Vam Award Annual Ceremony?

[Henriyk]

A thought I often have "why doesn't VAM have an award?, You might ask yourself why?. Meshed has made a fantastic piece of software, and has some talented moderators. But the most important thing is you and me, the users and not least those who create things for VAM, without us there is no VAM, it's that simple!. Create recognition for those who create. And the prize goes to the best model of the year is..., or piece of clothing, hair, etc. It can be done in many ways and ideas can be different. Maybe members have a vote and you choose who should be nominated or the moderator does it within categories. Another idea (only idea remember) is each member who wants to vote pays amount and the money goes to the winners of each category, and here you can then maybe divide it between free and paid categories?, the possibilities are many. I know VAM and its community want to be taken seriously (it's not just a fap "tool"). It would be an opportunity to take the creators seriously who spend a lot of energy and time on creating wonderful things for VAM, instead of "only" 10 likes and 1000 or whatever downloads.
I hear many things about a "strong" community, what I am asking for is that we create a breeding ground for a community that strengthens recognition for the creators.

 

[Farger]

A thought I often have "why doesn't VAM have an award?, You might ask yourself why?. Meshed has made a fantastic piece of software, and has some talented moderators. But the most important thing is you and me, the users and not least those who create things for VAM, without us there is no VAM, it's that simple!. Create recognition for those who create. And the prize goes to the best model of the year is..., or piece of clothing, hair, etc. It can be done in many ways and ideas can be different. Maybe members have a vote and you choose who should be nominated or the moderator does it within categories. Another idea (only idea remember) is each member who wants to vote pays amount and the money goes to the winners of each category, and here you can then maybe divide it between free and paid categories?, the possibilities are many. I know VAM and its community want to be taken seriously (it's not just a fap "tool"). It would be an opportunity to take the creators seriously who spend a lot of energy and time on creating wonderful things for VAM, instead of "only" 10 likes and 1000 or whatever downloads.
I hear many things about a "strong" community, what I am asking for is that we create a breeding ground for a community that strengthens recognition for the creators.

This kind of idea has been floated around before, as in this post.

The VAMMYs!!!!

WELCOME TO THE VAMMYs!!!! I wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the great work of our creators by offering my take on some of the great work that's been contributed to VAM in 2022. NOTE: The VAMMYs are in no way connected with VAM, The Virtamate Hub, MeshedVR or any other individuals...

hub.virtamate.com

 

[hazmhox]

I find the idea very nice, but it requires a lot of work, I'm not sure we could handle that on a per year basis. I'll poke the team with the idea.
On the other hand, the money idea is a no no. People are too afraid to break "anonymity" and asking for money to vote is a recipe for failure.

And for an award ceremony, we need to plan a lot of things : pre-ceremony (nominees), art/posts around the event, voting, finding a jury, etc... even tho I find the concept interesting, the amount of person you gotta get involved makes the whole thing potentially tedious to handle.

 

[atani]

I find a general award competition, as in all content in the Hub is in the competition automatically, a bad decision that would only create resentment and be extremely unfair regardless of the method used to "grade" the content. Having no say in joining such an award system would very much lead me to not wanting to share more resources or engage as much, it should only be a opt-in situation.
If it's a contest where a creator decides to join and the rules are clear, then that's totaly fine.

P.S. if money is involved that changes everything and highly discouraged, unless it's in some form of donation to something and not a reward to the winner.

 

[hazmhox]

I find a general award competition, as in all content in the Hub is in the competition automatically, a bad decision that would only create resentment and be extremely unfair regardless of the method used to "grade" the content. Having no say in joining such an award system would very much lead me to not wanting to share more resources or engage as much, it should only be a opt-in situation.

I don't even know where to start with this. Most of your answer feels like you have an issue with being "rated" and not the idea itself... which is something that concerns only you.

And to be transparent, I think no matter what idea we could bring. This would probably look like the Steam Awards and nothing more, so pretty much anybody could vote for anybody. Which in terms of fairness is pretty much the best possible way. To be honest, if you'd sort the content for a single year, by for instance most liked + most rated + most downloaded, is your award ceremony more less.

And to go back on the money subject... we're not Hollywood... sucking producers and lobbying the shit out of the jury/judges to get a spot. If there was an Award thingy, that would be a community event to celebrate the creativity of members. Not a competition to get cash.

 

[atani]

I don't even know where to start with this. Most of your answer feels like you have an issue with being "rated" and not the idea itself... which is something that concerns only you.

I have an issue with being entered into a competition without opting to be part of one, and I'm pretty sure I will not be alone on this opinion. That's why I said that an opt-in competition is better.

Rating of a resource to me means that the person tried it and liked it enough to come back to say that. That I value, the person put the effort to come back and share a message of incentive. One basic review is worth more than 10.000 downloads (arbitrary number), and having a post in the resource discussion area sharing tips to improve the resource, easily worth more than 100.000 downloads and likely the motivator to keep on making stuff.
A popularity contest is something else, I have no interest in such.

 

[hazmhox]

A popularity contest is something else, I have no interest in such.

