NEXT year's Advent Calendar.

[MANTIS01]

Congratulations to all the winners so far. Especially to this dude Rasta Fish. After joining Blonde a couple of weeks ago and making a few posts he's done swell to make the list of outstanding contributions to Blonde Forum 2012.

Has one of my fav posters smashedagain ever been included? Currently in Marrakech and was expecting to see a monument in his honour or his face on the bank notes or something, but nobody ever heard of him

[TightEnd]

Congratulations to all the winners so far. Especially to this dude Rasta Fish. After joining Blonde a couple of weeks ago and making a few posts he's done swell to make the list of outstanding contributions to Blonde Forum 2012.

its a mix of contributors to the forum/members who have achieved in poker in 2012 or a combination of the two

Rastafish qualified for what is a personal list by me on both accounts, in my opinion

Smashedagain was in the 2011 Advent calendar

[smashedagain]

Congratulations to all the winners so far. Especially to this dude Rasta Fish. After joining Blonde a couple of weeks ago and making a few posts he's done swell to make the list of outstanding contributions to Blonde Forum 2012.

its a mix of contributors to the forum/members who have achieved in poker in 2012 or a combination of the two

Rastafish qualified for what is a personal list by me on both accounts, in my opinion

Smashedagain was in the 2011 Advent calendar

yeah. Bet you regret that now

[I KNOW IT]

Congratulations to all the winners so far. Especially to this dude Rasta Fish. After joining Blonde a couple of weeks ago and making a few posts he's done swell to make the list of outstanding contributions to Blonde Forum 2012.

its a mix of contributors to the forum/members who have achieved in poker in 2012 or a combination of the two

Rastafish qualified for what is a personal list by me on both accounts, in my opinion

Smashedagain was in the 2011 Advent calendar

So is the advent calendar a personal list of yours Rich?  
I have to agree with Mantis on his point and it would also be a shame if Mantis doesn't make your list for the 2nd year running.

[TightEnd]

Yes the list is down to me

I have to get a long list of about 50 down to a shortlist of 35 and an actual list of 24

[MANTIS01]

Yes the list is down to me

Oh ok Rich I didn't realise they were your own personal choices. My own personal choice would be a thread where candidates are nominated by members and voted for by members which I think would be a much more interactive, democratic and neutral affair than you selecting personal choices. For example I don't think BBC Sports Personality of the Year would be as popular if Gary Lineker just chose the winner himself. It is fair to say your personal choices will be made up largely of DTD players who you interact with and so will by it's nature be biased.

Members using words like humbled, embarrassed, honoured etc because Rich chose you as a personal favourite seems less appropriate than if a raft of your fellow members and peers voted. Hope people don't think I'm pissing on anyone's bonfire or that I'm muchly concerned if I'm one of Rich's personal forum favourites. Lord knows I'm not the most popular poster so wouldn't personally benefit from such a system. Just flying my flag for interaction and democracy and would like the chance to vote for my own personal choices. Think it would improve this aspect of the forum and it would be fun for members.

Happy Xmas Blonde.

[outragous76]

Yes the list is down to me

Oh ok Rich I didn't realise they were your own personal choices. My own personal choice would be a thread where candidates are nominated by members and voted for by members which I think would be a much more interactive, democratic and neutral affair than you selecting personal choices. For example I don't think BBC Sports Personality of the Year would be as popular if Gary Lineker just chose the winner himself. It is fair to say your personal choices will be made up largely of DTD players who you interact with and so will by it's nature be biased.

Members using words like humbled, embarrassed, honoured etc because Rich chose you as a personal favourite seems less appropriate than if a raft of your fellow members and peers voted. Hope people don't think I'm pissing on anyone's bonfire or that I'm muchly concerned if I'm one of Rich's personal forum favourites. Lord knows I'm not the most popular poster so wouldn't personally benefit from such a system. Just flying my flag for interaction and democracy and would like the chance to vote for my own personal choices. Think it would improve this aspect of the forum and it would be fun for members.

Happy Xmas Blonde.

Although the principal of what you say is probably sound, i like it the way it is. Rich gets up close and personal with so many more blondes than anyone, and gets to know the personalities. So very often these are not just what people post on blonde, its all of their expolits.

[TightEnd]

Yes the list is down to me

Oh ok Rich I didn't realise they were your own personal choices. My own personal choice would be a thread where candidates are nominated by members and voted for by members which I think would be a much more interactive, democratic and neutral affair than you selecting personal choices. For example I don't think BBC Sports Personality of the Year would be as popular if Gary Lineker just chose the winner himself. It is fair to say your personal choices will be made up largely of DTD players who you interact with and so will by it's nature be biased.

Members using words like humbled, embarrassed, honoured etc because Rich chose you as a personal favourite seems less appropriate than if a raft of your fellow members and peers voted. Hope people don't think I'm pissing on anyone's bonfire or that I'm muchly concerned if I'm one of Rich's personal forum favourites. Lord knows I'm not the most popular poster so wouldn't personally benefit from such a system. Just flying my flag for interaction and democracy and would like the chance to vote for my own personal choices. Think it would improve this aspect of the forum and it would be fun for members.

