2009 September | Video Contest News

Archive for September, 2009

How to screw up a great idea for a video contest

Posted by Beardy on September 30th, 2009

In the last week I’ve gotten a few facebook messages from friends about Home Run Inn Pizza’s “Halloween Video Contest.” This is happening because my friends all know that if there’s anything I love more than video contests it’s Pizza and Halloween

The idea for this contest is one of the best I’ve ever heard; make a horror film that includes a Home Run Inn Pizza. Now….take a second to think about that. You already have 3 great ideas you can film, don’t you? How about Night of the Living Pizzas!? Or Pizzaface the serial killer that wears a mask made of pizza!? Or maybe a giant Pizza the Hutt type pizza blob starts getting some payback for all the pizza we’ve been eating and starts eating people!?

It’s great to see a contest that actually has a unique concept and isn’t just “shoot a commercial for us so we don’t have to pay an ad firm to do it.” Even the contest website is one the absolute nicest I’ve ever seen; cool layout, easy to use and filled with cute monsters and pictures of delicious pizza.

No, how about I eat YOUR face!?

There is only one grand prize in this competition. First place will get you $2,500 but ten runners-up will each get 12 free pizzas (and Home Run Inn is like the best frozen pizza out there) and a flip video camera.

Even though there aren’t a bunch of big prizes, I was ready to start shooting just because I know me and my friends would have a ton of fun making a pizza-based horror film. I bet you would too. But don’t start charging up your camera battery yet. The way this contest is being run is screwed up that no one should even bother to enter.

Here’s how the winner is selected:

The submission period runs from 9/21/09 to 10/19/09
The submission period is also the voting period. Viewers cast a vote for their favorite video during this time.
At the end of the submission/voting period the 10 videos with the most votes become the finalists. Their scores are then reset.
“Round two” starts and runs until 10/26. During that time, viewers again vote for their favorite video.
Finally the video with the most votes, wins.

SCREW….THAT……NOISE. That sucks! Any contest that lets viewers pick the winners sucks already but this plan seems like it was designed to make sure a really crappy video winds up the winner.

Google "pizza zombie" and you'll get some strange results

The biggest problem is that voting is happening during the submission period. Right now, the video in First Place has 1,422 Votes! The deadline is still 20 days away but anyone who entered right at the start of the contest has a gigantic advantage over people who submit later. How is anyone who uploads a video today going to be able to catch up to 1,422 votes? And to make things worse, all you have to do to vote for a video is register your e-mail address. In the end, the winner will be whoever feels like registering the most accounts and voting for themselves over and over.

So this is a contest that you should stay a million miles away from because it will only break your heart. What a fricking bummer. You know what though? It’s a pretty effective marketing campaign. I seriously need some Home Run Inn Pizza now.

No fair! You used your skills!

Posted by Beardy on September 29th, 2009

A filmmaker from LA named Angela Kholer won both the $10,000 jury prize and the $10,000 audience award in the “Your Amazon Ad” contest. On the contest page there’s a little story about how the video was created. Their concept was to do an Ad for the Amazon Kindle:

“On a plane from Japan to Thailand, we brainstormed ideas and sketched out little stories that our character could fall into following different literary genres. We scribbled out pictures on napkins and made a flip-book, putting the little scenes in different orders. The day of the shoot, we gutted a pillow to make clouds and smoke (a last-minute addition) and did the commercial in one seven-hour take.”

Here’s the video. I can’t embed it so click on the image to view it:

Pretty f#%&ing amazing right?

In all, the filmmakers shot more than 300 frames for their human stop-motion animation. That was a huge amount of effort and those folks certainly earned their winnings. However…there seem to be a lot of disgruntled people on the Amazon contest site. Some of the other contestants are upset about Amazon’s choices for the finalist slots. People are complaining that the five finalist videos (which you can see here) are too good!! Ha! Is that a refreshing change or what!? Usually other contestants are mad because the winning videos suck. In this case, contestants are mad because Amazon only selected videos that seemed (to commenters on the contest site) to have been created by professional filmmakers.

I have actually seen these types of complaints before. Non-pro video contestants feel like they are given false hope by contest organizers. They assume the contest will be for amateurs only so they shoot a video with their Flip camera and assume they have a shot at winning a big pile of cash. But then when a slick, HD video is selected as the winner they feel like the “little guys” never really had a shot at winning.

I can sort of understand this line of thought but yo…..$20,000 was up for grabs! It always amazes me that in every big contest half the entries will be poorly shot, badly lit and have terrible sound. Why would Amazon want to give thousands of dollars to an amateur-looking video?

Even though so much money was at stake there seems to be a real “anti-budget” mentality in the discussion boards on the contest site. Contestants who didn’t have much money to spend feel that people who are already rich enough to own high-end cameras had an unfair advantage. There’s even one discussion where contestants proudly compare their hyper-low budgets.

Like I said, I get the frustration but “best video wins” is the name of the game. If you’re new to video contests here is one thing you must lean and accept: Production Quality DOES matter. You don’t need a super expensive HD camera and full crew though. I once won $5,000 in a contest using a $250 camera from Walmart…which I returned after the shoot.

