Europe 2008

[rubikaz]

These 3 events have no prelims...


http://www.speedcubing.com/events/euro2008/events.html

 

[rxdeath]

These 3 events have no prelims...


http://www.speedcubing.com/events/euro2008/events.html

change it. it's easily done . ask the organizers for it, and see what they have to say about it. i don't think there should be limits on competitors, but if its completely necessary, then it should be done based on times, not where you were born.

 

[Subaruiz]

The definition of "championship" in this context is simply a contest or competition from which a winner or champion is selected. I don't see how that is a problem. It's not like a European champion suddenly can't be crowned just because one of the competitors in the competition happens to own an American passport.

The US Championships have been open to citizens of other countries, and nobody's had any problem with it.

Try again.

In a championship , it's the winner who is designed champion ( it's the definition of championship) . It's a problem , at euro , the winner will not been designed champion , and the champion will not been the winner.

Nobody's had a problem with it at US Championships ? They should.

 

[shelley]

The definition of "championship" in this context is simply a contest or competition from which a winner or champion is selected. I don't see how that is a problem. It's not like a European champion suddenly can't be crowned just because one of the competitors in the competition happens to own an American passport.

The US Championships have been open to citizens of other countries, and nobody's had any problem with it.

Try again.

In a championship , it's the winner who is designed champion ( it's the definition of championship) . It's a problem , at euro , the winner will not been designed champion , and the champion will not been the winner.

Nobody's had a problem with it at US Championships ? They should.

But they haven't, that's the point. People were fine with the way things were done with US Nationals at 2004 and 2006. Even when Shotaro Makisumi won in 2004.

How do you know the winner of the European Championship will not be the same as the European Champion? Have you guys perfected the art of seeing into the future over there? I'm quite curious as to who will win.

 

[rxdeath]

The definition of "championship" in this context is simply a contest or competition from which a winner or champion is selected. I don't see how that is a problem. It's not like a European champion suddenly can't be crowned just because one of the competitors in the competition happens to own an American passport.

The US Championships have been open to citizens of other countries, and nobody's had any problem with it.

Try again.

In a championship , it's the winner who is designed champion ( it's the definition of championship) . It's a problem , at euro , the winner will not been designed champion , and the champion will not been the winner.

Nobody's had a problem with it at US Championships ? They should.

that's your definition of championship, others look at it as a competition where the champion is chosen. we did US championships right, only selfish people would think otherwise.

 

[AvGalen]

Speaking of Euro 2006, it was open only to citizens of European nations and Israel. Why Israel? Israel is part of Asia, not Europe. Why include Israel and not Japan, or Canada, or the US?

In european competition, Israel is include in european championship, football basketball, etc etc

The reason Israel gets to play with Europe instead of Asia is mostly political. It's a sad reality, but it also shows that the world is far from perfect.

rxdeath: I think you should get off your high horse about fairness. The WCA regulations were an open process and if you really care(d) about this you should have spoken on the WCA forum and not just here. Fair means "according to the agreed rules", not "according to rxdeath vision". And your claim that

at least now we've established its not fair to have closed competitions to everyone

is just a blatant misrepresentation of the facts. If people want to organise a closed competition (according to rules 8b and 8c) they are free to do so and that would be a perfectly fair competition. If you believe that closed competitions are unfair that's an insult to the people that have put a lot of effort into previous and future closed competitions. Do you believe that the results from those closed competitions should be removed?

* According to http://www.thefreedictionary.com/fair fair means "8. Consistent with rules, logic, or ethics".
I have already discussed the WCA-rules
Logic says that a European Championship should be for Europeans only
Ethics are less obvious, but I don't think it is unethical to have a closed tournament. If rxdeath disagrees and actually means unethical when he says fair I hope he will stop using fair and start using unethical.

 

[rxdeath]

Speaking of Euro 2006, it was open only to citizens of European nations and Israel. Why Israel? Israel is part of Asia, not Europe. Why include Israel and not Japan, or Canada, or the US?

In european competition, Israel is include in european championship, football basketball, etc etc

The reason Israel gets to play with Europe instead of Asia is mostly political. It's a sad reality, but it also shows that the world is far from perfect.

rxdeath: I think you should get off your high horse about fairness. The WCA regulations were an open process and if you really care(d) about this you should have spoken on the WCA forum and not just here. Fair means "according to the agreed rules", not "according to rxdeath vision". And your claim that

at least now we've established its not fair to have closed competitions to everyone

is just a blatant misrepresentation of the facts. If people want to organise a closed competition (according to rules 8b and 8c) they are free to do so and that would be a perfectly fair competition. If you believe that closed competitions are unfair that's an insult to the people that have put a lot of effort into previous and future closed competitions. Do you believe that the results from those closed competitions should be removed?