You're on a digital plateform, for digital content. Most of the things is a popularity contest. Anything very creative does not get credit, anything really "trendy" gets the views.
You can spend 30 days at 3 people doing a very well crafted scene and get not even 10K downloads, when your average low effort look alike or basic snusnu "50 anims loops" get 10 if not 20 times that.
Just like your local restaurant struggles to keep afloat while McDonalds makes billions. ( spoiler, one is better than the other )

And again, if it was something that was a thing, it would be an award/recognition system. Not a competition.

 

[AshAuryn]

A thought I often have "why doesn't VAM have an award?, You might ask yourself why?. Meshed has made a fantastic piece of software, and has some talented moderators. But the most important thing is you and me, the users and not least those who create things for VAM, without us there is no VAM, it's that simple!. Create recognition for those who create. And the prize goes to the best model of the year is..., or piece of clothing, hair, etc. It can be done in many ways and ideas can be different. Maybe members have a vote and you choose who should be nominated or the moderator does it within categories. Another idea (only idea remember) is each member who wants to vote pays amount and the money goes to the winners of each category, and here you can then maybe divide it between free and paid categories?, the possibilities are many. I know VAM and its community want to be taken seriously (it's not just a fap "tool"). It would be an opportunity to take the creators seriously who spend a lot of energy and time on creating wonderful things for VAM, instead of "only" 10 likes and 1000 or whatever downloads.
I hear many things about a "strong" community, what I am asking for is that we create a breeding ground for a community that strengthens recognition for the creators.

I find this post manipulative and insulting, frankly.

I know VAM and its community want to be taken seriously

This statement is meant to imply we are not already taken seriously. A low-key insult that implies your idea is the solution to our supposed lack of being taken seriously.
I would argue that with millions of players, hundreds of copycat websites and communities, resources with downloads in the millions, creators of all kinds making thousands of dollars each month, and no real competition or software alternative to VaM -- we are already taken seriously.
You follow this up with

(it's not just a fap "tool")

I haven't seen anyone else but you in this post calling VaM a "fap tool". This is a community of talented artists and creators who think outside the box and create incredible things we never even imagined. I'm fairly certain this is insulting to most.

It would be an opportunity to take the creators seriously

The Hub already does seasonal events, gives awards, recognizes users through Discord roles, badges, featured resources, messages from staff, likes, reviews, favorites, reactions, Patreon subscriptions, and so on. I'm not sure who you are implying doesn't take creators seriously, other than yourself.

Could we find more ways to recognize creators and find fun and engaging ways to generate excitement about VaM? Sure! But not from someone whose main goal is to force their agenda by putting down everyone responsible for those things, and who is unwilling to acknowledge the hard work and dedication that has gone into building this community from a small subreddit to an internet presence with hundreds of thousands of visitors.

instead of "only" 10 likes and 1000 or whatever downloads

Trying to get creators who have had underperforming content to be angry and feel that it's the "system" that causes their lack of likes and downloads, and that your idea is the solution. A quick search filter to sort resources by most reactions or most downloads quickly dispels this manipulative "factoid". Quality free content gets quality reactions. Bland, recycled, low effort, or mostly-paid content gets less engagement.

I would also like to take this opportunity to point out that the statement "without us there is no VAM" implies that Paid Content is included. I disagree. Without quality FREE content, there is no VaM, perhaps. But I'm fairly confident we could wipe all paid content from the Hub and still have plenty of visitors. Does that mean I am against paid content? Not at all. I'm just pointing out that the creators who are the most well-liked are the ones who aren't just in it for the money.

Additionally, the creators who release the most quality free content are also the highest paid. Something to think about.

I hear many things about a "strong" community

I'm not sure what you are trying to imply here, especially with the quotation marks around "strong". Seems to be another insult to the community.

create a breeding ground for a community that strengthens recognition for the creators.

See, if you had said "my idea could help further strengthen recognition for creators" I would have no problem. But it's the subtle, manipulative crap where you imply that this community does not at all recognize its creators by choosing the words "that strengthens recognition" that really makes me not want to listen to anything else you have to say.

If you want to suggest ideas for community engagement, try to start by not insulting the staff and the community itself and don't just assume that weak manipulative tactics will not be seen right away by the talented, intelligent and strong community we have here.

 

[atani]

And again, if it was something that was a thing, it would be an award/recognition system. Not a competition.

I always find an awards/recognition system, of whatever kind it is, to be potentially troublesome when there's unclear rules or motives.
And on the opt-in part, the winner(s) should be contacted to know if they wish to receive the award/recognition before it's made public and respond within a reasonable timeframe.

 

[VaMRainey]

The idea of an awards type show/thing sounds fun in theory, but in practice is a lot more work and I agree with those who stated it could cause resentment. There are already options to make favorites lists, rating systems, likes, etc. There are many folks who make incredible work that is outside the box of regular VAM content and it doesn't get recognized. If people are wanting to have that recognized, they are welcome to message me here or on Discord to suggest this person be featured (if they haven't been already), as that is a good way for folks to be appreciated by their hard work.

ALSO LEAVE REVIEWS OF CONTENT YOU ENJOY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyway, I'm locking this thread. <3 Thank you for your suggestions everyone <3