Videos need to be compressed to be posted to the web and that compression really levels the playing field. As long as you can SEE all the action that is taking place in your video and as long as you can HEAR everything that is going on and as long as the script is good enough that the viewer CARES about what is happening then you will have a shot at winning. You just need to learn how to make the most out of the gear you have. Just look at the video that started this discussion. Did it really take a lot of money or expensive gear to shoot that? No way. The only things it took was creativity and ingenuity. As long as you have plenty of that you’ll be a serious contender in any contest you enter.

I heart sandwiches

Posted by Beardy on September 26th, 2009

After my last post I needed to write something more upbeat. So as a palate cleanser, here’s the winner of Vincent Giordano’s Video Chef contest:

Grand Prize winner. Prize: $4,000.

Ok, that video is just awesome. If there’s one thing I love it’s sandwiches and if there are two things I love it’s sandwiches and bears. That video is great for a lot of reasons but for one it just goes to show that you don’t need a fancy camera or slick editing to win a contest. Sometimes all you need is a funny idea and a stuffed bear. So kudos to Evan and Carl. Nice work. The canned bear roar coming from the motionless bear is what totally makes this one.

The ugly side of video contests

Posted by Beardy on September 26th, 2009

I really enjoy entering video contests. Each contest I enter is a new creative challenge that requires a different solution. Thanks to the contests I’ve entered I’ve become a much sharper filmmaker so it’s a great way to improve your skills. And of course, I also really like winning and getting big checks in the mail for my work.

But there’s a lot about video contests that frustrate me. Contest organizers sometimes don’t play by their own rules and sometimes contestants just flat out cheat in an effort to win. And that’s why I started this blog. My hope is that if someone shines a little light on the negative aspects of video contests, people will be forced to do better and play fair.

I think the thing that bothers me most about video contests is the lack of civility and good sportsmanship. Greed, jealousy and desperation can make people go a little crazy. Throw in the anonymity that the internet provides and you’ve got a recipe for sabotage and trash talk. For example, in a score-based competition, how many times have you seen your star rating drop mysteriously in a very short amount of time? How many times have you gotten ugly, anonymous comments about one of your videos? Do other contestants really think that the judges will see that youtube user “rudeboy742” thinks your entry “sucks goat ass” and then think to themselves, “yeah! This video does suck goat ass!?”

A few days ago I wrote about suspicious voting activity in the Butterfinger contest. The next day, someone going by the name “Douche Pumper” (yes, that’s what he called himself) left a very angry, very depressing comment on that blog post. Here it is:

"Douche Pumper" turned out to be Dallas filmmaker Justin S.

Wow. Talk about someone who is bitter about being fat and having a small ding-dong. You think anyone really wants to listen to some fat, red-bearded turd ramble on about how disgruntled he is over video contests? They don’t. Loser.

Get a life and get a job, you lazy f—. And, better yet, why don’t you make your own videos and actually compete in these contests. Then someone might actually care about what you have to say. Until then, have fun watching your website float off into the ether of Internet sites never visited.

It’s always the fat guys with little ding-dongs who start sites like this. Like Harry Knowles.

Anonymous Coward. <—That means you. Not my signature.

It’s obvious what has happened here, right? One of the contestants in the Butterfinger contest saw that I was questioning the suspicious voting activity and are pissed that I suggested that they may have been doing something less than ethical to win that contest.

Except….that’s not what happened. Though the comment was left anonymously it was pretty easy to figure out where it came from. I added a fancy piece of code to this wordpress blog that tells me where visitors are from and how they got here. I checked the program logs and saw that the comment came from a visitor from Dallas, TX who arrived at the site via a google search for the name “Justin S*****.”

A few weeks ago I did a blog post about a Dallas filmmaker named Justin S***** who flagrantly plagiarized the work of frequent video contest winner, Jared Cicon. Justin copied Jared’s 2008 winning Taxlsayer.com video for a contest held by ForRent.com. He not only plagiarized the concept he even copied the tone and pacing and locations of Jared’s video. I wouldn’t have even mentioned it on the site except that Justin’s rip-off actually won first place and 10 grand from ForRent.com. Jared graciously said he didn’t mind the plagiarism but Justin S. never bothered to get his OK until other people called him out on his theft. All around it was just a very uncool thing to do. To see Jared Cicon’s original Taxslayer video, click here and to watch Justin S*****’s ForRent.com video, click here. To read the blog post that got Justin S***** so angry, click here.

So it looks like Justin S. found the post about him while googling himself. He got angry and needed to unleash his venom (he also unleashed in a rather ugly way on the people on the ForRent site who also accused him of plagiarism.) But if Justin left a comment on my post about him then everyone would realize it was he who was obsessed with the size of my “ding-dong.” So he left the comment on the Butterfinger post to make it look like someone from that contest was the anonymous jerk. And that’s the part that really bothers me. Not only did he say a bunch of ugly (and wildly incorrect BTW) stuff, he also tried to frame one of the butterfinger finalists.

If Justin thought that what I said about his ForRent.com winning video was incorrect or unfair, he could have just e-mailed me and said so. I would have even been happy to post some kind of rebuttal from him or maybe even take down the original post. But instead, her spewed out a bunch of weird bile. Just for fun, I’ll address some of Justin’s points:

“Wow. Talk about someone who is bitter about being fat and having a small ding-dong. You think anyone really wants to listen to some fat, red-bearded turd ramble on about how disgruntled he is over video contests? They don’t. Loser.”

