just switch to the recent topics view, and look at the last 24 hours view.

As do I, but if there are SOME posts, I don't do that. If I remember correctly, on Friday night I didn't have the NO posts situation, but the SOME posts one. i.e. there was nothing to suggest that any posts were missing.

Gary,
I have these sorts of issues too. (Must be a Blue Mountains thing ) Any chance of making "Last 24 Hours" the default view in "Recent Topics"

I'm seeing this problem too for the first time today. I logged on in the morning and that was fine, I logged on again tonight at 6.30 and it said 0 new threads but when I checked the recent topics tab there were quite a few.

[Reschsmooth]

When are the results expected?

[sirhc55]

When are the results expected?

God only knows Patrick and we all know that God owns this forum

I forwarded my choices over 2 weeks ago

[phillipb]

Must be getting back at us for the "disappointment" we put him through for the lack of entries.

[gstark]

I'm waiting on Leigh to post some secondary choices so that we have some images to discuss.

He's been busy, but also a little recalcitrant. I've also been busy. Hopefully early in the new week.

[phillipb]

Hopefully early in the new week.

...or may be not.

[Pa]

this is becoming a little long winded....can we have a date for the judges decison

[gstark]

this is becoming a little long winded....can we have a date for the judges decison

I would like to, but the judges, like everyone here, are busy people, with lives away from here. SOmetimes those real-world lives need to take priority.

The baseline selections have been made, we need to now discuss those baseline selections and boil the lists down to the winners.

I'm sorry that it has taken as long as it has, but that's life.

[ATJ]

I would like to, but the judges, like everyone here, are busy people, with lives away from here. SOmetimes those real-world lives need to take priority.

Which is also true for the members of DSLRUsers, the ones who were chastised for not putting entries into the challenge some days before it closed.

[gstark]

I would like to, but the judges, like everyone here, are busy people, with lives away from here. SOmetimes those real-world lives need to take priority.

Which is also true for the members of DSLRUsers, the ones who were chastised for not putting entries into the challenge some days before it closed.

and they had a whole month to put in their entries. The judging typically is done within days; this time it is three weeks.

At the time I wrote my chastisement, there were all of FOUR entries

FOUR FRICKEN ENTRIES!

There would have been nothing worth judging!

Give me a bloody break!

[Mr Darcy]

At the time ... there were all of FOUR entries
...
There would have been nothing worth judging!

So the early entries are not on the short list for winning then. Hmm.
That means that the people who took the time to get it right were probably on the right track.

[gstark]

At the time ... there were all of FOUR entries
...
There would have been nothing worth judging!

So the early entries are not on the short list for winning then. Hmm.
That means that the people who took the time to get it right were probably on the right track.

Not at all.

It means very bloody simply - that with just four entries, I would have just cancelled the whole bloody thing, as it simply was not worth my time to do all of the organisation etc.

With just four entries, quite frankly, I would not be bothered to extract them from the emails, upload them to the display website, and then have the judges go through the judging processes. Would you?

I have much more respect for the time and resources of the judges than this discussion indicates that some of you might have.

As I said, give us a bloody break!

[Mr Darcy]

With just four entries, quite frankly, I would not be bothered to extract them from the emails, upload them to the display website, and then have the judges go through the judging processes. Would you?

Yes I would have. To do otherwise would be unfair to the four who entered. There was no clause indicating a quorum of entries was required for judging to proceed.

The judging process is no longer transparent. We do not know who the judges are, nor their workloads. We do know our own, however. After making a commitment to make the time to enter and being harangued for poor response, then having been made the promise of "Early next week" for results, it is neither surprising nor unreasonable for comments to be made when that promise is not met.

Time for a BEX and... I think

[gstark]

With just four entries, quite frankly, I would not be bothered to extract them from the emails, upload them to the display website, and then have the judges go through the judging processes. Would you?

Yes I would have. To do otherwise would be unfair to the four who entered. There was no clause indicating a quorum of entries was required for judging to proceed.

Be that as it may, to proceed with just four entries is wasteful of my time and resources, and disrespectful to the time and resources of those who are good enough to offer their time and resources for the judging and the prizes.

Four entries is not a competition. As we have done in the past (with PotW), I would rather withhold the awards etc and reuse them somewhere more worthy than just do them because somebody thinks they should be done. In the case of just four entries, not proceeding is far more dignified, and far more worthy than going ahead "just because".

But we do have more than four entries, so that discussion is moot.

The judging process is no longer transparent. We do not know who the judges are, nor their workloads.

That is simply not correct. It has been made very clear who the judges are: Chris, Leigh, and myself. Chris, quite correctly, made a statement many days ago that he had made his selection. I responded by stating that Leigh was very busy, and that I was trying to attend to finalisation of the process around Leigh's schedule.

Leigh has now completed the initial part of the judging, and we are now looking at the final selections to complete the process.

Regarding the workloads of the judges: these are, with respect, none of your business. If somebody here tells me that they have a busy schedule, I have no choice but to accept their statements at face value. Their participation here is entirely voluntary, and as such, nobody - not me, and not you - has any right whatsoever to criticise the participation of volunteers offering to help in this forum.

I see that as a very different form of participation when compared with the entering of a challenge, where you have, say, one month to create your entry and submit it.

The uploading of the images to the display site is quite a time consuming task. So to is the judging, if it is to be done seriously, which is something I am sure you would expect.

We do know our own, however. After making a commitment to make the time to enter and being harangued for poor response,

And what would you call the submission of four entries after almost a month, if not a poor effort on the part of the 600 or so active members that this forum has? In point of fact, I would consider that three members, each with busy schedules, have been able to almost complete the judging process in less time is pretty bloody good, IMHO.

Let's please now end this bleating, because I do have a very busy schedule at the moment, and I have better things to do than argue this point interminably.

If you are unhappy with the processes under which the challenges are run ... with the level of spontaneous support that this challenge engendered, why should I bother?

[Reschsmooth]

It has been made very clear who the judges are: Chris, Leigh, and myself.

With all due respect Gary, the initial indication was that it was just you and Chris judging:

judging will be by a panel including Chris (sirch55) and myself

Fair enough, it can be argued that "including" is a non-exhaustive word and there may be other judges, but I hope you can appreciate the feeling of lack of transparency.

Let's please now end this bleating, because I do have a very busy schedule at the moment, and I have better things to do than argue this point interminably.

Agreed

[surenj]

Time for a BEX and... I think

I wouldn't. I thought BEX caused cancer if you are unlucky. If you were lucky it packed up ya kidneys. Out of curiosity, do you have a stash hidden somewhere?

[who]

Meh.... who gives a.....................

Ultimately - its a forum..... not the end of the world! I haven't entered anything or posted many pics as I don't get done in a week what I need to, let alone want to. So I won't insult people with crappy pics that I am not happy with.

Actually, as a matter of fact, I haven't had the time to PP any pics in a very long time, but I try to keep up to date with what happens...... I actually dragged out some pics I took in Sep 07 and cringed over the quality, so I have come a fair way (both in equipment and skills, but still haven't got much compared to many here.).

On the specific topic - I couldn't think of anything good for globes or gargolyes....... Can't think of a gargolye locally (in NW Tas) either