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Regarding confident boosting from the community, the old method meant you may get a few DMs saying “I voted for you <3” and then the message from Mm saying you could be nominated if you accept. I feel the new method had a lot more patting-on-the-back and encouragement to enter yourself for the Impys, just from my own experience.

That’s why I entered this year actually. I was like “I already won last year, it’s not like it solved all my problems or anything. Who cares?” But people encouraged me in various ways, until I realised “It may just be an award, but I’m still proud of my work!” The way I see this method of putting yourself forward, it’s asking “if you were nominated—deserved or not—what would it be for?” Through that lens, we’re not saying we’re better than everyone else, and we don’t need that much confidence to put our name down. It’s just a thought experiment.

With the new process I found it a lot easier not needing to think of who deserves what for which category the most, and trying to make sure I didn’t forget something from earlier in the year, and double-guessing what would already have some votes and voting for something I like that may have bene forgotten about. That would stress me out before, so I was glad to not have to do it. I think that “Oscar season” effect where you wait until the last minute may have had less of an effect because it wasn’t up to the memory of thousands of other people. The creator easily remembers what they’re most proud of over the past year.

Also, the way I look at things, not a lot has actually changed between Impy’s 2022 and years previous.

In all previous years, the community votes did not push people into the shortlists. If a creation or person got just one vote, they were entered for consideration for the shortlist; there is no difference between getting 1000 votes for it or 1. Those were shortlisted by a group separate from people who put forward which should be considered for the award; that’s how shortlists tend to work. A lot of awards use that kind of shortlisting process, but that does not mean they are not awards.

Only people who made it onto a shortlist were “nominated.” And that was not based on the community’s vote.

People agreed to the terms and conditions because they wanted to use Dreams, not because they wanted Mm to include them in awards. Some people don’t want this kind of recognition or the spotlight, or are perhaps against the concept of awards on principle.

There are likely legal things involved that require Mm to get permission to be nominated.

The way it worked before, for a person to be nominated they would have to:

• Get voted for by 1 community member.
• Get picked by Mm for the shortlist.
• Have the confidence that they deserve to be nominated, and allow themselves to be added to the shortlist by Mm.

The way it worked last year, for a person to be nominated they would have to:

• Have the confidence that they deserve to be nominated, and allow themselves to be added to the shortlist by Mm.
• Get picked by Mm for the shortlist.

So there’s a reordering, and the skipping of the 1 community member vote requirement. The person still has to think they deserve it to become nominated.

In previous years, the community were not responsible for the win either; the winners were picked from the shortlists by judges. None of this has changed in any way.

Apart from the handful of community-voted categories, the winners of each Impy has never been based on who got the most votes by the community. It’s never been about the likes and dislikes of the community as a whole. That would effectively be a popularity contest, which I don’t think is ideal anyway.