Cancelled: SNAPPLE LEMON ICED TEA - Princeton University

[EricCohen]

The Princeton team is pleased to announce the creation of a new trash tournament, SNAPPLE LEMON ICED TEA* to be held on Sunday, March 29 at Princeton University. This will be the second tournament in a Princeton quizbowl extravaganza weekend, starting with the academic Buzzerfest on March 28: viewtopic.php?f=8&t=6764. Kunle Demuren is running buzzerfest, so email him for questions about that (kdemuren AT princeton.edu), and I am running SNAPPLE, so you can email me if you have questions/concerns about this (edcohen AT princeton.edu)

More details will come later, but we are planning to write about half of the tournament in-house, and we would like a packet submission of one packet per attending school to fill the rest of the tournament. A more detailed description of the distribution requirement will come later, but expect something similar to the usual trash distribution (with some minor tweaks).

This is a very early announcement, so please just email me or post on the thread if you are interested in attending this tournament, or both Buzzerfest and Snapple. We will likely give a discount to teams coming to both tournaments, bringing buzzers, and that have to travel a significant distance to come to Princeton.

Thanks,
Eric Cohen

*(Seek Not Alternative Preposterous Packets, nor Look Elsewhere Longingly for Esoterically Minded Obscurity. Navigate Instead to the Cohen, Eric Daniel Tournament and Enhance the Awesomeness.)

[Lapego1]

Penn will have at least one team for this.

[TheCzarMan]

I'll make a team for this.

[TheCzarMan]

Any packet submission guidelines yet?

[btressler]

Please?

Our packet will likely be half done by the end of this week. Advice on whatever quirks we have to include would be appreciated.

[EricCohen]

Sorry this took so long. Here is the requested distribution. Note that I'm not particularly strict here, specifically because I really want questions that bend the distribution if possible (Something like a David Bowie bonus that logically connects his Berlin period to "The Man Who Fell to Earth," and followed up by a question about his appearance in The Venture Bros., thus covering music, film, and TV) If the question is funny, pokes fun at ridiculousness, etc, then feel free to include it, whether it fits the distribution or not. These are simply guidelines.

5/5 Film - mostly modern stuff in English, but feel free to go earlier if you wish, or into foreign film, just don't be too excessive. Also, try to mix things up - don't have every answer be a film title. You can use well known character names, actor/actress names, fictional works within the film - stuff like that is smiled upon. And pleaaaase, don't give away endings unless knowledge of them is a pop culture necessity (ending of Empire Strikes Back, for example).
I'll give some general sub-category guidelines, but feel free to ignore them if you want
3/3 - Stuff on movies from 1970's - now
1/1 - Stuff on movies from before 1970's
1/1 - Other - maybe a foreign film or a short film?

5/5 TV - this is where some of the biggest problems tend to arise. Basically, I would rather see greater depth then huge breadth here in terms of the shows that are covered. Basically, stick to modern stuff when possible (last 15-20 years). So if you want to ask about older shows that people might not have heard of, see if you can connect it to more modern shows, through influences, same actors, etc. But if you're asking a bonus on Lost or something, feel free to go nuts. Again, here are some suggested guidelines
2/2 (at the very least) - Shows that have aired new episodes since 2000
2/2 - TV actors/directors/producers/writers - here is a great opportunity to connect questions to other categories
1/1 - Other - maybe an older show, or a bonus about Very Special Episodes through the ages for example.

5/5 Music - I recognize my own bias when it comes to music (I favor 60's-80's rock) , so I'll likely be less critical in this category. In general, the opposite of TV would be true. Try to cover a larger breadth of music (different styles, eras, etc), as opposed to a much more detailed question dealing with one little detail. Again, I'm not going to be too strict about this, just be reasonable.
2/2 - 60's to 90's rock (includes songs/albums/artists)
1/1 - "music" since 2000
1/1 - pop music before 2000 (pop usually doesn't refer to rock, a disco song would fit in well here)
1/1 - Other - write a question about jazz, world music, whatever

5/5 Sports - Do whatever you want here. I don't know sports (except for tennis). Someone else is editing these. I suppose you can do something like:
3/3 - Major American sports, such as basketball, football, baseball
1/1 - less major sports, possibly in a global context - soccer, tennis, cycling, etc (like a question about Italian soccer leagues)
1/1 - Other - maybe some alternative sports. or stuff about sports that really only become important in the Olympics

5/5 Other - This is where creativity will be rewarded. Anything that doesn't fully fit into one of the other categories belongs here. Some potential topics - video games, comics/graphic novels, trashy current events, trashy pottery. As long as there are no questions about books that are only books. If you want to talk about the differences between Blade Runner and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep or something like that, I might let it slip by, assuming it's well written or amusing in some way.

