Voting Problems

[NaviGATR]

Hey All,

I was wondering if anyone else was experiencing voting issues. Mostly, it's AOL users who are being told that they've voted when they haven't. My guess is that the site is "sniffing" out IP addresses to keep people from voting more then once.

The problem with this is that AOL uses IP sharing. They recycle a set number of IP addresses through all of there members depending on when you're online. So if one person votes from the IP address, chances are thousands of other people, (if not more,) won't be able to vote because they will be assigned the same IP. That's a pretty large amount of potential voters to block out.

I don't know if this bothers you guys, but I know of about 20 people who have tried to vote who have experiences this problem.

Just thought I'd mention it.

Thanx!

Shawn

[Version3]

I've been getting similar complaints and didn't noticed until you mentioned it... they are ALL on AOL. You may be right.

[theFerf]

we are aware of this issue and are working on a fix. its hard to track individual users without forcing people to login, but maybe that is what we will have to move to.

Any ideas will be warmly accepted.

[NaviGATR]

Hey There,

Thanx for the quick response.

I agree. Logging in is a pain in the butt, but you're already asking for e-mail addresses, so it's not much more of a hassle at that point. If it allows everyone to vote, it seems like a good option.

Shawn

[thumper369]

I think making users log in to vote would discurage the casual user from doing so. and besides, whats to stop people from creating many accts to vote more.

not to be over dramatic, but I thing it would hurt us when it comes to the average user if we required logins.

[indiekid]

i think voting is one of those touchy subjects. so many ways to do it, so many ways to cheat, it really is hard to fix the problem. at least in my opinion, the voting is great, but yeah, i would agree that fixes need to be done to make it easier, yet still secure somehow

[aaronsnet]

I thought that the voting system stored e-mail addresses/user names instead of IP addresses?

I think that the problem is with cache. I think that the easiest fix would be to place a notice on the voting system webpage telling AOL users that they "may experience a problem while using the internal AOL browser, and that they should open a browser outside of AOL to vote."

As I am sure you have seen on muliple webpages, these notices are common.

[NaviGATR]

Hey All,

New month. Same issues.

Does anyone know if anything has been done to address the voting issues with all AOL users being counted as one vote and the sniffing of IP addresses? It may not matter to many of you, but we are an AOL-based show with lots of AOL listeners. That' over 23 million members that are getting left out.

Can anyone help here?

Thanx!

Shawn

[shepdave]

I was having a similar problem today.

I teach at a public high school whose computers are on a LAN. Today several colleagues and students who know my podcast wanted to vote for me. However, once one person had voted from a school computer, it seemed to view all the computers on the network as belonging to the same person, and it told everybody they had already voted. I don't know if the anti-cheating machine saw the whole school as one person, but I suspect it might have.

I completely understand how hard it is to beat cheating, and why it's so important, but this was a little frustrating. Some of these kids only have internet access at school, and they'd like to support my 'cast.

Dave

[svitolo]

Has anyone had the problem of never receiving a verification email? A couple of people have mentioned that to me...

Steve Vitolo
The Steve Vitolo Show
http://www.thestevevitoloshow.com
http://www.podcastalley.com/podcast_detail.php?pod_id=3095

[cid92]

I was having a similar problem today.

I teach at a public high school whose computers are on a LAN. Today several colleagues and students who know my podcast wanted to vote for me. However, once one person had voted from a school computer, it seemed to view all the computers on the network as belonging to the same person, and it told everybody they had already voted. I don't know if the anti-cheating machine saw the whole school as one person, but I suspect it might have.

I completely understand how hard it is to beat cheating, and why it's so important, but this was a little frustrating. Some of these kids only have internet access at school, and they'd like to support my 'cast.

Dave

Makes sense since all the machines in the school tie back to a server or servers which in turn tie back to one firewalled NAT address that connects the school to the web. PCA only sees the routable address of the schools internet connection and not the non-routable addresses behind the firewall.

[NaviGATR]

Can anyone from Podcast Allley chime in here? I know you're aware of the problem, but seeing as you're the premiere Podcasting directory on the web, it's very important to us podcasters that the voting be fair and accurate.

Since we're an AOL-based podcast, limiting AOL members from voting is a big deal.

Thanx!

Shawn

[gozar]

The problem with this is that AOL uses IP sharing. They recycle a set number of IP addresses through all of there members depending on when you're online. So if one person votes from the IP address, chances are thousands of other people, (if not more,) won't be able to vote because they will be assigned the same IP. That's a pretty large amount of potential voters to block out.


