Nomination thread was here - https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=70237.0
Here is the poll for March's Keyboard of the Month. There was a lot of attention this month, despite me only putting the thread up for about a week.
Now, we have three run away winners in the nominations, but we did have 13 different boards nominated!
Anyway, the top 3 are:
Yoe's 60% custom Alps build
(http://i.imgur.com/YJzh4ab.png)
More pictures can be found here -> https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=69841.0
Next, is hwood34's KMAC with OG Dolch (and a shady right shift :)) )
(https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7617/16762929130_f2d7a2a631_c.jpg)
More images can be found here -> https://www.flickr.com/photos/129179817@N07/
(hope you don't mind me linking to your flickr, can't find anywhere else you have photos of it up)
And finally is BillNye's 360 Corsa
(https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8696/16206185123_7369f5a88c_b.jpg)
Find more photos in the nomination thread.
Shout outs to Sifo's blue board, and Lastpilot's LZ (again)
Previous threads can be found here:
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March Nomination Thread - https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=70237.0
February Poll Thread - https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=69438.0
February Nomination Thread - https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=68834.0
January Poll Thread - https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=68357.0
January Nomination Thread - https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=67831.0
December Nomination Thread - https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=66796.0
December Poll Thread - https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=67230.0
Rules here:
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1. A nomination thread will go up for the last two weeks of every month. You can nominate anybody you like, (even yourself) and any person can have any number of nominations every month.
a. These boards should be ones you are drawn to, ones that stand out for one reason or another. Keysets, modifications, whatever you fancy. I don’t want to have to post guidelines or restrictions on the boards, but I may change this depending on the types of submissions we get over the first few months. Please also say a little bit about each board you nominate, as to the reasons why you think it deserves to be up for KOTM.
b. The board must have been posted to the forums since the start of the calendar month. It can have been posted before then, but you must provide a link to the images that were posted after the first day of the calendar month.
c. Keyboards may be resubmitted in subsequent months, but they must have had a picture or progress posted within the calendar month that they are nominated for.
d. NO THEMES RIGHT NOW. These may or may not follow in the coming months. This also may or may not tie in with the calendar that may or may not happen at the end of next year.
2. However, after the initial two week period of nominations, a user will only have ONE board get through to the final public voting process. The final three nominees will be selected by myself from the most nominated and praised board in the nomination thread. E.G. If one board is posted and has the most +1s, quotes or references by other users in said thread, that will be chosen as one of the final three. Essentially, there is a crowd unofficial voting before the public voting. The final three are not up to me, they are up to you.
3. PLEASE post some good quality photos of the board you are nominating. I’m not looking for Macro lenses and DSLRs, but maybe more than one, top down, blurry shot would be nice. I realise if it isn’t your board there isn’t much you can do about it, but just pick a couple that aren’t terrible from an album or post.
4. On the 1st of every month, a poll thread will go up. This will consist of three finalists. Again, a user will only have one of their boards get through to this stage during any particular month. You can of course be nominated on another month. There will be one vote per person, and the results will remain anonymous until the voting closes.
5. After a period of one week, the voting will be closed and a winner will be announced. The winner will be posted both on that month's voting thread, and the following month's nominations thread. I’m not sure if there will be a prize every month, but if there is then I will sort it out and backdate it if I come up with one in a few months time.
6. The winner of each monthly process will go through to the ANNUAL KEYBOARD OF THE YEAR process, and the winner of the will DEFINITELY win a prize which I will work out in a year’s time.
VOTING WILL LAST FOR ONE WEEK UNTIL THE 8TH OF APRIL. GOOD LUCK ALL!
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, we have a result. However, we also have a problem.
As we all know, the vote this month was very close. At the final count we have hwood's KMAC with 39 votes, and Yoe's 60% Alps creation with 36 votes. As it happens, the vote was neck and neck until an hour before the vote was due to close. Three votes were then cast in the space of 13 minutes. Those 3 votes gave hwood his 3 vote lead, and ultimately the win.