* According to http://www.thefreedictionary.com/fair fair means "8. Consistent with rules, logic, or ethics".
I have already discussed the WCA-rules
Logic says that a European Championship should be for Europeans only
Ethics are less obvious, but I don't think it is unethical to have a closed tournament. If rxdeath disagrees and actually means unethical when he says fair I hope he will stop using fair and start using unethical.

i like how because no one can refute me i'm on a high horse. i think the rules of the wca are unfair and should be changed to make all of them open, so saying this conforms to some set of rules, doesn't change the fact it excludes people. what if the rules say 'only americans that live on broadway blvd can win', is that still 'fair'? i can look up definitions of 'fair' to support my cause too, but its obvious: everyone gets every opportunity everyone else does. as far as logic, that is a subjective statement based on how your feeble construct defines championship. it being unethical is to me, obvious. how can you win if you just don't invite others better than you? seems pretty cheap to me. as far as old results, the wca has never removed results when the standard has changed, so they could stay without any harm in my opinion. i'm not insulting anyone's organization or anything, you're completely exagurrating and putting words in my mouth.

for the record i have brought this up before now, but its never received any attention, and at the start of my thread in the yahoo group i said i should have been more pressing during the draft of the rules, but i won't make that mistake again.

 

[TobiasDaneels]

I swair I wouldn't respond in this topic but here I go.

Regarding the fact that "rxdeath" is somehow fearless in his cruisade to vanish every closed competition in the future, it's quite sad he only started his battle from the moment Euro 2008 was set on an other date and venue.
Then he realises he might be in that area in that period of time, and starts to argue. "rxdeath" is a member of the cubing community for a long time (what's long in speedcubing off course) and he seemed to have never complained (certainly not as energetic as now) about the regulations which say a closed competition can be hold. Even when it was in Poland and a couple of weeks earlier, this wouldn't effect him.

Now who's selfish mate?

Just my two cents.

 

[Lucas Garron]

I find this peculiar: I can attend a closed EC because I'm German and I can attend the US Nationals because they're always open.

Somehow this makes my nationality choice feel like something to play with, manipulate to my advantage...


For now, I'm really for Open, because the EC is open to all willing Europeans. I think the issue will become greater when US Nationals and the EC will become invitational, like large sport events. But even then, I think it should be invitational for all constituencies, but also for a few foreigners.

EDIT: Tobias, I would like to note that all your statements are verifiably wrong. Clancy can probably give you a good, evidence-based refutation of each.

 

[rxdeath]

I swair I wouldn't respond in this topic but here I go.

Regarding the fact that "rxdeath" is somehow fearless in his cruisade to vanish every closed competition in the future, it's quite sad he only started his battle from the moment Euro 2008 was set on an other date and venue.
Then he realises he might be in that area in that period of time, and starts to argue. "rxdeath" is a member of the cubing community for a long time (what's long in speedcubing off course) and he seemed to have never complained (certainly not as energetic as now) about the regulations which say a closed competition can be hold. Even when it was in Poland and a couple of weeks earlier, this wouldn't effect him.

Now who's selfish mate?

Just my two cents.

lol its not like you brought my argument crashing down, i'm still right, and not selfish, so don't feel too clever. i've brought this up before actually on the yahoo group, feel free to search the posts for it, i'm not going to waste my time. its just no one ever payed attention or spawned a debate about it. i will gladly agree not go/compete (which i'm not even sure will happen) if it kills closed competitions and meant that anyone else non euro that went could compete. i think its funny you could call someone that is fighting for equal right for everyone selfish. should the poland tourney have been closed? imo, no. i chose the euros as the breaking point since its such a large attractive event, and since other USA national competition have always been fair in allowing everyone to compete, i work to abolish this unfair duality.

its sad i actually took the time to do this: http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/speedsolvingrubikscube/message/29908

 

[Bryan]

Here's the discussion on the WCA forum

http://www.worldcubeassociation.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=84

And it was bumped for the 2008 discussion. I see it was also referenced in Clancy's yahoo post.

For those people who do support closed competitions, I'm curious where the line should be drawn. Should we be allowed to limit people by their location (regardless of citizenship)? How granular should we get? State/providence, city? What if we specifically excluded certain countries from competition? What about specific competitors?

Also, how important is a national title? Do you guys print up T-shirts and wear them for the next two years or get some sort of tattoo? Or is it a belt like in boxing or professional wrestling?

Also, how important are closed competitions to you? Would you be willing to give up anything in order to have them? Perhaps not recognize WR's from a closed competition or prevent the competitions from other competitions if they compete in closed ones? What if there was a limit of 1 round for each event in closed competitions?

