Proposal: Video Evidence Should NOT be used to overturn official records

[kinch2002]

Proposal 1

All official solves must be filmed with a high quality camera, from an unobscured viewpoint.
All judges must have undergone a full training program and gained a judging qualification. Same for scramblers.

Sounds good right?

Oops, forgot to add that competitors have to pay $200 per competition to pay for the officials, their training, the cameras etc.
And we'll have to halve the number of events as well because of the extra hassle of each solve.

Proposal 2

Leave everything as is, apart from that video evidence is not allowed in any way

Yay now we don't need to worry about uploading videos to youtube.

Owait, as long as the judge doesn't notice or decide to act at that moment in time, I can get away with anything including that time the judge was distracted for a second and I put the scrambled cube in my pocket and got a solved cube out. 10 people were filming and another 20 were watching but that doesn't matter, I can keep my world record.

Proposal 3

We have regulations. Let's follow them to the best of our ability, whilst keeping competitions fun at the same time.

 

[DeeDubb]

Proposal 1

All official solves must be filmed with a high quality camera, from an unobscured viewpoint.
All judges must have undergone a full training program and gained a judging qualification. Same for scramblers.

Sounds good right?

Oops, forgot to add that competitors have to pay $200 per competition to pay for the officials, their training, the cameras etc.
And we'll have to halve the number of events as well because of the extra hassle of each solve.

Doesn't need to be high quality cameras. Everyone has a smart phone these days. If you are gonna be going for a NR/CR/WR, there could be an additional requirement that you need to have someone filming your solve with a reasonable quality camera.

As for judges, There's more than can be done to ensure the judges understand their role. There's video from a US comp in another thread where the BLD judge is playing on their cell phone during a BLD solve and not using a paper to cover the solve. This is clearly a lack of understanding by the judge at a very fundamental level.

Proposal 2

Leave everything as is, apart from that video evidence is not allowed in any way

Yay now we don't need to worry about uploading videos to youtube.

Owait, as long as the judge doesn't notice or decide to act at that moment in time, I can get away with anything including that time the judge was distracted for a second and I put the scrambled cube in my pocket and got a solved cube out. 10 people were filming and another 20 were watching but that doesn't matter, I can keep my world record.

Again, any decent judge would catch something that is this egregious.

Proposal 3

We have regulations. Let's follow them to the best of our ability, whilst keeping competitions fun at the same time.

Sounds like this is the answer that most people are satisfied with. At least there's discussion going on though.

 

[Kirjava]

Doesn't need to be high quality cameras. Everyone has a smart phone these days. If you are gonna be going for a NR/CR/WR, there could be an additional requirement that you need to have someone filming your solve with a reasonable quality camera.

This would be unfair for people going for these records as the conditions are not equal.

 

[brian724080]

Proposal 1

All official solves must be filmed with a high quality camera, from an unobscured viewpoint.
All judges must have undergone a full training program and gained a judging qualification. Same for scramblers.

Sounds good right?

Oops, forgot to add that competitors have to pay $200 per competition to pay for the officials, their training, the cameras etc.
And we'll have to halve the number of events as well because of the extra hassle of each solve.

Assuming this applies not only to the inspection period, but also to the solve, what will you do if competitor choose not to solve on top of the table?

 

[DeeDubb]

This would be unfair for people going for these records as the conditions are not equal.

You mean not equal to other competitors who aren't going for records? yeah, that's true, but that's not really an issue considering people aren't really looking at video evidence to overturn a 30 second 3x3 solver.

 

[kinch2002]

Assuming this applies not only to the inspection period, but also to the solve, what will you do if competitor choose not to solve on top of the table?

It was not a serious proposal. Just one that was trying to make a point of how it would not be a good idea, which you have furthered with your point

You mean not equal to other competitors who aren't going for records? yeah, that's true, but that's not really an issue considering people aren't really looking at video evidence to overturn a 30 second 3x3 solver.

But wasn't one of your original points about it being unfair that some solves are subject to more scrutiny than others? You seem to be going against your own point by saying that we only need to scrutinise a subset of the solves.

Define 'Going for NR/CR/WR'. You can get records without trying for them. Especially in more luck-based events.

 

[Kit Clement]

My points:

• The issue that should have come out of Kunaal's Square-1 solve is that the rules on misalignments for Square-1 are incredibly unclear in the regs. We allow up to 45 degrees in the solved state, but does this also apply to misalignments in inspection?
• If someone breaks the regulations or is falsely accused of breaking the regulations, we want to get it right. Letting someone get away with a regulations infraction is not fair to other competitors.
• Video recording devices are not as accessible as we'd like them to be everywhere in the world. As our community continues to grow into new regions, requiring video cameras would impose significant costs on future organizers/delegates. Video recording every solve might be possible (though not practical) in the USA, but not in many other countries.

 

[Mike Hughey]

My points:

• The issue that should have come out of Kunaal's Square-1 solve is that the rules on misalignments for Square-1 are incredibly unclear in the regs. We allow up to 45 degrees in the solved state, but does this also apply to misalignments in inspection?

I agree with you on all points, Kit. But especially this one. I hope you guys are working on it? I think misalignment in inspection needs clarifying somewhat for all puzzles, not just Square-1. As is, I'm not sure I would know how to rule on some scenarios where the puzzle turns a little during inspection.

 

[kunparekh18]

I agree with you on all points, Kit. But especially this one. I hope you guys are working on it? I think misalignment in inspection needs clarifying somewhat for all puzzles, not just Square-1. As is, I'm not sure I would know how to rule on some scenarios where the puzzle turns a little during inspection.

Even I want to know what permissible limits for inspection misalignments should be.

On topic, Kit's second point is true,
using video evidence for rectifying judging / solving mistakes is right.

