We have winners!

[Thomas Paul]

First a big JavaRanch thank you to Marty for being here this week! We hope you had a good time and you'll come back and visit us!
This week's winners are:
Steve Williams
Pradeep Bhat
Pauline McNamara
Tim Baker
Send me your snail mail address ([e-mail]) and I will see that a copy of the book gets out to you.

[Ko Ko Naing]

Congratulations, Pradeep!!! I saw u participated a lot... But I'm not sure about others, though I has been here all the time...

[Pradeep bhatt]

Good morning Ko Ko!
Thanks for your wishes. I am surprised to find your name missing from the list.
See you at jdiscuss for ScWCD beta exam preparation.

[Ko Ko Naing]

I've been in this forum all the time, since the promotion started... If I am not wrong, Pauline McNamara, one of the bartenders(bartender of Orion forum), posted only a few posts(not more than three)... I'm wondering how the automated selecting process is done...
It's not quite fair that those who are participating in the forum all the time, dedicating their time to this, missed the book... But it's alright... Even though we missed it, we got a lot of knowledge from participating in the forum...
Remember, Pradeep, u and me argued about the "Filters and Front Controllers"... I liked that argument the most, during the promotion period...
Anyway, congratulations to all the winners... All the best...
Cheers,

[sunitha reghu]

Originally posted by Ko Ko Naing:
It's not quite fair that those who are participating in the forum all the time, dedicating their time to this, missed the book... But it's alright... Even though we missed it, we got a lot of knowledge from participating in the forum...
Anyway, congratulations to all the winners... All the best...
Cheers,

Depends on your luck..ko ko. Its very nice of you spending this much of time answering so many questions. I hope you will be around.
But Pradeep how many book you got. May be ten? am i rt. I Hate you Pradeep. Seems Pradeep didnt sleep today. Waiting for the results dont you?
aw congrats Pradeep and all.

[Thomas Paul]

Winners are selected by random. I have a program that selects every post since Tuesday and picks 10 posts randomly. I then pick the first four posts that meet the criteria (on topic post from someone with a valid name).

[Ko Ko Naing]

Originally posted by Thomas Paul:
Winners are selected by random. I have a program that selects every post since Tuesday and picks 10 posts randomly. I then pick the first four posts that meet the criteria (on topic post from someone with a valid name).

Well then, if it is randomized by the program, we cannot predict which posts will be selected... It's alright... I guess it's pretty fair to know that there is no discremination among all ranchers...
I'm looking forward to participate more in the future...

[Pradeep bhatt]

[QUOTE Seems Pradeep didnt sleep today. Waiting for the results dont you?
aw congrats Pradeep and all.

Yes, I did not sleep yesterday night because I was travelling by bus. The journey was bad. Going to

[Pradeep bhatt]

Remember, Pradeep, u and me argued about the "Filters and Front Controllers"... I liked that argument the most, during the promotion period...

Me too.

[Marty Hall]

First a big JavaRanch thank you to Marty for being here this week! We hope you had a good time and you'll come back and visit us!

Thanks for having me! I enjoyed it.
Cheers-
- Marty

[Unnsse Khan]

It was quite a pleasure, to have the great opportunity to speak with you again... Mr. Hall.
What's going on Ko Ko? Nice to have met you, also!

[Anselm Paulinus]

I can not believe Mr. Ko Ko Naing is complaining. Mr. Ko Ko Naing was selected just last week on the HF EJB book. I wish the program was built with stateful beens so they could remember past winners and make sure they do not win until the rest ranchers have also won; so people like us do not feel left out.

[Ko Ko Naing]

Originally posted by Anselm Paulinus:
I can not believe Mr. Ko Ko Naing is complaining. Mr. Ko Ko Naing was selected just last week on the HF EJB book. I wish the program was built with stateful beens so they could remember past winners and make sure they do not win until the rest ranchers have also won; so people like us do not feel left out.

No, actually not, I saw someone won books successively three weeks in the past... I'm just quite uncomfortable with how I spent my time a lot on it and I missed it.... But I now found out that the ten posts are selected randomly by a program and the first four posts are selected for the book...
I hope the algorithm for it should be quite intelligent to filter out the valuable posts... But it's alright for me, beacuse they use a program to select the posts and I feel that being random is pretty fair...

[Ko Ko Naing]

Originally posted by Anselm Paulinus:
Mr. Ko Ko Naing was selected just last week on the HF EJB book.

