June 19, 2003:
Voters and non-voters:"This is my descent into insanity, and you're all singing along!"
Ja, after excluding myself from the list of nominees every week, I couldn't resist beginning the end-of-the-year email with a quote of my own. But I'm not fueled by ego (well, not ONLY by ego): this quote pretty well sums up how I feel about Quote of the Week. At year's beginning, it was just four quotes a week in my profile on AOL Instant Messenger. No honorable mentions. No voting. No award ceremonies. No 40-member mailing lists. (No member dues.) But look how QOTW has grown... it started as an inside joke that only I got, and now: everybody's singing along!
Before I announce the end-of-the-year awards, let me get some official business out of the way:
The Official QOTW Season 2 Complete List of Quotes is available. It features every winner, nominee, and honorable mention from Christmas 2002 until June 2003, organized into whimsical categories such as "Josh-bashing" and "Gender Confusion (a.k.a. the further exploits of Alex George)". It's a Microsoft Word document, available upon request.
The Official QOTW Season 2 Standings are also available. This is a complete ranking of everyone who has been quoted in QOTW since the beginning of the voting era. It's also a Microsoft Word document, available upon request.
QOTW will not die out over the summer! Expect reruns and, on the rare occasion, a new batch of quotes every Saturday.
QOTW Uncensored will come out soon: all the quotes that were too explicit for the weekly email. (Be forewarned: my definition of "too explicit" includes several PG movies and most of the state of New Jersey.)
And finally, the winners of the Quotees (like Oscars and Tonys, only less creative) for the 2002-2003 Season!
BEST VOTER (awarded to the person who votes week in and week out, who follows all the voting rules, who does not piss me off by listing "Micheline" in zeroeth place every week (that means you, Jeff), and who does not vote for the bad quotes (that means you, Micheline)): HILARY JOHNSON
MOST VICTORIES (awarded to the person whom the voters chose as the QOTW winner the most times during the year): JOANNA RIFKIN
MOST OVERALL QUOTES (awarded to the person whose quotes were featured most often as winners, nominees, or honorable mentions in QOTW): JULIAN HYDE
MOST UNDERRATED QUOTE (awarded to the quote that was most heinously robbed of its rightful glory, either by the voters or myself): "Tell me what you think and I'll tell you why it's wrong." -Mr. Sherry, to Bassil (runner up: "Noodles are the best of pets; the only requirement is that you restrain your temptation." -Eloise)
MOST QUOTEABLE PERSON (awarded to the person who, as chosen by our complex point system devised by Alex George and myself, produced the highest quality and largest quantity of quotes): ROSWELL THOMAS
QUOTE OF THE YEAR (awarded to the quote that the voters chose as the best quote from the 2002-2003 season): well, before I go and tell you the winner, let me give you a bit of background.
QOTW uses an instant runoff voting system, wherein in each round the least popular quote is eliminated and its votes distributed to whatever was in 2nd place on any given ballot. It has never failed me... until now. Because QOTY voting ended in an exact tie.
21 ballots were cast. But when the elimination was done, two quotes had 9 votes apiece (3 of the ballots did not list either of the quotes). They even tied in the tiebreaker, since they were both included on exactly 15 of the 18 remaining ballots.
I was presented with an ethical dilemma of Shakespearian proportions. To choose the quote myself would throw QOTW back to the dark ages of tyranny and dictatorship. To let the two quotes tie would be a travesty on par with last year's MLB all star game (three of you will get that joke). To try to get more votes would be both corrupt and time-consuming. QOTW had reached its second great crisis: how would it be resolved?
I decided to just choose the one I liked better. So sue me. It's my descent into insanity, not yours.
And so, the Quote of the Year for 2002-2003 is: "Sucks is not a theological word, but it accurately portrays how I feel about the world." -Reverend Anthony Campbell (runner up: "I hate it when people say, 'I corrupted you.' It's so pretentious. I can corrupt myself just fine, thank you very much." -Roswell Thomas)
Thanks to everyone who participated in QOTW this year. Special thanks to anyone who actually read this whole email (go back and read the 3rd and 4th paragraphs if you didn't).
Last but not least, let me just say what gives me hope in humanity: nobody, in my year and a half of doing QOTW, has ever corrected me and tried to say that it should be "Quotation of the Week." ("Quotation of the Week" just sounds lame.)
-"Ben" Orlin
