I suggest simply looking at the member count of that group. You will save a minute or two of counting each member from the members list of that group... :P
Okay, okay, no more making fun. :(
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I think that's not a solution to what do you refer. I mean, the solution to stop bad users for being bad users is restrict the site to most users? (I bet there are more users without subs, and it's obvious anyway).
That would just kill the essence of this site IMHO.
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+1 me too! where gamer goes I go! :P No bu seriously, I got tons of spare time on my hands and can log on in unusual times due to time difference. would love to help out :)
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On the topic - I'm against it. It would start A LOT of private giveaways like that.
My point is that I, for example, own some money to somebody since the summer sale. How can I make a giveaway? Some people can't afford that.
And the point of that point is that this site would slowly start dying for people who can't afford to make that giveaway of 20 bucks.
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I'm just saying that Cg should monitor the entries in the private groups that way he can see if someone is indeed worthy to be in it. That way if someone owe's a friend( like me :( ). Then Cg could evaluate their past and determine a final verdict of entry.
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That isn't related to my comment... But that is a good idea for the group. I'm still against it.
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@Mysterious i dont exactly see how 20 bucks is such a huge problem to anyone.
Myself i'm a low income guy that could defenitly afford putting out 20 bucks for charity right now. Problem the last time i did one of the guys who won haven't even installed the game i gave away yet. so thats stuff that annoys me.
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You could've replied to my post.
Anyway, on the comment:
$20 is what I got for my birthday in 2009... Or 2008. Don't really remember. My last income was more than 8 months ago, and it was only a few bucks, that was from one generous guy who donated it. Before that - I think it was that $20 I received as a gift for my birthday in '08/'09. And before that, my last money received was in 2007, which was a few bucks too.
So as you can see, it's a big problem for some people.
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I'm still going to school. And the jobs available around here are physical with a salary of 200-400 bucks a month. Most of the time it's 250-300 bucks. And physical means to carry stuff around 8 hours a day. So yea...
Any more suggestions? :P
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Yea well. We gotta live from that when prices are growing towards the EU price range and salaries are either shrinking or staying in place.
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Post-Soviet Union country.
Just Google some statistics to spice up things:
Unemployment rate: 19.1%
Physical jobs, like construction (which is most popular, by the way) number is more than 3 times the other jobs number.
Average salary: $298
Minimal salary: $196
Inflation rate: ~3% (somewhere says it's 2.8, other place says it's 3.2, so picking out the average)
Do I need to say more? :P
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http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=shazbot
I knew it from Tribes before I knew it was from Mork and Mindy
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Well, yes $20 can be a problem to some people. Regardless if they have a job or not. Some people are in School while other might by unemployed due to illness or what other reasons there might be. Some may be in training and just get a minimum wage that won't let you spend too much money on games or other "luxury's". Either way its none of anybody business if and why somebody gives away games or not.
So please don't be to quick about judging other people and there reasons for not being able to spend $20.
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I'm all for this. However, I'm still gonna put up giveaways for public and I'm sure others will too, so I doubt it will make any big difference. It's not like SG is gonna burn to the ground because a small group of givers host private giveaways.
Sure, it might seem unfair to some, but when you think about it - it's not. Being a member of SG is not a human right, so if a small group of people would like to get together and host private giveaways for other givers, then so be it. You'd think that it would be nice to give something back to those who host giveaways, although that's not something one should take for granted either.
But I'm all up for it if it comes to that.
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First of all my post sort off proves my point in why there should be something like this.
A regulated environment is gonna be a nice change for us who give.
However its not gonna completly remove the public giveouts obviously. however this will create a enviorment protected from fakers and the like.
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So once again the only solution to fakers is to add more elitism within our elitism and further split the community?
I admit that I haven't put up a giveaway yet. My immediate financial situation at the moment doesn't allow any spending on games? Does this make me less of a member or less of a person? That I haven't been able to give yet? Will putting up the wall to have a "You're not good enough to be here" sign really inspire me and the many people like me to give when we can?
Yes, your private group would be free of fakers trying to farm points. But how many good users with plans to contribute do you need to drive off in the creation of your private utopia?
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I'm in favor, and have been wanting something similar since the beginning. Like others have said, it doesn't mean every giveaway is going to go private, there will still be plenty of public ones. It would just be nice to have a place to give back to the active, contributing community, and a private chat group (if active) would be an easier way to share giveaway codes with those people than the current setup.