Could the IP check be disabled for the AOL netblocks? If this is done it would require the person to use an AOL e-mail address.

[pwfenton]

I tried to vote today and never received a confirmation e-mail. I have nothing to do with AOL. Otherwise it acted normal... but now I've wasted a vote. It won't let me vote again... and it never allowed me a first vote.

[wallpaperman]

I tried earlier today also and never recieved an email. Then it would not let me vote saying I had alreday done so

[mikehipp]

I'm not on AOL, but I am part of a small network, and only one of us can vote before all the others get the message that "you have already voted for this podcast."

So, yeah, it's screwy.

[shepdave]

These are MAJOR problems.

Podcast Alley is, above all, the site where podcasts are rated by their listeners and ranked. The top 10 at PA become, de facto, the podcasts the general public is likely to know about.

Next most visible would be podcasts in the PA top 50.

No less than P.W. Fenton was not able to vote for his very own podcast for May. I have heard from several of my listeners who had the same problem P-Dub had: they voted but did not get an email confirmation. Their votes were not counted, and then they were locked out.

Others have had problems being individuals on networks and not being allowed to vote as individuals.

Something needs to be done about this rather urgently, it seems to me.

Respectfully,
Dave Shepherd

[NaviGATR]

I'm glad to see it's not just me.

With the popularity of Podcasting growing every day, and Podacst Alley being the "Yahoo" of podcasting, I would think this would be something we'd all like to see fixed ASAP.

Is there anyone from the site that's lurking that might be able to address this????

Thanx!

Shawn

[seek3r]

We are looking into the problem now.

[NaviGATR]

That's great! Thanx!

[NaviGATR]

I know you're all sick of hearing this from me... but it's a new month and I have listeners trying to vote for our podcast from all over the country telling me they are getting the "Sorry, you already voted" message when they vote.

Isn't there a simple fix to this problem you guys can implement ASAP? I know we're not the only one with this issue.

Thanx!

Shawn

[theFerf]

There are many simple fixes, but they cause holes in the system and hackers love to exploit voting systems. We are in the process of writing a smarter, more robust (yet simpler to use) voting system, but its going to take a little time. We understand the problems the current voting system is causing for some people, but the safeguards that have been put in place are there to ensure as much voting accuracy as possible.

We are working on the new voting, and rest assured, somethine much better will be available to you as soon as possible.

[PupuStudios]

YEAH! Give Mr Ferf some room to do his magick! Everything will all make sense in time, I'm sure. So keep your pants on.

[NaviGATR]

Consider my pants still on.

I appreciate the response. As you can imagine, it's very frustrating for everyone working on our show since none of us are able to vote for ourselves due to the issue.

Thanx again for your help.

Shawn

[NaviGATR]

Hey All,

With July 1st a day away, does anyone know if the voting issues with AOL members has been fixed?

Thanx!

Shawn

[UncleDan]

Well, just more proof that AOL suvks

[Patrick]

Please don't require users to login to vote. I think this will cause the majority of votes to be from people with podcasts, not casual listeners.

[docsnavely]

Well, just more proof that AOL suvks

A revelation my brother!! AMEN!!! :wink:

On a more serious note, I hope everything fixes itself out for ya. Maybe you could publish in iTMS and hopefully get in there and get rated for your download ration instead of votes here.

that is if that's how apple rates the podcasts

[Charles]

I'm glad to see it's not just me.

With the popularity of Podcasting growing every day, and Podacst Alley being the "Yahoo" of podcasting, I would think this would be something we'd all like to see fixed ASAP.

Is there anyone from the site that's lurking that might be able to address this????

Thanx!

Shawn

Podcast Alley Is Not the "Yahoo" of podcasting. In fact the "Yahoo" of podcasting will be Yahoo themselves when they launch their all in one podcast subscription/directory soon. PA is important, especially for small indie podcasts but it gets a fraction of the hits that Yahoo does(or Itunes) and what the new Yahoo Podcast client will get.

What remains to be seen is if Yahoo will strongly emphasis commercial podcasts above small indie podcasts the way Apple iTunes is doing. Podcasting News said that indie podcasts are in the 4th tier on iTunes.

-

[mfnoffice]

Podcast Alley Is Not the "Yahoo" of podcasting. In fact the "Yahoo" of podcasting will be Yahoo themselves when they launch their all in one podcast subscription/directory soon. PA is important, especially for small indie podcasts but it gets a fraction of the hits that Yahoo does(or Itunes) and what the new Yahoo Podcast client will get.

What remains to be seen is if Yahoo will strongly emphasis commercial podcasts above small indie podcasts the way Apple iTunes is doing. Podcasting News said that indie podcasts are in the 4th tier on iTunes.

