Competitions Discussion Thread Part 12

purplecatlover

iwannabeonthebeach wrote: »

i would hate the magazine comps being on one thread. I find the hardest comps to enter now are the puzzler ones because it takes me ages to find where i last left off.
also the enter button is only valid on the first post. so if it was posted today, 20/11 and i clicked enter, then next week's are posted as post 2, it would still show that i had entered when actually i hadn't

i subscribe to these threads so i get an email when a new comp is posted. that way when i have 5mins i follow the first email link i received, which takes me to the first post posted after i was last in the thread. or i click on the last page, load the previous pagea nd go abckwards through the few pages until i find one which i have thanked at the top, at worst i then have to go forward a page to hit the first unthanked post. by thanking every single post in the thread i know where i ahve gotten up to and as i try and keep up its usually only one or two posts at a time that i need to enter so 5 mins to do so is enough.

if emails dont work there is always the user cp which shows all subscribed threads that have been posted in...thats how i know when i want to check this thread since it gets too many emails for instant notification and daily notification just bugs me.

re the mag ones being in an individual thread instead of a new thread each week...if theyre in an indivual thread, its one post in it per week. the way you enter them now you enter one comp per week, but its a new thread. it would simply be a matter of book marking the current thread and checking the last post in it once a week.

i think a trial period of using regular boards properly is an excellent idea. a decent couple of months trial then if majority of people still hate it can go abck to them all being jumbled in on main and getting lost amongst the hundreds of single entry posts.

spreadsheets....i cant use them, thus i use the daily/weekly thread to keep track of those comps (and unthank and rethank each day so i know if ive entered that day or not). means i miss comps that get removed form threads because the posted end date has been reached but thats my tough luck basically for relying on those threads. also means i miss any that are not posted to those threads for whatever reason. well done those of you who can do spreadsheets, glad it works for you and you can keep track that way etc, persoanlly i find the regular threads far easier. cant remembner what my point was to that now lol

korky give up trying to figure the reg board out as it is atm. threads get posted, people dont use them, they get duplicated on main, eg the phones for you one i posted a while ago which got bumped successfully with new comps for a while but then also started getting posted on main as a separate comp which meant those of us using the thread to enter duplicated (ahem well some of us with rubbish memories did ie me) entries since the new thread on main made no mention of it being a regular comp whose prize/question and end date changed sort of on a weekly basis. i gave up thinking about it at that point and stopped entering unless i find it on main..which means now i am missing comps because unlike in the thread where it was easy to see if the newest was already there and post it if not its hard to find if its already on main by searching, every comp doesnt get posted on main, some get missed but as i cant be sure im not going to find them on main at some point i cannot enter them when/if they go in the thread since a post on main i havent seen wont have the thanks or entered button checked. iyswim.

if everyone used the regs board, if threads got bumped each time a new comp was added, and it was used properly then it would be easier to see how it works. yes some threads will still fall to the back, but if instead of reposting those on main every day/week or month someone was to bump the thread to say enter again now (as happens with some comps on main atm) then they woudlnt be lost forever.

Ms_Chocaholic

I've found a list of emails, tel nos and names of entrants into a competition but I'm not sure which site the competition was on. My details are on there.

Can anyone tell me who I should report it to so it can be removed - there's no obvious link to the site.

Thanks

fire**fly

purplecatlover wrote: »

korky give up trying to figure the reg board out as it is atm. threads get posted, people dont use them, they get duplicated on main, eg the phones for you one i posted a while ago which got bumped successfully with new comps for a while but then also started getting posted on main as a separate comp which meant those of us using the thread to enter duplicated (ahem well some of us with rubbish memories did ie me) entries since the new thread on main made no mention of it being a regular comp whose prize/question and end date changed sort of on a weekly basis. i gave up thinking about it at that point and stopped entering unless i find it on main..which means now i am missing comps because unlike in the thread where it was easy to see if the newest was already there and post it if not its hard to find if its already on main by searching, every comp doesnt get posted on main, some get missed but as i cant be sure im not going to find them on main at some point i cannot enter them when/if they go in the thread since a post on main i havent seen wont have the thanks or entered button checked. iyswim.

if everyone used the regs board, if threads got bumped each time a new comp was added, and it was used properly then it would be easier to see how it works. yes some threads will still fall to the back, but if instead of reposting those on main every day/week or month someone was to bump the thread to say enter again now (as happens with some comps on main atm) then they woudlnt be lost forever.

thank you pcl, makes perfect sense now :A :A

Cyynika63

My head's spinning too. But I thought i'd get in my 1p's worth...

Although I do use the daily threads a couple of times a week, I've rarely managed to venture as far as the weeklies.

So, for me (and anyone like me) it would be better to list the competitions ALL on the main board.

My suggestion is simply to amend the titles of the dailies/weeklies so that instead of reading E: 30/12 they would read ONGOING (WEEKLY) E: 30/12 or ONGOING (DAILY) E: 30/12 or ONGOING (MONTHLY). I don't see why a year couldn't be added for those with no announced end date.

Easy to search, easy to manage, easy to enter.

