You can always tell when a contest is coming to an end because dozens of these posts (those that claim the invalidity of the system, complaining about the way points are received, and complaining about the content of other users) begin coming out of the woodwork. Within about a two-week period, we will begin seeing at least ten more blogs posted (ironically, as blogs for points, not as forums for clarification purposes) complaining about what other users are doing on this site. Prior to today, I have kept off of this little bandwagon. "There's no point" I would tell myself. Why lower myself to doing the exact same thing as all these other users are doing? But I for one am sick and tired of people saying "well, I'm losing, so they must be cheating." People really need to grow up. Or is it just that they won't be happy until the contest and scholarship is completely cancelled? I have known users on this site who have quit simply because of the amount of complaining that goes on in this site about the contest. There are more users now that complain about the contest than there are people participating in this contest. And that's sad. We are all supposed to be intelligent college-bound students with something to say and a place to express ourselves. But instead of acting like college bound students and accepting responsibility for ourselves and making an honest "go" of this contest, people would rather spread blame and accuse others of cheating. Grow Up People. I swear more members of this site remind me of kindergartners than of college students "Wahhh, I would win in a fair fight so they have to be cheating!!! Wahh...." And now that my rant is over, here are some things that I believe all you people who would rather post comments and blogs accusing others of cheating are overlooking.... The ratings feature was an idea I had posted towards the end of the last contest, and a lot of users liked the idea. We thought it would help keep people in the mindset of posting worthwhile blogs rather than just printing up stories riddled with poor grammar and spelling. The idea was implemented, and I'm starting to regret it. The first time I saw one of my blogs reach the "highest rated" list I was proud and thought I was doing well in presenting my ideas... now when I see any of my posts get rated I just want them to take the rating off. I believe there are more people voting "1" just to get a blog off the list than there are people reading through and rating fairly. I'd rather not have a rating system than have people use it as an excuse to accuse others of cheating. Even now, I have a couple of blogs that are sitting at 5 stars with 2 votes, and I keep thinking to myself "I hope no one else rates them, that'll just make them a target for people to rate as "1" for no reason" It's truly sad that none of us can even feel proud that our posts get high ratings because other people will use that as a target to accuse them of cheating or try to skew the ratings as poorer than they are just because they can. The Highest Rated list is already out of skew, we all know this. Many or even most of the blogs that even get listed there are not the most thought-provoking and not the best written blogs on the site. But who's fault is that? The writers? Please - take some responsibility and rate the articles fairly if you want to see the ratings feature used properly. Or is it just easier to claim that these people must have multiple accounts and so they must be cheating than to think that maybe others liked the blogs? Or maybe people just aren't voting? Additionally, having a post listed as the highest rated posts doesn't guarantee any more reads. I have posts that have never been rated that have received more than 2,000 reads within a month (http://www.progressiveu.org/190000-mother-kills-her-child-in-walmart, which was written when there was no contest going on), and posts that made it to the "highest rated" list that receive less than 100 reads before it falls off the list. So to see a blog listed up there really doesn't do anything for the writer; either for points or even for reads. All it does do is serve to give the complainers another excuse to say something's unfair because a blog that they really like isn't up there. Well, we're all in that boat. There are plenty of blogs (most of which were written by people on my Buddy List) that I think are the best on this site; most are better than mine, that have received no ratings, or just the one rating from me. Many of my favorite writers on this site go ignored because no one rates their blogs (Fallon, MVenus, npsm, jordden and several more)... and although I don't always agree with what they have to say, I know that when I visit their blogs, it will be something worthy of my time to read and thought-provoking. As far as allegations of multiple accounts, Art has already explained (on another blog complaining about this same thing) that they have ways of telling when someone has multiple accounts, so even if someone tried that I doubt they could get away with it for very long. As for progressive content, this issue is dealt with. It takes a while before contest winners are announced because they do go through and discount certain blogs for various things. So, if you would rather monger points by continuously accusing others of cheating and childishly posting more blogs complaining about the way the site is run, just remember that it is you lowering the levels of this site - not those that you would accuse of cheating.