MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN) »

I hope you recorded my round 2 meltdown for the posterity of the podcast.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Auroni »

Dude, as your first time TDing a tournament of this caliber, you did quite well. Yeah, there were logistical issues across the board and some questions weren't the best (and yeah, I too was a bit sick of all the meta in the set), but people liked it. The weekend itself was frenzied; given more organization it would have been much better.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN) »

I already told Colin mostly what my thoughts on the tournament were, but I would like to say that really the major problem with this tournament were two moderators, one of whom was just not paying any attention and read us a wrong packet, and another that couldn't find his copy of the first packet and decided that, instead of checking with the TD, that just meant read the next packet. I think two things are to be learned here - 1. If you are running a computer-read event, you should password protect each round. 2. Moderators should be instructed to talk to the tournament director when something important like not being able to find a packet happens. My guess is the moderator who did that is new, so I won't go overboard angrily posting about him, but really it just seems like absolute common sense to run into tournament central and verify what's going on with a game instead of making the kind of strange jump to reading a different packet on your own.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Cheynem »

You expressed those thoughts during the second round of the tourney in a more succint, colloquial way, if I recall.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN) »

Yes, and your point is?
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by cvdwightw »

Look, for a fairly idiotproof way of making sure that people don't read the wrong packets, print them out and have the tournament central room hold on to them until that round is ready to be read. Otherwise, send it out in password-protected zip files and make people come to tournament central to get the passwords. If neither of these are feasible, then mark the packets in either of the following two ways, and tell people to read the packets from top to bottom:

Way A:
Rounds 1-9 as "Round1 TEAM", "Round2 TEAM", etc.
Rounds 10-whatever as "Round 10 TEAM", "Round 11 TEAM", etc.
Note the space between "Round" and the round number for double-digit rounds.

Way B:
Rounds 1-9 as "Round01 TEAM", "Round02 TEAM", etc. or "Round 01 TEAM", "Round 02 TEAM", etc.
Rounds 10-whatever as "Round10 TEAM", "Round11 TEAM", etc. or "Round 10 TEAM", "Round 11 TEAM", etc., keeping with the naming conventions of rounds 1-9.

I did Way A with my naming conventions for the Zot Bowl/VCU Novice packets and there were not any wrong-packet-being-read issues there.

Every single "moderator-reads-the-completely-wrong-packet" error I've ever seen involves the moderator either reading a packet from the bottom of a stack of packets instead of the top (or vice versa), or reading Round 10 instead of Round 2 because the editors either are too lazy or too overwhelmed to figure out a file-naming convention that puts Round 10 after Round 9 instead of after Round 1. If a moderator somehow went beyond standard idiot fare and did something bizarre, then this method won't help, but I'm guessing it was the standard "Round 10 was read instead of Round 2" error that can be quite easily prevented using a basic file-naming convention.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Strongside »

Another way to potentially avoid reading round sout of order if they are not printed or password protected would be to e-mail them to the moderator one by one.

For example, the tournament director could e-mail round 2 to all the moderators immediately after the first scoresheet from round one comes in, and this process could be continued for the rest of the tournament. Another problem with having rounds non password protected is that a person playing in the tournament reading during a bye round could accidentally/ or on purpose open the wrong round and see some of the answers. I don't have any specific examples of either thing happening though.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by AKKOLADE »

Hey,

I didn't get to attend this event unfortunately, but I did sign up to write for it. I didn't get to do much writing for it early on due to other obligations, but hearing through the grapevine that Colin was in desperate need of help and feeling like I have not been very helpful with quiz bowl in general recently, I decide to shake off the cobwebs and write some trash. I email Colin Friday night, telling him that I intend to go in to work (where I have squirrel-free Internet). He acknowledges it. I ask him what he needs me to do and the best way to get in touch with him. Response: basically anything, email. Okay, cool.

I get in to work a bit before 1 pm EST - a little later than intended, but oh well. I send Colin an email asking for guidance as to what specifically he needs, because I have no idea what is filled and how much is needed.

