Theme competition [ends 3/13 at midnight PST]

[urs1ne]

XDA Dream Theme Competition
2/12/09 - 3/13/09 (midnight PST)

Click Here to Donate - and please make sure to put your username and the forum you're from

Ok, Im getting tired of having to thank Stericson in almost everyone one of my posts but here we go again. Stericson is going to be covering the transaction fee on the donations for the first $200 donated and I will cover anything above that up to $400. Normally Paypal takes 2.9% plus $0.30 but thanks to Stericson this wont be an issue.

Please PM me when you are ready to submit your entry.

Total Donations: $660.00

List of Donors:

1. doooshty - xda-developers.com
2. oshay - modmygphone.com
3. Bobolon1219 - xda-developers.com
4. derfolo - xda-developers.com
5. smeyerhuky - xda-developers.com
6. Dave RL - xda-developers.com
7. saul972 - xda-developers.com
8. birkholze - xda-developers.com
9. All~G1 - xda-developers.com/androidcommunity.com
10. fivestar0234 - xda-developers.com
11. benmyers2941 - xda-developers.com
12. rickyteddyb - xda-developers.com
13. blehman - xda-developers.com
14. Ryanmo5 - xda-developers.com
15. birdman81484 - androidcommunity.com
16. *susan* - androidcommunity.com
17. guiltybydesign - xda-developers.com
18. afoulke - xda-developers.com/AndroidEvolve.com
19. missxoash - xda-developers.com/androidcommunity.com
20. gottifour - xda-developers.com/androidcommunity.com
21. TheDudeofLife - xda-developers.com/benjorno - androidcommunity.com
22. damnitpud - xda-developers.com/androidcommunity.com
23. nickmgray - xda-developers.com/htcsource.com
24. JLine05 - xda-developers.com
25. dandaninc - xda-developers.com
26. mariod1269 - xda-developers.com
27. MUZIC - xda-developers.com
28. DeadBody79 - xda-developers.com
29. wardy277 - xda-developers.com
30. GTIChris04 - xda-developers.com
31. Dharkaron - xda-developers.com
32. pychobj2001 - xda-developers.com
33. Bigworm2 - xda-developers.com/androidcommunity.com
34. Sangeet.003 - xda-developers.com
35. hackmania - xda-developers.com
36. big nu - xda-developers.com
37. Ryanmo5 - xda-developers.com
38. DaveRL - xda-developers.com
39. Shindokie - xda-developers.com
40. wpbcubsfan - xda-developers.com/androidcommunity.com
41. MontAlbert - xda-developers.com/androidcommunity.com
42. BOATRIGHT - xda-developers.com
43. djlucklu - xda-developers.com
44. Henchman - xda-developers.com
45. AGunz82 - androidcommunity.com
46. DeadBody79 - xda-developers.com
47. cal3thousand - xda-developers.com

[urs1ne]

2/27/09 - UPDATE
We are still hammering out the final details of judging but here are the provisional judging guidelines. All categories will not be based on points but rather other entries. The judges will pick their favorites in each category and we will assign them points based on the competition (think car racing, who cars how fast a car is, its about who beats who). The winner will take 10 points, second gets 5 points, and third through fifth will get 3 points down to 1 point. Then we will take all the themes that have received points and they will compete for the judges overall favorite. The winners for the judges votes will receive half of the overall vote for winner. The other half will come from the general public, 25% from donors and 25% from everyone (including judges, competitors, and donors).

Judging Categories
1) Artistic - This will include use of colors, consistency, icons, status bars, status icons, slider bar, etc. This is purely for the graphical side and yes some technical things will fall into this category.
2) Creative - This is for doing something new or original, hopefully someone does something that becomes a must-have for the next generation of themes.
3) Technical - For anything requiring above and beyond editing of the theme. This would typically mean xml or hex editing.
4) Overall - This is for our overall favorite. Sometimes a theme doesn't win by being the most technical or artistic, sometimes its possible to win by stealing our hearts or pushing the envelope.

The burden of making sure the judges appreciate your theme will lie in the hands of the competitors. It is advised to submit lots of screenshots, a list of modifications, and anything else you deem necessary to to truly appreciate your work. Normally I would not allow this type of information to be submitted with the entries in fear of it tainting the opinion of the judges but I think because theming with the G1 is so new that even the most knowledgeable judges may need a walkthrough to see and appreciate all of your hard work.


doooshty is the man making this contest possible, if you have questions or comments please direct them to him. I am just here to help doooshty get this whole thing going.

Rules:

1. No previously released themes, this goes against the push for innovation I hope to achive during this contest.
   
2. Designer has the choice to work in whatever enviornment he chooses...however RC33/ADP1.1 are the prefered choices as they are the most widely adopted releases.
   
3. The contest will last for one month from the start date. All themes must be recieved by midnight US/Pacific time on the final day to be entered in the voting. NO exceptions will be made. END DATE IS MARCH 13TH
   
4. The prize for this competition will depend on donations we receive, it will however be atleast $100 plus Stericson and I will pay the Paypal fees. The winner will receive 65%, second place will receive 15%, third place 10%, and XDA gets 10%.
   
