We have once again reached an awkward silent period in the group. It's a little disturbing. The contests appear to be only thing keeping this group active, otherwise there's not much chatting. We can't have these silent moments coming after every contest.

I'd say it's time for another contest for a little activity boost in this group, but we still have to think how to have more activity. Have 1 on 1 building challenges, a longer term contest or something. Any ideas?

I know this issue might have been discussed here a few times before, but still it's hard to ignore, when it happens.
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I've realized it too, we need to start another contest, or maybe our own little BIO-Olympics...now THAT would be something cool. But I'm not sure what I can do to increase the activity here.. :/
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Some 1v1 Moc battles sounds cool, maybe we could open up a thread where people can put their names down and then be paired up with someone by the Admins. The good thing about that setup is if you’re too busy to be Mocing at a particular time you can just withdraw your name and then put it back in when you feel like a challenge.

It would kind of be an on-going chain of miniature contests and Bionicle Display would be the first to have it. Maybe some Admins can have a look at this comment and cook up some rules ;)

Keep MOCing!
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I like Kai's idea. It would be good to cheer the group. And what about the logo contest?

These silent periods are usually normal in groups, but, if they beocme bigger and bigger, it's a bad sign.

C 'mon, this is (or at least used to be) the biggest Bionicle group in this site, let's make it alive!
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I like it. Kai/Dach may even want to set up the standard guidelines and whatnot to organise it. You may be able to bug an admin/mod (Johann? lol) to organise it for you.

I'm still a bit busy until the end of November, so I will approve of you guys in making it happen.

I had noticed an oddity when I wasn't getting email updates on new creations from my faves for 2 weeks, but I think it was just a glitch lol
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Alright, thanks! What do ya say Dach, do you want to give me a hand with rules and whatnot?

This is what I've got so far. We make a thread where people can put down their name and perhaps a theme (toa, mech, vehicle etc) that they would like their Moc off to be based around.

A Mod or Admin can go through and mix and match themes that two or more mocers would like (they can also match mocers that are at the same sort of level, so the match is fair).

If more than two people suggest the same topic then 3, 4, 5 etc way battles are possible. If a mocer doesn't have the time to be in the contest then they can just delete their comment and post it again when they have the time.

Once people are paired up they can discuss in-between themselves the time frame, rules, height restrictions etc.

Admins and Mods simply reply to the people’s comments that they would like to pair up or people in the contest thread can challenge others.

Only one entry comment for each person can be made at a time but multiple themes can be suggested.

Well that’s what I've got for the structure of the contest thread so far, anyone want to expand or add/change rules and things? – I would like as many people in the group as possible to suggest things for this, it’s a very new idea and I need lots of input for it to work.

Keep MOCing!
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Well, I can help with it... I don't have much spre time, but I think there's enough...


One thing that is important is to organize the topics. I'm a litle afraid that this may cause excessive topics, wich can confuse things a litle bit... That's my idea:

Of course, a main topic, with the rules and stuff and where people can sign their names and suggest themes...

Them, a separated topic, where the mods and/or admins that will hep with it organize the matches, and where people can complain about theirs, if they don't agree with them. The matches and their current staus(ongoing, under approval, completed, etc) may be written in a list, just like in previous contests

And them the big problem: Where to put their entries. I think a topic for each match would be more organized, but this can flood the forum and confuse people. However, a single topic for all entries would be even more confusing, people would have to be very specific about what match are their entry for... But I don't know whats the best option.... What do you think?
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Well let’s see here, one thread for rules and signing up and suggesting themes. That’s seems fine.

One thread for Admins/Mods to discuss with entrants about themes, pairing etc and status of contests, a good idea, it will stop the first thread from being flooded.

And the last, maybe just one thread for entries structured in comments like this:


-----
Competitors: Johann Dakitsch vs. Kai Heffernan

Theme: Toa

Guidelines: 7 inch height restriction, must have classic elements (Stone, Earth, Fire etc), only one entry per person

Starting/ending dates: 21/11/10 to 21/12/10 (Midday)

Entries: (Johan's entry link), (Kai's entry link)

Status: Ongoing

Winner: Undecided
-----

Volunteers can than scroll through, click on the entry links and vote in a comment on the creation itself. That way we only have 3 threads, all of them fairly clean. Maybe Admins can delete comments in the wrong thread. Do you think this is ok? Rules for the signing up thread still need to be made aswell...
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Yeah, I think it's a nice idea.

