I can see that today the person leading the Article contest is the person who has 100 points in popularity. It is the same person who sent his email (probably) to every member of the FX Community about clicking on his article. I surely am one of those who received his email.
When I joined the contest I joined with the idea of providing high quality education to fellow traders. I thought I had something to contribute that would benefit many. Now I see that this is mainly an internet marketing contest which has very little to do with trading. Unfortunately this is encouraged by the way rules of the contest are written and the way the awards are calculated.
The worst thing about this marketing is that no internet marketing skills are required. One can simply spam which is against the law in a way. In ethical internet marketing people sign up if they want to receive what you want to send them. Not here. Spamming seems to be the way. Pathetic.
I read in another topic on this forum that people who spam the FX Community justify their actions by the fact that if they put effort into preparing an article they are entitled to spamming. Has somebody completely lost all their marbles or what? Everyone who submitted an article puts in some effort. By this logic everyone is entitled to spam. Now imagine every participant of the contest spamming the complete FX Community with: Click on my article… The community would go berserk.
Just to set the record straight. I am not a sore loser. I seem to have a few more years of life behind me than most contest participants. My world was and still is built on values like honour, decency and integrity. Those values have disintegrated in the modern world which is sad to watch. The goal seems to justify the means. It is not the power that wins but the force. But this is a mirage. The force is destructive and eventually destroys everything.
I am surely not going to start spamming the community to increase my popularity. Nor will I start creating bogus accounts so I can write comments on my articles etc. But I will rethink the way I participate in the contest and the effort/work I put in preparing the articles until the rules change.
I suggest that article contest participants with some decency and integrity in their souls write to Dukascopy requesting that rules get amended so that the best person/article wins and not the most crafty marketer.

All the very best with your trading and article contest if you are participating honestly with integrity
Robert

Sadly that is the truth in this and other contests...

I agree 100% with your point of view.

Best regards

Trade well and good luck

JL

This is the nature of the game and it's sad, I got a message from indian chap and the most we can do is report it - which I've done - Unfortnately it's never going to be stopped and we can only hope that Dukascopy team notice it and do what is right.

There was a point 2-3 months ago where it was unclear in the rules as to whether it was acceptable and most people where doing it but dukascopy have come out clearly stating that it is a bannable offence, Last month those Brazilian guys where spamming and at this point we don't know if action has been taken but I dearly hope so for the sake of the integrity of this contest.

We will see - good luck

Adrian.

I agree with all written here, in my first month when I took part in this contest, I also got some spam from greek guy, who was later banned. When I asked in forum if its ok to ask other participants for giving them comments and rates as this guy did, nobody answered me. Sometimes I see the number of comments and votes is slowly increasing
in some articles and some other articles have zero of that. How is that possible? How is possible that some article is fresh new here and gettin so much comments as article being whole month in contest? I would never create false identities, ask somebody to vote for me but I must say I suspect it is simply happening with some people. The reason is simple - getting as high as possible before Dukascopy expert evaluation...minimizing losses in the final stage (not getting too much points from experts) by maximizing gains in the beginning. If some article will be seen high from the beginning, in my opinion it has little higher chance to get some good marks from experts because here the basic psychology works. Only solution is to decrease weight of popularity even more as most of you guys say. Introducing quality was a great idea. But even if my article got 100 points, what can I do if somebody gains 30-60 comments, half of that by self-commenting (which is ok, only should not be counted and visible in the number of comments) and my article gets 0 comments. In such case it does not matter that other article got 50 quality points, later increasing popularity by help of spamming or false accounts.

Andrew's suggestion about erasing points before the last stage would solve most of the gripes in my opinion. It is like having the preliminaries and the final. You can cheat your way to the final but there you are naked and all flaws become obvious.

Read about his idea in the following topic: viewtopic.php?f=82&t=47282

I hope Dukascopy take note of this.

Of course it has been taken. Do you see them in top10?

Dear Robert ,

Nice to see a colleague with the same ideology as of mine.I am totally with you by each word of your's above.As of late I am restructuring my "value system" to cope with the current affairs!. The value, ethics, morals, quality,study, research etc are the things of past. I have been a silent observer of this practice for last 6 months.A particular instance last month has made my belief much more strong i.e:To finish at the top what all you need is not honest efforts - but only some ill intentions, and then some good understanding of unfair means to boost your popularity.! As simple as that.

I can show you with evidence what all people did/ do to win? congratulations!

A concept called "popularity" has really killed the heart and soul of this contest - That's what I can say.Writing more is just a waste.

It looks like Dukascopy are doing something in this regard. Let's hope it is not too late.