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<blockquote data-quote="Treebore" data-source="post: 3334806" data-attributes="member: 10177">I disagree that the Judges are the &quot;heart&quot; of the awards. The fans are the heart of the awards. Judges are just facilatators. Separate the wheat from the chafe, so to speak. Let people know what products are pretty darn good, whether they have heard about them or not.The only problem here is that in certain categories there was a lot of &quot;good&quot; product submitted. The judges themselves wished for a way to say, &quot;Hey, this wasn't a top 5 product, but it was 9th, and I think everything in the top 10 should be given a serious look by fans interested in other product lines.&quot;I believe that is why &quot;Honorable Mention&quot; was instituted, to try to raise awarenes about at least a few additional products.Still, the &quot;heart&quot; of the ENnies is the fan vote, not the judges who whittle down the field to a manageable size.I think the real fear about the judges is that certain publishers, and maybe even fans, think that if their product had made it to the final 5 they would have won. So they may think that Judges are why they lost.Which is true. Judges do have that power. However that is why there is an odd number of judges. The 5th is a tie breaker on any vote. No one can abstain. Plus that is why the are voted for every year.So yes, there is room for &quot;unfairness&quot; to occur, but until something better is suggested the ENnies has the best and fairest system going that I am aware of, that is a &quot;Fan Award&quot;.Plus the system is still evolving. Will a &quot;codified judging guidleine&quot; be created? Probably. It is going to be a detailed list of checkmarks. Not entirely though. Products being judged vary greatly, and new ones are showing up every year. So no set of guidelines will ever be &quot;comprehensive&quot;.So the best guideline I see being written is a core baseline of criteria by which to judge products by. It will still leave the final decisions wide open to each judges interpretation. So in reality, these guidelines are a false security blanket. It still comes down to the collective judges opinion. Opinions are always open to disagreement and argument.So I see the current/past &quot;judging&quot; to be just as legitimate as any future years in which some kind of codified system is utilized. It is still, and always will be, Judges opinion that gets a product to the final 5 in each category.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Treebore, post: 3334806, member: 10177"] I disagree that the Judges are the "heart" of the awards. The fans are the heart of the awards. Judges are just facilatators. Separate the wheat from the chafe, so to speak. Let people know what products are pretty darn good, whether they have heard about them or not. The only problem here is that in certain categories there was a lot of "good" product submitted. The judges themselves wished for a way to say, "Hey, this wasn't a top 5 product, but it was 9th, and I think everything in the top 10 should be given a serious look by fans interested in other product lines." I believe that is why "Honorable Mention" was instituted, to try to raise awarenes about at least a few additional products. Still, the "heart" of the ENnies is the fan vote, not the judges who whittle down the field to a manageable size. I think the real fear about the judges is that certain publishers, and maybe even fans, think that if their product had made it to the final 5 they would have won. So they may think that Judges are why they lost. Which is true. Judges do have that power. However that is why there is an odd number of judges. The 5th is a tie breaker on any vote. No one can abstain. Plus that is why the are voted for every year. So yes, there is room for "unfairness" to occur, but until something better is suggested the ENnies has the best and fairest system going that I am aware of, that is a "Fan Award". Plus the system is still evolving. Will a "codified judging guidleine" be created? Probably. It is going to be a detailed list of checkmarks. Not entirely though. Products being judged vary greatly, and new ones are showing up every year. So no set of guidelines will ever be "comprehensive". So the best guideline I see being written is a core baseline of criteria by which to judge products by. It will still leave the final decisions wide open to each judges interpretation. So in reality, these guidelines are a false security blanket. It still comes down to the collective judges opinion. Opinions are always open to disagreement and argument. So I see the current/past "judging" to be just as legitimate as any future years in which some kind of codified system is utilized. It is still, and always will be, Judges opinion that gets a product to the final 5 in each category. [/QUOTE]

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