With the clear winner, Anime Princess with 6 votes unless it changes in the next several hours, it was a very close match… but a very ironic one at best since my blog from my assumptions would have won mainly on the strength of content. It simply proves that the Aniblog Tournament is a popularity contest and the voters aren’t voting based on content, but on popularity as described on a recent post: Although with Anime Princess winning being very close with content strength, I think with some matches, the following applied:
As you may have noticed, there has often been a difference in the number of votes in the two different polls in the one post. The main reason this happens is when people link to the tourney asking them to vote for someone (usually themselves), their followers/readers/minions blindly obey and vote in just that poll, never looking at anything else on the tourney whatsoever. So while its great that people are at least writing about the tourney, we would like to ask that you perhaps write something more substantial than just ‘VOTE FOR ME!’.
Sometimes it is all politics, but not in this case. I know my flaw is the banner, but that shouldn’t be a real weakness since I found a lot of flaws on Anime Princess, but my blog I have to admit is also flawed because I’m not exactly the best writer out there. I’m surprised that I have even gotten that far considering most people stop blogging after one year. My writing may not be the greatest, but certainty not the worst.
I think there is some things I can improve on with the following:
- Making people more aware of the blog: I think this is one of the problems. If you look at my blogroll, it is hopelessly small. I need other Anime Bloggers to help out and give the blog more exposure. Next time when there is another contest, I can probably have a better chance of winning since there will probably be more readers and such and with myself updating the blog regularly, it wouldn’t be a problem. Considering I have half the followers compared to Lossty on Twitter… it is pretty sad.
- More original title: I’m guessing that a very generic title like ‘s Anime Blog is getting tiring. I probably need to think up another name for the blog so that it would stand out more.
- Guest Editorials/Reviews: Perhaps I should allow other bloggers in the blogosphere share their thoughts on issues like Anime and the Industry and other stuff to get readers more interested.
- What you think I should improve on in the future besides the banner and the theme? I know I have some troubles with grammar, but I think I am pretty good in the content department since I no longer do those summary episodic posts and more of an editorial/thoughts type now and that I post editorials time after time again.
As the results stand, I wish Lossty luck and I will help her by sending a list of stuff that she should fix on her blog so she will have a chance to win against the next match. Also, I apologize for any rude remarks I have made and I never meant to attack the blog since Lossty deserves it after the tight competition.
Well, I guess things like this also are a popularity contest to some extent. People are generally going to vote for the blogs they read, even if the opposing blog might actually be better because, well, they already read the other blog. I think part of the hope was that people would vote in polls involving blogs they had never seen before, and that would help balance out some of the biased voting. I think that may have happened to start with, but it’s largely gone away.
As the first round has dragged on, the number of voters in each poll has been going down. The first 8 matches saw an average of 260 votes. That number dropped to 229 for the second 8, then to 187 for the 3rd 8, and is now down to 135 for the last 8, if no more votes are made in the final two polls.
That means that the number of voters per poll has almost been cut in half since the start of the tournament. Indeed, the most voted in poll thus far in the final 8 – Memories of Eternity vs. Oballer – had 158 total votes. 7 blogs in the first half of the tournament received that many votes by themselves – and 2 of them lost!
It’s a lot easier for fans of a blog to determine the result when you lose 130 votes of just people voting based on which blog they like better rather than clicking on a link on a “vote for me!” post on a blog they happen to visit.
I’m not really sure what the solution to that problem is. Naturally people are going to be excited or interested in the tournament to start with, and then lose interest or just plain forget as it goes on. It’d be useful if some of the big blogs actively promoted it every now and then, but I haven’t really seen that happening.
Against the backdrop of the size of the anime fandom, it makes almost no difference whether 300 or 150 votes were cast. It’s a niche contest at best; with 1/2 to 1/3 of the votes coming from the participating bloggers themselves, and most of the rest from blogoshpere regulars who couldn’t even keep their interest up until the end of Round 1. Some would call it a circle you-know-what. Winning or losing in it means… not a whole lot. About the only useful thing about it is the opportunity to get more feedback.
@chikorita157: This may sould like a weird question, but are you autistic? Your manner reminds me of a friend of mine who is.
I don’t think so since I had friends and I wasn’t socially isolated. However, I was put into Special Ed because of my nationality since they thought I can’t speak English properly and then everything pretty much went downhill from there. To make the story short, I wasn’t even supposed to be in the program because they soon realized that I was normal as everyone else and that program just hindered me. This is the main reason why my writing is a bit weak than it would otherwise.