And about the voting, will everyone be allowed to vote? Or maybe some kind of selected juri? Chosing the winner only by the number of comments is an option, but I don't think its fair. There's a lot of creators and creations here that just can't get all attention they deserve, or are underrated, I think most of us passed trough this at least once...

And, about in-creation voting, it leaves a lot of space for cheating, since we can't control who's actually voting and who's been asked to vote (you know, friends that make accounts just to vote in someone). Maybe a in-topic voting would be better, but this will require some more organization. Maybe a topic for voting, using some post model... Just like with the entries...
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I know what you mean about the commenting for voting...

We might have to make a forth thread for voting. Perhaps a rule in the thread for signing up and suggesting themes could be 'all who put their name down in this thread must be willing to vote on a winning creation in every contest in the entries thread (have a link to correct thread here)'. That would make voting fair I think…

In the voting thread people could vote like this:


-----
Competitors: Johann Dakitsch vs. Kai Heffernan

Contest Number: 001

Vote: Johann Dakitsch

Comment: Both entries were very good but I felt that Johann’s overall design and colour scheme felt more like how I would have expected a toa of fire to look…
-----

Someone could then continue updating the first comment every now and again in the Voting thread to count in new votes like this:


-----
Contest 001 - Johann Dakitsch vs. Kai Heffernan
Votes for Johann (13)
Votes for Kai (11)
Winner - Johann
-----
Contest 002 etc etc
-----

It's hard to explain, maybe I should make some new 'proto-type' threads to structure it all and then we can continue conversation in here and continue changing them for the better... Sound good? I'll make 4 new threads, if you want, and start writing down the structure for them :)
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Yeah, go on. Let's see what we can figure out...

And if anyone else have an idea or suggestion, please, go on...
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Alright, I'll have something up by the end of the day. Right now I've got to quickly do a couple of things though...

And, as Johann said, if any one else has ideas or suggestions please say so. We need all the help we can get! Thanks.
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I am now making up the four threads in Microsoft Word but can't think of a good name for the contest...

I was thinking maybe Chain Challenges, Mocist vs Mocist or something like that. Please make some suggestions and help me with the name, otherwise I can't create the threads.
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No suggestions... Ok, I'll just go with Mocist vs. Mocist for now. Loading the four topics...
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Well well well... You made something happen while I had a 12 hour sleep :D Kai, even though you made a question to me, looks like you still took over, but that's fine.

I looked around your prototype topics, there's one thing I see as a possible problem. As the pairing will be random made by admins and there's a lot of contests going the same time, the problem is how do you see who are you paired with.

(I might have thought a bit ahead thinking of a lot contests going on, but apparently there's not that much of us here to need this. But the suggestion could be a 'just in case')

I think we might need some kind of list of current pairings, which gets updated along the ended and new challenges. (Might be a tough job, but also might be necessary, depends on how many challenges will there be going at the same time) It could be an addition to the Contest Entries topic as a separate comment, to avoid long text.


A possible layout:

"Contest 001:
-Kai Heffernan
-Johann Dakitsch

Contest 002" etc...

This might not be needed, for example if the ended contests are deleted from the Contest Entries topic and there's not too much contests going at the moment.

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Yeah, I've already suggested a list... like the ones in previous contests, you know? In a post, and being updated every new match is settled... I can do it if you want...


And sorry for letting you talking alone, Kai, but when I last posted something in this topic, it was already very late (about 2am), so when I woke up today it was already lunchtime...




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BiOlympics. Or The Bio Duels.
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maybe bio-build offs? I don't know I'm not good with epic names
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It's ok, I just wanted to gets something done before exams started (that reminds me, you probably won't see me on here much for about two weeks because of exams). Anyways, talk about it all and I'll join in every now and again to see if I can help!
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I only plan on having about 3 contests going at a time, each of them going for no longer than 2 weeks (unless of course someone else volunteers to count up votes and update the voting page with me...). So that might make things a little less complicated.

Concerning the players being aware of who they are paired up with, there shouldn't be too much of a problem (in the 'Entries' topic the template already has 'Competitors' listed.