I wait a little bit for a response. An hour later, nothing. I try IM'ing him; not available. I try going the Facebook route, finding someone on IRC in the middle of the day. I even end up calling his girlfriend, since hers' is the only number I could get a hold of. Nothing. I end up posting a thread because argh.

Finally, Colin gets back in touch with me and tells me that he only needs five comic book bonuses. I can do this; I do it; he says that they're fine beyond this. Later, I hear that he was up until 2 am writing.

So, what I'm trying to say is - if someone volunteers to help and you can use them, make sure you do. I am definitely not going to go so far as to say that I would have significantly improved this tournament; that's an outright ridiculous statement. I might not even have been able to write acceptable quality questions. But it was extremely frustrating for me to give up a day of my free time and essentially waste it away waiting for someone to get in touch with me. The moral of this story: if you're running a tournament and have volunteers, make sure you utilize them efficiently and are openly communicating with them.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by naturalistic phallacy »

Fred Morlan wrote: I wait a little bit for a response. An hour later, nothing. I try IM'ing him; not available. I try going the Facebook route, finding someone on IRC in the middle of the day. I even end up calling his girlfriend, since hers' is the only number I could get a hold of. Nothing. I end up posting a thread because argh.
Hey Fred, I am so sorry for not answering the phone. I screen my calls and don't answer any number I can't figure out, so this is partially my fault. Now I know your number, though :)
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by AKKOLADE »

I am not really angry about it; annoyed, yeah, a little, but I understand stuff happens. I just think it's kind of an important lesson for new TDs across the circuit.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Cheynem »

Jeremy Gibbs Free Energy wrote:Yes, and your point is?
No real point, just found it very memorable. Didn't mean anything insulting by it.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN) »

Alright then, sounds good.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Matt Weiner »

The stats from this...post them.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Captain Sinico »

I would feel remiss if I didn't point out that, in almost a decade of quizbowl at all levels, this was the worst-run tournament I've ever attended. The problems were far beyond what's outlined here (in type, number, and extent.) For example, still a third way to avoid having readers read the wrong packets is to have a schedule...
Anyway, I realize that the people responsible have apologized and I accept that; that's the only decent thing to do. Therefore, I don't want to hammer them too badly. On the other hand, it would be much worse than hammering them after they've rightly apologized if anyone, especially the people in question, walked away from this thread thinking that the planning and execution of this tournament were "[done] quite well" or that a moderator twice reading wrong packets (as bad an error to allow as that is) was anything like "the major problem" of the tournament (emphasis mine.)
I don't want it to be missed that this is not an indictment of the questions. The questions were okay-to-good as trash goes; for example, I concur with an earlier poster in saying they compare favorably with the TRASH sets I've played on. They certainly deserved a better venue than this tournament.

MaS
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Cheynem »

Are the packets from this available online?
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Mike Bentley »

Cheynem wrote:Are the packets from this available online?
I think they're on my laptop. I can post them later tonight.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by StrongerSide »

I'll just take a quick minute to once again apologize for my role in the fuck up that was. After rushing out to lunch, only to be called back to start the video game tournament, I somehow lost in translation what round we were on. I will say, however, that I made an effort to announce which round we were on every round, as well as the packet number, thereby giving teams ample opportunity to call me out on reading the wrong packet before that occurred. Look, I know the mistake is largely on behalf of the moderator in a case like this, but someone could have pointed out that it was only round six after I said "Round 7, Packet 7 - both teams ready?" Granted, this was the first tournament at the collegiate level that I have been involved in, so I was perhaps a little in over my head to be volunteering as a moderator, but what can you do. Criticizing people for their mistakes only further discourages their involvement in future tournaments, and I don't think anyone deliberately tried to sabotage the MO Trash tourney.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by BuzzerZen »

