I get that, but it’s well known that Contests are great for reach, and whether or not people get gift cards out of it or not doesn’t change the fact that the views/likes/boosts/downloads/makes are going to AI garbage when it could have gone to others.
I mentioned this in another thread, but in the candy dispenser contest at the moment, 10 of the top 25 trending models in the contest are simple “generate a [animal/character] themed candy bowl” 5 times each.
then someone else sees this and they do it too. When I’m bored on my break i might actually see if i can count how many of the 388 entries are like that.
It’s also a Master Challenge, I’m not sure if a simple Bowl or Catch all tray even fits the criteria personally, but that’s up to makerworld. It still takes up space in the contest, and if you scroll for a while you can actually find some really good entries, but they are buried in a sea of AI slop
I’m aware, I had a contest entry that was well and truly ahead of everyone else in Likes/Downloads/Makes. I was given a participation award and the winner of that one was a remix (technically against the rules, but as you said makerworld gets to choose as it’s their contest)
The thing though, the reach that I gained from being trending for that contest has now far surpassed the 1st/2nd/3rd prize. So to me it’s more valuable to be in the running of a contest with a good long-lasting entry, and winning is icing on top.
Sorry i rambled a bit, Long story short I’m not necessarily disagreeing with you but having contests flooded with AI slop that barely fits the criteria at times, is disheartening.
The least they could do is limit entries to 1 per person.