If the title of this entry was to be really truthful, it’d have a GIANT question mark at the end.

See, IGN is holding a sweepstake for District 9, where the prize includes airfare/hotel to San Diego and a meet and greet with PJ (producer) and Neil Blomkamp (director) at SDCC 09. Yes, I recognize that I have a snowball’s chance, but it’s one of those situations where the prize is so cool that it’s worth the hail mary.

I noticed right away that men and women have different entry deadlines, which I thought mildly odd (why even have distinctions at all?). Peculiarities aside, as I went on my merry way completing this flash entry form, when I noticed something even more distressing- I could not check the ‘male’ box for gender. It states that the men’s deadline is July 22, so that couldn’t be it. And a quick try confirms that the women’s checkbox does work (but does not allow you to uncheck it once it’s checked, ugh, poor coding, anyone?)

A quick google search found something mighty revealing: the contest was originally open to males only. “You are not welcome here” indeed.

This totally explains the odd double entry periods and partially explains why the contest form is broken. The story has gotten some play around the blogosphere for its sexist restrictions and the powers that be have since rectified the situation, but as you can gather- rather haphazardly. Nice going!

While I’m glad the ladies now have a rightful chance at the goods, it still leaves me with a conundrum now that the roles are comically reversed: how the hell do I enter? Refreshing the page to clear the female checkbox, I wanted to see if it would allow an entry with neither checked. It did. I figure if I did win as a female, I would be disqualified pretty quickly. So I did the right thing and am now entered as a genderless human being.

Yay for that!