If you know already that it’s just a popularity contest, then you shouldn’t have minded it in the very first place XP.
Everything looks better on paper… but in practice… not so much. In this case, it applied.:p
Maybe people voted for Anime Princess because they prefer her content doncha think? I like AP myself and she’s been around a long enough time to get pretty skilled at writing. She also only wrote the vote for me post because “I saw the other person promoting themselves so I figured it must be the proper thing to do too!”.
Honestly, you’ve got to stop worrying about things like layout and post styles. Improve your writing, make your posts entertaining. Everything else should be secondary
Believe me, it is going to take some time to improve my writing. Although the content is there, I believe that there is other factors with blogger’s writing style. Sometimes, readers are going to have preferences over who’s writing is better and such and there is also personality.
Like I have previously mentioned, my grammar may not be the greatest since I already know that my weakness is writing since I forget to read over my posts before publishing them. Even so, there is always a next time and not too disappointed by the results. Like everyone else, there is no such thing as a flawless blog because by human nature, it’s not possible to be completely perfect.
“It simply proves that the Aniblog Tournament is a popularity contest and the voters aren’t voting based on content, but on popularity as described on a recent post”
So when Anime Princess wins, it proves that it’s a popularity contest. What makes you so certain that your blog is clearly superior and deserves to win?
I can find just as many flaws on your blog as I can on Anime Princess’s. It’s not all popularity. At least not for me. I didn’t follow either one and I voted the one I would enjoy reading more. Yes, there is politics. Yes, there is popularity. But I still think the blog itself is the major draw of votes.
Granted, you do have a better design. Anime Princess has a terrible banner and a distracting sidebar, but the writing itself isn’t actually that much better.
Take for instance: “If it’s not a fluke and I win at the last minute, that will be good for me… if that really matters since I lost interest in winning or losing.”
What are you trying to say here?
Looking at your other posts, I see that you also overuse ellipses.
As for the actual content, your editorials and reviews are comparable to Anime Princess’s. Some posts are better; some are worse. However, Lostty replies to all her comments. That adds a lot.
So before you claim that she won all because of popularity, try to maybe realize that your blog is not clearly better. The vote really could have gone either way, and the fact that it’s such a close poll indicated that people are not voting on popularity.
It’s a bit conceited of you to say that about Anime Princess’s blog, and it’s rude to the voters to assume they couldn’t vote objectively.
“Everything looks better on paper… but in practice… not so much. In this case, it applied.:p”
Not really.
I did vote for you though because yours look better at first glance. After a bit of reading though, Anime Princess just has better style and composition. I don’t follow either blog, but if I really voted on content, I would vote for Anime Princess.
Of course the layout overshadowed the content. If I reviewed the blog more closely like more in depth and reading more of her posts, I will probably get more from it. There is a flaw with a first glance review and then writing the conclusion because it only gets the surface, not in depth. I the content is there already, but she only needs to improve the layout and design and thats it.
Keep in mind that my writing may not be the greatest in the world and I know that since I struggled through English after I transferred to a Liberal Arts school. Blogging will help me improve my weakness in writing, but it’s going to take time. If you compare my writing from now and when I first started, I have improved, but as they all say, there are always room for improvement.
My point was that it’s incredibly rude to Anime Princess when you say that her win proves aniblog is only based on popularity. It’s not. She won because she has a better blog. Your post discredits her blog and makes it seem as if she didn’t deserve to win. She did.
“It simply proves that the Aniblog Tournament is a popularity contest and the voters aren’t voting based on content”
Again, that’s very presumptuous of you too and also rude to the voters who really tried to vote based on content.
I will issue an apology then…sometimes my ego gets in the way…
I think it’s great that you get lots of constructive opinions from readers and several prominent bloggers because of the tourney, win or lose.
I voted for you. I would change very little to be honest. If you like Clannad then it should be your header.
If you look at my blogroll, it is hopelessly small.
Read more blogs ^__^ and write stuff that other bloggers might mention in their own posts. Connections with the content creators (bloggers) and being mentioned/quoted on other sites is a good way to get views and possible readers.
And like Scamp mentioned, the layout and overhead should be secondary. Mostly, enjoy what you’re doing and if your writing can extend that feeling to readers, it’s enjoyable.
ps. Swap the buttons for posting comment and T connect; the latter is right where I expect the Post Comment button to be XD (or at least make them look fluid)