I'm not sure if that is what you meant but it has reminded me of another problem, how will players be notified one they have been paired up and/or if there is a spot open?

Maybe it would be wise to have the 'Sign Ups', 'Discussion' and perhaps 'Contest Entries' in Bionicle Display and have, instead of multiple topics, a separate contest page. That way it will be a bit more organised and it won't crowd this group to much...

The good thing about the separate contest page is that we can have heaps of volunteer Admins to manage things like pairing, counting votes etc making it possible to have more than three contests going at a time :)

What do you think?
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I quite like BIOlympics ;)
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For how contestants get noted about pairing, we have to trust them to check the contest topic whenever it's updated with new contests. It's easier to keep them stay on track if we delete the ended contest messages.

Since there's no private message system in mocpages, we just have to hope those who have signed up check the group actively. If someone's missed his/her contest, there's not much we can do :( We have to depend on people's activity.

The topics. 'Sign up' topic is necessary atleast and people will have to keep their own state updated whenever they can participate in contests or not.

'Contest Entries'. 3 contests at a time sounds good. The thing to avoid is chit chat messages there. We just announce the current contests there and participants put only entry links and nothing else. Once the contests end, the page is cleaned for next ones. There could be more contests if we get volunteer hosts to supervise more contests. 3 contests per supervisor, but to avoid any mess, there probably should be own contest topic for each of the hosts. Might not be good idea in that case =/

'Discussion'. Questions and chitchat. That's probably it.

I think we need a separate voting topic, having that too cleaned after each contest. If people vote on more than one contests (and anyway if only one), they put their votes under contest numbers in their message.

Name BiOlympics sounds to me bit exaggerated, and the name might be anyway used if there's the bionicle version of MocOlympics coming any time. What popped in my head was BioBattles and Bionichallenge :P
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I agree with Dach about the topics. Since the main objective of this contest is to 'reactivate' the group, it make ssense that people will have to check the topics to know if their match has been settled. And I like the name Bio-Duels, BioBattles is fine too...
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I think I'm voting for the name Bio-Duels :D

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Same here. :D
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agreed.
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I support all your suggestions. I had been quite busy with all the renovations at my house. Once its done, ill hopefully try to join.
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I'm fine with Bio-Duels. Does anyone want to object or make any other suggestions?
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Bio-BuildOff: 1vs1?
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I actually quite like that one, we'll see what the others think though. Haha, it's so fun to say. Bio-BuildOff, Bio-BuildOff, Bio-BuildOff, Bio-BuildOff, Bio-BuildOff! It just flows off the tongue :)
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lol i just came up with it in like 5 minutes and i do have to agree with you kai it does sound nice.
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Ok, sounds good. Are there any other problems that need fixing? I can't really think of anything at the moment.

I think it's a good idea to go through what people would have to do to play, that way we can get rid of any other problems.

So, I would sign up using the template:

-----
Name: Kai

Preferred theme/s: Toa, Titan, Rahi, Vehicle

Wanted opponent/s: Johann Dakitsch

Comments: None
-----

I would then wait until I was matched up with one or more opponents by Admins. I would check the 'Entries' Topic and wait to see something like this:

-----
Contest Number: 001
Competitors: Johann Dakitsch and Kai Heffernan

Theme: Undecided

Guidelines: Undecided

Starting/ending dates: 21/11/10 to 5/12/10 (Midday)

Entries: None

Status: Pending

Winner: Undecided
-----

After I have seen the above, I can then see the starting date (that is also the contests-before-them ending date), this will give me 1-2 weeks to work out the rules with my opponents before it officially begins. After rules and theme are decided the blanks can be filled in. 1 of the 3 current contests ends and mine officially begins.

I build my Moc and post it before the given end date (2 weeks), once all of the entries have been posted voting can begin. (While doing all of this the next group will be figuring out their rules and theme) this makes a continuous cycle.

Once the end date arrives the votes will be counted, the winner announced and the contest posts in the ‘Entries’ and ‘Voting’ topics removed for the next contest details.
-----
-----
There we go, what the player would have to do to participate in the, dare I say it... Bio-BuildOffs! With the current rules and guidlines in the proto-type topics of course.
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So...Now that we got all this down...WHEN DOES IT START!?!?! *Drooling in anticipation!*

(This sounds awesome! :D I have a few builders I would like to headbutt with... ;D))
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actually I already had that one.
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I actually change my vote on that one. It does flow nicely :D When I repeat it I sound like a robot :P

Also, probably the last thing to wonder is who runs the contests?

