Thanks for leaving feedback on the previous thread. As we said, everything is still up in the air, and we're trying to decide on the best way to move forward. For that reason, here's another option, although quite different.


Proposed changes to the contributor system

The contributor system is removed entirely, meaning contributor giveaways are no longer an option. In return, we setup a system based around friends.

  1. When viewing a profile, you have the option to add the user to your friend list, by simply clicking Add Friend.
  2. While creating a giveaway, you have the option to limit the giveaway to your friends.
  3. A friends list would work one way, meaning there are no requests. For example, say I add lokonopa as a friend. He would now have the ability to instantly enter any of my friend giveaways. However, this doesn't mean I'm suddenly able to enter his friend giveaways. There would be no limit on the number of friends you add, it could be 10 or 10,000.
  4. The system helps to reward people for a wide variety of actions. For example, someone might not be able to create giveaways because they're on a limited budget. Previously, they could never enter contributor giveaways. If we go with this approach, they could actively participate on the forum by creating interesting discussions and by leaving entertaining comments, and they'll begin to see others adding them as a friend. As a result, they'll find themselves with access to additional giveaways.
  5. You'll know everyone entering your friend giveaway, since you personally selected them. You might choose to only add users that have contributed 50 copies of Shadowgrounds, users that have a monkey in their avatar, or users you know in real-life. It's up to you.
  6. Why remove the contributor system? Doing so would mean values can no longer be abused or exploited for ones benefit, we don't need to make assumptions on where a game was purchased, and we can return to gifting for the purpose of gifting. We might see a few less users and giveaways on the site, since we'd no longer be providing anything in return, but maybe those are the users we shouldn't be fighting to keep.

Feedback

Similar to before, nothing is set in stone, we're only looking for feedback at this time.


Edit

Ok, lots of people are saying this is similar to group and private giveaways, so I'll note some differences. For example, there are a few dozen people on the site you've come across, that you would like to share giveaways with. The following options are below.

  1. You create a friend list, by visiting their profiles and clicking Add Friend. After that, you can create a giveaway for those users anytime and it appears in their giveaway list. If you remove a user from your friend list, their entry is automatically removed from open friend giveaways and points returned.

  2. You create a private giveaway. You manually track down those few dozen people every time you create a giveaway and send them the link. There's a security risk of people sharing the link, and people you never intended entering.

  3. You create a Steam group for yourself. You can't instantly add users, you need to send invites to each of them. There's a good chance they'll decline because they're apart of countless other groups they're trying to manage.

Groups work well for communities. Reddit, GOG, CheapAssGamer, etc. Users all part of a trusted community gifting within the group. It's far from ideal for a personal list of friends.

Private giveaways work well if you don't know the audience. You have a website, you want to limit a giveaway to your visitors, but you don't know who's entering exactly. At the same time, it works well puzzles, chat rooms, or a spontaneous giveaway between two or three friends.

12 years ago*

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But what if we have no friends

12 years ago
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12 years ago
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At least we got gam... oh, wait we won't get any gamez! NOOOOOOOO

12 years ago
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For those who like the contributor status, just make a milestone for them with a random reward.

1k contributions = milestone
2k...
3k...
and so on.

Perhaps that way u won't loose that many people.

12 years ago
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Lol the people on the internet are the only friends i have.

12 years ago
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Achievment unlocked

12 years ago
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foreveralone

12 years ago
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Why do i need friends if i have games?

12 years ago
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To play together, games with coop + friends = profit! :p

12 years ago
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Uhm, we have groups for this?

12 years ago
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That was my thought. Group and Private giveaways already cover this for people. I have nothing against removing the contributor system, but adding this system in place of it seems pointless.

12 years ago
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i'm thinking about the same, people are just doing groups for tghose who they want to see in their giveaways

12 years ago
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Basically what he said, Group's and Privates are already doing all that.
Adding the friends list might only complicate stuff.

12 years ago
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^this

12 years ago
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Agreed.

12 years ago
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exactly.

12 years ago
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Instead of adding people to a friends list, you can add them to your group. Same with this friends list idea, they'll see your giveaways and even more they'll get a chatroom to drop by and talk with everyone. If you have other friends that are not in that group for some reason coughdramacough, you can just link them a private giveaway. I just don't see any positive sides to this friends list idea over what we already have.

Contributor thing was a good idea, sad that it didn't last with everyone abusing 90% discounts.

12 years ago
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Sounds like groups to me.

12 years ago
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I prefer option 1. This is just meh. Some giveaways have 2000 entries. Imagine going in and manually adding over 2000 friends just to make a single giveaway. I certainly wouldn't use it.

12 years ago
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Can we see who added us as friend? Likewise, can we see giveaways created by our friends only?

12 years ago
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That's a great feature, but I don't want the contributor system replaced by it =/

12 years ago
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I'm not sure if the site should be turned into a social network like that. Also, we had problems with bundle keys before contributor giveaways were made. It's just that people don't read and don't care and nothing that requires the users to act on their own accord will work. I'd have to say no to this option, though the idea of making friend giveaways sounds interesting.