5. The themes will be scored based on three catagories. Innovation/Originality(25% of final score), Technical Difficulty(25% of final score), and popular vote(50% of final score. If you are interested in being a judge let send me a private message and let me know. Judges are not able to compete, so any theme makers looking to sit this one out I can use your help as a technical judge.
   
6. All themes must be stable enough to run flashed to a phone and be useable.
   
7. Teams are allowed, however it will be limited to 2 members per team in order to keep the amount of themes up. I may do a larger team competition in the future however.

Judging:

When the contest ends we will get screenshots posted of all the themes so everyone can see the entrants and then we will provide download links to all the judges and donors. After the judges and donors have a week the themes will be posted for you guys to vote on and then after giving you guys a week to vote we will declare 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place. Note: We are not a big company or something doing this. I have 2 full time jobs and a new puppy so I dont want to make any promises on how long this part will take but I assure you it will be done ASAP, just bare with me.

Most of the judging will be done by carefully selected judges that have shown expertise or above average knowledge of themes and the Android operating system. These chosen judges will be responsible for 50% of the total vote. This is to ensure nothing is overlooked and fine details are noticed.

The remaining 50% will be split into 25% vote for donors (to encourage people to vote) and 25% to the general populous. This means that the donors will get 2 votes, one in the donors 25 percentile and one vote in the general percentile so donors votes will count for double a non-donors vote. Again, this is to encourage you guys to get involved.

[urs1ne]

Up to $360!!!

[birdman81484]

Hopefully we will be inundated with themes on 3/13 at 12:01am!?!?!

[urs1ne]

You guys are on the board!

The donors and judges will get access to the themes first, after they have some time to review them the rest of the public will get them and get a chance to vote. This is going to be awesome.

[birdman81484]

You guys are on the board!

The donors and judges will get access to the themes first, after they have some time to review them the rest of the public will get them and get a chance to vote. This is going to be awesome.

Well right but at midnight the competition is technically over as far as submissions go and the judges have the themes to review...why does the public need to wait any longer...im saying is doesn't really matter at that point (12:01 a.m.) if the public has them or not....although i suppose not releasing the themes until the winners are announced will help give recognition to the themers(on top of the cash prize they receive, in theory themers in this competition should not care about public recognition as this competition is based around profit motive) However what if you received a rating placing right out of the money your theme might get lost in the excitement and never get the public recognition it deserves.....(competition judges may have a completely different idea of "good" than the public does) Why not just release the themes to the public and have "people's choice" poll just for fun why the judges do their thing for those motivated by profit....

Edit: looks like you kind of answered my question...but when will the public get a hold of them.... I think the public vote should be released before the judges....

[urs1ne]

All I know is I have a full time job, i manage 21 condos, i got a new puppy, and im trying to make this contest happen. I can only do so much so for my own sanity I need to space things out a bit. I would rather take more time and keep people waiting than rush a decision.

The reason for giving the handful of judges more time is so that they will have time to switch between RC and ADP and truely test all the features in each theme. The general public wont be trying all the themes and testing them throughly. More than likely they will have 1 or 2 favorites from the screenshots and they will make a decision based on their preconcieved favorites. It is my goal to ensure the winner in chosen because it is truely the best theme, not because it had a cool color combo or because the dialer buttons were something different.

[birdman81484]

All I know is I have a full time job, i manage 21 condos, i got a new puppy, and im trying to make this contest happen. I can only do so much so for my own sanity I need to space things out a bit. I would rather take more time and keep people waiting than rush a decision.

The reason for giving the handful of judges more time is so that they will have time to switch between RC and ADP and truely test all the features in each theme. The general public wont be trying all the themes and testing them throughly. More than likely they will have 1 or 2 favorites from the screenshots and they will make a decision based on their preconcieved favorites. It is my goal to ensure the winner in chosen because it is truely the best theme, not because it had a cool color combo or because the dialer buttons were something different.

That's cool man. Thanks!

[tiki]

This is a cool idea- BUMP

I'll try to throw a few bucks into the pot this week

[prash]

For some reason XDA forums don't load for me at all sometimes, I'm not sure if its my pc or that their servers are just down a lot, but I did google for more info and I see that this exact info is posted in multiple forums. I just had a question or two.

I was wondering if I submit a theme, and say before the deadline, I make changes to it (because I learned something new I could do or just to tweak images and what have you) can I resubmit the same theme in the hopes that the new version gets judged?

Also what are the rules to post theme screenshots and/or getting feedback from community before submitting. I know the usual respond would be that your competitors will also see the themes and get/steal ideas but what if I want to post to get help on certain aspect of the theme or such. Basically how secret do we have to keep our themes if we want to enter the contest?

Well I hope this gets answered, or at least bump this thread, since it's a great idea for some friendly competition. Thanks.