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Giftception...
Didn't Steam Gifts get created to move away from Steam Game Sales and now you're talking about moving away from the Steam Gifts concept by making it more private?
I'm still sticking to my "rules" of a) not creating my first giveaway until I've won one b) making sure my first giveaway costs more than the first game I win (or equal if it is £29.99+) and c) not until I am happy with anti-scam measures - that last one is not a dig at CG or admins, I think they're doing the best they can but at the moment things are... well, chaotic in my personal opinion.
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I don't like. (probably because I would be excluded) but outside of that I believe it ultimately defeats the purpose, or at least one of them imo, of Steamgifts. To be generous to those who aren't always able to afford a game. Having private giveaways for certain people every now and then? Fine, but I think it would simply cause far too much segregation, leaving most people who aren't in that group with really nothing to motivate them to even come to this site.
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I would be interested in joining such a group, to throw around and enter some giveaways aside from he usual that I participate on the main site. Managing such a thing doesn't really need any moderation form Cult or CG. You can just make a Steam group and invite people into it that fits to your criteria and announce private giveaway links in that group's chat.
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"You can just make a Steam group and invite people into it that fits to your criteria and announce private giveaway links in that group's chat." this is true too :)
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I consider this the height of elitism and don't agree with it.
If you wish to implement something like this though, you don't need steamgifts to add it. Just simply make a steam group that is invite only / private and put the links there for each giveaway.
Again I would like to stress I don't agree with the elitism. The concept is giving. Not 'giving because you gave away', like many have stated there are others who just sit with the games in their library and not play them - a fair point etc.
At the end of the day you can't put stipulations on things, if people wish to enter and win, its your responsibility to give them the game they won. If you don't wish to participate and wish to leech [like quite a lot of people on here do] then do so.
The issues of fake games could quite easily be resolved with strict policing. I know a lot of sites that do something similar and work by membership invitation use a 'responsibility chain'. If someone creates a fake account / giveaway, you just ban them + whoever invited them. This serves as a responsibility chain and whoever brings someone in, has to be aware that they run the risk of losing their own account here if the person they brought in messes up / scams / fakes.
To conclude; Elitism no, stricter policing yes.
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I don't see how it's "elitism" to want to give back to the active community here, and not the, as you say, "leechers".
At least not when there are so mant "leechers" around. They gave out mass invites, which attracted a bunch of bad apples. I don't know how many of the almost 11,000 members have either not given anything away, or even not commented on any of the giveaways they have entered, but I'd take a guess that it's a pretty high number. I've given away I think 16 games (more if you count the number of games in different bundles) and the last few have not had any comments, and only one has said thanks. Hell, I guess there's lurkers in the SG chat not because I gave away a private gift earlier in chat, and the person who won didn't (as far as I saw) say thanks in the chat, OR comment in the private giveaway. I don't like that, and I don't want to give away to a bunch of people who are here just to win and not to participate in the community at all.
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skzorak, I know I thanked you in all your giveaways that I entered and in case I haven't I want you to always know that I am personally grateful and thankful for you and all the contributions you have made on this site. Thank You. :)
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@skzorak
Then that's your choice. I see this all the time, it all boils down to it being your choice. You could go out and buy 100 games a day and provide gifts, you could buy 0 and just keep entering. Everybody lives by their own codes of practice and interpretations of giving.
At the end of the day the principle of steamgifts, is giving. That's all it is. It's pretty simple. Adding complexity and stipulation and essentially hoops to jump through in giveaways adds in my opinion a layer of complexity that doesn't bode well with me. It's the same reason why I stayed away from the ARMA 2 giveaway by the devs of it, they wanted you to join 3 groups prior to it. I endorse games that I enjoy, not random ones that I know nothing of. Sure if I enjoyed the game afterwards I would be inclined to join the group, but prior to it I wouldn't.
Anyway I digress, if you do not see how it is elitism, I am glad to explain. Feel free to contact me through steam and I will have a lengthy explanation about it and show you exactly how it works and give you multiple articles about it and hopefully build your insight into it. I doubt you will do that though.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elitism That's the wiki link if you want to read more into it.
At the end of the day, getting rid of leechers should be done through stricter policing and membership invites. Although who is to say that being a leecher is bad? You have to consider the ages of some people and their current financial circumstances. Just because I was able to be born into a reasonably wealthier nation than some people, does it give me the right to criticise those who don't contribute?