12 years ago
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I may or may not be confused about both options, but I personally think that both options wouldnt turn out we/ the scripting wont work well. But I dunno, I dont like either option.

12 years ago
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This could be better.

12 years ago
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As I said, I would like this as an alternative to group giveaways, but I think it should run in tandem with the contribution level.

12 years ago
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This
It would mean the end of random users creating more random groups with strange rules - everyone would be able to add friends (even better if we could create different circles of friends, like pals and puzzlers and dota2crew and...) and create "group giveaways", but there would also be 0-20-100% contributor levels... Could it go even better? Is there a third solution? Achievements for 100 and 1000 giveaways created, 1000 entries with no winning and so on?

12 years ago
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We've discussed achievements before. We have no wish to gamify our site. If we did, they would be for show and not have any actual use (compare to Playblink, where achievements give you points and more exclusive giveaways).

12 years ago
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I was joking :)

12 years ago
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I like that 1st option better,...

12 years ago
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Sounds like facebook to me.

12 years ago
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More like G+, on Facebook people have to accept your friendship request.

12 years ago
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I don't like it.

12 years ago
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I think this would have some nifty applications in terms of setting up giveaways with special qualifications that would be less of a pain than distributing a private link or creating a group and handling invites, but I'm not sure I like it as a complete replacement.

12 years ago
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But I don't have friends :(

12 years ago
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You have a monkey in your avatar.

12 years ago
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Monkey Group (nods)

12 years ago
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12 years ago
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12 years ago
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I thought of slappy first, then the 707dude too xD

12 years ago
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Everybody should have a monkey in their avatar :D

12 years ago
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That's like groups, except less convenient. It simply isn't enough to replace contributor system.

12 years ago
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Seems cool, but I don't think the contributor system should be removed.

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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Should still be an option, yeah. Now there's no way to make one cent giveaways to weed out leeches. >:<

12 years ago
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+1, that's the reason why people even contribute in the first place...

12 years ago
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This site existed and worked quite properly long before contributor giveaways were an option.

12 years ago
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After I noticed that I was getting a 50-50 chance that the winner of my giveaways wouldn't even contact me after the fact to say thanks, and it was almost always some random leech that had never created any giveaways, I started only making group giveaways with restrictions (before contributor giveaways were added). I was essentially prepared to stop contributing because I was just feeding thankless give-nothing leeches who had a flimsy grasp of the rules and several times regifted or traded their gift instead of redeeming it.

Then contributor giveaways came out and my wallet hasn't been the same since.

12 years ago
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I thought the reason people created giveaways was to give back to the community, personal satisfaction, or to dump excess copies of games at least.

As cg suggested, the type of user who only makes a few giveaways to bump their contrib. score...maybe those aren't the kind of users we should be worried about keeping. After all, if bumping their contrib. score is all that's important, what happens when they decide their score is high enough to get them into most or all of the contributor giveaways?

12 years ago
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This. Having both would be much better. And if I had to choose to have either friends or contributor giveaways, I would choose contributor giveaways.

Also, I can already see the "Why don't I have any friends????????????" or "add me as a friend!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" threads...

12 years ago
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12 years ago
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If you're keeping the Steam group giveaway feature then this is kinda redundant in my opinion.

The community on this website already seems divided enough as to whether keys should be allowed, how points should be distributed and so on. I'm afraid that giving us the power to essentially whitelist or blacklist people would cause the community to become even more divided.

I can imagine groups of "non bundle contributors" banding together and thinking their better than the "bundle contributors". There could be people who contribute for personal gratification, but don't participate on the forums who are now at a disadvantage since they don't know lots of people. I would hope it wouldn't become too bad, but it's possible that you'd see threads with lists of "acceptable friends" and "bad contributors".

All in all, I think the calling out and shit flinging would be at an all time high if this option rolled out.

12 years ago
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Sounds good

12 years ago
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I definitely like the other option better.

12 years ago
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Hmm. This seems a bit better than the previous option, which didn't distinguish between bundle key giveaways and giveaways of tradable games that happen to be in bundles. But it also seems rather group-like, as others mentioned. Out of the two options so far, I suppose I'd prefer this one unless option 1 is modified to recognize the difference mentioned above.

In the previous thread, others mentioned the possibility of turning the contributor system into a simple yes/no -- either you have contributed or you haven't. It seems like doing this would allow recognition of people who contribute and to have giveaways specifically for them, but without worrying about the value of what they've given. And it should still provide some encouragement for people to contribute. This might not be perfect either (what is?), but might this possibility be considered as another option?

12 years ago
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I like previous idea more. This one will only create 9999999 groups and the number of giveaways will drastically get lower.

Contribution system is good. If people want more chances, than they have to give sth. Both sides are happy.

12 years ago
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First version was more interesting, this is too similar to the group system.

12 years ago
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Who prefers the 1st option, reply this comment with a "+1".

We'll have a lot of this kind of post if this ideia is implemented
12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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Both are bad ideas.

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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Closed 12 years ago by cg.