How did you calculate that? The assumption in most cases is that the odds are based on purely random factors. The probability is much higher than you think when you consider votes are not coming from a random source.
Originally posted by TrollMan:
Odds of getting 5 1's in total and all of those in a row when getting 236 votes is 1 to 732082482176. That is 732 billion.
While its frustrating to have ghost accounts voting on images, I would imagine their impact on the overall score outcome would be more or less limited. This then begs the question, is it worth applying a drastic measure which could significantly limit the number of votes cast per image?
For example say in an average challenge, you receive 150 votes. Lets assume 5 of those votes are from ghost accounts/cheaters/losers/@$$holes. Would you be willing to have votes say drop to 60-70 votes per image just to mitigate those 5 unfair votes? I would argue that, statistically, the more people voting for your image, the less the impact of ghost accounts and "bad" votes, and the more your score will normalize to its "true level". More votes is a better thing here, IMO.
How did you calculate that? The assumption in most cases is that the odds are based on purely random factors. The probability is much higher than you think when you consider votes are not coming from a random source.
Originally posted by TrollMan:
Odds of getting 5 1's in total and all of those in a row when getting 236 votes is 1 to 732082482176. That is 732 billion.
You're right. I see the error. But the odds are still low enough that it is impossible for this to happen. Particularly since the only 5's given were given consecutively.
While its frustrating to have ghost accounts voting on images, I would imagine their impact on the overall score outcome would be more or less limited. This then begs the question, is it worth applying a drastic measure which could significantly limit the number of votes cast per image?
For example say in an average challenge, you receive 150 votes. Lets assume 5 of those votes are from ghost accounts/cheaters/losers/@$$holes. Would you be willing to have votes say drop to 60-70 votes per image just to mitigate those 5 unfair votes? I would argue that, statistically, the more people voting for your image, the less the impact of ghost accounts and "bad" votes, and the more your score will normalize to its "true level". More votes is a better thing here, IMO.
I would rather 20 honest votes as compared to a mix of ghost votes, which if nothing is done, will soon outnumber the honest votes.
@Timosaby - True, but to take it step further, valid votes are an even better thing. I can't see how this would cut down on legitimate votes. If anything, it would just weed out the five bogus votes. Of that 150-vote average, it's highly likely all of them have at one time submitted something, unless they're bogus.
How did you calculate that? The assumption in most cases is that the odds are based on purely random factors. The probability is much higher than you think when you consider votes are not coming from a random source.
Originally posted by TrollMan:
Odds of getting 5 1's in total and all of those in a row when getting 236 votes is 1 to 732082482176. That is 732 billion.
You're right. I see the error. But the odds are still low enough that it is impossible for this to happen. Particularly since the only 5's given were given consecutively.
Someone suggested in another thread that the impact is so small that it doesn't matter. BUT ... Let's say the offender have 5 ghost accounts. That means that a 'victim' that is scoring 6.0 at 175 votes will drop to 5.834 after getting 6 1's AND if the offender had a score of 6.0 after 175 votes he would go up to 6.111 after giving himself 5 10's from the ghost accounts. A difference of almost 0.3 is defintely a factor in what you're final place will be.
Please correct me if I calculated this wrong but I think it's fairly close.
How did you calculate that? The assumption in most cases is that the odds are based on purely random factors. The probability is much higher than you think when you consider votes are not coming from a random source.
Originally posted by TrollMan:
Odds of getting 5 1's in total and all of those in a row when getting 236 votes is 1 to 732082482176. That is 732 billion.
You're right. I see the error. But the odds are still low enough that it is impossible for this to happen. Particularly since the only 5's given were given consecutively.
Theres no way you can guarantee honest votes. Even a paying member whos entered in 50 challenges and been around since 2005 may not be voting honestly.
"This image might win i'll vote it down so i'll have a higher placement for myself"
We all know this happens. How many times have you had a kickass image that gets 30 4's, 20 3's, 11 2's? We always see it even on ribbon winning images, where do you think all the 1's, 2's and 3 votes are coming from? I doubt they're all ghost accounts. Harsh and dishonest voting is a reality when most of the voters/judges are the competitors themselves. To me, the only way to mitigate those few dishonest people is by drowning their votes in more and more honest votes. This is, of course, assuming that the majority of voters are honest, and only a small number of them aren't, as i believe the case to be.
