480 bucks?! You should be really happy with that price, believe me =)

RE: Finalists who can't vote for themselves.

Here's what I don't understand: on the rules & initial announcement for the contest, it's stated that the final voting would take place on this forum. I though that was made clear, didn't everyone else? I hate to be so cruel as to say RTFM, but c'mon, at least some reading of the rules would have helped here. If it were me running the contest, I would have slipped something in the small print, just to see how many people really paid attention.

PKT - I didn't think your entry was self serving, but I could see how other people could interpret it that way. Regardless, I think you did a great job, and I've bookmarked your site - I'd love to see more of your work.


Malfaiteur, I have two words for you: Marshal McLuhan.

"The medium is the message". Odd you should mention McLuhan, I thought about him often when I first got my tablet. The internet in your pocket. Just... wow.

Not sure if that was directed at me. The rules were clear to me as well. I just happened to mention that at some point I initially missed/forgot about the forum voting or just paid attention to Dan's video post or whatever ... you know, at one point in time ... it skipped my mind. Whether it was ADD, multitasking, ... who knows. But, yes, I did read the rules prior to entering the contest and submitting my entry.

No, no - it just seems that there were more than a few folks who didn't register for this forum until after they'd already entered the contest (as in, join date prior to 11/17/07), and thus were unable to vote. It's odd to me that someone would put the work into entering the contest without making sure they'd be able to participate in the rest of the contest process. I didn't want to sound mean with my comments, I just thought it was odd that a number of entrants (including 2 finalists) won't be able to vote because they didn't register here first.

Um. . . I think I should try to elaborate what I'm saying a little better, but I already feel like I may have accidentally insulted someone.

Marshal eh? I knew a marshal once; liked him for a while, then turned out not to be that great of a guy. But perhaps this particular Marshal will be a decent fellow. I know what you mean about registering ahead of time. I rushed to the forums after a second reading of the rules and made sure I was a member ahead of time. But, maybe having worked in retail, I'm predisposed to reading the fine print.

~!M

No problem. My bad. I thought it might have applied to me as I said ... and then your reply came ... Anyway. It's all good

You know what I can't believe? It is another two days before the poll closes

Here are the rules pertaining to what you are talking about....
2. Eligibility - Contest is open to YouTube users aged 18 years or older. Judges and family of judges are not eligible.
5. Winning - One winner will be chosen from a pool of five finalists, rated by voters of the InternetTabletTalk.com community. Finalists will be chosen by Judges.

Where did it say you had to be part of the InternetTabletTalk.com community before a certain date, like 11/17 to be a voter? The rules were posted on 10/25. Why not before 10/25? Maybe between 10/25 and 11/17, someone could have registered a bunch of accounts?

The changes are fine though, it is covered by this statement...
8. Limitations of Liability .....the Sponsor reserves the right in its sole discretion to cancel, terminate, modify, or suspend this Contest and may select the winner from among all entries received to the action taken. So changing the date to 11/17 is perfectly legit, and as I said before, if it makes the contest fair, I am perfectly fine with it.

Well, I am one of those that apparently didn't RTFM as well as you did. Despite how clear it was to you, before the contest was even started, I was able to register on the 20th, and I was allowed to vote on the 21st. At that point there was still no indication that people had to be registered prior to 11/17 to vote. So it wasn't a requirement at that time and only was made a requirement after there seemed to be some apparent hanky panky going on with the voting.

At least that was the way I understood it, but obviously, according to you, I didn't read the rules as well as you did.

So. Anyone wanna pony up to getting their friends and family to vote?

Thought not.

I admit ... I missed the finals

No. Seriously. I had dozen or so people view the clip on youtube. Nothing more. Nobody I know registered here to influence voting, either way for any candidate. Even if I were a finalist I wouldn't have asked anyone. And, I wouldn't know enough people to win such type of 'popularity' contest anyhow. It would have been purely on the merits of the entry. Pure and simple.