You make a great point!

I love PCA. In fact, like most, we push to maintain our show in the top 50 each month. But a fact is a fact...Right now iTunes and Yahoo is where you want your feeds to be seen!

You (the Podcast Producer) should be pushing to have your show in the iTunes Top 100 Podcast list now! As for the commercial podcasts, keep watching the (iTunes) top 100 and pay attention to the names. Since the opening day indie podcasts are slowly pushing the commercial grade podcasts down the list!

What are (and have been) the top 50 of PCA are slowly becoming the top 100 of iTunes and that my friends speaks MAJOR volumes!

Jim Goetz
Firehouse Radio

And my show is the fat kid of Itunes, forced to sit on the sidelines while all the football players get the hot chicks.

[NaviGATR]

Well, although our podcast was lucky enough to be included in the latest iTunes release, we've been trying to support the original sites out there that helped bring podcasting to the forefront. That's why I've been trying to get these voting issues addressed here. We've been talking about it for months and it's still an issue. I coudn't vote for my own podcast today because of the problems.

We have links on our site pointing to PCA and we promoted it on the show, but we'll have to stop because it makes no sense to continue to do so if we can't get a fair shot when it comes to rankings and voting.

I guess we will just focus our attention on iTunes going forward.

Shawn

[theFerf]

the new voting code is mostly in place that should fix some of the AOL issues, and the issues that require multiple votes from the same IP (as in dialups or shared networks) to be counted. The only issue now is iTunes. When they came out so early, it messed up our whole schedule for release.

Now that we are standing again from the itunes podquake, we are moving to a new server. the next step is to release My Alley, which also includes a new voting mechanism as well as entire playlist voting support.

I know it seems like we keep pushing it out, but it is right around the corner.

[NaviGATR]

I know for a fact it's not just an AOL related issue. I've had a number of people contact me directly from other podcast that have had the same problem. It can happen to people using the same network even if it's 2 totally different computers, people and e-mail addresses.

I know this has to be more widespread. It's just really annoying and I'm sure it has a very large effect on the vote tallies every month.

[Patrick]

I can confirm this, even as late as this morning. Same network (different IP's), two different people, two different emails and it says "You've already voted."

[theFerf]

Patrick:

can you PM me the email addresses and the show people are voting for? The voting errors up till this point have only be due to AOL or shared networks. If everyone shares an internet connection at an office (even though there machines have different local addresses) this is the main issue. We are fixing this in the new release.

Send me the email address, show voted for and IP if you can, I will locate those specific votes and see what the error was.

thanks!

[PupuStudios]

Perhaps we should just switch to paper ballots. It would make cheating much harder. Each person voting has to register beforehand. Once they've gone through that paperwork, they need to turn their ballot into Mr Ferf personally. I don't see anything flawed in this system.

[Brian]

Ouch, my chad is hanging!

[Hittman]

Perhaps we should just switch to paper ballots. It would make cheating much harder. Each person voting has to register beforehand. Once they've gone through that paperwork, they need to turn their ballot into Mr Ferf personally. I don't see anything flawed in this system.

And then Ferf would dip their index finger in blue ink that would last for a month.

It would make it easy to find fellow PAers on the street. Except for Iraq, of course.

Maybe we can use the voting system Ohio and Florida use, Karl Rove seems to like it.....and what could possibly be wrong with that?

[NaviGATR]

New month... same problem. The site tells me I voted when I didn't. I thought they were working on this? It's been about 5 months now!

[mesoed]

Hey Shawn,

We'd have to check with Chris, but I doubt your problem will change, if it's what I believe it is...

The main reason people can't vote more than once within the same network is because of how the network handles IP routing to the internet. In layman's terms, any traffic coming from your network is identified by the internet as if it was from one single IP address. Because Podcast Alley treats anyone from your network as having the same IP, it prevents more than one vote from your network. I'm guessing someone already voted for your show on your network.

This also means that the same computer can vote more than once if it can attach to a different network. For example, I could vote for your show on my laptop while using it at work, and then again on my home internet connection. Same computer... 2 different internet connections.

BTW: You guys have absolutely the BEST sports podcast/internet radio show out there. Keep up the good work! :)

[docsnavely]

OMG, it's alive.......AGAIN!!!

[NaviGATR]

Month 6 and counting...

I gave up hoping for a voting fix months ago. Every month there's a voting issue. AOL member get blocked because of the fact the site "sniffs" IP addresses on top of the e-mails, so hundreds of our listeners get told they've voted already when they HAVEN'T!!!

