As a member of the Board of Directors, and a member of the committee that revamped the Annies 15 years ago, I can answer your questions…Would it be fairer to split CG/drawn?ASIFA-Hollywood is dedicated to promoting excellence in animation. It doesn’t matter if it’s CG/Flash/drawn/clay/pixilation or any other type or combination of animation techniques… They’re all on an equal playing field. This year a clay film won best picture (Wallace & Grommett). Last year it was a CG film (The Incredibles). The year before that was an Anime film (Spirited Away). The voting membership casts its ballots for excellence. The technique doesn’t matter.Separate demographic divisions for TV?This has been tried. Several years ago, we divided TV into Animation For Children and TV Animation. It didn’t work out well. It was difficult to draw the lines. (Where do you put Samurai Jack?) The Children’s Programming category wasn’t well supported by entries, so we ended up merging them back together again.Foreign Animation?ASIFA-Hollywood is just one chapter of The International Animated Film Society. Each chapter represents its own geographic area, and many of them have their own competitions. The Annies are open to any production, whether it’s local or overseas. But the submissions are largely from US based studios though. There’s noone excluding foreign productions. They just aren’t being submitted for consideration.By the way, Amid mentions the shorts category… It’s a vital link between the commercial category and the television production. The Annie categories are loosely based on running times. If the shorts were eliminated, that would make it impossible to submit anything with a running length between a commercial and a half hour show for an award. The category isn’t intended to be the same sort of award as the festivals. The festivals represent a different group of filmmakers and serve a completely different purpose. This year, the number of shorts submitted was pretty big. The committee had its hands full reviewing them all.As for the membership being qualified to vote… more than 80% of ASIFA-Hollywood’s membership are professionals. And having been privvy to the counting of the ballots in the past, I can tell you that the majority of the ballots are not entirely filled out. People vote what they know. It’s important to remember that all of the submitted films are screened for ASIFA-Hollywood members during the year and during balloting time, and this year all of the paper entries were available for members to review before voting too. It’s the responsibility of the membership to cast educated votes. I have had no indication that they aren’t doing that.One of the safeguards in the Annie selection process is the instructions given the nominating committees… They are told that they are to judge solely by merit, and that every nominee on their list should be worthy of winning the award. They aren’t just picking the five best entries… they are selecting however many entries they feel are worthy. In the past, we have had categories with only one or two nominations. This guarantees that whatever happens in the voting, the winner is still worthy of winning.The rules of the Annies are discussed and decided on at a meeting of a special committee of the Board of Directors each year. This meeting is open to ASIFA-Hollywood members to address the committee and make suggestions for improvements. Every year, every rule is evaluated and a decision is made whether to keep it the same or change it. The Annies evolve as the animation community evolves. Lots of people talk about “wouldas” and “shouldas”, but the ones who show up for that meeting are the ones who actually make a difference.Hope this helpsStephen WorthDirectorASIFA-Hollywood