Why was my challenge entry disqualified ("Fortune teller")?

justpictures1 said:

Hi

I got a letter from dpreview saying that my pciture for the challenge "Fortune Teller" had finished 18th. Yet, to my surprise, when looking at the challenge results, I saw that my entry had been "disqualified" after the end of the voting process. I suspect the reason was that the picture showed a fortune teller's business, not the person. However, the Merriam-Webster online-dictionary says:

Butcher:

1 a : someone who cuts and sells meat in a shop

b : someone who kills animals and prepares their meat to be eaten

2 : a shop that sells meat

• The town was small but had a grocery store and a butcher (store/shop).

(Bold type mine). Now a) an American dictionary of that calibre should be considered authoritative enough and b) what applies to "butcher" should also apply to "fortune teller", shouldn't it. Otherwise, what should a non-native-speaker of English be able to rely on?

Thank you, DPR-challenge-Team, for an explanation for the disqualification.

For all other people: you can have a look at my entry in my gallery:

http://www.dpreview.com/galleries/302610406

justpictures1

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bikinchris said:

Forgive me for answering for him, but "Submit an image of a Fortune Teller" means he wanted a photo of the person who tells fortunes. Not the place they do it in.

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aufinger said:

bikinchris said:

Forgive me for answering for him, but "Submit an image of a Fortune Teller" means he wanted a photo of the person who tells fortunes. Not the place they do it in.

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Then why wasn't 7, 10, 11 & 15 disqualified? There's not a "person" in those pictures.

Larry G.

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aufinger said:

bikinchris said:

Forgive me for answering for him, but "Submit an image of a Fortune Teller" means he wanted a photo of the person who tells fortunes. Not the place they do it in.

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Then why wasn't 7, 10, 11 & 15 disqualified? There's not a "person" in those pictures.

Larry G.

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Skylane said:

aufinger said:

bikinchris said:

Forgive me for answering for him, but "Submit an image of a Fortune Teller" means he wanted a photo of the person who tells fortunes. Not the place they do it in.

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Then why wasn't 7, 10, 11 & 15 disqualified? There's not a "person" in those pictures.

Larry G.

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Perhaps because the rules did not specify a LIVE fortune teller?

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justpictures1 said:

Thank you for all your clarifications, whether they support my view or not.

I think it was a somewhat unfortunate decision of the host of the challgenge not to check the submissions regularly and to wait instead with the disqualification until after the end of the challenge with the participants having been infored as to their rankings. But he seems to have decided not to respond to our questions.

justpictures1

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Midwest said:

justpictures1 said:

Thank you for all your clarifications, whether they support my view or not.

I think it was a somewhat unfortunate decision of the host of the challgenge not to check the submissions regularly and to wait instead with the disqualification until after the end of the challenge with the participants having been infored as to their rankings. But he seems to have decided not to respond to our questions.

justpictures1

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I don't think there was much point responding. A reasonable interpretation of the rules brings the same end result, a person (or mechanical person) telling fortunes is not the same as a photo of a building.

How about a challenge stating 'Submit a photo of a plumber'. Would a picture of a shop with a sign on it be a plumber?

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LeeBic said:

The challenge was to "submit an image of a Fortune Teller".

That is it, nothing else. It does not say human, alive or otherwise.

It is your interpretation that the Fortune Teller had to be a person.

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aufinger said:

LeeBic said:

The challenge was to "submit an image of a Fortune Teller".

That is it, nothing else. It does not say human, alive or otherwise.

It is your interpretation that the Fortune Teller had to be a person.

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Initially I was responding to an earlier post from Bikinchris who suggested “Submit an image of a Fortune Teller” means he wanted a photo of the person who tells the fortunes. I then asked why wasn't 7, 10, 11 & 15 disqualified? They did not contain a "person" in those pictures.

In regards to the fortune telling machines, I can make an argument that the person who maintains them and provides the fortunes is the actual fortune teller. Here are a couple of rhetorical questions. Can you say that a crystal ball or a set of tarot cards by themselves are fortune tellers? I’d say they are objects used by fortune tellers no different than a fortune telling machine. Or how about if you baked a batch of fortune cookies. Who's the fortune teller, you who wrote and inserted the fortunes into the cookies or the cookies themselves? To me the cookies have absolutely no ability the tell one's fortune - they are just cookies.

There are robotic surgical systems that are capable of performing complex surgical procedures. I doubt that there are any patients who refer to them as their surgeon.

Thanks for the discussion,

Larry G.

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bikinchris said:

And this kind of discussion makes hosting challenges far less fun. Either you write tons of rules no one wants to read to discourage people trying to find loopholes, or your the "bad guy" who disqualifies people who act like they don't understand.

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LeeBic said:

The challenge was to "submit an image of a Fortune Teller".

That is it, nothing else. It does not say human, alive or otherwise.

It is your interpretation that the Fortune Teller had to be a person.

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justpictures1 said:

Hi

I got a letter from dpreview saying that my pciture for the challenge "Fortune Teller" had finished 18th. Yet, to my surprise, when looking at the challenge results, I saw that my entry had been "disqualified" after the end of the voting process. I suspect the reason was that the picture showed a fortune teller's business, not the person. However, the Merriam-Webster online-dictionary says:

Butcher:

1 a : someone who cuts and sells meat in a shop

b : someone who kills animals and prepares their meat to be eaten

2 : a shop that sells meat

• The town was small but had a grocery store and a butcher (store/shop).

(Bold type mine). Now a) an American dictionary of that calibre should be considered authoritative enough and b) what applies to "butcher" should also apply to "fortune teller", shouldn't it. Otherwise, what should a non-native-speaker of English be able to rely on?

Click to expand...

justpictures1 said:

Thank you, DPR-challenge-Team, for an explanation for the disqualification.

For all other people: you can have a look at my entry in my gallery:

http://www.dpreview.com/galleries/302610406

justpictures1

Click to expand...

Midwest said:

LeeBic said:

The challenge was to "submit an image of a Fortune Teller".

That is it, nothing else. It does not say human, alive or otherwise.

It is your interpretation that the Fortune Teller had to be a person.

Click to expand...

I agree with you. The mechanized fortune teller still provides a fortune to the customer. And some of those mechanical fortune tellers make for a very good photo op as they really play up the traditional seers' dress and jewelry. A building is not a fortune teller.

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