Like I stated before, if you have problems with how it works, either create your own or make your own steam group or do a range of other things... The tools are in place for you to do all of these, then you can easily filter out people and be as restrictive as you want.
I fully understand your concerns and in some respects I agree with you about people leeching and giving back to the people that contribute, I cannot however agree with your methodology of thinking.
Like I said, i'm willing to debate all of this over steam or any form of IM service, so feel free to hit me up if anybody here wishes to debate this with me.
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going private will lead to a lack of points. and once, every gifter is in that group and gifts only to that group (why would he want to give to all those scammers, anyway?), the site will die, so making a private group leads to a fade of steamgifts. there should be some other way without private groups.
i think the best way of doing that is here
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You couldn't be more wrong. There's already people hosting private giveaways (I did one yesterday for example), but I've also created 3 public ones the last two days. Only difference is it's not organized at all at the moment.
I want the whole community to be able to have my gifts, but I also want to thank others who do the same as me, hence the private giveaways.
Edit: Of course there's no need to implement anything new on SG itself, as many have already stated someone could just create a private group on Steam and invite the people that one thinks eligible.
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I'm not sure if I'm against this or not. This has nothing to do with me probably not being included into the group, it's what has been said before. I can imagine that this would split the community here in a way nobody would really like. BUT, I can understand the TOs point he is trying to make, since there has been a strange and not so pretty turn in the way things were going here before. There is a lot of ranting, flaming and hating that has not been a part of SG before. So I can imagine that the idea behind all of this is to include those people that are not or weren't part of the hating. Maybe I'm wrong and I missed the point or something.
But maybe this is just a phase that the site is going through and would be over sooner or later again.
As I said, I don't know what to think of this.
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So here we are, with what seems to be the majority wanting to go with the "cover your eyes and pretend it doesn't exist" approach. Ultimately, this game RELIES more upon the people who give away games, than it relies upon people who don't give, and only accept. Before arguing with me, state whether you agree with this point, or if you do not (in which case, explain yourself.)
If enough (key word) "Gifters" feel like they're taking their money and turning it into chum for the internet's faceless, nameless masses, then that thing that makes them want to give away in the first place, WILL diminish. Which, as you can see, will cause their chum..I mean giveaways...diminish as well.
So before saying what sounds good on a moral or ethical level, consider what matters - the people doing the giveaways. If they/we stop feeling appreciated, then you'll see a decline in actual giveaways (and thereby increase fake giveaways). And then the site would die, despite the resistance against being "too elite." At least there would be a good chance, then, that something like this would pop up afterwards. Only we probably would not be invited. Just food for thought.
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Indeed, I like giving more to the active thriving part of the community, than I do to the random masses of thankless users.
That said, most of the people I have gifted to have said thanks after they receive the gift, but they don't participate in the community here, and see it simply as a site they can go to, click on a button and maybe get lucky and win a free game. No forum discussions for the most part, rarely even a comment in the giveaway itself.
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I agree with your thoughts and the points you made, Dellmaker.
It just makes me sad to see that the community has changed so much lately and that people want to take measurements, that they have every right to do, and that I do fully understand. I'm no big contributer myself due to a financial situation I'm in myself atm. But if I would be giving away more games (god knows I sure want too) I would want to make gifts to those, that really appreciate a gift that comes from the heart.
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Generally speaking, I'd almost say that the "forum readers" would likely make up a "Gated SteamGifts Community" (I like that, jbaskin), seeing as how it's pretty much something that has occurred on it's own. There are those that are "seen" and vocal about their interests, perspectives, opinions, etc. Perhaps a steamgifts-within-a-steamgifts is already in effect, except that it isn't gifting much to itself (more towards the masses).
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Since it feels like this website is half people screaming fakes to try to scare others away from entrying to competitions to increase their odds to win
So i figured us who actually like to contribute to the community should make our own sub community we could make a steam group for the contributers and admins of the site.
My ideas:
We make a steam group that is private where we put private entries on.
Requirements for joining this group is that you have made at least 1 serious giveaway (20+ points?)
Or if your a respected member of the community that has helped out in other ways (such as the web client addon for this site) then i would be more than happy to invite you over.
But before i start doing this i would like to know if there would be others that are interested in helping out?
Also if anyone got a idea on how to do this better i would be happy for any suggestions.
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