Photo Competition Survey

[Lynda Bradford]

Have you received the Photo Competition survey sent on 12 February?

As we are keen to hear your views on the monthly Photo Competition we have sent a survey to all our newsletter subscribers.

We are trying to understand who participates in the competition and for those who do not participate we want to hear what changes would encourage greater participation.

We have had a very good response so far and will be analysing the results and considering all comments after the end date - 28 February 2022.


If you have received the survey but not responded, we would very much appreciate if you could respond as soon as possible.

However, if you have subscribed to the newsletter and you have not received the survey,  can you check your spam folder as sometimes mail can be added to this folder and needs to be retrieved. 

Please contact admin@theqe2story if you require a copy of the survey to be sent to you. 

[Isabelle Prondzynski]

You may have been wondering what the responses to the survey were. We shall be bringing various statistics to this topic here, so that you can have an idea how our members responded. We were very happy with the number of responses received, and the honesty with which you replied.

We have not announced a new competition for the month of April (but left the March competition open, in the hope of many more entries). The reason is that we wanted to have a discussion about some of the survey results.

One very striking result was that quite a number of you told us they enjoyed looking at the photos entered, but had never (or only rarely) voted.

Why?

If it is a technical issue, is there something we can do to help?

[cunardqueen]

  If it is a technical issue, is there something we can do to help?
 

I often wondered why there couldn't be a link up to the actual photos and a little tick box beside the photo to cast your vote
Its all very well and good seeing the photos, but then you have to remember the title of the ones you wanted to vote for the three favorites.

Where as perhaps having the photos showing in tile format with the tick box might improve or at least make it slightly quicker to cast a vote
I remember a great many moons ago getting into a discussion with the late Kindlychap about the position of the photo titles in relation to the actual photos on here  , l think it was aboard the QV on a visit to Invergordon. we reached the perfect conclusion, neither of us were correct, but neither of us were wrong.

Feedback is always welcome. Again a number of years ago l took part in research by a flavored bottle water company on one of their new products . l felt that the bottle cap had too many attachings  making it just that bit more harder to open , yes l know who in their right mind thinks about such things. 

 Several years ago where l work we did the pre launch party  of a new whisky product, a rather limited edition expensive product in a beautiful leatherbound box . l had noticed the rather fancy box on the bar, it had actually been in the office the night before and l was able to gave it  a good looking over . So on pre launch night one of the guys asked me my opinion. l asked him was he sure. he said yes, so l told him i thought it  was utter crap and whoever designed it should stick to lego blocks. He asked me to elaborate so l did l mentioned the fact the protective corners on the leather box were pretty feeble and showed him how much they moved,indeed one broke off. Then the actual plinth the bottle of whisky was resting on was just plastic, and looked very cheap out of the box, why not use some wood from the actual casks to make a stand or at least use something more professional-looking, and the final comment was that this product was to buy £10K and with that is enclosed  a beautiful leather covered book with a silver badge. You open the cheque book sized book to find its blank note pad filled with blank pages. It would have been an ideal chance to have used it to promote the whisky company, or show some details on the product it comes with, as it stands its a note book to take to Tesco for your shopping list  About  month or so later we were given a dummy bottle in the box for display in one of the cabinets. there was no protective corners, the plastic base was gone and replaced with a chunk of wood from the 50 year old cask and the little book now had illustrated pages ., Wel how was l to know l was talking to the original designer , and he never even bought a drink.           

[Isabelle Prondzynski]

I often wondered why there couldn't be a link up to the actual photos and a little tick box beside the photo to cast your vote .       

Unfortunately, the forum software does not allow this. Basically, by uploading all the pictures entered for a competition, we are already stretching the possibilities of the software.

On the other hand, the Gallery does allow votes under each picture. So do you think we should move the photo competition entirely into the relevant gallery album and cast our votes there?

[Lynda Bradford]

I often wondered why there couldn't be a link up to the actual photos and a little tick box beside the photo to cast your vote
Its all very well and good seeing the photos, but then you have to remember the title of the ones you wanted to vote for the three favorites.

Where as perhaps having the photos showing in tile format with the tick box might improve or at least make it slightly quicker to cast a vote
I remember a great many moons ago getting into a discussion with the late Kindlychap about the position of the photo titles in relation to the actual photos on here  , l think it was aboard the QV on a visit to Invergordon. we reached the perfect conclusion, neither of us were correct, but neither of us were wrong.
         

Thanks Myles for your comments and as you said feedback is so important. 

When we started the competition way.. back in 2011 we had initially considered the option for people to vote in the gallery, but it was thought that it would be difficult to control the number of votes each member could cast for photos, hence the reason we option for the poll.  Also a moderator would need to manually count the votes/smilies for each photo, which would be time consuming.

We then made a few changed at the start of the competition:

1. The photos were not displayed on the poll topic, just at a link to the album. We changed this when there was a suggestion that it would be better if the photos could be seen in the topic. 
2.  At this time the member's name was displayed but following comments that it would be better if the name was not displayed on the poll topic, we stopped displaying the name. 

I would be very interested to learn more about your conversation with Kindlychap in relation to the positioning of the titles of the photos.  This is something that had been changed since the first year of competitions.  At the start we positioned the photo title under the photo, whereas now the title is at the top of the photo.  If there is any improvement that can be made please let us know. 

