We can't just dump it. Imagine the site where everyone can enter every giveaway, so you never have a good chance of winning a game. I think it's a fair thing for people who contribute, but it does limit some things, so Id say rework it. I liked the idea of making contributor points that could be used on special giveaways, but I think that it should be reworked so everyone who has already contributed get their value. SO it has to be an easily addaptible way that still makes things fair and easy.

I'm impressed that the second option, "remove CV", has this many supporters as is. It's certainly not going to come up as winner though.

At this point, a group hug seems in order.

Share the love, Steamgifters.

Who's with me?

I don't know why this many people don't support the CV system. You giveaway games and you gain access to more giveaways. The majority of giveaways are still non-contributor.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: the contributor system causes more issues than it's worth, and should be done away with.

Contributors deserve a reward, otherwise where's the incentive? I love giving away games. I love making somebody's day. Can I not also enjoy receiving them? People act like if you think you deserve at least a chance at better odds, you're in this for the wrong reasons. The entire reason this site functions is because people want games, and people want to give games.

I give away bundle games sometimes. I also give away non-bundled games. I don't see a benefit for the former until I've paid my dues with the latter. That's what the bundle system is there for. It's doing its job. At the end of the day I do just want to give games. Giving those games happens to help me receive them as well, but that doesn't mean it's why I'm doing it. It'll always be about giving games first. I saw I could get a complete Killing Floor bundle for <$3 and thought, "Wow, somebody would be real happy to win that". Contributor value didn't even cross my mind as I bought it. Assuming it had already been marked bundle, I had figured I wouldn't see cv for it until some time later, and was fine with that. If people are trying to "abuse" contributor value from a system that does just fine at locking them out of value until they use it legitimately, then they're pretty shitty at exploiting things.

"I bought 20 Red Orchestra/Killing Floor bundles and gave them away. Now I just have to buy 10 Valve Complete Packs and give those away and I'll be good to go. Really gaming the system."

How about this how can we improve the system, it seams to me that most people in this poll want it. but their has to be a middle ground for this. how about kick off some of the older bundles off the list, or lowering people CV that give away like Excessive copy's that could only be found in a bundle thats open. what are some solutions that we can come up with

No need to heal headache with guillotine. There are no perfect solutions; each system will have its drawbacks. So don't trade bad for worse, but work on improving what you have.
I voted “keep it”, assuming “keep it and tune it up”.

Set $0.01 as a minimum for every single giveaway to avoid leechers.
If you don't have $1 to buy a bundle/game or one of those under-$1 DLCs you don't belong here.

"Remove it. The contributor system causes more problems than it solves."

Erm, what problems would that be, please?

No keep, but modify option? That would be my choice. I do think it's a useful system to help encourage people to give away their extra games -- if you contribute, you get some perks, like contributor-only giveaways. I see nothing wrong with that. However, the change made a while back to simplify accounting for bundles affect people who gave away tradable Steam gifts for games that also happened to appear in bundles. I think that was an unfair penalty for people who followed the SG rules (did not give away bundle keys). I realize it was probably the best compromise at the time, and the staff couldn't be expected to manually verify every giveaway of every affected user, but I still don't like the collateral damage this change caused. I'd like to see the contributor system kept, but modifying in a way that does not penalize people who did not break the SG rules.

Hey cg.
I'm pretty sure CV system is pushing people to do more giveaways so removing it might not be the best choice.

I'll suggest my solution here again:
Please add personal banlists for both users and games to the site. So games added to your personal banlist wouldn't count in CV in your giveaways and users added to your banlist can't enter your giveaways.
If you guys create a sticky thread for a community bundle/exploited game list that's regularly updated and probably suggest that community bundle list thread to people while they're creating CV giveaways, this can solve many problems..

It does tend to split apart the community a lot, I would say, and tends to confuse newcomers somewhat. It is a nice feature to have, but I do think it's kinda destructive to the community at large. That being said, I don't really think the CV system can be removed at the current stage it is at. The CV system never was advertised as a experimental function, and a fortix says that a massive shitstorm will ensue should the system be removed. I still voted for it to be removed, but whatever the outcome, I think swift and decisive action has to be taken.

I'm essentially a leech on this site because I've never given away anything and unfortunately that's not going to change (or I wouldn't want to use this site since I'm only here because I can't buy these things myself for non-financial reasons (all my steam games were either purchases retail, won here or gifted by a friend that happened to have an extra copy)).
Now typically that would mean I'd be against contributor only giveaways, but no, I'm completely 100% for them. In fact I was surprised there wasn't some sort of system like it already in place back when I first joined up.
Absolutely zero reason why anyone should be forced to make their giveaway available to someone like me that hasn't given anything back to the community. And also no reason why someone with zero giveaways like me should dilute the chances of those that have already contributed to the community to win whatever they actually want.

So whatever problems it may cause I'd definitely say having contributor value and contributor only giveaways is fairer than not having them. Although I have to admit I'd love to know what people who give away $2 DLC with a contributor lock of $1,000 are thinking.