Actually I was not selected last week... It was two weeks ago that I was selected... Nice to see you here, Anselm... I used to see you in JDiscuss.com too...

[Tim Baker]

looks like it is my lucky day
i hope it wasn't one of my posts that was wrong that was selected

[Dani Mazzuca]

Well,
My impression is that book promotions rules should change. Why? I think the intent is to promote the book, have the opportunity to "speak" with authors, promote high level discussions in JavaRanch about the subject, promote JavaRanch, and also have a chance to win a fresh book. The idea is pretty good, good for everybody. I confess, the possibility to discuss with authors and have with everybody a highly technological discussion is the thing that attracts me more. Things would be all right if ranchers make use of this promotion, but ... not abuse.
What I saw happening in the last 2 promotions was that some(few) ranchers are hanging on all the time at JavaRanch, answering as soon as he/she can, each and every question that suddenly appear, even if they didn't have nothing valuable to add to the discussion, with the main intention to have one more chance to win a book. Some ranchers answered with only a link to some articles in the web. Come on! We all know how to find articles in the web. I didn't came to the ranch looking for a paper of some other, what I want here is to promote a high level interesting discussion with authors and other ranchers.
I confess I got irritated with this situation. No personal offense, seriously, I really believe in the good intention of ALL ranchers. Nothing wrong in wanting to win a book. Sure. I would like to win a book either. But we should see that the intent of this promotion is becoming an unmotivated and distorted one.
So, I ask Sheriff Thomas Paul to meet others sheriffs, and analyze the possibility to change rules, so that this promotions would not become a mere dispute to see how many messages I send to win a book. You have tools to do that, some examples: limit the book chance to a maximum of 2(n) per rancher; don't consider answers, only questions; some rancher that win a book may not participate in the next 3(n) promotions; a combination of all above, or whatever.
Again. I hope no one get offended with this message. Please, don't. This is not my intention. The intention is only to improve the promotion, that I consider needs some adjust to continue on good rails.

Dani Mazzuca

[Pradeep bhatt]

There should be no limit to number of books that a person can win. Why should only questions be considered, any one can post questions.

some rancher that win a book may not participate in the next 3(n) promotions;

Why should this be made a rule ?
If I am not wrong, Only meaningful posts are considered.

[Dani Mazzuca]

Hi,
I think the previous message was clear enough, however here there are some more explanations about the examples I wrote before, which are nor exclusive at all, they are just samples, suggestions, ideas:
1) limit the book chance to a maximum of 2(n) per rancher:
i.e., if someone wrote more than 2 (or n) messages, he/she will only participate with a maximum of 2(n) entries in the promotion. With this you discourage ranchers that write every answers with the only purpose to win a book, without adding any valuable contribution to the topic, i.e., you avoid abuse. And you also stimulate others to participate.

2) don't consider answers; only questions:
with this you stimulate ranchers that want to have a high level technical discussion in a topic, avoiding the abuse problem mentioned in the previous item, i.e., answers without any value. Of course a person whose only intention is to win a book, can also abuse and ask a bulk of unvalued questions, but this doesn't bother other topic ranchers that have other intentions, and also item number 1 can limit this abuse.
3) some rancher that win a book may not participate in the next 3(n) promotions;
this doesn't limit the number of books that a person can win, and of course, doesn't limit her/his participation in the discussion, only in the promotion. This only avoids abuse and tries to give better opportunities and stimulate people that never win a book; plain fair. Will a rancher be stimulated to participate in a promotion that she/he knows in advance that the winners will come from few people that frequently write a bulk of messages?
4) As far as "only meaningful posts are considered", even if it is actually been done, this is a subjective point. Of course, sheriffs can precisely discard messages such us "Congratulations" or "thank you", etc. But it is very difficult to say what it is really a "meaningful" post. I mean, what it could be a meaningful post for you, can be an irritating answer for me, and vice versa. So, I don't think sheriffs would (and don't like to) analyze each an every message in detail. Anyhow, it will continue to be a subjective selection.
Thomas Paul, could you give just an acknowledge, just to know you read the suggestions?
Dani Mazzuca

[Andres Gonzalez]

I think it is fair the way it is (even though the random program loves Pradeep )
congratulations to the winners

[David O'Meara]

Congratulations to the winners and huge thanks to Marty for his efforts over the week.
After reading the book I was extremely impressed, so if you didn't win, cough up the cash and get a copy any way!