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I change my vote to my own idea also.
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BioBuild-Off is a fine name... And about who will run it.. Well, maybe a group of two or three people. I think Kai, me and maybe someone else... I think more than one person is necessary since we're gonna choose the matches, and it may need more than one opinion...
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Sounds great, 3 people is probably a good idea seeing that there will be 3 contests running at a time. Does this mean that you, me and a trustworthy volunteer will get their own 'Voting' topic, that way we can all have one contest at a time.

This will make 1 'Discussion' topic, 1 'Entries' topic, 1 'Sign Up' and then 3 Voting topics.

That makes 6 topics, a little more than I would have wanted but it might be neccasary. Now all we need is a volunteer... *cough* Dach *cough* *cough* ;)
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Howabout me?
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I think I have spare time to be one of the contest hosts, if you accept.

Also if there's around 3 contests at a time, each having it's own host, I think we need a 'Host Discussion' topic to negotiate over picked contestants and contest subjects.

Also a little suggestion.
If each contest is kept as it's own topic, it can include all the parts of the contest in one tight package happening in this order:

1. Contest, rules and players announced
2. Entry links added
3. Voting beginning announced
4. Votes added
5. Votes counted, winner announced, contest end
6. Topic deleted in a certain time (3 days or a week maybe?)

All the chitchat, celebration and questions go to the 'Discussion' topic and the entries and votes are automatically sorted by contest. What do you think?

It can narrow the topics a bit.
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If you like I might be able to find a position for you. Dach has also volunteered and, unless he decides not to, I think he should be the last host (mainly because he started most of this). Hopefully that's ok with you; I'll get looking for some other position for you if you like. No guarantees though.
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There isn't a start date yet, but I was thinking the 3rd of December (the end date of my exams). That will give us time to fix any other problems there might be and it will have my full attention after then.
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If there's still a need for a host or whatever, I could do it. I'm currently home most of the time thanks to... things. I certainly have time. Just tell me when you need someone else =)
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Perfect! I can't think of any other problems now... BobaFett 2 also wanted to volunteer, do you have any positions for him?
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Good idea! I think that with this we'll need only two topics plus the contests ones... One with the rules and entries, and one for discussion...

I agree that Dach should be The Third(sounds kinda epic, doesn't it?), he started this conversation after all.... And about Boba and Skorp, we'll try to find a room for you guys.
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What about me? XD
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Anytime after November's good for me.
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We can't take too many volunteers, it all depends on if we find a need for all of them I suppose...
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You mean additional topics right? Not two overall...

Anyways, just to get things down. We have 2 'discussion' topics (one for hosts and admins and another for players), 1 for signing up, 3 for voting (1 each for Dach, Johann and I) and an entries topic. Is this all ok or do we need to change things around a bit more.

I'm pretty happy with it all so far :)
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Yes, that's waht I meant. And I'm satisfied with it too, I think we can settle this already.
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Yep, everyone happy with the starting date being the 3rd of December?
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*Ahem*

Some messages up from here I suggested to have individual topics for each contest, each topic icluding rules, entries and voting in one package. (Go check it) That way we can turn voting topics to contest topics and entries topic can be deleted.

3 Contest topics (including rules, entries, voting and winner announcement in each)
1 Host Discussion topic (contestant and contest subject negotiation)
1 Discussion topic (questions, chitchat)
1 Sign up topic

Total of... 6 topics (instead of your 7)

(3rd of December is fine)
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Okay, so you have 3 hosts. Two others signed up for it. Can the two of us judge?
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Oh, yeah... I remembered seeing that, not sure what I was on about in that comment back there. Anyways, your set up looks fine, I think that it will all work out very well.

Sorry if it seemed I ignored that post... must have been late when I wrote the reply :) but I definitely saw and read it.
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Alrighty then :)

So, are we ready then here? No more problems to solve? No? Good.

Now if someone could delete the prototype topics and create official 'Sign up', 'Discussion' and 'Host Discussion' topics so we're ready on Dec 3rd. Yes, we need people to sign up their names BEFORE the contests start, so they're actually in a contest by then. Time for preparation begins now, I say.

