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Can we talk about giveaway transparency for a minute?
MagdAlmuntaser
Member
I honestly don't understand why some giveaways are handled with so little transparency..
Take (ServerHost's UGREEN NASync DH2300) giveaway on LowEndBox..
The giveaway closed on September 30 after running for well over a 2 months, and on the final post the only thing we got was basically:
"Congrats to the winners, they will be contacted by email.."
That's it.!!
Who are the winners?!!
Why not simply announce them publicly?!!
I'm not saying the giveaway is fake, and I'm not accusing anyone of anything..
I'm just saying that when people spend weeks entering a giveaway and then, at the end, they are told "the winners were selected and contacted by email", there is absolutely no way for the community to verify that the prizes actually went to real participants..
What if nobody won?!!
At least publicly announcing the winners gives the community some basic transparency..
I actually won (Ray-Ban Meta glasses) in a previous @ColoCrossing giveaway, and the winners were publicly acknowledged..
That's exactly how I think these things should be handled..
You don't need to publish someone's private information, of course..
Even just the username, first name, or some other reasonable identifier would be enough..
And now there is another (ServerHost giveaway) running for October, this time for $500 cash, It runs until October 31..
same? I really hope I'm wrong..
This isn't about ServerHost specifically.. This is about the general approach..
If a company wants to use LowEndBox/LowEndTalk to promote a giveaway and get thousands of people to participate, I think the community deserves to know who actually won..
So I think it would be reasonable to add a simple transparency requirement:
approved giveaways should publicly announce their winners after the giveaway ends..
It would actually make the giveaways more trustworthy, not less..
And finally, about Gleam...
I really dislike Gleam for giveaways..
There are websites that aggregate Gleam giveaways from all over the internet, so people who are serious giveaway hunters can find hundreds of campaigns in one place..
Gleam also makes it very easy to turn a giveaway into a numbers game where someone can throw dozens or even 100+ accounts at different campaigns..
A normal user enters once or twice and moves on..
A giveaway hunter enters everything, everywhere, every day.
So I'd honestly prefer to see more giveaways managed directly through LowEndTalk, with simple rules and public winner announcements..
That would be much more transparent and much more useful for the actual community..
What do you guys think?
Comments
They are rigged.
People are definitely botting the giveaways but I don't want winners announced publicly when it's real names being used, instead of a username.
I think requirements should be LET account and a minimum amount of posts, e.g. 5
Make it 5000
RIGGED
yea there was a skrime giveaway that just ended as well where "all winners were contacted".
i think winners announced needs to be a standard part of the rules for giveaways (i actually thought it was, just because they always were, guess not~).
For the Skrime one, I believe all winners were listed in the giveaway thread. I know because I was one of the winners and I got a notification there before I got a PM from Skrime.
oh that's funny, apologies to @SKRIME i checked the last page and the 1st.
Should be account age too, and picked randomly from the thanked list or single comment etc
lots of ways to make it fair and legit but the whole point of Gleam is to let people rig or bot while the provider gets the benefit nevertheless
Honest mistake. I think he made the final post because morons kept trying to enter a giveaway that was already over. Page 11 does list the winners, I just checked.
If I was a provider I would just create my own giveaway and let one of my alts win it.
Oh wait @Fourplex did that already right?
well you know i THINK that happened but everytime he tries to apologize about it i get lost in the convoluted shitbabble so not sure!
Why not just build a giveaway system into LowEndTalk itself, connected to the users database, with some basic requirements?
Like, the account has to be at least X days old, the user needs at least X posts, etc..
Pretty much the same way you already handle the domain auctions here..
Im giving my ass away.
yes. people can create 1000s of (real sounding but fake) accounts and give 1000s votes per day on Gleam. that's the reason I stopped voting through it with my sole account as I can't compete the wholesale votes given by one person (multiplied by 100s such)
Why do you want "people" taking part in
LowEndBoxgiveaway to haveLowEndTalkaccount?What next? serververify "people" need LET account too?
also gleam widget shows winners, so there is your transparency
exactly this
What are you talking about?
LowEndBox is part of LowEndTalk, they’re not separate from each other..
Giveaways posted on LowEndBox are also announced on LowEndTalk..
One is the forum and the other is the forum’s blog..
Are you actually a member here, or did you just get the Veteran badge from posting a lot of random comments?
Did you even check the Gleam links I posted above? Did you see any winner names there, or are you just replying randomly here to increase your post count?
Hello, interested.
Offers has arrived in your inbox.
i mean they want you to feel that way, but LEB is a garbage pit. have you ever opened it in a browser? it's fucking horrid.
they're very separate for me, or i wouldn't use LET either.
and?
You can't force "people" reading the blog to make an account on some shit forum. If you want to force people to read the forum just kill the blog and have 'blog' category here and direct all traffic. Oh, it's not like that?!
Wait, if offer is posted on forum then it automagically means it's posted on LEB? I think providers should sue them for not posting every community-offer as blog post, it's outrageous, LET and LEB is the same!1o1neoene!Oneone
I did. Literally on the page you linked in the gleam widget itself.
🤣🤣🤣
They only posted the winners today, after I made this thread..
From September 30 until yesterday, they just said the winners had been contacted and closed the thread without naming them..
Anyway, I still think an in-forum giveaway system would be better than using shitty Gleam..
Just my opinion..
I agree with you on this point..
I still don’t really understand why LEB exists..
It’s basically just an advertising platform for companies, nothing more..
You’ll even see bad companies advertised there 🙂
Yes, it's exactly that. Companies submit offers to advertise their services and then there's some random posts sprinkled in.
leb circa '2013 to guess when' was really great, when let didnt exists yet
Comment 2019:
true ..
Hmm, @William, wdyt?
Easiest way, if it should follow let and leb only, then use usernames and kick all unknown out. But you cant disallow leb readers for a giveaway from leb.