Hi all,

First, I'd like to congratulate /u/Jetz72 for winning the most recent Weekly Design Competition. You can view the runner-ups on the original thread. This week, we are taking a hiatus from weekly competitions in order to do some housekeeping & discussion on the format.

Since the very beginning, our Weekly Design Competition has stayed almost exactly the same in format. The only major rule changes we have instituted are disallowing distracting formatting, and switching to a system where mods vote amongst the top 5 upvoted cards rather than choosing the winner to be the strictly most upvoted. I think this format has served us well, but it might be time for a change.

Participation in the past month or two has not been fantastic. We have seen some weeks with comments up in the 90s, but some of the recent weekly competitions have been in the 30's. Plus, as previously mentioned, the format of the competitions has remained the same for a really long time now. This might not be an issue, but that's what we are here to discuss.

Basically, we are looking into changing the weekly design competition format. We appreciate any and all feedback, whether it be from frequent participants or subscribers who for some reason do not participate in the weekly design competition. Let the following questions guide your response, and feel free to contribute anything else you see fit:

• Does the weekly design competition need a format change? Essentially, is the sameness of format and dwindling participation an issue that we should seek to resolve?
• How can we better the logistics of submissions, voting, and choosing the winner? Potential options are switching to reddit polls, or switching the competition format to be submitting to the subreddit and using a flair.
• Is the current method of choosing themes appropriate? For reference, we currently let each winner choose a competition theme. Would more consistently interesting themes encourage you to participate more in the weekly competition? If so, what types of themes would you like to see?
• Is the frequency and timing of current weekly competitions appropriate? As it is, we do a competition roughly every week, and give about 2 days to design and 5 days to vote. Should we in any way modify the frequency or duration of competitions?

Again, all feedback is appreciated. We'd love to hear from people who participate or have participated in weekly competitions, but other feedback is just as important. We should have weekly competitions up and running by next week. If we get some good ideas or feedback, it shouldn't be long after that we change the competition format if appropriate.

Thanks again for reading, looking forward to hearing your thoughts!