In addition, I tried to vote for my own podcast this month and I didn't get a confirmation email, so we're screwed either way.

It upsets me because Podcast Alley gets written about, and the Top 10 is distributed around the web even though the ranking system is bogus. IT should either be fixed or discarded.

Thanx.

P.S. Thanx for the kind words Kansas... Glad you like the show! I understand the IP sniffing issues, but it doesn't make me happy. AOL has 20 million members on the same network. IP sniffing shold be disabled. But then again, e-mail confirmations are not being sent out either. So how can anyone take the rankings on the site seriously?

[theFerf]

We are actively seeking an answer to these issues. We have developed and tested many systems, but do not want to require people to login to vote (i should mention, however, that if people have a valid forum account and are logged in, they do NOT need to verify votes via email).

Since we do track IP addresses (shared via AOL and most networks) it does cause many problems. We are working on this as we speak, trying to figure the whole thing out. Maybe email verification is not the answer, what other suggestions do you guys have? All suggestions are welcome, lets get this problem worked out.

[theFerf]

UPDATE:

I think we have found something that may make the vote confirmatioin emails more reliable. We will be implementing and testing over the next few days and I will keep you posted here on updates.

[geeknews]

UPDATE:

I think we have found something that may make the vote confirmatioin emails more reliable. We will be implementing and testing over the next few days and I will keep you posted here on updates.

Chris this is a real issue I have a significant number of e-mails this morning from people saying they voted yet e-mail are not being received. I cant keep asking them month after month to do this if you cannot get this fixed. I just tried voting for myself and did not get a verification so something is broken.

[theFerf]

hey todd, please refer to my previous post. Im working on it and will be testing it today and tomorrow. trust me, it is more of a problem for me than it is for you and i am working on it. :)

[thezashow]

I have just bumped into this voting issue whereby I voted for my own podcast, but when a friend of mine wanted to vote for my show, he could not cast his vote because of the IP checking that is done. We both work together, so the IP address that is posted out there, is the one from our gateway to the outside world. I think using the e-mail address should be the way to check for duplicate voting combined with the verification of the vote too.

[shepdave]

What's happening with this?

People who have voted for me for the past five months are now getting no email confirmations. Their votes are not being counted. Our podcast is no longer in the position it has been in all summer long.

Now, apparently, the only votes that count are those of people registered as users at Podcast Alley. At least currently, "plain old listeners" are not able to vote for their favorite podcasts and have their votes counted.

Another couple days of this, and I predict the Podcast Alley rankings and voting system will be fundamentally discredited. It'll become what so many already claim that it is: an "inside club" for podcasters and podcasters only.

Dave

[Esme]

It's voting time again and I've just tried to vote for a few of my favourite podcasts. When I attempted to vote for Tom Corven I got the usual message:

"Please check your email to verify your vote.
You must click on a link in your email for your vote to count."

I checked my mail but there was nothing there from PCA, so after I while I tried the "vote" button again. This time I got this message:

"You have already voted for this podcast this month.
Please vote again next month."

Then I tried to vote for the PK & J Show and had the same problem. There are several other shows that I'd like to vote for but there doesn't seem much point if the voting system is broken. What should I do? :?

[Fueled By Beer Radio]

Does voting REALLY matter all that much? Honestly. I mean do we get a button or something if we rank in the Top 100? Inquiring minds want to know.

[gatobrit]

Hi,
I guess I understand the IP addres checking, but people are reporting to me that they don't even get an email when they ask to vote. These are not AOL users. They are then prevented from voting again even though an email was not received and therefore a vote wasn't counted....




Gatobrit
Desercast
http://desertcast.libsyn.com/rss

[John and Wendy]

I've never had this problem before, and now I have caught this disease also. I get a message saying you're getting a verification email - and it never comes. I have a comcast address, and I talked with comcast to make sure it was not them. (Obviously I should have checked the forums before I started dogging comcast.)
Actually, it happened late in Sept too, but I thought it was a fluke and I'd just be voting again in a few days anyway. But now, I cannot vote for anyone.
Do we at least have an idea of what the problem is and are we close to a fix?

[podcastrant.com]

It's been four days since we have heard from Ferf on this. Any luck yet Ferf?

[Bryan D]

Not using AOL but i was not able to cast votes last month. I am probably one of the few regular voters. My message kept telling me I voted already. I did not. Still waiting to cast my votes for October.

[podcastrant.com]

Hey bryan,

If you haven't already register over at podcast pickle and add your favorites to your favorites. The shows you like would really appreciate it.