[Ko Ko Naing]

I think the suggestions given by Dani are not too bad... I know it's his intention to make the promotion more valuable and meaningful to us...
One more suggestion from me is that JavaRanch.com personnels should not be eligible to win the books, since they got more powerful access on the forum administration... I think bartenders are also personnels of the JavaRanch.com... I don't know why many of them won the books in the past...
Just want to improve the quality of the JavaRanch...

[Pradeep bhatt]

My opinion is quality of posts is high in Javaranch. It is possible that during book promotion members will try to answer posts for which answers are already posted and the new answers being no different from the previous answer.
It doesn't make sense to debar some one from particpating in future posts just because he/she has won a book. Dont forget that a guy can always come up with a different display name (login id ) and different address for delivery of book. How do you solve this one?

[Thomas Paul]

Here's my suggestion to improve the book promotion: anyone who doesn't like the rules shouldn't participate in them.
The only person who is ineligible is me since I am responsible for running the promotion. If anyone has a problem with that then I would suggest that they silently protest by refusing to particpate.
We have been running the promotions the way they are for three years. I am a volunteer. I have many things that I could be doing instead of running these promotions. You are sucking all the fun out of them.

[Thomas Paul]

Originally posted by Ko Ko Naing:
One more suggestion from me is that JavaRanch.com personnels should not be eligible to win the books, since they got more powerful access on the forum administration... I think bartenders are also personnels of the JavaRanch.com... I don't know why many of them won the books in the past...

I think the quality of the promotions would be better if you were banned from winning books. Perhaps I will change the promotion and do away with the books as prizes altogether. Instead I'll just have the publishers send copies of the book to the bartenders who moderate the forum. That way I won't have to listen to this crap.

[Gregg Bolinger]

Originally posted by Thomas Paul:
I think the quality of the promotions would be better if you were banned from winning books. Perhaps I will change the promotion and do away with the books as prizes altogether. Instead I'll just have the publishers send copies of the book to the bartenders who moderate the forum. That way I won't have to listen to this crap.

Wahoo!! Let's have more JDBC promotions then.

[Pradeep bhatt]

Perhaps I will change the promotion and do away with the books as prizes altogether.

Please dont do that Thomas.

[Thomas Paul]

Originally posted by Pradeep Bhat:
It doesn't make sense to debar some one from particpating in future posts just because he/she has won a book. Dont forget that a guy can always come up with a different display name (login id ) and different address for delivery of book. How do you solve this one?

Excellent point, Pradeep.

[Dani Mazzuca]

You are sucking all the fun out of them

That way I won't have to listen to this crap.

Well, this was not precisely the kind of acknowledge I was expecting. So, what to say...
Dani Mazzuca

[Ken Januski]

Pretty sad to say that this most likely has more posts than any other hread of last week. Does that make sense? Do people participate mainly to get a free book? I have to admit though that I probably posted my first messages to this forum because I'd read earlier versions of Marty's books and would have liked a new one. But the free books should really just be a way to get newcomers to use the forum and to give people exposure to the book and author. I would think after seeing Marty's responses that anyone who hadn't read his previous books would now want to read his new one.
I'd say just take the free books as bonus, like a day in 70s with sunshine in November in climates that are normally in the 40s and gray. But don't ruin them by complaining that every November day isn't in the 70s with sunshine. (Obviously the sun was shining on my drive into work today). If the drawings are more or less fair, and the explanations show that they are, then just leave it be.
My two cents,
Ken

[paul wheaton]

