I haven't been trying to keep this going the last several days. For anyone who may have voted, thanks and I hope you continue. There has been a few issues with the show recently and thought I would share with you my thoughts and email to the station and one finalist. I did recieve a response from Gordon but not from the station. Not sure what they will do, if anything on this.
On Fri, Nov 23, 2012 at 12:19 PM, Joe Hankins <fattirejoe@hotmail.com> wrote:
Hello all,
Week 4 was pretty interesting and the finals started with a twist also. Then all the trash talking on KLAW site and Travis bowing out. Then Wednesday morning I received some information on how the voting system is tainted. It has weighed on my heart whether to share this with you, let it run it’s course and be done with it, or fight fire with fire. Well, my sense of fairness and morals says for now just to let you know about this so in future(?) shows, everyone will be on the same level. I’m still struggling whether to include everybody involved, from the contestants to the people that are supporting me. I don’t think the show needs any more negativity or drama. I do feel Gordon should be aware of this also, so hope you understand
I’m not very keen on putting my thoughts in print because things that are said can be taken out of context so easy. So I will try to explain how what I was told started to make sense once I started to “really” look at things. My figures and timeline I’m sure will not be accurate but you should hopefully get what I’m trying to say.
To begin, I posted the 3 links you sent me to 5 automotive forums I am a member of. The actual member count in each one is 108 .. 100,102 .. 67,062 .. 8,699 .. 6,377. Then add in all the guest that visit the forums that is A LOT of exposure. Don’t Facebook but my wife has it on hers. Not sure if you are familiar with how forums work so in case you don’t..when I started the “thread” on the virtual car show, the majority of the people will respond, saying something on the line “I voted for you” when they place a vote. When they do, I receive notification, both on my home computer and my phone. The wife receives notification on her phone when her people respond. More on this in a moment.
Monday before the site went down, I was receiving notifications from the members of my boards saying they had voted. But a few also said they voted 10 times for me. I knew that can’t happen as you can only vote once in a days time no matter which of the 3 sites you use. I’m thinking probably 75% of members are most likely kids (I say kids because to me they are, I’m 57) and it’s just internet talk or they think just because they keep going back and selecting a person and hit vote time and time again it counts. I also know it doesn’t happen because that is how I monitor how I am doing throughout the day. All I ever get is “Thank you. We have already counted your vote”. Then the site goes down and the phone is again buzzing with notifications from members posting on the thread about the page down. So I go to each of the forums and post a copy Jerri Anderson sent and all got quite.
Tuesday starts fine with the normal buzzing of the phone saying people were once again responding to the voting thread. After short wait I would visit the Z94 site to check on my progress. Most of the time it seems like my figures didn’t change any. So they must not have voted for me like they said they did. Seems like the 3% plus gap between us couldn't be closed up any. Midday was the same same, the phone letting me know there was more activity. This time I checked the progress immediately and the votes were there so I was staring to climb finally. Can’t remember the exact figure but I believe something like Bucky’s 34.75 to my 34.35. An hour or so later, that 3% gap was there again. Same that night also. I also wondered what happened to Gordon’s people as his figures weren’t moving very well either. Rest of the night, between my phone and my wife’s, it rang fairly constantly the rest of the night. One last look before bed, still down by 3 plus %.
Wednesday morning checked back in and was I down a tad over 4%. “Now how is this guy getting so many new people" I was thinking to myself. We went to Wichita Falls for some shopping but continued monitoring Z94 to stay updated. At one time the phone rang 25 times (I counted them this time) , again letting me know that 25 different members had just voted. When I looked again I was knocking on his door. But within maybe 30 minutes I was back down about 3% again. I my long thought process....“Now how can so many people that hasn’t voted yet happen to come on at about the time I start moving count-wise and again establish this 3% cushion. Don’t make much sense to me. I’m no mathematician but a large increase in a short period of time I would guess would be a pretty large group of people. And to do this on a regular basis thru the day just seems odd”.
Now for the kicker. Late Tuesday night I received a personal message from one of the members of one of the forums. The short version, he told me how to win hands downs. Now everything is finally starting to fall into place. The chatter on the forums about voting multiple times. The only figures that seem to change is on the top, the others stay about the same. Always that 3-4% buffer, especially at night. Now as of this writing, over 6%. Now I'm leaning up against a mall wall refreshing the site, hitting vote (each time saying my vote has already been counted), seeing the numbers rise for a solid hour, and then all of a sudden everything stops. Even went back to an early poll and Bucky led from the start by around 40% and stayed there the whole week. Just doesn’t seem right, that kind of spread.
Just let me say I am in no way accusing Bucky, or any other contestant past or present, of personally doing this or personally having someone do this as I hope he has enough sportsmanship and high morals to not do so. Just trying to keep future contestants from doing so. I just want you to know how the voting system is corrupted and everyone isn’t on the same level. Unless they too know the secret to winning. I wouldn’t want to win by like this and hope the others feel the same. 250 bucks would be nice but with or without I don’t think it would have that great of an impact on my life.
I’m not the brightest bulb on the tree and never would have figured this out if not for the PM I received from the member. To test this I had to actually do the steps he mentioned to see for myself it it worked or not. I guess it may wrong in doing so, may every get me disqualified for self admittance. I have wrestled with this since I found this out. I could very well just keep quite and do this night and day till the final minutes of the show since I’m off all week, but then it would become a contest of wills. And not fair to Gordon either. The kid, he cut his own throat IMO with his mouth so to me he even isn’t in the picture. So the 5 test vote I did, I gave them to him. Of course it did work. But in doing so it takes away from the top. Didn’t take long for the top to gain back either. I didn’t what to bother you about this during family day yesterday. I still debated with myself during the night on what to do. Deep down I know this is the only right thing to do. And if you need to try it to see for yourself give everybody but me a vote. At this point it really doesn’t seem to matter.
So here it is. I’ll try to make this make sense hopefully. I only know how to do this with internet explorer.
Bring up your web browser.
PROCEDURE OMITTED FOR FAIRNESS
Hope this makes some kind of sense to ya. I’m not good at this putting thoughts into text thing. Much easier to do or say something in person so nothing is lost in the translation. And once again, not accusing anyone of anything. Just very obvious there is a major issue that keeps this from being a fair and fun contest.
Thanks for having me..Joe
And Gordon's response......
Joe,
Thanx for bringing this matter to the attention of the Radio personnel. I too have been wondering what the heck has been going on, The numbers acted kinda funny to me. I noticed it was pretty even among the top three when I went to bed a little before midnight that evening and by 4am Bucky had jumped like 10 percentage points or so (dont quote me on the exact number) a fete nearly impossible to do in my estimation and if done legitimately then you would expect the surge to occur in a similar fashion the next night since you have to wait 24 hrs to vote again., but instead he had a steady increase throughout the following day.
If you have noticed on fb I have been beating the bushes for votes. And if it was counting votes correctly, the Speer truck would be down to next to nothing instead of hanging around 5% for so long. IDK what the radio station is going to do about this matter but I applaud you for bringing it up and you get my vote as the winner for not participating in that loophole.
I pledged the 250.00 dollars to a charity Im passionate about, Basket of Hope if I were to win. I dont really know exactly what I'm ask KLAW to do about this matter but Virtual Car Show 111 is proving to be anything but what it was intended to be!
-Gordon-
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