Not actually a photo.

Do you see what’s going on in this guy’s head? He doesn’t seem to realize that the mascot of this website isn’t an actual photo of me. I don’t look anything like that guy. I just thought it was a funny piece of clip art so I picked “beardy” as The Video Contest News’ mascot. The thing that really speaks volume’s about this person’s maturity level is his obsession with “ding dong” size. Why is Justin S***** so hung up on penis size? I’m no psychiatrist but I’ve seen enough episodes of Frasier to make an educated guess. Also, I am not disgruntled. I am totally gruntled with video contests! I don’t want to give an exact number but I have won A LOT of money thanks to video contests in the last two years. Also, Beardy’s beard is really more brown than red, isn’t it?

“And, better yet, why don’t you make your own videos and actually compete in these contests. Then someone might actually care about what you have to say..”

Why would someone be into video contests enough to start a blog devoted to them and yet never shoot entries themselves? For the record, I shoot maybe 3 contest entries a month and as I said, I do win….a lot.

It’s always the fat guys with little ding-dongs who start sites like this. Like Harry Knowles.

How does Justin S***** know how big Harry Knowles’ penis is? I don’t know and I don’t want to know. Wait a second, they are both from Texas. Maybe…um, never mind.

At the end of Justin’s comment he slams me for writing this blog anonymously….and then signs off anonymously with the name “Douche Pumper.” (Why would he call himself Douche Pumper??)

Ok….so, I understand that the irony here is getting pretty deep. I write a blog under a pseudonym where I call out cheaters, bad sports and crappy contests and Justin S***** criticizes me for doing that and then tries to make it look like some innocent contestant from the Butterfinger contest did it.

This is a good time for me to explain why I do things the way I do here on VCN. I’m very, very proud of my video work and it’s been very tempting to post about my latest wins here. This site could also be a great tool for building a personal fan base and for getting votes for videos when I need them. But I’ve decided that I should keep my work out of this blog, at least for now. The reason? I am worried about retribution from people like Justin S*****. Like I said, I want to see video contests cleaned up and so I’m going to be bringing attention to people who are making video contests less fun for the rest of us. Now imagine if my name and a list of my work was available on this site. Many video contests are basically popularity contests. If a guy like Justin S***** is so bitter and angry that he has to make fun of a cartoon mascot’s beard and penis size then it’s not a giant leap to assume that he might also try and sabotage a stranger’s contest entries in retribution for them pointing out his inappropriate actions. Long story short, if you act like a jerk I am going to call you out on it. But I refuse to give bad people the tools to wreck my chances in whatever contests I’m currently in.

Video contests are awesome but guys like Justin S***** make them less awesome. These are the guys that aren’t just satisfied with getting their friends to vote for their entries, they also have to get their friends to give bad scores to their competition. These are the guys that create fake youtube accounts so they can make it look like “the people” all agree that your work sucks. These are the guys start fights in the comments sections of a contest’s website. These are the guys that make us all look bad and these are the guys that convince companies that video contests are just not worth all the hassle. Guys like Justin S***** are the ones that want to wreck a good thing. But you don’t need to let these angry people get away with it. If someone is harassing you in a contest, let us know and we’ll try and give them some of the attention they obviously crave so badly.

And who says rap videos never win video contests?

Posted by Beardy on September 25th, 2009

It never fails. In every, single video contest there is almost always one rap entry. It’s a no brainer. It’s the easiest way to get a lot of required information out quickly and in a possibly amusing way. I myself once filmed a rap video for a contest and the entry went on to win $5,000. But that was way back in 2007 when the concept was still fresh. Today, the rap video idea is pretty played out. Even though there is always at least one rap video submitted to every contest, it seems like the rap videos never, ever win. Oh…until now.

A few weeks back I blogged about the Department of Health and Human services Swine Flu PSA contest. Apparently the got more than 200 entries and for once, a rap video beat out all the other contenders. Here’s the winner.

First place. Prize: $2,500 and a national TV spot.

What cracks me up about this video is that the guy is a real doctor! Guess Health and Human services thought that’d be a nice hook for a TV spot. You can read more about the contest and the winner on the ….official white house website?? Holy crap. That’s a pretty sweet prize in and of itself. http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/Rapping-Doctor-Wins-H1N1-Video-Contest/

The video contest that can’t get no respect

Posted by Beardy on September 25th, 2009

The ghost of happyjoel

This next contest we heard about thanks to super-video contest winner HappyJoel. In fact, it’s HIS contest. After having some fun doing an imitation of Rodney Dangerfield for Conan’s “Please blow up my car” contest, Joel decided he needed to encourage others to also channel Rodney.

The rules of the contest are amusing so I’ll just post them straight from Joel’s site. After years of being frustrated by the limiting rules of other contests, Joel decided to keep the restrictions on his own pretty loose:

“You must submit a video of your best Rodney Dangerfield impersonation.