As I see it the people that have a problem with contributor values are:

1. Leeches who haven't given anything at all away and get bamboozled by even a $0.01 contributor giveaway.
2. Cheapskates and other leeches that want to be excluded from as few giveaways as possible whilst personally spending the lowest amount of money they can to achieve that goal quickly running into the $30 limit on bundle games in the process.
3. Legit generous people that never cared about contributor values and bought some premium AAA game fresh off the presses purely out of generosity to make some other guy or gal's day. Now however they find their generous contribution of $50-60 reduced to a far lower value thanks to the game being added to some bundle a year+ later locking them out of giveaways they should have every right to enter thanks to suddenly having a sometimes quite significantly lower contributor value.
4. Although there are of course also slightly less liquid generous people (IE unable to fork out $60 for strangers or even themselves in one go, choosing instead to buy new indie titles at the $10 or 20 mark, or premium games that have been around for a while and have a lower price as a result) who had decent contributor values without looking for them but have now found most of their their generous donations reduced to a measly total of $30 thanks to most of their past contributions being added to discount bundles, again locking them out of giveaways that their previous generosity should have allowed them to enter.

Of those four only the the 3rd and 4th groups actually have a valid claim against the contributor system, although I reckon a good chunk of them also simply don't care or they like the contributor system.
The other two groups, the leeches and bundle cheapskates don't count. In fact this very poll should have a $30.01 contributor value limit so all the leecher hate can be eliminated.

It's definitely not a perfect system and it has some obvious flaws (like full retro-active bundle treatment to the entire steamgifts userbase) but I, despite having 0 contributor value, still think it's a good system to have around and that it's more fair than not.

CV isn't a problem. I say let it stay. We do have a problem with the bundle list but that's MUCH more complex.

let's change it so that you can only set a contributor value on your giveaway if you mail cg a homemade pastry

I voted Keep it. With one real reason why. The more options the gifters have available to them, the more likely they are to gift. This goes for me gifting and I'm sure many others as well. Instead of taking away the option (flawed or not), I would rather see more options available. Like how about a multi-group option. Instead of making it private and having to give the key out to everywhere, what if you want to allow all your steam groups access. That would be nice. I've given a number of (bundle games away) I don't always get cv for it. Guess what, I don't care. I don't ever expect to enter a giveaway with a rediculous cv of 500 or more and I don't care about that either. I do believe that gifter deserved the right to make that giveaway with that restriction though. Removing this only hurts the gifters not the leechers.

If there was a way to limit CV for multiple copies. You give away 4X Copies of Death Rally for example, but only get contrib for the first one .. or first one and a % of the proceeding ones ..

Im voting to remove it. Getting tired of reading multiple threads about it and Im sure its giving staff a headache. I mostly giveaway to specific groups through Group Giveaways or Private links spread between the groups I frequent.
Also I keep hearing giveaways will dry up, I doubt this is true. THis problem we have gets HOTTEST when there's confusion about a sale. Mostly unbalanced ones like Ignite and Parameter Earth from Steam store, or Crazy machines from Galastore... During the rest of the week, when there are clearly defined bundles, people still giveaway like crazy - full well knowing they are not getting (much) credit for these.

I'm really in the middle.

I'm voting to keep it, but by that I'd like some tweaks/changes for it.

Gonna copy and paste this from what I said in another thread.
One thing people should remember is 5x( or so) giveaways were made and have been stable since the value system came into place. If the value system just left over night, many people would stop gifting because many people do it for the value. You can say "we don't want those kind of people here." but the simple fact is they help the site live. Yes, it's not the best reason to gift at all, but many people do it for that reason, and doing that as least gives a little good for people to win games.
(and gonna add one more thing.)

If people think it's hard to win now, it will be even harder to win with the CV system gone, there are going to be MORE entries in public giveaways if the value system goes away. Less giveaways and can only enter those giveaways? Will make giveaways super hard to win.

I know people hate the value system, but the aftermath is something people really need to think about.

I want that mythical third option. The one that doesn't create huge elitist misery with looking at $2000 contrib values, for what feels like a small majority to enjoy... on the other hand, I am strongly opposed to people being able to just... grab and run. Okay, I bought a bundle once... but I gave a few games from it since I didn't have any use and I wonted someone to enjoy them. I know this makes me nowt in the grand scheme, but it was what I could do. But I did it because it was right, and there's users out there who'll just whizz through take what they can and laugh on their way out the door, and that HAS to be discouraged... so...

Guess the point is, too much elitism (at times), too many leechers(always), where's option three, I'm not voting cos my head hurts <wry>

I like the contributor system, but the if you are going to put the hubmle sales in the bundle system, do that for the Gala Sales too... (i'm not complaining i actually want that to happen and i have no problem with it.)

I'm not a complete fan of CV. It completely changes the mindset of the site to give away games for the sake of entering more exclusive giveaways. However, contributor value was added to combat the issue of exclusive group giveaways, giving the average user the opportunity to increase their odds without having to be at the mercy of different Steam groups.

I'm voting to keep.

to be honest if you removed contributor you are just gona see more private/group giveaways