 

[Ton]

I guess the problem is in the way the podium places are assigned

In the other open competition , being 4 th - e.g. 3th European- , would get no medals, so we could do two podiums for every event. One for 1,2,3 overall, and 1,2,3 for the best European, who will get the European medals. This is the case for the Rubik 3x3 event, currently for the other event this is not the case

However to have two podiums per event would not resolve the fact that the price money will go to , I guess 1,2,3 overall, but I think it is fair to assign also a money prize for the first European in any main event.

 

[KConny]

carrot (just drop it)

 

[Rama]

Fair or unfair, I do not care, I want my European Championship.
Give me the EC and give me the EO seperated!

Nobody's taking it away from you. Allowing a few extra people to compete isn't going to destroy your championship. Especially if they don't even win. Besides, judging from the preregistration list so far, it doesn't look like you have anything to worry about anyway.

Yes, but some people cannot even advance to the second or final round, because some people were faster and they were from a country outside Europe.
I wouldn't mind that, but it's still the EC and it's not fair for the European cubers not to advance in their championships.

Am I being selfish? Yes sir!

That's a strange thing to be proud about.

NO MA'AM.

 

[Erik]

Actually I think all points Tobias made are actually true besides the one that Rxdeath made some points about this in the history.
@Bryan: I think the line should be drawn on continental competitions, I don't care that much about nationals.
The fact that most people, like lucas did in his last post, compare the US Nationals (1 country!) to Europe is maybe because most people think if the USA to be at the same level as one continent because it happens to be a big country with lots of influence?

Maybe rxdeath put the finger at the right spot now, the European Championship is no longer a Championship but an Open...

Also Arnaud's post makes a lot of sence, in a way, if you are against the EC being open, you are kinda saying the WCA rules are wrong. How can you change the enforcement of the rules when the rules (which say a closed competition/championship is fine) say otherwise?
You can't make a new rule to inspect for 15 sec instead of half an hour before each solve for a competition unless the rules have changed (no matter how bizar the half hour inspection might be)...

 

[AvGalen]

i like how because no one can refute me i'm on a high horse. i think the rules of the wca are unfair and should be changed to make all of them open, so saying this conforms to some set of rules, doesn't change the fact it excludes people. what if the rules say 'only americans that live on broadway blvd can win', is that still 'fair'? i can look up definitions of 'fair' to support my cause too, but its obvious: everyone gets every opportunity everyone else does. as far as logic, that is a subjective statement based on how your feeble construct defines championship. it being unethical is to me, obvious. how can you win if you just don't invite others better than you? seems pretty cheap to me. as far as old results, the wca has never removed results when the standard has changed, so they could stay without any harm in my opinion. i'm not insulting anyone's organization or anything, you're completely exagurrating and putting words in my mouth.

for the record i have brought this up before now, but its never received any attention, and at the start of my thread in the yahoo group i said i should have been more pressing during the draft of the rules, but i won't make that mistake again.

You are misrepresenting others words and drawing incorrect conclusions and stating them as facts. You are not on a high horse because no one can refute you. I said you should get of your high horse because you are preaching about fairness while the WCA-rules have been to a fair process and you didn't address it properly then and there (if at all).
And again you are not being fair when you say "I can look up definitions of 'fair' to support my cause too". That implies I looked up a definition that suited my cause which is not true. (first hit: http://www.google.nl/search?q=fair+dictionary) and I even mentioned that you might mean the ethical part.
Than you mention my feeble construct of the definition of championship and how you could only win if you invited everyone. The topic is not any championship, but the European Championship and you can win that if you don't invite everyone. That doesn't mean you are the best there is, it means you are the best of the people that came to the European Championship (and arguably could mean you are the best in Europe).
Your argument about 'only americans that live on broadway blvd can win' is silly because that is so obviously unfair that it would never make it to become a WCA-rule. The current WCA-rules however do allow for closed tournaments so it is fair to have (and want) closed tournaments. If you don't agree, take it up with the WCA.
And then you even say that I am exagurrating and putting words into your mouth when I ask you "Do you believe that the results from those closed competitions should be removed?". I am not saying you think that that should happen, I was interested to find out if you think that should happen (you don't). The one putting words into anothers mouth is you, not me.

For ultimate clarity, this is what I think about this:
1) The current WCA rules are fair and allow for closed competitions
2) I like having a National and Continental (closed) competition
3) I like having many Open competitions too
4) I like the idea of having a European Open
5) I don't like the idea of a European Championship (closed) that changes to a European Open
6) Now that is has been decided to change the European Championship to a Europea Open I look forward to meeting as many non-European competitors as possible (though I think only about 5 will be there), but this tournament will no longer feel like a European Championship. Instead I will feel like the (big) Bilbao Open

Here's the discussion on the WCA forum

http://www.worldcubeassociation.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=84

And it was bumped for the 2008 discussion. I see it was also referenced in Clancy's yahoo post.