I would like to suggest that if you are sincere about making suggestions for improvement, that you do it in the right forum. This forum is for discussion of servlets.
The details of how the promotion would be handled were laid out ahead of time and followed perfectly.
I did the first promotions a few years ago and let me tell you: It's a helluva lot of work! First, there is lining up the book - some publishers seem to lose a lot of e-mail. :roll: Then you gotta get the author to show up and get familiar with the system. Sometimes authors refuse to let you talk to them directly because they think they are a celebrity above helping themselves in some petty web site that has merely a half million people. Then you need to compose the announcement and mail it to thousands of people - several of whom signed up with a bogus e-mail address, or ditched their e-mail address so that you have to update our database to not send them any more mailings. Make sure the author has their account set up all pretty so that they are not being maligned (after all, we did it for the other authors). Then we get people that can't seem to read, so they sign up with an invalid name - we have to point out to them six or seven times to change it. Then we get people that think they will improve their chances by posting messages like "Yes!" or "Me too!" which have to be deleted. Finally, the time comes to announce the winners. When you get the e-mail from the user saying "I'm a winner, here is my address" you have to check to make sure that, yes, they are one of the winners and not somebody claiming to be a winner that really isn't. You then have to respond to the e-mail or else the winner thinks that you didn't get the e-mail and will sometimes get irate. You have to save the e-mail and not forward it just yet, because some of the publishers get weird if you send four e-mails instead of one. Half the time that I did the promotions, the publishers "just forgot" to send out the books, so follow up turned out to be a big job.
Managing the giveaway is a HUGE task. And I think that Thomas does a superb job of it. Not only does he do what has to be done, he goes beyond that and makes things a little smoother for everybody.
I think that if anybody would like to make a suggestion about the giveaways, they should first start out with saying "Thank you Thomas for doing an excellent job with the book promotions." and the phrase "not fair" should never appear.
I would like everybody reading this thread to take a look at the number of posts Thomas has posted. Thomas has not only been generous with his time with promotions. He has helped thousands of people one question at a time.
Take your ideas for improving the giveaway to the JavaRanch forum where they can be properly discussed.
Let's leave this thread to congratulating the winners and thanking those responsible for making it happen.
Thanks Marty - word on the executive floor of JavaRanch is that it's always a smooth ride to work with you.
Thanks again Thomas, for making the book promotion look so easy, even though I know that every week is a bitch.

[Dani Mazzuca]

OK
Congratulations to winners then. Thank you Marty, thank you Thomas,
Dani Mazzuca

[Thomas Paul]

Originally posted by Ko Ko Naing:
One more suggestion from me is that JavaRanch.com personnels should not be eligible to win the books, since they got more powerful access on the forum administration... I think bartenders are also personnels of the JavaRanch.com... I don't know why many of them won the books in the past...
Just want to improve the quality of the JavaRanch...

How about if we ban people from winning if they only post in the forum where the promotion is taking place week after week? After all, we dont want people who have no interest in JavaRanch outside of winning a book.
"Just want to improve the quality of the JavaRanch... "
[ November 17, 2003: Message edited by: Thomas Paul ]

[Ken Januski]

Thomas,
First of all thanks for all the work you do managing all this. Second I have to say I'm only an occasional user, having participated most in the SCWCD forum a few months back, so I don't consider myself as having a lot of standing to make comments one way or the other.
My feeling though is that if a person is really going to go to all the trouble to learn enough about quite varied subjects in order to post on the promotion forums each week then go ahead and let them have a chance to win a book. I don't really care myself but it seems like extra work to manage the process as is without having to keep track of who has posted in just the promotion forums for a number or weeks. And if they've gone to that trouble then they must at least have some interest in the subject.
My feeling is that things are fine as they are. Save everyone, including yourself, time and effort and leave things as they are.
Best wishes,
Ken

[Tim Baker]

I had no idea there was a book giveaway or that i would be eligable so it came as a surprise to me but no-one has to worry about me winning again I only post in the servlet/jsp rooms on a regular basis
good luck to everyone for next time

[Thomas Paul]

We send out a mailing every week so you either:
1) checked the box to not allow JavaRanch to send you emails
2) have our emails blocked as spam
3) gave us a phony email address
4) don't read your emails

[Mark Spritzler]

Congrats to all the winners. And thank you so much for your time Marty.
Mark

[Jean Miles]

I want to say thank to java ranchers that support javaranch and its forum. Thanks for having book promotion.
Please continue with book promotion, it gives me a chance to ask the authors questions.
[ November 17, 2003: Message edited by: Jean Miles ]
[ November 17, 2003: Message edited by: Jean Miles ]

[Andres Gonzalez]

Originally posted by Thomas Paul:

How about if we ban people from winning if they only post in the forum where the promotion is taking place week after week? After all, we dont want people who have no interest in JavaRanch outside of winning a book.
"Just want to improve the quality of the JavaRanch... "
[ November 17, 2003: Message edited by: Thomas Paul ]

that would be great!

[Pauline McNamara]

Hey cool, IwonabookIwonabook!!
Thanks for your time Thomas and Marty.

[Ko Ko Naing]

Originally posted by Thomas Paul:
[QB]
How about if we ban people from winning if they only post in the forum where the promotion is taking place week after week? After all, we dont want people who have no interest in JavaRanch outside of winning a book.
[QB]

Oh! R u talking about the one who had won about ten giveaway books, posted over 2000 messages and I saw him/her every week in a forum that the promotion is running... But I don't want to mention the name...
If you are trying to ban such person, he/she would be very sad about that...