ALL THE JOKES MUST BE ORIGINAL! YOU CANNOT USE ANY OF RODNEYS OLD ROUTINE! Just jokes IN THE STYLE of Rodney Dangerfield.

Post YOUR video as a response to MY video by midnight October 4th, 2009. Winner announced Monday, October 5th. Here’s the link for my video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5Hm-UFvWtQ

1st PRIZE: $50 iTunes Gift Card

2nd PRIZE: $25 iTunes Gift Card

3RD Prize: My intern and I will call you and say hi.

Since it’s my own video contest, I’m finally going to run one the way I wish they all were run. The winner is to be determined by me and me alone. There is no time limit minimum or maximum. I am picking based solely on which one I think is the funniest. I don’t care about production value, I don’t care if it was filmed with a webcam, cell phone or HD CRX-500 or whatever the hell it is. NO age limit. Any Nationality. Just make it funny, make it watchable, and make it feel like Rodney.”

So far, only 2 people have entered and one of them is Joel’s personal assistant for hire from India! The assistant’s entry cracks me up but I think it’s ineligible to win. Still, it’s funny so I’ll post it as inspiration.

So there are two itunes cards up for grabs and only one entry so far! This one definitely qualifies as “ripe for the plucking.” You know what I like best about this contest? That the winners will be announced the day after the contest closes. Joel understands that in any video contest, the waiting is the hardest part.

Scariest Story Ever told

Posted by Beardy on September 25th, 2009

This site has only been up and running for a few weeks and even though I haven’t really done much to promote it we’ve started getting a small but growing stream of visitors. We’ve even heard from a few contest organizers which I think is a good sign.

VCN’s un-written policy is that if a contest organizer asks us to post about their contest, we’ll do it no mater how big or small the contest is. On that note, here’s some info for a contest called The Scariest stories Ever Told. The top prize is $500 plus some prizes and it sounds like a very, very easy contest to enter. All you have to do is sit in front of a camera and tell an original scary story. Scariest story wins!

Jawbone.tv is running a video contest to discover The Scariest Story Ever Told, and we’ve got more than a thousand bucks in cash and prizes to make it happen. Contest opens today (September 22, 2009) and runs through until October 22, 2009.

# 1st place

* $500 Cash.
* $474 prize package

# 2nd place – 5th place

* Prize packages

For all the details, Click right here.

Olivia Munn picks her fan film

Posted by Beardy on September 24th, 2009

This was an unusual but very cool video contest. G4’s Attack of the Show host Olivia Munn has been looking for video pitches for Star Wars fan films. She agreed to appear in the final version of her favorite concept and Atom Films would put up a production budget of $5,000. Today Olivia announced her choice; it’s an idea called “Galaxy News.” You can see Olivia announce the winner and the selected video pitch below.

I like the concept. I think it’s a good choice. Yeah it’s not a traditional fan film concept but it’s just right for this type of thing. $5,000 isn’t really a ton of money top make a high quality short film. So with the news show idea they can shoot most of it in front of a green screen in only a day or two. If it’s written and paced well it’ll be joke, joke, joke, joke, joke end. It’ll be able to hit hard and fast and won’t take too much effort or money. So, way to go nerds!* Good thinkin’!

More details and pitches here: http://community.atom.com/groups/olivia_munn

*I use the tern “nerds” with the utmost affection for I too am a Star Wars nerd.

Voter Shenanigans in the Butterfinger contest?

Posted by Beardy on September 23rd, 2009

Imagine this scenario: You’re a finalist in the Butterfinger video contest. You now have a one in four chance of winning ten thousand dollars. All you have to do to get the money is to get the most votes in the competition. To vote for videos on the butterfinger site, all you have to do is open a yahoo account. Now, imagine that you are just 200 or so votes away from winning the ten grand. How tempted would you be to take a day off work and do nothing but register and vote for your own video all day long?

Voting ended yesterday in the “Nobody’s gonna lay a finger on my Butterfinger” video contest and even though the vote counts of all the finalists are right there on the website for the world to see, no winner has been announced yet. The Butterfinger site says they are “tallying” the votes and a winner will be announced on October 1st.

What the heck is there to tally? The winner of the contest was supposed to be determined by a public vote. The votes are in and one video clearly has the most votes. Here’s the final results of the butterfinger contest:

I have a feeling that by “tallying” Butterfinger really means “checking for vote fraud.” I’ve been checking in on the voting in the last few days and it seemed really suspicious. Why did 2 videos peak at 9210 and 8046 votes while two other videos both made it past 12,000 votes? Is it because they are way more hilarious than the other videos? Not really. All four videos are pretty much equal in quality though I guess my personal choice would be “Robochop.” But according to the votes, the winning video is Butterfinger Phone App by David Markus.

First place. Prize: $10,000

As I said, I kept checking on the voting during the final days. As it got down to the wire, the number of votes coming in really seemed to jump. The top 2 videos were gaining hundreds of votes a day. Was some kind of advertising done to draw more people to the butterfinger site in the last days of the contest? Or maybe the people who made those top 2 videos remembered they had hundreds of friends and family members they hadn’t asked to vote yet?