I've received a few requests for this distribution, so I was wondering about how many teams are interested in coming, and can write a packet? Shoot me an email (edcohen at princeton.edu) or post on this thread.

Have fun!

-Eric

[Lapego1]

If it involves discounts, Penn would write at least 1-2 packets for this.

[yoda4554]

Hey, I'm tentatively interested in this, if anyone wants a free agent or something.

[TheCzarMan]

Hey, I'm tentatively interested in this, if anyone wants a free agent or something.

What is your email?

[DumbJaques]

And pleaaaase, don't give away endings unless knowledge of them is a pop culture necessity (ending of Empire Strikes Back, for example).

Are you serious?

2/2 - 60's to 90's rock (includes songs/albums/artists)
1/1 - "music" since 2000
1/1 - pop music before 2000 (pop usually doesn't refer to rock, a disco song would fit in well here)
1/1 - Other - write a question about jazz, world music, whatever

This is the most confusing distribution I've ever seen. Why is "music" in quotation marks? I assume it perhaps indicates you don't think any recording produced after 2000 is music. Well, I mean that kind of makes you sound insane, but the fact is that you're editing a trash tournament. You don't see me writing distributions where I call for 4/4 biology and 1/1 other "science" because I don't think math is real (btw: it's not). You're writing a trash tournament that will be attended by at least a majority of people who were just barely teenagers in 2000, so your plan sounds like a pretty terrible idea. Also, if I read your distribution correctly, I
a) Can only write rock that was recorded in the 60s to 90s, unless I want to write 3/3 rock.
b) cannot write about hip hop that occurred before 2000, meaning that you actually have succeeded in destroying the absolute best era of a genre from your distribution
c) Have to write 1/1 fucking disco? What?

Seriously, put your vanity distribution aside and use something analogous to GARBAGE or something, please?

The fact that you also write things like

5/5 Sports - Do whatever you want here. I don't know sports (except for tennis). Someone else is editing these.

and call for 5/5 other without any kind of restriction indicate that you don't really care about producing a well-distributed tournament, just about making your favorite niche categories prominent at a trash tournament at which you will not be competing. Is there anything in this distribution that could stop me from writing 5/5 "trashy pottery?" Well, maybe the fact that I have no idea what the flying crap that is, but I hope it illustrates my point. I really, really hope you'll consider using some kind of vaguely standard distro, perhaps (again) the much-lauded distribution of GARBAGE or the Chicago open trash tournaments or something like that. This makes me hesitant about committing two Maryland teams to this tournament, and we're already coming to buzzerfest anyway.

EDIT: words

[Theory Of The Leisure Flask]

This is the most confusing distribution I've ever seen. Why is "music" in quotation marks? I assume it perhaps indicates you don't think any recording produced after 2000 is music. Well, I mean that kind of makes you sound insane, but the fact is that you're editing a trash tournament. You don't see me writing distributions where I call for 4/4 biology and 1/1 other "science" because I don't think math is real (btw: it's not). You're writing a trash tournament that will be attended by at least a majority of people who were just barely teenagers in 2000, so your plan sounds like a pretty terrible idea. Also, if I read your distribution correctly, I
a) Can only write rock that was recorded in the 60s to 90s, unless I want to write 3/3 rock.
b) cannot write about hip hop that occurred before 2000, meaning that you actually have succeeded in destroying the absolute best era of a genre from your distribution
c) Have to write 1/1 fucking disco? What?

I'm not sure where you get "have to write 1/1 fucking disco" from Eric using disco as simply an example of "not rock". I would assume that pre-2000 hip-hop could go into the pre-2000 pop 1/1, or also the "other" 1/1.

This is not to say the distribution doesn't have issues, but fixing a) the complete banishment of trash lit and b) total lack of specificity in the "other" category is more important IMO. (Full disclosure: Eric's music distro happens to be majorly skewed towards my specialties, and I'll quite possibly be too busy to attend anyway, so take what I just said with a giant pillar of salt- a more "balanced" distro would surely please more people. Also, if no trash lit means no Harry Potter, maybe that's not all bad.)

