PhotoSE staff (both the moderators and a few key top users) has been watching the Picture of the Week contest for some time, and we are always looking for ways to improve it, make it more fair, etc. We've made some changes over the last few months that we believe have lead to a much better, more effective, and more presentable contest. I want to thank everyone who has participated, both by submitting content and by voting (and conforming to voting rules!), for your cooperation and help keeping our contest working smoothly.
We would like to consider another change in an effort to make the contest more fair. Before doing so, it seems prudent to ask the community and get your feedback. The winners of the last few months contests have been dominated by a couple individuals. Their work is excellent, and they most certainly deserved to win each week they participated. However, we do not want to exclude others work from having a chance to be exhibited on our site header, either.
As such, we would like to propose yearly submission limits for each member. No specifics yet, however once each member has won the PotW X number of times per year, they would no longer be eligible to submit new photos. They would most certainly still be eligible to participate via voting and comments. The goal here would be to give other members a chance to win the PotW.
Alternatively, we don't change the rules. There is no question that the winners each week have stellar work, the kind of content our membership desires to see each week on our header. If the community prefers to allow unlimited wins and see the best of the best each week, were happy to oblige.