During the final two days of the contest, the vote counts of the top two videos both were going up so steadily that it did seem like maybe 2 people (or two teams of people) were racing each other to the finish line. Maybe the reason the bottom two videos didn’t make it past 10,000 votes is because the people who made them saw that something fishy was going on and decided not to even bother after a certain point. So in the end, the “winner” was whoever had the willpower to crank out the most votes for themselves. This kind of vote fraud would be easy to prove if yahoo kept tabs of the IP addresses where the votes came from. I guess we’ll find out if they did that if they final scores have been adjusted when the winner is announced on October 1st.

Frequent Video Contester wins the HP “You on You” challenge

Posted by Beardy on September 22nd, 2009

I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the results of HP’s “You on You” video contest. The winners were announced yesterday and I immediately recognized the work of the first place winner. Here’s the winning entry:

First Place. Prize: $40,000

The guy in that video is named Lucas Ridley and he is a frickin’ genius. Frequent video contesters all seem to have their own favorite gimmicks and no one proves that better than Lucas Ridley. Not only is he a filmmaker, he’s a hang glider and he’s shot numerous video contest entries that feature himself hang gliding! According to his blog it looks like he’s entered at least 20 video contests and his hang glider is the main subject of most of his videos. Here are a few examples:

Post-it notes contest entry:

Taxslayer.com contest Entry

Excedrin Speed Challenge Entry

THAT EXCEDRIN VIDEO WON LUCAS $10,000 LAST FALL! Is that crazy or what!? After a 10K win I probably would have retired that particular gimmick but maybe that wouldn’t have been the best call. This dude has found the most perfect hook imaginable. Video contest organizers love videos that feature totally over-the-top stuff and what could be more over-the-top that some crazy guy using your product while hang gliding? And that taxslayer entry aside, usually this guy doesn’t just film himself hang gliding and call it an entry. He seems to have some serious post-production skills. His work in the HP video is really, really slick.

Ok, back to the HP contest. This one was huge. In all, $300,000 in prizes were up for grabs. Judges picked the finalists but the winners were picked by voters on youtube. Ug…youtube voters. It only takes like 60 seconds to set up a youtube account! It’d be so easy to cheat in a competition like that. Fortunately, I think one of the best finalists won. Here are some of the other winners:

Second place. Prize: $20,000

Third place. Prize: $15,000

In addition to those giant awards the first, second and third place videos also got a laptop and $2,500 as finalist prizes. In all, HP gave 100 laptops to the finalists! Too bad they didn’t give out 100 hang gliders. Watching all those hang gliding videos makes it seem really fun.

All of HP’s You on You winners and finalists can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/hp

Crash the Superbowl site goes live

Posted by Beardy on September 21st, 2009

Today marks the official start of the 2010 Dorito’s Crash the Superbowl commercial contest. Until today, the site was locked but it is now open for business. New this year is a really interesting feature. There is a multi-chapter commercial tutorial hosted by the winners of last year’s competition, the Herbert Brothers. The videos are pretty funny but they are also chock-full of good advice about stuff like writing, production and copyright. The brothers even explain how the USA Today AD meter works and what kind of videos do well in it. Spoiler Altert: The entire AD meter rankings are decided by 300 subjects in two locations. Crazy. I plan on shooting a Doritos entry myself and I’ve been focusing all my attention on one single idea. But watching the video about the AD meter made me realize my idea would be kinda dark and would turn off too many viewers. (It would have been hilarious though!)

The tutorial videos are actually helpful for anyone interested in shooting entries for any type of video contest. So you might want to check them out even if you’re too chicken to shoot a Crash the Superbowl ad. DEADLINE TO ENTER THE DORITOS SUPERBOWL CONTEST IS NOVEMBER 9TH!

http://www.crashthesuperbowl.com/

Conan’s car contest: Something is rotten in the state of California

Posted by Beardy on September 18th, 2009

I had planned to just do a short little post about this but the more I look into it the more suspicious this whole thing gets. Something shady seems to have happened with the “Conan, please blow up my car” video contest. Let me start from the beginning before I lay out the case….

Shortly after taking over the Tonight Show, Conan O’Brian decided that there had to be a more interesting way to dispose of a “clunker” than just trading it to the government for some cash. So he announced the “Conan, please blow up my car” video contest. If you had a really crappy car you were supposed to create an interesting, creative video explaining why your car sucked and why you deserved to have it blown up and replaced by Conan with a brand new Lexus.

Since this contest was promoted on the Tonight Show for a few weeks they got a flood of entries. In all, 951 videos were submitted. Earlier this month, this video was selected as the winner:

Grand Prize Winner. Prize: A new Lexus Hybrid

Sure that’s a really crappy car but the video is as simple as can be. The rules of the contest encouraged participants to create over the top videos though. Judging was supposed to break down the score like this: Originality (50%) and Creativity (50%).

So was that video original and creative? No…not one bit. It was just a guy talking about his suspiciously crappy car. Commenters on the Tonight Show’s website are pretty upset that this video was chosen as the winner. Some even charge that some kind of fix was in. And you know what, as much as I love Conan I have to admit that I think something shady did occur. Consider these points made by commenters on the Tonight Show web site:

1. One poster points out that the entry should have been ineligible because the video features a business’ logo (A “Pizza Pirates” logo on the hood of the car and on the guy’s shirt) and that was prohibited by the rules.