StrongerSide wrote:Criticizing people for their mistakes only further discourages their involvement in future tournaments,
No, criticizing people for their mistakes generally makes them do better next time. Nobody in this thread wants Colin or anybody else involved to stop being involved in things.
and I don't think anyone deliberately tried to sabotage the MO Trash tourney.
Nobody has suggested that anyone did. There is no evidence that the people involved in creating or running the trash tournament were not acting in good faith. Quiz bowl is a community built on criticism and a constant demand for improvement; that's why we discuss these things. We give points for effort around here, but not a lot. So be involved, and do better next time. You have to do a lot worse than fuck up reading a round for anyone to think that you are an inherently terrible person.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Captain Sinico »

For what it's worth, Aaron, I doubt the lack of a clear schedule helped you or helped others to help you. I don't absolve you of fault 100%, but I can hardly entirely blame you, either.
Also, I mean, this is hardly something that can improve with criticism. "Read the correct round" is a blindingly obvious point and one I'm sure you already knew. I hope you realize by now that you have a tendency to read the wrong round when you're not careful so, when you're reading, you have to carefully verify you're reading the correct round. If you don't realize that by now, my (or 10 other people's) saying it isn't going to help: indeed, you probably never will and should let others read or keep someone around to make sure you're doing it right (or something.) Thus, I agree that hammering you further for simple errors (and ones that couldn't have been entirely your fault) is pointless.

MaS
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN) »

As a participant in games where two of the rounds got screwed up, neither time did the moderators announce what packet was being read beforehand.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Mike Bentley »

Matt Weiner wrote:The stats from this...post them.
Yeah seriously, can we please get these?
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Mike Bentley »

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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Theory Of The Leisure Flask »

BuzzerZen wrote:
StrongerSide wrote:Criticizing people for their mistakes only further discourages their involvement in future tournaments,
No, criticizing people for their mistakes generally makes them do better next time. Nobody in this thread wants Colin or anybody else involved to stop being involved in things.
I don't want to threadjack, but I can think of at least one instance in which an entire organization disbanded in the face of criticism that was supposed to be constructive, but was taken to be sneering and mocking. Said organization was at the time undergoing some changes, and were mostly all full of new and less-experienced players at the time, but were still eager and active before this incident happened. I strongly believe we have an obligation to at least not be assholes, especially when dealing with folks that may not be particularly experienced, or in tune with the culture of the boards here.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Matt Weiner »

I have a feeling that Colin, who has taken this criticism as a learning experience and seems eager to do better in the future, is going to be a more valuable contributor to quizbowl than people who were so eager to quit that they took the unprecedented situation of someone being forceful on the Internet as an opportunity to do so.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Captain Sinico »

Theory Of The Leisure Flask wrote:...I don't want to threadjack, but I can think of at least one instance in which an entire organization disbanded in the face of criticism that was supposed to be constructive, but was taken to be sneering and mocking.
I mean, if a whole organization is that paper-skinned, something was going to come along and implode them eventually. The business of running tournaments (and, some times, even going to them!) consists by and large dealing with adversity; if you're not equipped to do so, you will fail sooner rather than later.

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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Mike Bentley »

Bentley Like Beckham wrote:
Matt Weiner wrote:The stats from this...post them.
Yeah seriously, can we please get these?
I saw people entering stats at this tournament... I don't understand why they haven't been posted yet.
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by StatsDiskPr0xy »

OH NO I MUST BE LOST
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Mike Bentley »

Has Colin just disapeared from the internets?
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN) »

Charlie Dees, North Kansas City HS '08
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by journterp »

Are stats going to be available at some point? What happened to the score sheets?
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Re: MO Trash: The Rob Pilatus Memorial Tournament - 10.19.08

Post by theattachment »

Hey all -

As you could probably have guessed from the non-posting of stats, the stats don't really exist for the tournament.

I had prelim stats in an SQBS file just to get rankings for playoffs done; that file was lost somehow. Going through my statsheets last night showed that I have portions of rounds 3 and 5 missing. In addition, playoff stats were never punched in after the second "Oh shit wrong round" debacle burned the backup backup packet in order to get JECHT started. I have nothing from round 8 and about half of the other two rounds. Since shamefully incomplete stats would not really explain anything by way of deciding a winner (plus, if I remember right, there were two teams at 2-1 in the top bracket) I've decided to try to beat the memory of that day out of my head.
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