Odds of getting 5 1's in total and all of those in a row when getting 236 votes is 1 to 732082482176. That is 732 billion.
If someone get 5 1's in a row from the ghosts account of one cheater, I think that we can say a program might be created to automate the process else you have to login, vote on every pic, logout and restart that 4 more times.
The manual processing must be long enough to allow a "normal voter" to place a vote between those cheat votes...
If it's a band of friend, I see no reason to have synchronized votes.
So, assuming the cheater is smart(?) enough to create a cheat vote program, I find this strange that he didn't think to give random votes...
if, as everyone seems to suspect, there are voters giving batches of 1-3 votes...then specific 8-10 votes in the same challenge.....wouldn't that be relatively easy to identify?
Joe
ETA: as i was typing this i was receiving a 2 for my sports entry. groan.
To clarify, my entry didn't start with five votes of 1 in a row, but the early voting was brutal. It was at 3.83 after 6 votes, dropped as low as 2.5 shortly after that, and had five votes of 1 (and a 2) within the first 24 hours. Needless to say, I wasn't too happy about it. However, I actually got a higher average from participants than non-participants this time, and eliminating all the votes of 1 still wouldn't have been enough to ribbon.
I suspect it was a coincidence involving people new to DPC (more likely in Open challenges). As the DPL raises participation, some of the people who hadn't been entering before will naturally get their friends and family members interested, too. They won't be as familiar with the rules, and may vote down entries they think were edited illegally, buddy vote, etc. The good news is that more participation also means more "normal" votes to reduce the effect of the unusual ones.
could there be anything more foolish than cheating to win a virtual ribbon?
Joe
Probably not, and yet it's done all the time here and elsewhere.
I am completely on board with the suggestion to earn the right to vote by entering at least three challenges. That every shmo can sign up on this site and vote is not right. Not right, I say! :o)
And - I have also noticed that there is a wave of low votes that hits in a certain rhythm. It's happened too many times in the last months for this to be a coincidence.
I am completely on board with the suggestion to earn the right to vote by entering at least three challenges. That every shmo can sign up on this site and vote is not right. Not right, I say! :o)
Many people vote and comment before they work up the confidence to enter.
I am completely on board with the suggestion to earn the right to vote by entering at least three challenges. That every shmo can sign up on this site and vote is not right. Not right, I say! :o)
Many people vote and comment before they work up the confidence to enter.
Well, maybe their confidence would build up sooner. :) I don't see why voting would build up their confidence. They can still look through the challenge entries and even comment without voting. Just a thought.
Many people vote and comment before they work up the confidence to enter.
Absolutely true. I registered so I could vote. Then I became a member so I could vote on member challenges. I didn't enter a challenge for almost a year.
They can still look through the challenge entries and even comment without voting. Just a thought.
What is interesting about this is that my wife, (who recently started participating here) is entering and voting, but is not confident about commenting yet. She does not feel qualified to leave explanations until she is more sure of herself and has a better feel for the place. In many cases, her votes and reasons for those votes are far different from my own.
Also lots of people go through the images initially and sort the challenge images into sets (low, medium, high) sometimes by scoring 1, 5 and 10 or something like that and then go through later and adjust them.
I don't think limiting voting to paid users only makes sense, the number of votes would probably go down a huge amount.
I do something very similar to this for my voting. But I wait until there about 2 days left in voting so the effects are minimal on people watching their score.
I seem to remember that the average vote for 'participants' is usually lower than for 'non-participants' and that in the past there have been plenty of calls for people not to be allowed to vote in challenges they have entered. It seems that this is a non-issue that just won't go away.
The arguments seem to go something like this:
- Those with challenge entries shouldn't be allowed to vote in the same challenge.
- Only those who actively enter challenges themselves can vote.
I don't really see what having someone be forced to enter challenges would achieve, other than add a load of potential dross for people to wade through... There are plenty of people who are perfectly qualified to vote on challenges, but either are aspiring photographers without a digital camera, or are people who enjoy art and photography, but have no desire, or perhaps ability, to produce it themselves. Whilst peer group recognition is nice to have, I also want my photography to be viewed and appreciated by a wider audience.
Mind you, you can all probably ignore my views, as I just don't feel there is a problem worth investing time and effort in solving....
Bravo for speaking up!!!! I have suspected hacking as well. It's very suspicious when I post my score in a thread then promptly get 10 votes of 1's and 2's right in a row.