Happy Xmas Blonde.

It could be done this way, but it would involve a shed load of extra work in a voting process, then completely lack any element of surprise when it came to the daily picks

There's no bias in it either there are plenty of people on the list I have never met, or have never been to DTD.

Its all about "doing that little bit extra" forum contribution or poker achievement,or both, and everyone on the list qualifies on that

Anyway, its just meant to be a feel good exercise where the major challenge is to reduce it down to 24 picks from many more I could include. Hopefully everyone included gets a smile to see their write up, and if someone isn't included it doesn't mean anything negative. Just not enough days to go round!

Completely happy for someone else to lead it or manage it as they see fit next year. If the consensus wants a public vote, I am sure that can be done too.

[AndrewT]

Also nomination and a vote would take away the surprise element.

To use your SPOTY analogy, with no nominations Laura Trott, Greg Rutherford and Charlotte Dujardin might have been a bit more excited on Sunday night.

[FUN4FRASER]

Mantis... I think you are a great poster and make an invaluable contributions to Blonde with your observations ,sharp wit,controversial view points all cemented with your great writing ability...

...So I respectfully suggest rather than contest the voting procedure...why don't you get with the spirit of the thing ?... Who knows what might happen if you're good this Christmas !

[snoopy1239]

I hope Mantis is tomorrow's pick.

[ACE2M]

Yes the list is down to me

Oh ok Rich I didn't realise they were your own personal choices. My own personal choice would be a thread where candidates are nominated by members and voted for by members which I think would be a much more interactive, democratic and neutral affair than you selecting personal choices. For example I don't think BBC Sports Personality of the Year would be as popular if Gary Lineker just chose the winner himself. It is fair to say your personal choices will be made up largely of DTD players who you interact with and so will by it's nature be biased.

Members using words like humbled, embarrassed, honoured etc because Rich chose you as a personal favourite seems less appropriate than if a raft of your fellow members and peers voted. Hope people don't think I'm pissing on anyone's bonfire or that I'm muchly concerned if I'm one of Rich's personal forum favourites. Lord knows I'm not the most popular poster so wouldn't personally benefit from such a system. Just flying my flag for interaction and democracy and would like the chance to vote for my own personal choices. Think it would improve this aspect of the forum and it would be fun for members.

Happy Xmas Blonde.

Mantis = Forum posting hero

[sovietsong]

I hope Mantis is tomorrow's pick.

[Lucky]

Yes the list is down to me

Oh ok Rich I didn't realise they were your own personal choices. My own personal choice would be a thread where candidates are nominated by members and voted for by members which I think would be a much more interactive, democratic and neutral affair than you selecting personal choices. For example I don't think BBC Sports Personality of the Year would be as popular if Gary Lineker just chose the winner himself. It is fair to say your personal choices will be made up largely of DTD players who you interact with and so will by it's nature be biased.

Members using words like humbled, embarrassed, honoured etc because Rich chose you as a personal favourite seems less appropriate than if a raft of your fellow members and peers voted. Hope people don't think I'm pissing on anyone's bonfire or that I'm muchly concerned if I'm one of Rich's personal forum favourites. Lord knows I'm not the most popular poster so wouldn't personally benefit from such a system. Just flying my flag for interaction and democracy and would like the chance to vote for my own personal choices. Think it would improve this aspect of the forum and it would be fun for members.

Happy Xmas Blonde.

Although the principal of what you say is probably sound, i like it the way it is. Rich gets up close and personal with so many more blondes than anyone, and gets to know the personalities. So very often these are not just what people post on blonde, its all of their expolits.

Is there something we dont know?

[MANTIS01]

Hey guys, advocating democracy over autocracy isn’t a negative. We aren’t living in North Korea you know. Suggesting ideas to make this more interactive and inclusive for members isn’t a negative.

If the objective of the thread is to give people a smile then for example nominating 10 members for 24 categories gives 10x the number of people that smile. If you register a vote for your pick but the winner isn’t revealed until the day well the element of surprise is still alive and well. Every member can be engaged in the process if they so desire and can make nominations and register their own personal opinions. We did have something like that on the go at one stage and I thought it was really entertaining. As I recall I got many votes from fellow members for most annoying poster

Personally I wouldn't vote for members who don't qualify for the staking board cos the poker achievements thing is like how many hendon mob flags a player has, something Blonde hero smashedagain gets slated for. My own inclusion doesn’t make any of the above points less valid or relevant or I would have waited to see if I was included before making them. I know deep down Rich loves me so it’s all good. If people don’t think it’s a good idea then ok. Now that I have satisfied my appetite to register my holistic opinion on this matter enough said, please keep calm and carry on.

In the category of most missed poster I would vote for Greekstein.