Faceless competition winners ?
The recently concluded Real Beauty contest winners throws up certain questions in my mind. The primary one is regarding the profile picture. At least the winners or those who are competing for prizes should display their profile pictures on Indiblogger. There are 17 winners and only 5 of them have profile pictures. Secondly their profession and certain identity proof. This to an extent should eliminate doubts of the genuine credibility of the writer. Last but not the least the prizes should be distributed in a ceremony or meet. I am sure Hindustan Lever with mega budget can organise a function for the 17 winners in Mumbai or any suitable location to award the winners.
One sure way to identify a genuine entry is to obtain PAN nos or college identity card or in the absence of both go for election id or UID for verification
Thats a nice idea Umesh..but I am from Bangalore..Will Indiblogger pay me to come and attend the ceremony? :P
Generally as far as i know Indiblogger does not pay for attending the meet Kimi, but if Levers want to conduct a meet for honouring the winners of the contest than they might consider, and consider it as PR exercise
I can't agree with you in this profile picture suggestion. It's an infringement of the privacy. What's in a profile picture? Is it matters? If a person doesn't like to display his photo in the public forums, there may be several reason for that.
PAN...Voters id..et..etc.. Other than an email id and a blog, what else you did submit to join indiblogger? Not only indiblogger ..in any other social network.
Now coming to the prize ceremony..It's a good idea. 
+1 Sujith... anyways PAN, voter ID etc are very sensitive documents... who will take responsibility for their storage? and the implications in case of some hacking or similar disaster would be unimaginable... not to mention indi would have to move to a secure server!
Sujith PAN no is essential to deposit the tax amount due on account of winnings in excess of Rs 5000/- in terms of prize money. The organisers are supposed to deposit or winner has to deposit the same in TDS format to IT department. So my suggestion is valid.
I appreciate that you have agreed for ceremony or meet to distribute prizes, but photography would become inevitable there i suppose
I wonder how prizes have been given before here..
I heard that the money was transferred to the bank account of winners
But I think for that they definitely would ask an identity proof na?
Your bank account no and pan no will be essential even if the organisers decide to reward you electronically. Any winnings above Rs 5000/- will be taxable with 30% plus surcharge.
ya that's great to spend money for prize ceremony
I hope Party is overdue since HUL has an India COO, it is time to celeberate Lolz
many people wish to remain anonymous. You can't demand them to upload a profile picture or ask for an identity proof. It is upto them and they too have a right to privacy.
I respect privacy of the participants who have not won, but once the winners are announced at least for a short period they can load the photograph or if they are photographed in a ceremony of prize distribution ceremony can they raise objection.
Whether it is a short period or a long period, their privacy is at stake for ever. The profile images that are displayed on the right hand side along with their names are not dynamically updated from their grvatars but they are their gravatars that they had at the time of winning the contest.
Ranjith each one has his opinion regarding the transperancy, it is upto to the organisers and indiblogger to decide on this important criteria. I have been member of many forums, and when it comes to rewarding or awarding star or celebrity status they ask us to upload our photographs so that other ordinary members recognise who is the personality. I am celebrity member in Mouthshut, Okaytatabyebye, Sulekha etc, and i have merged the profile pic into one photo rather than different photos in different forums.
It is not possible for everyone to attend a meet as and when announced. Moreover, how can a profile pic guarantee that the article has been written by the same person. Frankly speaking, what's the guarantee that any post written on a blog is written by the said person!!! These are the limitations when it comes to cyberspace
Well transperancy is the hallmark of any organisation or individual Priya, if you agree to statement than ? raised by me is in order. If someone claims undue credit of any contest post, and he can be caught by the original author if his article has been misused, this is a classic trap, DO YOU AGREE ?
Guys my suggestion of loading the profile pics of the winners and due diligence done on account of verifying identity should be carried out to ensure that the winner is rewarded. Anyways if the winning amount is exceeding Rs 5000/- 30% IT plus surcharge needs to deducted at source, and credit to the pan account of the winner. So the issue of PAN number raised by me is in order. Regarding winners photo being dispalyed in the contest or being photographed in a ceremony is no big deal. The winner cannot object to photographs being taken and displayed in media and company bulletins or their website as part of PR excercise. When you are winner in a open contest, your persona becomes public and gains recognition, can we expect the winners to cover their faces in mask or burkha Lol
If the sponsorers wish to take a photograph of the winners, they need to mention it as a part of teh contest terms and conditions. That is what is done in all other contests or lucky draws outside IndiBlogger.