2. Another mentions that he car is also totally illegal to drive because the seat-belts don’t work and apparently the car had to be a drivable clunker.

3. Yet another poster asks a question so brilliant it would make Columbo proud: “If this guy drives with one lft arm holding the door (oh pity me, could of said you used bungies mr. wizard). Can you imagine the right arm making gear changes and turning the steering wheel at same time. People this whole thing was preplanned to appear as a clunker. Aha!!!” (While that move might be tough it would at the very least make the car illegal to drive.)

4. The most astute observation came from a poster that suggested that this particular car was chosen because it was so wrecked that its make and model are a complete mystery. In the video, the owner of the car refers to it only as a “1980.” So instead of blowing up a crappy Ford or Toyota or whatever, Conan got to keep the car companies happy by destroying a completely anonymous car.

The damage to the car also seems kinda suspicious too. As the guy says, he intentionally cut the roof off because it would get hot while he was making his Pizza deliveries. But who wants to eat a pizza that’s been wind-cooled by a ride in a homemade convertible? Near the end of the video the guy shows of a bunch of mysterious dents in his driver’s side door. He said that one day at work someone threw eggs at his car and shot paintballs at it. But look at those dents! Were those eggs shot out of a 44 Magnum? And listen, I have played paintball before and I don’t think they could do that to a car door. If paintballs really could dent metal, would it be legal to shoot them at fleshy human beings? Most suspicious of all though is the guy’s front license plate. It looks like someone took a hammer to that plate. And even if he didn’t, how can it be legal to drive around with a license plate that is so bent that it can’t be read?

But forget all that stuff. Here is the biggest red flag of all; The guy in the video says he delivers Pizzas for a place called Pizza Pirates. I googled Pizza pirates and guess what? They have several locations but the guy with the clunker works in Ontario, California…..a mere 52 minute drive from the Universal Studios lot where the car was blown up by Conan. The winner lives in Chino, CA which is basically a suburb of Los Angeles.

Wow, how convenient

I hate to do this but I officially call “shenanigans” on Conan O’brian. Can you imagine how much money NBC would have had to spend if the winner of this contest was from New York or Florida? By picking a guy who lived in the LA area they probably saved at least $10,000. Besides paying for a trip for two and a hotel room for the winner, NBC would have had to get the clunker to LA! NBC lawyers would never let someone drive the winning “clunker” to the west coast so the chosen vehicle would have had to have been shipped inside a big ass truck. That would have cost thousands of dollars if the winner was from the East coast. Oh! And then NBC would have had to get a new Lexus Hybrid to that guy! The actual car that the guy won was presented to him at the Universal Studios lot after his car was exploded. If the guy lived 2,000 miles from LA would he have had to drive the Lexus all the way home? Of course not. NBC probably got 1 free car in exchange for all the publicity and they again would have had to ship it to the guy’s house. After all, how many Lexus Hybrid dealerships do you think there are in the middle or Georgia or Montana? Not many I’m guessing so they couldn’t just make arrangements with a local dealer if the winner lived outside of the LA area. Because the winner lives in Chino he would have been able to drive that car right home after the taping.

While googling I found the Pizza Pirate’s Facebook page and they seem very proud of their employee and the death trap he drove while working for them. Several “fans” of Pizza Pirates have commented on the company’s wall that they have seen that beat up car driving around Ontario, CA many times. One girl says….

“haha dude that’s awsome. my school is like right by there and we use to walk by and see that car all the time,lol. so when we heard in was going to be blown up on tv we were like omg..haha.”

Kids say “dude,” “OMG” and “LOL” in every internet comment they make….right? That might be a little suspicious but like I said, a number of people on facebook have said that they will miss seeing that crappy car drive around town. So it probably was a real car at least.

So what’s the final verdict? After looking at all the evidence I believe that:

1. The car that won the contest was real and was a total mess.

2. The winner of the contest might have done a few things to the car to make it look even crappier.

3. The winning video should have been deemed ineligible to win because the car was not legally drivable and because it featured a company logo. (Pizza Pirates isn’t just one store, it’s a small chain with 3 locations.)

4. The judges of the contest that picked this clunker totally disregarded the judging (Originality/creativity) criteria outlined in the rules and picked this car as the winner because:

a. It was funny looking
b. No potential advertisers would be offended that one of their cars were being called a “clunker” since only an expert could decipher its make and model.
c. NBC would be able to save thousands in transport costs because the winner and his car were located just across town from the studio.

In conclusion, here’s what I think happened: The contest was announced and someone at the Tonight Show remembered seeing this beat up Pizza Pirates car driving around the LA suburbs. The car was easy to track down of course and someone contacted Pizza Pirates and the owner of the vehicle got a discreet call. Someone from the Tonight Show encouraged the owner of the car to create an entry so that they could pick a local winner with a really funny-looking car. Conclusion: Shenanigans abound!

To add insult to injury, the actual blowing up of the winning car was really lame! It didn’t EXPLODE at all. It just kid of popped and then was engulfed in flames. Here’s the video of the “Explosion:

For the record I should probably mention that I am not a disgruntled contest entrant. I did not enter a video into the Conan Contest and I have no stake in this unsavory affair.

