[theme-reviewers] Question: Someone Want to Take Benefit From a'Top Reviewer of the Month'.

Wed Jan 29 20:29:15 UTC 2014

Well one of those issues we can address immediately: nobody should be
assigning multiple tickets at a time. Assign one ticket at a time, and post
(full) review comments, before moving on to another ticket.

If it appears that anyone is attempting to game the system by hogging
tickets for new Themes - at the sole discretion of the admins (and Otto,
who isn't exactly known to deal with such things with kid gloves) - we will
handle such gaming appropriately.

On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 3:24 PM, Trent Lapinski <trent at cyberchimps.com>wrote:

> As the owner of a theme shop (CyberChimps) being forced by the .org admins
> to now pay employees to do theme reviews I inherently hate that we are
> being forced win the contest to keep our themes featured.
>
> We use to do theme reviews to contribute to the community but now that
> we're being forced to do them to be able to afford to support our themes it
> feels more like extortion then a community contribution.
>
> Responsive has had over a million downloads, and is the most people theme
> on .org that isn't a default theme. We were featured for some time, but
> were unfeatured without explanation and saw a dramatic decline in
> downloads, and revenue. Now we're stuck maintaining a massive theme that is
> no longer supporting itself, providing support and maintaining a popular
> theme like Responsive isn't cheap. You'd think .org would want to reward
> their most popular theme, instead we're having to delay the release of 2.0,
> and are being forced to rededicate our resources to win the review contest
> so we can get downloads and revenue back up so we can even continue
> development.
>
> We point blank have asked .org admins what we can do to be considered for
> being featured again and there answer was to pay people to win the contest
> every month. A contest that isn't even being maintained monthly, that is
> being gamed by other theme shops.
>
> What was once a community contribution has been turned into a confusing
> nightmare. We can't even get themes to review because other theme shops are
> assigning themselves everything ticket immediately. The system is
> absolutely being gamed, and soon the cost of entry won't even be feasible
> for CyberChimps, so I have no idea how anyone else is going to even have a
> chance.
>
> We should be rewarding the best and most popular themes, not extorting
> theme shops and preventing everyone else from being featured. Theme reviews
> should be a community contribution and have nothing to do with featured
> themes.
>
> -Trent
> CEO CyberChimps Inc.
> Sent from my iPad
>
> On Jan 29, 2014, at 11:49 AM, Srikanth Koneru <tskk79 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Not possible for an individual to compete against the might of theme
> shops. They can have 4 guys reviewing 4 themes simultaneously.
> Was this vote admin only vote? don't recall it on the list.
>
>
> On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 1:14 AM, Edward Caissie <edward.caissie at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> I was originally out-voted on not allowing "theme shops" have one account
>> for all of their employees to use as I was concerned it would create an
>> "unfair advantage" for them to choose a Featured Theme (and why wouldn't
>> they choose their own?) so there is not much more I can add to this
>> conversation except to say I agree for the most part with Otto's responses.
>>
>> Edward Caissie
>> aka Cais.
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 2:21 PM, Philip M. Hofer (Frumph) <
>> philip at frumph.net> wrote:
>>
>>>   Could always have the random themes that display be pulled by date as
>>> well, max 1 year since last update sort of thing.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>  *From:* Jose Castaneda <jomcastaneda at gmail.com>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, January 29, 2014 11:14 AM
>>> *To:* Discussion list for WordPress theme reviewers.<theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org>
>>> *Subject:* Re: [theme-reviewers] Question: Someone Want to Take Benefit
>>> From a'Top Reviewer of the Month'.
>>>
>>>  I think the issue that arose was exploiting the system by reviewing
>>> that persons theme regardless of position in the queue of tickets.
>>>
>>> At least that is my take. I received a similar email about two months
>>> back. I never responded, just deleted it.
>>>
>>> Sent from my iPhone
>>>
>>> On Jan 29, 2014, at 11:01 AM, Rohit Tripathi <rohitink at live.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>  A Very Good Point raised by Emil.
>>>
>>>  ------------------------------
>>> Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2014 12:52:26 -0600
>>> From: emil at uzelac.me
>>> To: theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> Subject: Re: [theme-reviewers] Question: Someone Want to Take Benefit
>>> From a 'Top Reviewer of the Month'.
>>>
>>>  I am with Chip here, paying your employee or employ someone
>>> is 100% the same, no difference whatsoever.
>>>
>>> The moment we said yes to commercial Theme shops to have their
>>> people review tickets under a single username, is the moment we allowed
>>> this very thing as well. Not sure what is the problem?
>>>
>>> Every time one of us mentions Featured Themes, entire* community jumps
>>> on. When we need help, only few of us replies. How come?
>>>
>>> http://make.wordpress.org/themes/2014/01/28/time-for-a-new-team-rep/
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 11:51 AM, Srikanth Koneru <tskk79 at gmail.com>wrote:
>>>
>>> all 3 options can be manipulated unfortunately, admin choice is fine but
>>> a bit more frequently would be nice.
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 11:19 PM, Konrad Sroka <konrads at themekraft.com>wrote:
>>>
>>>  Otto +10000
>>>
>>> Why not get rid of the featured themes sections like it is now and have
>>> a filter for
>>>
>>> "most downloaded" and "best rated"
>>>
>>>
>>> Maybe add a filter or tag for commercially supported themes, so you know
>>> you can get professional support and stuff like that..
>>>
>>> Or make a poll on wordpress.org twice a year and the results are the
>>> "featured" themes
>>>
>>> Cheers, Konrad
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 29 January 2014 18:25, Rohit Tripathi <rohitink at live.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>  I am not in favour of switching Featured themes to a Random Themes
>>> Section. Because Many themes in the repository are outdated or not fully
>>> compatible with recent versions of WP.
>>>
>>> +1 for the Redesign of landing Page.
>>>
>>> :)
>>>
>>>  ------------------------------
>>> From: zulfikarnore at live.com
>>> To: theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2014 17:11:33 +0000
>>>
>>> Subject: Re: [theme-reviewers] Question: Someone Want to Take Benefit
>>> From a 'Top Reviewer of the Month'.
>>>
>>> Part of the original question asked "has this happened to anyone" (not
>>> the exact words) - the answer is yes, not once not twice but a good few
>>> times. Initial response? I responded with not part of my business
>>> plan/working model! Then followed by "mark as junk" and now that is where
>>> (if any) those emails land and deleted without a first look never mind a
>>> second.
>>>
>>> For me the incentive scheme and having a theme featured for my hard work
>>> is only a bonus - true benefit is derived from learning code as Otto said.
>>> The real reward out of it all will be when one day I create a theme from
>>> scratch, submit, have it reviewed, approved and made live without a single
>>> issue being raised - now that is (will be) the achievement :)
>>>
>>> So,
>>>
>>> 1) Should we be paid to review themes in order to win and get the
>>> payer's theme featured? Certainly Not!
>>>
>>> 2) Should commercial theme shops pay their employees to review for the
>>> same end in mind? Weather they get a theme featured or not they are going
>>> to pay their employee regardless. So that is their prerogative - but should
>>> they hire for the sole purpose of reviewing and getting featured? To me
>>> that is no any difference to 1 above and is a No!, but who is going to
>>> police it?
>>>
>>> Solution? Switch the "Featured themes" section to a "Random themes"
>>> section and let the system cycle though all and any theme on a given time
>>> period and everyone is a winner. Easier said than done with over 2000
>>> themes I know :)
>>>
>>> I second and +1 the call for a redesign of the landing page.
>>>
>>>  ------------------------------
>>> From: christine at bluelimemedia.com
>>> Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2014 08:02:39 -0800
>>> To: theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> Subject: Re: [theme-reviewers] Question: Someone Want to Take Benefit
>>> From a 'Top Reviewer of the Month'.
>>>
>>> Awesome, I'll see what I can do.
>>>
>>> Christine Rondeau
>>> Bluelime Media
>>> www.bluelimemedia.com
>>> twitter: @bluelimemedia
>>> skype: bluelimemedia
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 7:58 AM, Otto <otto at ottodestruct.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 9:56 AM, Christine Rondeau
>>> <christine at bluelimemedia.com> wrote:
>>> > I still think that
>>> > rethinking the theme landing page with a better more visual design
>>> would be
>>> > nice.
>>>
>>> I wholeheartedly agree. Poke your designer friends. We need a better
>>> design. :)
>>>
>>> -Otto
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> theme-reviewers mailing list
>>> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________ theme-reviewers mailing
>>> list theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________ theme-reviewers mailing
>>> list theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> theme-reviewers mailing list
>>> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>>
>>> i.A. Konrad Sroka
>>> Themekraft  UG haftungsbeschränkt
>>> Beautiful Themes and Plugins for WordPress and BuddyPress
>>> web - http://themekraft.com
>>> mail - konrads at themekraft.com
>>>
>>> Höhenstrasse 55
>>> D-40227 Düsseldorf
>>> Germany
>>> HRB 66772, Gerichtsstand Düsseldorf, deutsches Recht
>>> Geschäftsführung / Managing Director: Sven Lehnert
>>> USt-ID: DE282376267
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> theme-reviewers mailing list
>>> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> theme-reviewers mailing list
>>> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________ theme-reviewers mailing
>>> list theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>>  _______________________________________________
>>> theme-reviewers mailing list
>>> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>>  ------------------------------
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> theme-reviewers mailing list
>>> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> theme-reviewers mailing list
>>> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>>
>>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> theme-reviewers mailing list
>> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
>> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>>
>>
> _______________________________________________
> theme-reviewers mailing list
> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> theme-reviewers mailing list
> theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org
> http://lists.wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/theme-reviewers
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.wordpress.org/pipermail/theme-reviewers/attachments/20140129/fab20ed0/attachment-0001.html>