Ranjith i don t think any sponsorer will mention it as a part of terms and conditions of the contest. It is taken for granted in most cases. A meet or award ceremony itself will cost 5 lakhs plus if they have to hold it in a good location with a buffet
I'm not much aware of the competitions on the blogosphere. But still I have seen that point being mentioned in many places.
I am sorry Umesh.. I don't think I can agree with what you say.
With 3G life contest, after winning I had to give all my details such as bank account number, pan card number and pay tax of 15,000 rupees before the amount was transfered. So they just give out the award money like ransome being handed to kidnappers.
As for the profile pictures, I have mine on my blog - not because I want to prove anything to anyone. It is my rebellion attitude which does it. Many tell me being a muslim woman it is not right to have my picture on web. Normally I would not choose my picture for profile photo. It would be some book ... for my blog name is 'chapters from my life'.
Ceremonies and meets are not for everyone. I have a special needs daughter and I cannot go out much- one of the reasons why I am on net so often. It keeps me connected to people which I cannot do much in real life.
When we talk about rules and regulations we usually tend to forget that people come from different walks of life. Everyone has thier own reasons behind setting up the profile and blogs the way they have.
I feel the freedom of choice should be given to the blogger.
Exceptions are always welcome dear Farida, but just imagine if everybody avoids posting profile pic, it will be lifeless contestants. I understand your compulsions for not attending meets. good luck
Thanks for understanding .. and oopppsss I meant to say they don't give out award money like ransome being handed over to kidnappers. LOL. I need to read before submissions.
We all get fooled some day or the other, i am not aware whether we can patent or have TM for an icon, experts should answer this ?
I ran a search for "tarot images public domain" and got this: http://www.sacred-texts.com/tarot/index.htm. Anyway do peruse and find out yourself they really are in Public Domain before using one of them. I think it's maybe okay to use it for gravatar, only you aren't supposed to make monetary gains out of it
Thanks Rajesh for clarifying, i believe such icons from the net are available with a rider, it is only when you hit the charts of popularity somone might forward legal notice claiming rights. It is the case in youtube too, when you officially buy the CD and use the music track for publishing your videos, you still get pulled up by the copyright owners. Google offers an alternative track and problem gets sorted out. 
I got my logo designed by a friend with lot of modifications to convey the line of venture
Thans, Rajesh. I also thought it might be in public domain as it is the general version. But probably Umesh is right. If I ever become popular,, someone might have problems. No one has any problems as long as your an unnown blogger.
@Pramod - Lol. @Umesh - Interesting thought. You could try it.
Yeah, then it's wise to be cautious.
But having a Gravatar around here helps us spot one's post easily so it's good to have one of your own though the avatar you end up using may not be your most preferred image
How is putting up our own pic as profile picture guarantee that the post is written by the same person in the pic..? And why would i divulge important details like my PAN details just for writing few articles.?
I donot agree with the PAN thing.....
PAN no is required for claiming prize amount exceeding Rs 5000/- So Chitra you should be aware of the rules of IT 33% is taxable and TDS is paid only through your PAN ac
i agree with u The Sorcerer
Why we should much worry about these verification PAN card, identity blah blah..Leave it to Indiblogger team, sponsors and the winners. If they don't pay Tax, IT dept will take care of that.
Sujith please read Farida Rizwans comment who is one of the winner
With 3G life contest, after winning I had to give all my details such as bank account number, pan card number and pay tax of 15,000 rupees before the amount was transfered. So they just give out the award money like ransome being handed to kidnappers.
Hmmm I damn typo lol.. I meant to say that when we win we need to give some proofs. They do not give it like ransom money. But if we do not win and just participate to lose then we can say without cussing .. just 'NO'.
Thanks Farida for agreeing to the authentication clause, being a winner i am sure you are proud that your profile is announced with your photo. I appreciate your participation in a long drawn debate on transperancy.
@Umesh..It's well understood, If you get a Super loto of 1 Crore...you will not get the whole amount. My question is that why we should worry on this? leave it to the winners and the sponsors..Years back one of my friends got Ford icon car by winning a contest conducted by Readers digest, he payed the tax and got the car. It's the business between the winner and the sponsor, why others should interfere in this?
Well transperancy is the hallmark of any organisation or individual is my conclusion
What is written should matter, not who has written it, IMO
If a blogger is attending the meets that are arranged in his or her city, then that blogger definitely gets known to Indiblogger. May be Indiblogger will make it compulsory to atleast attend one meet in a year. haha am kidding 
I have attended few meets so some from the Inditeam know me now. You always need to trust Indiblogger as it'll regularly come out with improvements that will make the genuine bloggers happy .
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