Gotta Get a Gearmax (if you want to win)

Posted by Beardy on September 17th, 2009

Here’s a tip to anyone interested in winning video contests: If you come across a contest that has a “barrier to entry” you may want to consider going after that contest. What do I mean about a “barrier to entry?” I mean that there is some rule in place that makes entering the contest difficult. When the barriers to entry are too high, most people give up and look for an easier contest to enter.

I would like to have 5 of these

Gearmax, a company that makes a very cool looking brand of folding backpacks held a video contest where entrants were supposed to film a short script that the company had written or make a unique video that promoted their backpack. They offered a bunch of prizes: $2,500, $1,500 and $1,000 plus 5 runners up would get two free backpacks. Oh, and each of the top three winners would get 5 free backpacks each. That’s a lot of prizes but in the end Gearmax got only 6 entries. That means TWO runners-up prizes went unclaimed! What a waste.

So why did they get so few entries? Two reasons I think. First, the rules required that videos must be submitted to Gearmax on DVD. I couldn’t believe that when I read it. Why not just let people post them to youtube? Gearmax had to upload them to the web anyway to post on their site. So the DVD thing must have been a big turn off. But I bet what really kept the entries from coming in was the fact that the video had to feature a Gearmax backpack. That makes sense of course but I looked all over the Gearmax website and there is no way to order one of these packs online. They have a list of stores where you can go and buy them IN PERSON but they are scattered around the country.

So if you were determined enough to hunt down one of these packs you would have had a serious shot at winning one of the cash prizes. Here are the videos that did win:

First Place. Prize: $2,500

Second Place. Prize: $1,500

Third Place. Prize: $1,000

Pretty decent. The first place winner is really slick and does a nice job showing off how the backpack works. Just try not to spend too much time wondering why the backpack was on that roof or why that skateboarder just picked it up and took off. The other two videos were based on the “Area 51” script that Gearmax posted to their website.

You can see the other three entries here. If you watch them you can see that Gearmax picked the only three videos that were good enough to make it to the top three. One guy made two really nice entries but he didn’t win for two very obvious reasons; he didn’t show the backpack for more than a split second and he showed the backpack doing unrealistic things like being able to hold a computer…and his mom.

The asinine video contest that’s getting people busted by the cops

Posted by Beardy on September 17th, 2009

Yeah, whatever.

I don’t know if this story is more depressing or more infuriating. This week, some moron in Houston was charged with criminal mischief after he was seen running around his neighborhood posting copies of the “Obama as the Joker” poster. Why did he do that? To win what is undoubtedly the most douchebaggiest, video contest ever.

A right-wing radio talk show host named Alex Jones is holding a video contest via his website infowars.com. Now before I go any farther, let me say right here that if I’m anything, I’m a political moderate. I don’t like jerks, liars or vandals of any political persuasion. In my book, people should be judged by their actions more than their ideas. So if you want to believe that 9/11 was an “inside job” or that the president is somehow going to take away your food(!?) then you go ahead and believe that. But when you start propagating lies to push your agenda forward or if you encourage people to damage private and public property, well….then we’ve got a problem. And that’s the kind of garbage that’s going on over at Infowars.com. Actually, Alex Jones and his fans seem to have a bigger beef with the government in general than they do with Obama. They are equal opportunity protesters and they have plenty of anti-republican and anti-George Bush. Anti-John Mccain stuff on their site too. So I guess this isn’t really a left/right issue. It’s more of an assholes/non-assholes issue.

Anyway, back to the video contest in question. This Alex Jones guy is giving away 3 prizes; $1,000, $500 and $200 to the three best videos he receives of people hanging up the Obama as the Joker posters. This is from the instructions he posted on his site:

Alex Jones says "Hey kids, juvenile delinquency is fun and now it can win you big bucks!"

“The posters can be related to any subject you like, whether it be the swine flu vaccine, fluoride in the water, police brutality, genetically modified food, or the man-made global warming hoax. Pick any issue you like, make a poster and then film yourself posting it in public and upload the video to You Tube or similar websites.”

To be honest, this is a pretty good idea for a video contest. Participants have to include the name of the website on some or all of their posters so it’s a nice way to get a lot of cheap advertising. Plus it gets people’s attention. Hey…just look how many times I’ve had to mention Infowars.com in this post! So it is effective. But it also very irresponsible. Alex Jones is basically saying that if you commit vandalism you might win some cash. Ok, actually he says the opposite of that. Again, here’s a warning from his website:

“Note: Obama Joker posters should be posted in public commons where other fliers, public announcements, handbills, etc., are posted. Please do not post on federal or private property as this will be considered vandalism and will be counterproductive and diminish the message of the Obama Joker poster.”

Great. Alex Jones does not condone vandalism. Oh…except that he totally does. The contest has actually gotten a lot of entries and many of them show people breaking the law like crazy! Here are a few entries from the Infowars site. Keep in mind, these aren’t some videos that I pulled off of youtube. These videos were embedded on Infowars.com by someone who works on the website.

