iTalent
"Competition Both Performed And Judged By The Artists"
and 
Introduction
Welcome to the opening post of the iTalent contest here on Steemit. This contests is made for everybody that has worked and improved it's own talent throughout the years. I myself am an artist that spent just 2 months here on Steemit, but I have gained so much respect towards this amazing platform and it's enormous potential to improve lives of many people and artist included. I believe enough to give all of my earnings I've gotten so far towards this initiative. This contest is a bit different from what you normally see here on Steemit (with all due respect to other contests) because it is a long term relationship between all of the artists/contestants and has Auditions before the competition to ensure that only real artists have a chance to win, and not copycats or spammers. Voting will be done by artists/contestants themselves between each other via a fair voting system (no judges or upvote count) you can read more about it below. I'm planning to make a standalone app for this contest, which will make things much easier, my coder/programmer friends assured me that it is not that difficult to make but it costs some money, so if the contest gets enough light and support that is exactly what I will do.
ATTENTION:
If you want to enroll for the Audition now, post your art in the comments below, I suggest you too read the contest rules first - Please check my "iTalent Rules Post" via link below:
https://steemit.com/art/@ivan.atman/italent-or-contest-rules-or-100-steem-mo-giveaway-or-all-talents-or-auditory-arts-visual-arts-performing-arts
For live help and any questions regarding the "iTalent Contest" you can join the discord group via this link: https://discord.gg/g4EZQ3d
Categories and Rewards:
There are three categories on the iTalent contest, each one is being rewarded separately. A full description of which talent falls into which category can be found further below. Rewards for the contest will start at 45 STEEM per contest, 15 STEEM per category (with some surprise rewards along the way)
Just so there is no confusion here is a very simple example below:
| CATEGORY | Auditory Arts | Visual Arts | Performing Arts |
|---|---|---|---|
| WINNER | 10 STEEM | 10 STEEM | 10 STEEM |
| RUNNER UP | 5 STEEM | 5 STEEM | 5 STEEM |
All of the rewards come out from my own pocket for now, but
See the full description of the iTalent categories below...
VISUAL ARTS category is for anybody presenting an art piece that is either handcrafted/drawn by hands, or created/recorded by digital media including:
Category tagg is #visual-arts
- Filmmaking / Videomaking
- Animated Video
- Photography
- Painting / Drawing
- Sculpturing
- Sand Animation
- Ceramics / Pottery
- Graphic Design
- Crafts
- Fashion Design
- Interior Design
- Decorative Art
- Poetry / Songwriting
- Costume / Make Up
AUDITORY ARTS category/tagg is for anybody presenting art in a form of
Music or a Sound Design including:
Category tagg is #auditory-arts
- Singing / Rapping
- Playing a Instrument
- Ethno / World Traditional Music
- EP or Album presentation
- Classical Music Compositions
- Sound Design / Soundtrack
- Beatmaking
- Musicals
- Experimental Sound / Industrial
- Conceptual Music
- Beatboxing
- Original Instrument
PERFORMING ARTS category is for anybody presenting performance that is either presented to live audience or includes a performance act:
Category tagg is #performing-arts
- Dance / Choreography
- Ethno / World Traditional Performing Arts
- Gymnastics / Contortion
- Stage Magic / Illusion
- Street Performance
- Performance Poetry
- Live Audience Performance
- Installation Art
- Impromptu / Improv Act
- Live Theatre / Opera
- Circus / Acrobatics
- Act (drama) / Plays
- Spoken Word / Poetry Reading
- Conceptual Art
- Stand Up Comedy
- Flash Mob
- Pole Dancing
- Martial Arts
So How Does The iTalent Contest Work?
iTalent doesn't work in the "once a week" formula, and it has three phases per competition, a competition that lasts 15 days in total. One competition will have an assignment, specific goal or a theme, and another will be for covers/personal originals. First episode of the iTalent will be for covers and personal originals to get things going, and also first Audition (Entry Phase) that will usually last for 5 days will last from today February 21'st until the March 5'th, this is because everybody needs to hear about the iTalent first, so the number of entries provides a fair and interesting voting.