For those people who do support closed competitions, I'm curious where the line should be drawn. Should we be allowed to limit people by their location (regardless of citizenship)? How granular should we get? State/providence, city? What if we specifically excluded certain countries from competition? What about specific competitors?

Also, how important is a national title? Do you guys print up T-shirts and wear them for the next two years or get some sort of tattoo? Or is it a belt like in boxing or professional wrestling?

Also, how important are closed competitions to you? Would you be willing to give up anything in order to have them? Perhaps not recognize WR's from a closed competition or prevent the competitions from other competitions if they compete in closed ones? What if there was a limit of 1 round for each event in closed competitions?

Thanks for pointing to that discussion on the WCA list and for telling me that rxdeath is Clancy. I still don't know the details about the change from EC to EO, but at least now I know I bit more about the general discussion Open/Closed. (and I was really wondering who rxdeath was)

I am one of the person's that support closed competitions. If a school would like to organise a competition where only its students could compete that would be ok with me, but they shouldn't expect to be an official WCA tournament. The WCA has clear rules about this and I support those rules.
For non-WCA-tournaments I am very ok with closed competitions on the base of age/gender/handicapt/others if it helps to improve those competitions and increase the joy of the competitors. For example an 18 year old shouldn't be allowed in a "kids-run", but a kid should be allowed in a "grown-up-run". Seperate competitons for men/women make sense to me in most sports (not cubing) and things like the paralympics should be self explanatory.

Getting a national title or a national record is a pretty big thing and can be a great motivator. Having a Dutch National (closed) or European Championship (closed) means that competitors, press and sponsors have a different experience compared to their Open equivalents. That doesn't mean that I think every tournament should be closed. Actually I think 1 closed national (yearly) and 1 closed continental (yearly/2-yearly) should be the only closed tournaments and that's the way it has been.

 

[TobiasDaneels]

its sad i actually took the time to do this: http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/speedsolvingrubikscube/message/29908

Ok, you're right, you brought it up a long time ago. My bad.
But you could have complained much more back then.

Now you say, I will make sure the new regulations will be different, while bakc then you made some complains about it and afterwords let it rest.
Since now, it effects you, you, it seems, won't rest untill it has been changed.

Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate you fighting this, but I think you started it for the wrong reasons.
http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/speedsolvingrubikscube/message/41185

Reed the second sentence.

 

[Dene]

Well I figure I may as well post here with everyone else. It's clear that a majority of Europeans (so they say) want the competition to be closed, and by the current rules they should be allowed to adhere.
However I would be all behind rxdeath to eradicate closed competitions in future.

It wouldn't be nice to close this competition again, but I think it is for the best in this particular case. Some of the European guys here seem either offended or plain hostile at having it open. That would take away a lot of the fun, and it shouldn't be so for the Europeans, whom the competition is for.

 

[keyan]

If a school would like to organise a competition where only its students could compete that would be ok with me, but they shouldn't expect to be an official WCA tournament. The WCA has clear rules about this and I support those rules.

Not so much.

A closed competition may be open to... members of a specific club

For example, the My First Name is Tyson Club, or the I Didn't Participate in the European Championship 2008 Club. That sound fair? These fit the rules just as much as yours, excluding people arbitrarily.

 

[jazzthief81]

I don't quite follow the reasoning that this tournament is "not a European Championship" anymore.

The European Championship is the tournament that decides who is awarded the title of European Champion. It's about what is at stake. How exactly is decided who is the European Champion is of academic interest as long is it is done in a fair and sporting way.

For me the fact that the European Championship is open to everyone doesn't change anything:
- The competition is open to all Europeans and they all get an equal opportunity to defend their chances.
- The European who has the highest placement in a certain event I think can rightly call himself the best European cuber in that event and is entitled to be awarded the title of European Champion.

Some people are worried about how prices/medals/podium places need to be divided. I think it's not up to us to break our heads over that, it's up to the organizers, who have decided that this is going to be an open tournament. I'm sure they will come up with a good and fair solution and everyone will get what they deserve and return home feeling happy.

Speaking of organizers: I'm sure the people who are in charge of this championship made this decision because they thought it was going to be an asset to this competition to allow every competitor. It was made with the best of intentions. Therefore I think it's sad that we have reacted in this way.

All the people who work very hard to make this happen certainly didn't deserve this.