To Enter Or Not To Enter

Some people here at FAA take the contests more seriously than others. For the most part, contests are just another way to expose your work, more than they are serious art contests. I think it's fine if contest administrators enter their own work in the contests they host.

Those who take the contests very seriously may disagree with me though.

Contests are suppose to be about marketing, so why would you not want to market yourself. The contests aren't real anyway, so I don't understand why people think its a bad thing to enter the so called contest, or even vote for themselves. Its not like you having a contest for sick kids and going to take their prize away.

i don't see why not. if it was juried, and you were a judge, it's a conflict. however because it lists the entries in order, being the first one would give you an advantage to lazy people, so maybe enter it in the middle. however again, when a contest is confusing i tend to look at what the op put in to get an idea of what the heck they want.

it's only wrong to put your things in, then disqualify everyone else. i've seen people do that.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

I typically enter contests I admin unless I think it might be a slow contest, but I also trty to mention in the rules if I plan to enter or not. On groups I admin, I try to keep my own images off the front page or at least down to one or two at a time.

I don't take them seriously.....and I have won a few and got real prizes when that used to be the norm.
Anything goes in the contest arena......there's one contest that pops up monthly by someone who really likes to expose herself, if you know what I mean! lol
I think the results of your query will be 50/50.

I did when I hosted them. I found out how ugly they were with more than half the entries not fitting the simple criteria, so I won't host another. It's an obvious marketing ploy. f you want a simple contest join a camera club. Also I like the ones that let anyone vote with and lots of votes. It's about exposure. But I guess there are people that are not here to sell or don't really think they could. They need to revamp the whole contest/group thing and and have artists curated collections with a user interface geared to buyers. The contests really show that this is a non serious amateur site.

I host contest and enter my work. However, there was one contest where I was in first, second and third place with one day left to vote so I removed my work. I will leave it unless I am in running for first place.

Bradford I have to agree it would be wonderful to have curated competition. That would be far more appealing to buyers and be a real marketing tool. I would not mind if the contest creator is one of the entries.

Phyllis;

I think what you did by removing your work was pretty awesome. I may have done the same thing. Well, probably I would have left one of them. I'm a decent person, just not a really good one! LOL

I find it a rewarding chance to exhibit.

And I agree with Iris. More value would be added to the piece of work if it were curated. Think about it.

I've done both. Basically if my contest ends up being too narrow to get many entries, I don't enter. Otherwise, I don't worry about.it

For example, with only 9 entries, I did not enter this one.

http://fineartamerica.com/contests/pinhole-photography.html?tab=overview

I am however, going to enter this one:

http://fineartamerica.com/contests/screaming-hdr.html?tab=overview

:) :) :)

Well, here's a question. Do non-members often even look at the contests?

I've been posting mine to facebook, but am not sure I've pulled many over.

On the subject of voting. On all of mine, I've made the voting COMPLETELY open. The reason is, I think that asking non-members to vote is a way to pull in and engage non-members, and that's what we want right? In fact, I think FAA would be smart to make that the default on the contest form.

Wouldn't be much of a contest if I did.