I think the problem I'm having with the way the contests are set up is that they don't really promote any sense of community like they should. It only takes about 15 minutes or so to cook up a submission, but after that, there's like a three week waiting period where there's nothing happening, with no idea of what other people are doing. In my opinion a much better way would be to have people's submissions be visible for everyone to see right from the get go. It would give members an idea of what others are doing, which might eliminate duplicate ideas (like the four or five "Shining" submissions in the Stephen King contest), as well as give new members an idea of what quality is expected. It would also encourage members to give each other feedback, communicate with one another, and let their submissions inspire others. Again, in other words, build a community.
This is how it's done on another (not art related) forum I visit. There's an initial theme given, and people upload their photos to the thread. There's about a week submission period, followed by a week of voting through a poll. The winner gets to decide the theme of the next contest. Even if two weeks doesn't seem like a long enough time to you, there would at least be another contest right around the corner for people to jump into, and things would move along much quicker.