Both of these videos show people doing exactly what the Infowars website says they shouldn’t. Yet the website promotes and displays them anyway. The people in these videos are seen postering public and private property. The 16 and 17 year old kids in the second video are actually hanging up posters with propaganda-filled bumper stickers. They’re sticking them on glass doors and vending machines for God’s sake. Vandalism that leaves a sticky residue is the most annoying kind of vandalism if you ask me.

These are just two of the many, many entries that show people breaking the law in the name of winning a stupid video contest. I don’t want to post anymore but you can see the other entries right here: http://www.infowars.com/the-obama-joker-1000-video-contest/

Wait, I will post one more. This video not only shows a bunch of idiots in clown make-up defacing things like newspaper boxes and parking signs, it features an especially bat shit crazy dude harassing some goofball reporter as he’s trying to do a story about the traffic or whatever. The clown make-up guy unleashes a tirade about the media and though he seemed a little freaked at first, the reporter goes on to handle himself pretty well. Notice that video cuts out when it’s the report’s turn to start talking. I’m guessing his best, most intelligent retorts didn’t make the final cut:

This dumbass video contest has been going on since August and 2 participants have been “detained” by police in at least two separate incidents. The first (a teenager in Florida) was questioned but never charged. He will probably have to make restitution of some kind though. He admitted to hanging 500 of the posters and sometimes used GLUE to stick them up.

The guy that was stopped by cops the other day also used F%^&ing glue to stick his posters on public and private property. People defending these guys say that their first amendment rights are being abused. Grrrrrrrrrrr. Do I even have to point out that the First Amendment does not give you the right to smear glue all over lampposts and newspaper boxes and street signs?

Vandalism caused in the name a video contest

Here’s an article about the guy in Houston and it includes a news clip. In the video, you can see the aftermath of his handiwork; posters that can’t be fully removed because some jerk stuck them up with glue.

News Story: Man Charged Over Obama ‘Joker’ Posters

One final point, I’m not hating on this contest because I’m offended by the Obama as the Joker/Socialism poster. But I am hating on it in part because the posters are stupid. Can someone please tell me WTF The Joker has to do with SOCIALISM!?!? In the movie, The Joker robs from the rich and gives to NOBODY! If he took all that money and sent to it to AIG that would be one thing but he doesn’t. The Joker burned his money because he’s a psychopathic anarchist not a “Socialist.”

Alex Jones claims to be the “creator” of the Obama/Socialism poster. Actually he just stole the image from some artist’s flickr account and stuck the word socialism on there. So not only is Alex Jones an instigator of vandalism he’s a content and credit thief.

The video contest is still open for another 2 days. So if you’re a jerk and you want to enter I guess there’s still time.

Score another victory for copyright infringers

Posted by Beardy on September 13th, 2009

This is really starting to get annoying. It seems like half the contest results I post include one video that should have been deemed ineligible by the contest’s judges. Today’s example is the first place winner of the 20/20 For Life video Contest. In this competition, people were supposed to create a video that promotes eye health and that illustrates themes set forth by the advertisers, blah, blah blah. First prize was good for $2,000. I can’t embed the winning video so click on this image to see it:

Not bad…well edited and written. They even got a good actor and filmed inside a real eye doctor’s exam room. So what’s wrong with it? The video is called “Boomer Magoo” and features a quick sound clip from a Mr. Magoo cartoon. That’s 100% copyright infringement right there chief. Also, I’m guessing that if the person behind this video didn’t care about infringing on the Mr. Magoo copyright then they probably didn’t bother to make sure the music in the video was royalty free. Here’s what the 20/20 “rules” say about doing stuff like that:

“Video must not contain any materials that are subject to third party ownership, including without limitation copyrighted materials such as music, videos or artwork; third party trademarks or names, likenesses, voices of third parties for whom Entrant does not have express written permission.”

Jim Bakus (AKA Mr. Magoo AKA Thurston Howel III) does not approve

As a bonus violation of the rules, I’m guessing the people who made this video didn’t dig up Jim Bakus and ask if they could use his voice.

Even though there were $3,500 in prizes up for grabs in this contest, only 15 people entered this one and most of the entries are not great. The Boomer Magoo video was the best video entered but legally it was ineligible. Why is it that filmmakers are expected to follow the contest’s rules to a T but the contest organizers can do whatever the hell they want, whenever the hell they want? The “Rules” of a contest are supposed to be a legally binding contract between the contest organizers and the participants, aren’t they? They promise in writing that if we do A, B and C they will respond by doing D, E and F. Obviously the contests have to have a lawyer write up their contest rules. So where are these lawyers when it comes time to enforce these rules? Isn’t anyone worried about getting sued? Seriously, the second place winner in the 20/20 contest has a slam dunk small claims court case here if he wants.

Archive for September, 2009

How to screw up a great idea for a video contest

No fair! You used your skills!

I heart sandwiches

The ugly side of video contests

And who says rap videos never win video contests?

The video contest that can’t get no respect

Scariest Story Ever told

Olivia Munn picks her fan film

Voter Shenanigans in the Butterfinger contest?

Frequent Video Contester wins the HP “You on You” challenge

Crash the Superbowl site goes live

Conan’s car contest: Something is rotten in the state of California

Gotta Get a Gearmax (if you want to win)

The asinine video contest that’s getting people busted by the cops

Score another victory for copyright infringers

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