1. Entry Phase (Audition)
There is a lot of spam on Steemit regarding art plagiarism and fake entries, and Audition phase will sift them out so there is no confusion later on.
- In this phase everybody who wants to enter the contest, enters their art/performance in the comments section of the iTalent announcement post
- Everybody has 5 DAYS to enter the Audition from the day that iTalent announced the competition started (because the competition just started and the competition naturally needs to get some attention to make everything right, first auditions are from today February 21'st until the March 5'th)
(everybody can enter 3 times, but only with 1 entry per category)
2. Qualifying Phase (Voting For Entries)
After everyone entered the contest the voting starts, and lasts for 5 days,
on the last day iTalent Team will count the votes and announce the artists/performers that have qualified to compete for the reward.
(if you don't vote for others, you cannot pass to the final phase, even if you get enough votes to do so)
3. Final Phase (Voting For Qualified Entries)
In this phase all of the contestants vote for the best art/performance that qualified in the comments section of the "Finalists Announcement Post"
(if you haven't made it to the finals you still have to vote, if you don't you will not be eligible for the next contest)
Whilst everybody votes for the winner, finalists can provide another art/performance and not the same they auditioned with to gain extra 10% of the overall points
If a finalists entered more categories than one, they must decide in which category they want to compete for the finals
Voting is always done by the contestants themselves, never by iTalent Team or non-contestants
To improve the authenticity of the content that artists provide as an entry to the iTalent competition, I've designed a voting system that will discourage people to beg for points, or team up between each other. Voting is done in the comments section of the current iTalent post, you must vote for 6 performers by providing them points and insights, you must find six performers that deserved (by your opinion) something from below:
Point/Insight Awards:
(5 Points) (3 Points) (1 Point) (Creativity) (Originality) (Technicality)
And decide who deserves what, you cannot give the same award twice or give two awards to the same performer, every award goes to only one performer
THE EXAMPLE BELOW SHOWS YOU HOW THE VOTING SHOULD BE DONE:
(attention all of the accounts in the example are purely symbolic)
As you can see in the example above you cannot give points to whom you already gave insights and vice versa. This is because insights serve as a counteract to the points
(the reason for this rule is to engage a voting balance, you can support your true favorite performers with the most points, but insights will have to come from elsewhere to confirm a truly unanimous public opinion)
POINTS
Points are simply added up by the iTalent Team on the last day of the Audition (Voting) or Final (Voting) phase of the contest
- To ensure absolute fairness, the votes are recorded by the screenshot software (video) and posted in the winner announcement post, this is done just to make sure if somebody goes and tries to change/edit their comment/vote in the last minute for some reason to try to disapprove of the votes counted by the iTalent Team.
INSIGHTS
There are three insights Creativity - Originality - Technicality
Each insight gives the contestant that had it most attributed to him an additional 20% of the whole points pool (so not from the reward pool but an additional 20% that is measured by the full amout of points in the contest)
So for example, let's say that there is 50 people voting in the contest, that would amount to 400 points in total, 20% of that is 80 points, this means that whoever gets most insight votes gets an additional 80 points in that case
So in actuality the contest that has 50 people voting has 400 points + 3 x 80 from insights, amounting to 640 points in total.
Voting System Conclusion:
As you can see it is "almost" impossible to rig the votes with this voting system, and this will ensure that both the reward and the attention goes to the ones that truly deserved it the most.
No contest judges that decide for everybody what is good or not, no upvote count that can be manipulated by misuse of upvote bots and no nominations that get lost so quickly and is hard to keep track of. Just simply a fair contest judged by the people, artist judging artists because artists know art the best themselves. The points/insight counter balance will also entice voters/artists to find more value in not just one but several performers.