I'm off to sleep now. Somebody, start preparations here ;)
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I agree with the date. I may be off for vacation someday around 17th of December, but that's not certain yet... And what about the other volunteers? The judging will be by popular vote, so I don't think ther'll be any judeges... I really don't know what they could do...

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No one can always win :( Looks like we have reached the limit, there's really no need for any other duty, so...
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Silent again all of a sudden.

If some admin here could draw some attention, we need the prototype topics deleted to make the official Sign up and Discussion and Host discussion topics. Or do we just go over?

Also, who takes the duty for creating the topics? Might be better if it's an admin/mod... Maybe some all-applying basic rules could be announced in the 'Discussion' topic.
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Yep, just waiting for an admin now...
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I locked the topics, just for safety... I can create the topics too, if you want. Lets just make a final verison of the rules first...
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I suppose the contest rules are individual by contest, so there's not much going there.

Atleast on voting can be a few rules.
1. Only ones who've signed up can vote.
2. Only one vote per person. (the contests aren't that big to choose multiple favorites)
3. Voting time? A few days maybe?

Some basic rules.
1. People must keep their sign up state updated. The state tells are they willing to participate.
2. Chat and questions are for the discussion topic.
3. Votes and entries are for the contest topics.
4. Host discussion is hosts and admins only.
5. You cannot choose your contest. This will be done by hosts. Same for the contest subjects.

These might need some sorting. Keep posting more ideas and suggestions for the rules.
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I think a week or two is enough for the voting...

And about choosing the matches,the person cannot choose it, but if he gives us a (very) good reason, it can be changed.

I don't think that voting should be only for who signed up, it would be a problem if few people sign up... But I'm not sure about it...


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You call this silent?
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Will we be be keeping many rules from the proto-type contest topics? They can be easily tweaked and added too...

I just think it would be a shame to completly dump them. It took a while to write up those rules and create templates etc.
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Good point. I didn't realise :] See if you can gather some rules from them.
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In the 'Sign up' topic all rules except 3, 9 & 10 I think are good. All in the 'Voting' topic except 6 are working well also, what do you think?
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They're good. We'll go with those. Regarding the 'Voting' topic, rule 8 won't be needed, since the votes are in the individual contest threads. Or it can be edited a little, having only 'vote' and 'comment'.

And regarding the 'Host Discussion' topic, it needs just the rule of Hosts and Admins only.

The rules need to be sorted. Basic rules regarding the contests and discussion can be in the 'Discussion' topic to avoid one more topic. Name edit for the topic then: 'Rules and Discussion'. Rules regarding the sign up go to the 'Sign Up'.

Final thing to wonder. What is the voting time? Shall it be 5 days and by the last 2 days of the week the winners are announced and next contests made?
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I'm really not sure... maybe instead of a time limit we can wait for a certain amount of votes to be cast (13 maybe? That way it can't be a draw). Would you like to take over for now (Creating topics etc)? I've got exams starting tommorow and I won't be able to do much until friday :(
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Vote limit sounds good. So max limit would be 13 and everything under it can be a draw or a victory. (Unpaired number recommended) We can still edit afterwards :)

I can take over. I finished my last exam of this period just recently. Hopefully by the weekend we have the contests up. If you have exams, just be here to negotiate your contestants and contest theme.
I'll create the 3 main topics, once I'm home (I'm at school now, finished last exam 15 min ago :D).
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Good luck on your exams! I hope you did well; my first exam is geography and it'll start in exactly 13 hours and 28 minutes :)
I will have my exams finished by the 3rd, I have that day off also (it's a start to a long weekend!)
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Sound slike everyone is having exams. I having mine too, but most of them are just giant and insane homeworks... So, Dach will create the topics? Ok them, and all three of us will take care of them or each one take care of one? I can make you moderators for a while, if it helps and the admins let me...
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Good luck on your exams too :) I created the topics now, if you can have a check on them and tell any problems, I can fix the last issues and we're then almost ready! :D

Let's also negotiate our contest themes in the host discussion. Contestants can be negotiated once people have signed up.
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Hey, things really started developing since I last checked!
Good thing too, I'm relieved to see this groups can stay active when I'm not around :)
As soon as I get an internet connection at my new home, I'll make sure to follow things more closely.
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