This is not bogus at all. We will award an artist but the project has been stalled out on our end. We are not getting free designs at all. We are not using anything that has been presented yet. We started in conversation with a few artists, but had to postpone awarding winners because we needed to solidify the direction of our vision and strategy which will inform the logo.
I apologize that it appears to be bogus. However, we are not "working the system" or anything shady. Truth is, if we award someone at this point, it is most likely we will not use it. That would be wasted money.
There is no option on Design Crowd to put a project on hold, even keeping it guaranteed.