The Parody of the Month (PotM) was created by Master Studios (MS) and is based on, and meant to coincide with (although it never has) Benad361's Unterganger of the Month (UotM) award video (released at the end of every month), though in actuality the PotM is announced usually days later.

At the beginning of February 2013, judges of the Unterganger Awards (UA) took over the judging of the PotM, and MS was no longer considered a judge. In March 2013, Master Studios relinquished his post as judge, and an election is opened to select two new judges, which ended on 5 April 2013 with DictatorAntics' victory.

Benad361 and DictatorAntics thus both announced in April that they will be withdrawing the announcement videos and voting threads of their respective contests from under the banner of the UA, as of April 2013).

HistoryEdit

Master Studios initiated the Parody of the Month on January 2012. When it was announced, an "Unterganger of the Month" was also included, with MS not realizing that Benad361 has been awarding one "Unterganger of the Month" since late-2010. The confusion was resolved with MS only handling the PotM from January 2012 afterwards.

Following the Unterganger Awards (UA) inception in October 2012, the PotM was planned to be announced under the UA. As the month progressed, it became apparent that the PotM was still too independent to run in line with the UA, and suggestions for a closer integration were refuted by Master Studios. The first UA award series was announced without either the PotM or UotM, leaving both to be announced separately by their own main judges at their own leisure (usually days later).

For unknown reasons, the PotM was stagnating around November of 2012. As of 20 November 2012, no results for October's were announced, and November's vote never happened. However, a transfer of power was carried out, and the PoTM for January 2013 was eventually announced, alongside other award systems. The November and December awards were dropped, and the series for 2012 discontinued due to aforementioned problems, starting afresh in 2013, with the UA judges as the de-facto judges. However, Master Studios released the announcement videos for October, November and December and stated that he planned to continue maintaining the award series.

In spite of Master Studios' consistent commitment problems beginning the latter half of 2012, beginning February 2013, Benad361 and judges of the UA decided to take over the PotM, announcing a set of PotMs alongside February's UA. This marked the first time that the awards were announced outside of MS's control and council. This also marked the first time that any award systems finally achieved full integration.

In March of 2013, Master Studios discontinued his control of the award system, and an election was started to elect two new, competent judges - a maintainer (the leading judge), and a secondary judge. The election ended on 5 April 2013, and DictatorAntics (DA) and WonkyTonkBotty (WTB) won. DA was thus made the principal judge, and runner-up WTB the secondary judge. DA is now giving untergangers a referendum which, among others, is to decide on whether TheSilverUniverse, who was promoted judge under MS but later sacked at the start of 2013, should be brought back. It was later also announced that the UoTM and PoTM will no longer be released under the banner of the Unterganger Awards.

DetailsEdit

Judging and FairnessEdit

To insure that winning nominees are chosen more directly on their own merit, the submissions can only be judged by originality, creativity, quality, and the number of times nominated. This way, things such as number of views on YouTube are taken out of the equation, so "unpopular" parodies (in terms of views, likes, etc.) have more or less the same chances of winning as the "popular" ones. Also, as an added measure, Judges are not allowed to nominate anyone for the contest to prevent favoritism or other manipulation by the judges.

Changes in 2013Edit

Beginning in January 2013, nomination procedures have been altered to parallel the Unterganger Awards. If a parody gets nominated for a Unterganger Awards of the same month, that parody will be automatically nominated for a Parody of the Month award, instead of requiring a separate nomination. This incorporates the appeal of the Unterganger Awards and provides more opportunity for deserving Untergangers to be recognized. Of course the criteria that has been applied in 2012 will be the same criteria utilized to determine which parody is the Parody of the Month. The judging panel was supposed to remain independent of the UA judging panel, and any parodies nominated by a judge of the PoTM would need a second to be considered. However, Master Studios' abandonment of the PoTM ensured that this never took place (see below).

Master Studio's last activity concerning the PotM, was the announcement of January 2013's PotM. January's nomination thread hasn't been closed, and February's has not yet been opened, as of March 2013. Due to this, the UA judges took matters into their own hands and released February's PotM as part of the UA, without MS's council. February's PotM announcement factors in all nominations of the UA, essentially continuing January's reform made by MS.

From this point on, the PotM's functions took taken place as part of the UA (with untergangers voting for the PoTM winner within the UA), and MS's council was considered irrelevant, given the amount of times he seems to have failed the community. The PoTM has essentially become a category within the UA; a semi-autonomous award system.

The leadership changes handsEdit

In March 2013, Master Studios finally admitted that he was unable to run the contest himself, and that a new leadership was needed. In response to this, Benad361 took control of the PoTM forum area and opened up the formally-cancelled elections, with the aim of choosing a new leadership. Given the current voting sway, the appointment of DictatorAntics and WonkyTonkBotty to the judging positions looks imminent. 

Current JudgesEdit

Master Studios had followed in Benad's footsteps in that, if an unterganger receives three Parody of the Month Awards in the same year, the unterganger is sent an invitation by Master Studios to join the judges panel. If they accept they are added to the panel and therefore are bound by the rules of the contest.

Under January 2013's reform, however, Master Studios added a clause that restricts additional judges in the panel to their year of invitation. TheSilverUniverse's judge post thus effectively expired in January of 2013.

Under February 2013's takeover, however, Benad361 as the host of the Unterganger Awards, too the de facto role of judge. The status of TheSilverUniverse as a judge was unknown. Master Studio's position was in limbo - it was unknown if he would continue judging the PotM alongside Benad361 and TheSilverUniverse - though his council was considered irrelevant by this time.

With the onset of the recent leadership changes in March 2013, the judges' positions have been started from scratch, and an election is ongoing in an attempt to elect two new, efficient judges.

RecipientsEdit

2012Edit

2013Edit

February's announcement are made in the same video as February's Unterganger Awards.

PlaylistEdit

Master Studios catalogues the winners in the form of a video playlist showcasing all of the winners for easy access and as a way to promote the winners even further.

External linksEdit

• Downfall Parodies Forum's subforum for Parody of the Month nominations
• Parody of the Month 2012 Winners Playlist