Ziaheart wrote:I'm a mod, and I entered the contest. Is my entry up there? No. OMG bias LOLOLOL. Plus, the names are redacted in the poll. The only way to know which entry belongs to whom is to know their style/go through the long list in the previous announcement. I'm SURE that a lot of people are going through that right now in order to kiss ass. /sarcasm

Same-handed people often find it easier to draw the hair sweeping the same way. I overlayed previous Knuffel in order to get the positioning of nose, eyes, and lips correctly. I don't find it that startling that the overlay of the facial features line up, especially on computer graphic entries. Plus, the coat tail looks a bit like you're grasping at straws. That leaves the bubble and the pants, which could have been coincidental.

A LOT of people used fire on hand/feet idea, not just M o i and you, Kiihay. And I would think I would put off entering as long as possible if I didn't want people stealing my ideas. I've seen M o i's works a lot and he enjoys using heavily lined slanted eyes on his character. If we were truly hushing up this episode, we would delete all comments saying that M o i copied off of you and pretend this discussion never happened, as opposed to trying to explain it/work it out. It is my opinion that the original poster was told that way because of the way they were expressing themselves. There is a way to voice your concern without being so argumentative. I thank you for being professional that way, unlike your previous two advocates.

My head is spinning. X.x

I will just add the two following things to my defense:

1. I did with all honestly see no difference between these entries when I picked them. Yes, after you overlayed them, the look awfully similar. Maybe I am also seeing where your concern is coming from. I think this would happen to many designes though, simply because they are drawn on exactly the same base. It would probably also happen to lot of my own Knuffel.
I could overlay random Knuffel and always find some similarities if you do it the way Norala did:

Maybe it is not a similar as the two others, but it isn't even the exact same base, but there are still things that are similar.
This is not the best example, but I want to get the idea across, how you find similarities when you overlay Knuffel.
Yet I think that the design and idea behind these two Knuffel is still very different.
I cannot judge whether the clothing was ripped off. I see similarities that could be on purpose, but could be sheer coincidence. I think Ziaheart pointed out a few good examples how the same ideas are recycled over and over again.
I picked the entries because I both liked them, and I did not look after whether similar ideas were used for different entries, because a lot of the entries did use similar ideas, which is naturally to happen when you are provided with the same base and are given the theme of fire. I did not say "I will not take this one entry, because someone else already used the idea
I am sorry this is causing so much uproar.
Had I been aware that there were too much similarities (regardless on whether on purpose or not, again, I cannot judge this) I might not have picked it, mainly to avoid any drama. But I was simply not seeing it and even now, after similarities in the clothes are pointed out - and yes, they are there - I still think these are two completely different ideas.

2. When I picked the entries I did the following - I saved them all to my harddisc and then went through them, picking the ones I liked - and at this point I just had files in front of me, named from entry 1 to entry X. So please do not say that " this is being over looked purely because it's this specific member" because when I picked them I was not even aware which entry was provided by which member.

3. I do not understand why mods should not be allowed to participate in contests. They are members like everyone else, who in addition offer to help out moderating this site in their free time and have every right to use and enjoy this site like all other members. I think it would be unfair to take away the privilege to use an aspect of this site to them, just because they are helping out. It would seem like an punishment to me. A lot of people consider being a moderator a high privilege. I see it as dirty work. I love providing art and ideas for this site, I myself, utterly hate to have to administrate it and be responsible for everything. You would be surprised how much criticism and hatred you get for every decision you make. Mods suffer from the same. I have seen them being called names, being called lazy, unfair or being blamed for things that were never up for them to decide. I am very thankful that they are helping me and taking on sometimes unpleasant task and I do not want to punish them for it by saying "you mustn't take part in the contest". Above all, they are users like everyone else. You might think moderators are having an advantage because of their status, but they get a lot of unpopularity because of it too. Besides, I did not add the usernames to the entries, so, unless people went through the entries in the original contest submission thread, many users who vote here aren't even aware which entry was made by whom. So regardless of whether you think the idea was stolen, please do not say "it is being overlooked because he is a moderator". This is an unfair accusation.

Again, I am sorry for all the drama and to all the grief this might have caused to anyone, may it be Kiihay or Moi or anyone else who might have felt treated unfair in this contest.
I wish I never started this contest and there will not be any contests like this in the future.