[cunardqueen]

I would be very interested to learn more about your conversation with Kindlychap in relation to the positioning of the titles of the photos.  This is something that had been changed since the first year of competitions.  At the start we positioned the photo title under the photo, whereas now the title is at the top of the photo.  If there is any improvement that can be made please let us know.   

Oh it was such a long time ago and knowing him like what i did he was very pedantic at times , he was always aghast at the white dinner jackets on crossings . But he seemed to think back then  having the title under the pic he felt it was confusing.

Not sure how you can really change the photo vote , perhaps it's a case of we are all used to the present system, I'm sure some of us will remember the good old days of "answers please on a postcard !"     

I would have thought of all things the photo comp was probably the easiest thing to vote on. That is after you decide which three gets your vote.

[Peter Mugridge]

Yep... whittling it down to just three is the hardest part of the process...

[June Ingram]

I find it interesting that a number of respondents have found the poll difficult to negotiate. The admins are constantly urging members to contact them with questions or for help. But very few people do make contact for help.

[cunardqueen]

  I find it interesting that a number of respondents have found the poll difficult to negotiate. The admins are constantly urging members to contact them with questions or for help. But very few people do make contact for help. 

Oh never underestimate people and what they cant do. Its rather like a quiz, easy if you know the answer.
 
I have avg stuff on here, I'm sure it works, but when l go and have a little look and run some programme it always flags up issues which can be resolved on upgrading the account and of course pay a bit extra , so l don't bother.

I have one drive some stuff is saved to that, lord knows what and this thing called Adobe , which to me is a Mexican place in San Juan Capistrano.

I'm the first to admit I'm not good with PCs my knowledge is what it is  and l envy those that are as they say good with computers

I often wonder if any new member looking at here for the first time, where on earth do they begin ? so l can understand fully the hesitation not to enter the photo comp or ask for help, in order to ask you must first accept defeat.

However l hope you will continue with the surveys they will provide answers you may not even know you knew you needed or wanted
A few years back we gave out little survey cards to arriving guests. We were all shocked surprised saddened and generally dumbfounded by some of the answers that were written , But it was a survey and you must accept any answer, simply because from that one person is their own viewpoint. You may not like it.

Im only to happy to provide in a survey my own honest and forthright opinion, and if there is the option "other" well , they did ask for feedback.
I wonder what reaction might be gleaned by asking " What stops you taking an active interest on here "

[Lynda Bradford]

Thanks Myles, you have made some good points:

1.  People have photos stored online that initially was free but later required a subscription and if that has not been paid access may have been lost. 
2. Photos that have not been converted to digital format, so unable to upload.
3.  Not everyone is computer literate. 
4.  New members may not know where to begin navigating the forum, or how to participate in the photo competition.

Honest and forthright opinions are appreciated, hence the reason we asked for opinions, so that we can make an informed decision on the competition.

[cunardqueen]

In the early years, l thought I was doing well with an external hosting site, only for Rob to let me know it had links to a porn site
I suppose Lizzie with the big blue hull can take on a different meaning in some other forums (not here!)   

[Isabelle Prondzynski]

As someone who has almost always uploaded photos to the competition, and who has voted every time, I am not myself in a position to answer my question above.

But could we hear from those of our members who like to watch the photos in the competition, but who have not voted ever, or only very rarely?

What would be the reason? And is there something that we as a moderating team could do to help?

[June Ingram]

Ditto on Isabelle’s post. Please do remember, that just about any question about the competitions, etc., can be and will gladly be answered by contacting admin@theqe2story.com

[Isabelle Prondzynski]

As you will have noticed, we set aside two months for the most recent calls for entries, thinking that this would give more members a chance to find suitable photos and possibly process them so that they can be uploaded to the competition album.

In the end, we found that the number of photos entered in the competition was not much greater than usual and that, with a couple of exceptions, mostly the regulars entered their pictures.

If it helps you to search for suitable photos and enter them, possibly with the help of the Moderator team, we could continue the experiment of providing for two months for each theme. If, on the other hand, this would not be a help to you, we shall revert to setting one month for each topic, and again one month for the poll to select the prizewinning pictures.

We would very much like to know what you think about this matter. Please tell us here .

[cunardqueen]

Personally, l think two months is a tad long and one month is long enough. Now if l had only listened to my own advice l could have had three photos uploaded and not just the one. l put it off and realised im now out of time .
So for me i would vote for a month at a time .

[Peter Mugridge]

I'm another vote for keeping it monthly...

[Lynda Bradford]

I'm another vote for keeping it monthly...

Thanks Peter

Looking forward to hearing what members think about keeping the photo competition monthly or moving to two monthly competition

[Isabelle Prondzynski]

It is good to hear our regular participants in the competition (whether by entering photos or by voting) saying that they prefer the competition to continue on a monthly basis.

We have therefore done the necessary for the month of May, and we can continue month by month as the year goes on. But if switching to 2 months were to encourage more people to enter or more people to vote, we could do this from June.

The photos which are entered do not only add spice to the short lived competition, but they stay in the forum Gallery and add visible substance to one or more themes, so that we can keep fleshing out the memories of QE2 in her sea going career.

[Rod]

Monthly.