I like easy :P

Sorry if it's been suggested already. I've read as many suggestions as I could :P

finatra26

A quick question - I have just ventured into the advents for the first time (thanks Toni for the hard work & lovely thread) how do I thank the OP for the comps they have found - I think I am just being a bit blond here but when I click on the link it takes me straight to the comp - I don't like entering comps without thanking the OP

becca_wecca

Can someone help please....

For the life of me I cant work out how you can arrange the boards so you have all the comps ending soon together....I've read the comping guide but I really can't work it out

twotimes

No offence to any of the people that support this particular idea, but I personally really think the idea of posting more than one competition in the same thread (one thread for each website) is a terrible one.

• It would mean there were hundreds and hundreds of threads on the board just getting bumped all the time that I would have to open constantly to see what had been posted inside.
• Not every new bump would be a new competition as there will always be posts that contain extra information or new answers, so a lot of the time I would be opening these threads for no reason.
• It means that the "enter" button cannot be used. I love the "enter" button as it shows me at a glance which competitions I've looked at and which I haven't without needing to open them again.
• Following on from my last point, if for example LastBroadcast were on one thread they sometimes change the question so new answers would get lost as they would be posted well after the original competition post.
• You would have to read through each thread to see if the new competition was a prize you actually wanted. i.e. if the This Morning ones were all posted on one big thread on regulars then I would have to check each time to see if it was something like money that I wanted or a cruise that I don't want. This applies to most of the competitions. Or for example if the SkySports ones were all posted on one thread, you'd always be checking to see if it was something that interested you or tickets for the team you supported or not. Re: event ticket competitions, I always like to see a date and location in the header, if they were all in one thread, I'd have to look through the thread first to check my availability.

At the moment we only have a handful of competitions posted like this, notably the two magazine ones for Takeabreak and Puzzler. I struggle to keep up with these, only remembering to enter about once a month, and this is only because I have them bookmarked, not because I see them bumped on the first page. This means I usually miss out on a lot of them. Imagine if this was the case for hundreds and hundreds of threads. It would be unworkable (for me at least and I am on here for hours and hours each day).

Personally I would like to see every competition posted separately as its own thread. I would see the "regulars" section closed down and replaced with two threads; one thread for "Daily entry competition" which was a list of links to threads containing competitions that can be entered once per day; and another thread for "Enter early competitions" which is a list of links to the threads where it is beneficial to enter as early as possible. There could also be scope for three more lists if needed; "Can be entered weekly", "Can be entered monthly" and "Can be entered unlimited times", however these would be for strictly only those competitions that were truly weekly/monthly by my definition which is ones which are one draw but you may make more than one entry on a weekly/monthly basis (an example of this is the Cantbarsed competition, one prize draw but you can make weekly entries). By my definition a lot of the current "weekly" and "monthly" competitions would not fit this category. That is my opinion, but I realise not everyone else would like this.

toniq

finatra26 wrote: »

A quick question - I have just ventured into the advents for the first time (thanks Toni for the hard work & lovely thread) how do I thank the OP for the comps they have found - I think I am just being a bit blond here but when I click on the link it takes me straight to the comp - I don't like entering comps without thanking the OP

Hi Fin xx

This is easy! most threads should go the op, unless it's one i've posted,or one just mentioned in the advents if they dont go to the op look across follow the grey line and where it says (thanks blah blah) click the ops name and it will go to their post where u can thank accordingly xxxxx

finatra26

Thanks Toni - told you I was having a blond moment!!!!!!

Glad

twotimes wrote: »

No offence to any of the people that support this particular idea, but I personally really think the idea of posting more than one competition in the same thread (one thread for each website) is a terrible one.

I kind of agree with you on this one, and it would be a major change to the whole way the comps are posted, I just made a suggestion that the reg mag threads could go in the reg board but no change to the way they were posted

twotimes wrote: »

Personally I would like to see every competition posted separately as its own thread. I would see the "regulars" section closed down and replaced with two threads; one thread for "Daily entry competition" which was a list of links to threads containing competitions that can be entered once per day; and another thread for "Enter early competitions" which is a list of links to the threads where it is beneficial to enter as early as possible. There could also be scope for three more lists if needed; "Can be entered weekly", "Can be entered monthly" and "Can be entered unlimited times", however these would be for strictly only those competitions that were truly weekly/monthly by my definition which is ones which are one draw but you may make more than one entry on a weekly/monthly basis (an example of this is the Cantbarsed competition, one prize draw but you can make weekly entries). By my definition a lot of the current "weekly" and "monthly" competitions would not fit this category. That is my opinion, but I realise not everyone else would like this.

basically we already have the above (just in a sub board)
there isn't the room for any more stickies in the main board, but could be in the regs board if it helps things run easier

gilla and princess pixiedust do a great job looking after the lists linking to the regular comps (they do depend on people letting them know when comps have died, especially when there is no clear end date)
I'm slowly working through all 36 pages of the board checking every comp, this is going to take some time but at the end of it all the lists can be updated, and a note could be added to the first post of the lists asking people to pm if they find a comp that doesn't exist anymore
and if we need another couple of sticky lists we can look at that too,

after all that people would only need to look at the sticky threads to have links to all current reg comps the regs board would then be used to 'store' all these threads

another thought, if a new reg comp was added to the list and (added 01/12) for eg was put after it, people could quickly see new ones added since they last looked