NZ Bear tossed the cheater out (only one guy was cheating), and his Ecosystem remains accurate.

Let's see you do a better job.

I have run across a lot of great new blogs as a result of this contest. To me, that's the important thing.

Quit griping.

You know Patterico, running across great blogs isn't all that hard. If you need a contest you aren't clicking enough.

In addition, the "do it better" canard is just that, a canard.

As for the ecosystem, the Bear himself in a plea for help has admitted there are lots of holes in it.

Not that I don't think it is a fine thing, but that doesn't mean it is an accurate thing.

Words said in the heat of the moment. The cheating it turns out was easily traceable. None of the 4 blogs were involved. Would it be fair to remove them? No. That would only encourgage others to try to get a death penalty for other blogs.

When someone votes 400 times in a row I see it and remove it from the totals.

The magic links were harder to track down, BUT they were all pointing to the same poll and entries, with the same query string; AND my referal logs easily tracked them down. I know exactly how many votes (and who they were for) that came in that way. Those votes were removed and the exploit was closed.

That's the easy part to be sure. But as you acknowledge it is possible for one person to vote more than once and even more than twice or three times.

Where's the honesty in that?

I personally appreciate the work Kevin has put in. I have personally gotten a benefit out of it: discovering many new blogs. You may have a different way of discovering new blogs that works for you. Great. It doesn't change the fact that I have gotten something out of this contest.

I think it's a hell of a lot easier to sit on your ass and criticize something like this contest than it is to do it. You can call it a "canard" and that's a nice word. But the only way to prove it a canard is to do it yourself, and do it better.

But you aren't gonna do that, are you? You're just going to sit there and make fun of the guy who's trying to do something fun for everyone. Right?

Yup, that's what I thought.

Whatever your response is -- save it. It's a canard.

Well, that's what I call a good example of "I'm just going to take my brain and go home" pouting.

At one of the weblogs named in the contest this morning comes this wonderful post:
"in the 2003 Weblog Awards category Best New Blog. Head on over and check out the entrants, find some favorites for further reading, and vote. This process is going on all week and you can vote every 12 hours."

Yet another canard!

(Actually, the idea that you are using that word properly may be the only actual "canard" in this string of posts.)

Now take your "pouting canard" and your "brain-taking canard" and prove the "do it better" canard wrong.

To put my money where my mouth is, in each new article I'll build a hypothetical application that illustrates the guidelines I'm covering. Today's application is called "Paint" and will be based on the photo-illustrative icon I created in my last article. Together we will complete each step, and by the end of the project we should have a well-designed, 95%-100% Aqua-compliant application. I'll leave some room for personal preferences and the fact that Apple changes the OS every few months.

The simple fact is that, when all other factors are equal, where will consumers spend their money? I believe that in the long run, the best looking, easiest-to-use applications will also be the most successful. I think that's why Apple encourages developers to write programs that are 100 percent Aqua-compliant.

Dock Animation. Sometimes animating icons in the dock can be useful in communicating the status of the system or application.

Adhere to Layout Guidelines. Did you leave 12 pixels between your push buttons? Does the positioning of your pop-up menus make sense, and when do you use a pop-up versus a scrolling list? Are you using the right types of buttons for the proper functions?

You Must Promise. To call your mother, to help old ladies cross the road, and to turn your cell phone off at the movies.

But limit your animations to whatever is required to communicate the necessary information. Avoid annoying animations that discourage ease of use. Ask yourself, "What do I need to show the user, and what is the cleanest way possible to achieve that?" A good example is the Mail application for Mac OS X. Whenever a new message arrives, the Dock icon changes appearance to indicate a changed state.

But limit your animations to whatever is required to communicate the necessary information. Avoid annoying animations that discourage ease of use. Ask yourself, "What do I need to show the user, and what is the cleanest way possible to achieve that?" A good example is the Mail application for Mac OS X. Whenever a new message arrives, the Dock icon changes appearance to indicate a changed state.

Adhere to System Appearance. Does your application use all the sweetly colored buttons, delightfully shaded windows, and all the other "bells and whistles?"

This topic is one we will tackle later in this article, but it refers to making sure that your application and the dock aren't fighting it out for supremacy of the screen.

To help you become a good Aqua citizen, Apple has created a few guidelines. I've put together a brief overview of them, and we'll be tackling many of them in the months to come.