So in theory this could be the mythical three way tie for third. This wouldn’t surprise me seeing as how close they were up until the end. I wonder how Woot would handle such a mess?..
Secret +1 vote to the ones in the fog. Three-way tie? Never happened… 
There were more designs I wanted to buy this week than the whole rest of the year combined – hoping to see a bunch more of these in a second chance in a couple months!!
I liked and voted for all 4.
Will your square be turning blue this weekend?
I’m a chemist and I’m very disappointed in the shirt choices! I was eagerly looking forward to this week’s derby and I voted for a number of great designs. But meanwhile, the shirt designs chosen don’t really represent the elements, but merely regular things …
I hope an element-themed derby will happen again and will be more focused on the actual elements!
Oh, and congrats to the top picks. I do love the shirts! I just hoped for something more traditional.
I was hoping that either of the tinmen would have been third and the other forth so I wouldn’t have to choose!!!
I’m really hoping one of the Tin Man shirts finished fourth. It would be really disappointing to have two shirts that are that similar in one Derby. I mean, there are 117 elements (94 naturally occurring), and the voters had to pick “tin” twice? Not only that, but essentially the same joke involving “tin” twice? Wooters must love the Wizard of Oz.
That, and I want the Plutonium shirt (the only one of these I voted for)…
I know what you mean. Not the first time something like this has happened, either. In the Text as Art derby, these 2 designs won:
http://enstxzrnsprxt.6hops.net/Nevermoredv5Thumbnail.jpg
http://enstxzrnsprxt.6hops.net/Quoth_the_Ravenog2Thumbnail.jpg
Or, maybe we’ll see two nights of ties? 
I’d hate to see any of you guys lose by just 1 or 2 votes. That’s always heartbreaking.
Heya guys/gals… Just to drop it and give a little more detail on the workings of SDS.
I’m in Arizona, so currently the derbies start/end at 10am my time. The only weirdness happens when daylight savings happens. I either gain an hour of derby voting, or lose an hour. During those times I switch up my hotness grabbing times so I can get a value right at the end of the derby. I miss an hour of hotness votes twice a year 
but I try to do it during the night when voting is at a minimum.
On to the estimates…
Every fog entry gets a VPH (votes per hour) value. When a entry is in the fog, I take the last known vote total, and time in the derby, and calculate it’s VPH. So this gives a HUGE vph value at the beginning of the derby, but votes then are HUGE. It adjusts correctly over time.
I also take the hotness value of the fog’d entries once every 3 hours. (this ensures that I only have ‘added’ votes and not ones that by chance get removed) This hotness value is also factor’d into the VPH, as well as just added to the last known vote total. Which ever is greater is the estimate.
Basically these 2 things are how I arrive at my estimates.
As Patch said, 1st - 4th are always at least 1 vote ahead of 5th, I do this because sometimes based on the VPH and hotness(or lack of hotness) the estimate would actually be under the fog, and below 5th place. But since they are still in the fog they have to at least be tied or above 5th place. I take the easy road and say it’s at least 1 higher, only once in over a year has 4th and 5th place been tied.
Also one thing to note, is that the VPH values on all entries get adjusted by another value.
With all the past derbies I know what I estimated, and also what the actual vote total was. This gives me a ratio of how close my estimate was. I use that value to adjust the VPH. So as time goes on the estimates get more accurate based on the craziness of the woot voters.
Whew… that was more than I planned on typing… Most prob won’t care but I know a few of you do
Again thanks for visiting and stuff
As a chemist, I have to say that I’m a little disappointed that the only one that really is chemistry-nerdy to me won 4th. Oh wellz… at least I don’t have the urge to buy all 3 shirts like I was afraid I would when the contest was annouced!
I don’t believe the 2nd and 3rd finishers have really beed decided yet, all we have is estimates which are inaccurate. Considering that the estimates say that Tin Man #2 is only 3-4 votes ahead of Plutonium, this is likely well within the uncertainty in the estimate. Tune in to see who wins third on Saturday Night/Monday Morning. I’m personally hoping for Plutonium.
Also, personally, I wouldn’t be adverse to the shirt.woot staff having a policy that if two derby winners are very similar in theme and design (like the two raven designs above), and one of them finishes third in the voting and the fourth place is very close, to just print the fourth over the third. This wouldn’t necessarily be a bad decision since there are likely more people who wanted to buy one “Tin Man” shirt but voted for both than there are people who want to buy two “Tin Man” shirts. I mean it’s a real possibility that a significant amount of would-be “Tin Man” shirt buyers decide not to buy the third place shirt, since they just bought a very similar shirt the previous day. There would likely be enough people who “would buy one, wouldn’t buy two” that the third place shirt wouldn’t necessarily make more money than the fourth place shirt.
Anyway, go Plutonium!
I would LOVE to see a Wizard of Oz themed derby, after all, with all of the political and other elements going into the story, it would be amazing!
What ever you do - its awesome and keep it up! even tho its not perfect, your site is a great resource for so many more things then just fogged votes
Thanks for all your hard work!
Agreed. It’s fun seeing what others have created in the past.