[DumbJaques]

I'm not sure where you get "have to write 1/1 fucking disco" from Eric using disco as simply an example of "not rock". I would assume that pre-2000 hip-hop could go into the pre-2000 pop 1/1, or also the "other" 1/1.

I mean, I would never characterize hip hop as "pop" - perhaps that's yet another issue with the distribution. Why does it go into these subcategories? I don't see why we should be restricted from writing modern rock questions, 90s rap questions, and 70s non-rock questions because it's the whim of the editor. All I'm saying is use a normal distribution.

[Cheynem]

While I understand that nobody (except me?) wants to see a bonus, say, on Petticoat Junction, I dislike how a lot of TV bonuses end up being "let me plumb through the pet TV shows for deeper and deeper trivial sludge." So we end up with yet another bonus on Lost or Futurama or whatever. To me, this is the academic equivalent of all Brit lit being about Shakespeare and Dickens and just getting deeper and deeper rather than logical canon expansion. I realize this seems to be what you are suggesting by linking older stuff to modern stuff, but to me that would be infinitely preferable than some bonus on minutia of Lost.

[btressler]

Sorry this took so long. Here is the requested distribution. Note that I'm not particularly strict here, specifically because I really want questions that bend the distribution if possible (Something like a David Bowie bonus that logically connects his Berlin period to "The Man Who Fell to Earth," and followed up by a question about his appearance in The Venture Bros., thus covering music, film, and TV) If the question is funny, pokes fun at ridiculousness, etc, then feel free to include it, whether it fits the distribution or not. These are simply guidelines.

Chris I think you're getting worked up over nothing here. I took all of this to mean "write a balanced packet and here's some suggestions". It doesn't say you have to write disco and it doesn't say you can't write 70's non-rock as part of your "other".

One of the problems I have with (capital) TRASH is that they seem more determined to write about things no one has heard of, rather than hard questions about things we have. I've played four trash tournaments in the last twelve months and don't recall a single bonus on Lost, but would very much like one.

[EricCohen]

I think Bill has the right idea. I basically took all the complaints I have whenever I go to a TRASH tournament and created some guidelines out of them. All of my suggestions for the distribution were just suggestions, which can be completely trumped by writing a question of sufficient quality/hilarity.

Dues information and submission deadlines should come within a few days, as I need to coordinate with Kunle, who's working on Buzzerfest.



Eric Cohen
President, Princeton College Bowl

[geoneb]

Rochester will likely be sending a team to both this and the academic event the day before.

[EricCohen]

Here is the long awaited dues/fees announcement. Sorry for the extreme delay. Just like for Buzzerfest, here is the fee structure:

$100 per team
-$5 for a working buzzer system
-$10 for a competent staffer
-$10 per 200 miles of travel
-$5 for a working laptop
Maximum (non-packet sub related) discount: $35


Packet submission discounts/deadlines:
(all deadlines are 11:59 PM Eastern Time)
Submitted by March 1: -$30
Submitted by March 8: $0
Submitted by March 15: +$30
After March 15, there will be a $20/day additional late fee, again, echoing what Kunle has said about buzzerfest, please no awful packets.
March 18: Final Ultimate deadline, but the packet must have virtually no need to be edited (this would also come with about a $90 penalty)

Again, email me at edcohen at princeton.edu to register, and send your questions in a reasonable file format (.doc variations - please no pdfs)

Thanks!
-Eric Cohen
President, Princeton College Bowl

[EricCohen]

Oh yeah, and Kunle and I will work out a reasonable discount (probably $10-$20), for teams that attend both events (Buzzerfest and Snapple)

Thanks again,
Eric Cohen
President, Princeton College Bowl

[EricCohen]

Hey all -

Unfortunately, only two teams have registered for the tournament so far (the late deadline is today), so I'm going to go ahead and cancel the tournament on the basis of not enough interest. For the two teams that submitted questions, I will delete them, and you can have them back. Thanks to everyone who expressed interest, but I guess there were too many conflicts.

And as a side note, Buzzerfest is still going on.

Thanks,
Eric Cohen
President, Princeton College Bowl

[answerguy]

If the issue is that no one wants to write a packet...have you guys thought about running a full or partial RC Cola Mirror? I can't speak to the feasability of that per se, and if the issue is not enough interested teams than cancelling the event makes sense.

I was hoping to help out at some pre-TRASH trash tournament just to see what goes on at them nowadays (lest my sense of what teams may or may not know grow stale) but they keep getting cancelled on me.