This, unfortunately, piqued my suspicions. I asked the mods if there was a way to see who voted for who. A google document is produced with a list of all the users who voted for which entry, along with timestamps of when they voted. After requesting the list from the moderators and casting my eye over it, my attention was drawn to a number of names that I had not heard before, and seemed a little strange. Due to there not being a member search function for non-admins, I had to go through members by changing the numbers of their User ID, which is done by date created, with iMav being user ID number 1. I then compared their time registered, last active, post counts and voting times, and my findings you can find below. All findings are accurate as of 20:25 Geekhack time on 08/04.
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https://geekhack.org/index.php?action=profile;u=46981 - MFW - created 07 April 17:13:35. Voted 07 April 17:16:03. Zero posts. Last active 07 April 17:15:49. Voted for hwood's KMAC.
https://geekhack.org/index.php?action=profile;u=46980 - reddittttttt - created 07 April 17:10:18. Voted 07 April 17:11:51. Zero posts. Last active 07 April 17:11:51. Voted for hwood's KMAC.
https://geekhack.org/index.php?action=profile;u=46978 - 1337 - created 17:02:12. Voted 07 April 17:06:16 Zero posts. Last active 07 April 17:06:07. Voted for hwood's KMAC.
https://geekhack.org/index.php?action=profile;u=46972 - QuickLime - created 07 April 13:48:10. Voted at 13:55:57. Zero posts. Last active 13:56:52. Voted for hwood's KMAC.
https://geekhack.org/index.php?action=profile;u=46931 - karrigan - created 06 April 15:57:14. Voted 06 April 16:00:45. Zero posts. Last active 06 April 16:00:37. Voted for hwood's KMAC.
https://geekhack.org/index.php?action=profile;u=46932 - d3n13D - created 06 April 16:03:32. Voted 06 April 16:06:01. Zero posts. Last active 06 April 16:05:38. Voted for hwood's KMAC.
https://geekhack.org/index.php?action=profile;u=47023 - zzyzz - created 08 April 16:04:52. Voted 08 April 16:09:24. Zero posts. Last active 08 April 16:09:11. Voted for hwood's KMAC.
https://geekhack.org/index.php?action=profile;u=47024 - topgun - created 08 April 16:11:43. Voted 08 April 16:14:36. Zero posts. Last active 08 April 16:13:52. Voted for hwood's KMAC.
My interpretation is, that all 8 of these accounts have been created to sway the results of the vote.
I sent these results to the moderators, who did further investigations with the tools that only they have. I was told that seven out of the 8 email addresses for the accounts in question are clearly generated and are not legitimate. They follow the same format and are very suspect. Half of them are also from TOR nodes.
In the interest of fairness, I asked the moderators to use their user search tool to look at the last dozen users who voted for Yoe's board, and all of them came back as genuine users.
Ultimately, I am disappointed. Why anybody would do this to try and fix the results of something like this is beyond me. I have tried to be fair with everything, not letting my personal preferences get in the way of nominations or results, and I am always open to feedback. I want this competition to go ahead, because I really think it is a great way to showcase people's hard work and dedication to a hobby a lot of us love.
My decision, ultimately is to decide what to do with the result of this month's vote. While we could do a re-vote, I am afraid that the person or persons responsible for fixing this month's vote, would just do it again. I could strike off the vote completely, but I believe that would be unfair to the real voters, the three competitors, and the competition itself.
So I have decided to strike 7 votes off the total for hwood's KMAC, thus giving the win to Yoe.
I apologise to hwood for having to strip him of this win like this, but I do it out of the fairness of the competition. I apologise to Yoe for him having to win like this, and I apologise to Billnye for him having to be apart of the controversy.
Finally, I have to apologise to all those who voted, especially those who voted for hwood's board who are expecting me to announce his victory. I hope this doesn't deter people from participating in the competitions in subsequent months, and doesn't stop people from voting or nominating. In the future, I will ensure that votes are hidden until the end, so nobody knows how close the votes are, and we can prevent a similar situation happening in the future.