Might as well just jump into this hot and sticky topic.
I’m referring to voting contests. And for the record, I’m referring to voting for recipe or cooking contests. So please, let’s not bring up Al Gore, k?
It’s a rapidly growing trend within the cooking/recipe writing community, one that sponsors have discovered as a way to drive internet traffic to their product website or Facebook pages. I understand their motives. Their marketing departments are paid to come up with avenues to boost page views and interest in their products.
But it’s a piss poor way for participants in a contest to be judged on the merits of their recipe or cooking skills. Seriously…just because you have 11,564 Facebook friends, does that make your “Fried Alpo with Cheese Whiz Gravy” the BEST recipe???
There are also “voting clubs” that support one another to vote – sort of an “I’ll scratch your back, if you scratch mine”. As well as numerous software programs that easily gets around the “one vote per computer” rule. None of these shady voting scams have anything to do with either the recipe submitted or even the product. It’s just massive scale cheating.
That’s why I recently declared publicly (well, publicly meaning Facebook…I didn’t send out engraved announcements) that I will not participate in any contest that has voting as the MAIN component of choosing the winner. I have no problem with participating in a contest where voting is a small part of the contest, as long as the recipe or cooking is judged on its RECIPE merits by at least a semi-professional judge or group of cooking enthusiasts. I also do not participate in frenzied voting for friends….I MAY consider voting for a friend if it’s a one-time only deal or seems to have some degree of actual judging involved. And, also, if this friend sends me booty in the mail.
BUT JUST DON’T ASK ME. When I read your recipe and I think it’s
awesome, I’ll vote. DO NOT ASK ME TO ASK MY FRIENDS AND FAMILY TO VOTE EITHER. I’m already on a bunch of shit lists for this!
And I do hope that fat little doughy guy does NOT have voting in the next go around! The grand prize of $1,000,000 in the Pillsbury Bake-Off is too big and too historic to begin to participate in this nefarious trend of voting.
When I see incredible cooks and seasoned competitors (Jenn, Michaela, etc., I'm looking at you!) lose out in a contest because a handful of professional cheaters have taken an “interest” in our hobby, it’s pretty disheartening and frustrating. And even if sponsors in voting contests have taken steps to try and eradicate the cheaters – voting is STILL the most inane way to choose the best recipe.
Call me old-fashioned, but I’d like my recipe to be judged by an actual person or persons and not chosen by sheer number of “clicks”.
Discuss…..I’d particularly like to hear suggestions about how to convince sponsors this shit is stupid.
Oh, and if you are totally into voting and kinda get a buzz posting on everyone's FB wall and mass emailing your second cousins and high school bandmates for votes...well, as long as you don't bug me, we are cool.
10 comments:
I love you. Will you marry me?
@Laureen...you're engaged to Bono, so I can't marry you. But I'll text you pics of my Weiner!
Very well said, you've really gotten me to think twice about this whole "voting" concept, not that I hadne't already. I'M DONE! And, I do hope I've not stepped on your toes with any voting requests, if so, it won't be happening again :)
Oh Jenn, absolutely no toes smashed! Your recipe was great, and should have won in a fair contest. These voting contests are getting out of hand, with no connection to the talent and originality of the cook! Hang in there..you are so talented!
A little over year ago I posted on CCC that I would no longer vote in or enter recipe contests thatrequired voting. THEY ARE POPULARITY CONTESTS THAT HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH THE MERITS OF A RECIPE.
Well said! I no longer participate in voting contests and don't ask my FB friends to vote for anyone either (including myself). Of course, Pillsbury is the total exception here when I'd come clean your house for a vote.
When I was little girl believed there was a tooth fairy.
When I was a know it all teenager I believed the line "I'll only stick the tip in".
As an adult I now know a thing or two about a thing or two and can put two and two together.
Where am I going with this?!? Okay, the quick and dirty version morale of the story . . . voting contest ain't the Tooth Fairy and money just won't drop in your lap. If you are gonna be in a voting contest somehow you're gonna get screwed . . . granted you might like it or you just might wake up in the morning thinking . . "what have I done".
I was the latter . . . I'm out of voting contests.
Yes, maybe dropping a note to a sponsor that their product has now left a bad taste in my mouth might be a positive start to change the trend.
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE!!!! Seriously, you are a GODDESS...
Right on!! I have sworn off participating in any cooking or recipe contest where online voting is the primary aspect to win. SUCKS to lose to a software program! That being said, like Karen Harris said, Pillsbury is the only exception except that not only would I come and clean your house for a vote, but I'd entertain doing some windows, too!
Agree. AGREE!! I've not entered them as I learned from my daughter's one venture into a voting contest that it wasn't fair. Plus she was quoted as saying, "I now know the price of my pride and integrity...$2,000." (the prize for that contest) Quoth the Raven,and me, "Nevermore". Maybe it will take non-participants notifying the sponsor that they tried the recipe and it sucked and they will never again buy their product in order to halt this craze. And while I will support friends when I can, I've also decided if the voting process gets to a window that says something like "I agree to allow access to all my information", I'm done. Expect no votes from me on those. All in all, voting contests are not recipe/cooking contests.
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