 

[Bhargav777]

In my opinion, we could possibly have something like this.
<45 degree rule applies to all puzzles not only after solving but also during inspection.
Wait a minute, what if someone takes undue advantage of it and makes turns during inspection?
We could bring in the OH rule here. While solving one handed, the competitor is not allowed to take support of any of his body parts. Although, if the delegate confirms that the cube fell over the competitor 's body unintentionally, the solve need not be disqualified.
So if the move is unintentional and the judge /delegate confirms it was, the solve need not be disqualified.

 

[Kirjava]

You mean not equal to other competitors who aren't going for records? yeah, that's true, but that's not really an issue considering people aren't really looking at video evidence to overturn a 30 second 3x3 solver.

The issue of conditions being unfair is very much an issue.

 

[Noahaha]

The only thing that bothers me is when people decide not to post videos when they think a solve might be disqualified. I know that there's no way to make these people turn in their "evidence" but it's a little bit of an uncomfortable situation.

 

[Kit Clement]

I know an issue was created for this, but I was surprised to see that no proposed change was made. Here is my proposal, which does not necessarily represent the current regulations or how we may go in the future.

https://github.com/KitClement/wca-documents/compare/KitClement:official...sq1-inspection?expand=1 (EDIT: updated link)

If I had to interpret the regulations as they are currently, then I would say 45 degrees is permissible for realigning the faces. Here are the regulations I would cite:

A3c1) The competitor must not apply moves during inspection. Penalty: disqualification of the attempt (DNF).
A3c2) If the parts of the puzzle are not fully aligned, then the competitor may align the faces, as long as misalignments stay within the limits of Regulation 10f.
10f) Limits of acceptable misalignment for puzzles:
10f4) Square-1: at most 45 degrees (U/D) or 90 degrees (/).

By A3c2, Square-1 may be aligned up to 45 degrees if the puzzle comes in a state where "/" moves cannot be performed. You could argue that this realigning can only be done when "parts of the puzzle are not fully aligned," and from the video, it appears that Kunaal's square-1 came fully aligned. However, this is subjective, as in reality, every puzzle is going to be at least marginally misaligned. Thus, I would believe any turn under 45 degrees in inspection is actually valid by the current regulations.

Of course, the board can make rulings that supersede the regulations. Currently, the regulations do not make sense with regards to misalignments of square-1 in inspection, so a board ruling would make sense here. Again, I state this not as an official ruling or statement, but just my own judgment of the regulations.

EDIT:

To Mike: As for misalignments for other puzzles, I believe any unintentional misalignment during inspection within 10f can be interpreted similarly. Thus, if a competitor happens to turn a 3x3 30 degrees and realigns it, that should be fine.

 

[uberCuber]

Here is the one problem I have with video being used, and this one really annoys me.

The way it appears to me, a regular WCA competitor who has no access to delegate/board discussions, is that once the decision was made to set Kunaal's solve as a DNF, the board had no intention of considering any counterarguments. Several people, including myself, made posts in the Kunaal thread arguing that the misalignment he did during inspection is not a DNF based on the regulations. I believe I made my initial post a full month ago. The last post made in that thread was 3 weeks ago. The board has had plenty of time to consider our arguments. But no reply ever came, not to agree with us and remove the DNF penalty, not to give an explanation why our arguments were not valid based on the current regulations, and not even to let us know that they were considering our arguments. The fact that neither reply came after this much time makes it appear (note I am not saying it is the case, but appearances are important) that the board intended to let the case simply be forgotten with time, as people would get tired of arguing about it eventually.

The board can overturn stuff based on video if they want, but they'd better listen to specific arguments based on the regulations as to why their decision might not be the right one. I don't want to have to think of the board as a dictatorship that will decide to do whatever they please without acknowledging sound arguments against them, but the Kunaal incident has, to this point, strengthened that impression.

Until I see that the board will listen to appeals by seeing a response from them regarding Kunaal's incident, I will remain against the use of video. (and will certainly never have my own square-1 solves filmed and uploaded if something as stupid as an accidental 30-degree misalignment causes an automatic DNF)

 

[Mike Hughey]

To Mike: As for misalignments for other puzzles, I believe any unintentional misalignment during inspection within 10f can be interpreted similarly. Thus, if a competitor happens to turn a 3x3 30 degrees and realigns it, that should be fine.

Here's where I get a little confused. Does the competitor have to realign it? As I read A3c2, there's an implication (which I'm not sure is clear enough, but it is implied) that the puzzle must be closer to correctly aligned after the adjustment than it was before the adjustment. So if a 3x3x3 were 30 degrees off and you realign it to make it 5 degrees off, that would clearly meet the regulation. But what if, for instance, the 3x3x3 was 5 degrees off, and you made it 10 degrees off? I actually see A3c2 as implying (but not very clearly stating) that this would not be acceptable - it's not aligning the faces; it's misaligning the faces ("the competitor may align the faces"). And one could see where making such an adjustment might actually help - it could make it easier to corner-cut, for instance. So perhaps such a silly example is actually important? (But I hope not, because I think watching for a 5 degree misalignment is essentially impossible to ask of judges.) Ability to corner-cut really can make a mess of these regulations if we want to protect against people taking advantage of misalignments.

To give an example (fortunately, I've never seen this in competition yet), if you as a delegate saw some competitor who always made a slight turn (just a few degrees) on their 3x3x3 during inspection to match the first turn they're going to make in the solve, would that constitute sufficient grounds for DNF? And if so, on what basis? Because of what I mentioned above with A3c2? I'm afraid this could get quite ugly for judges.

(I have a feeling Ron would say I'm just making this more complicated than it needs to be. Perhaps I am; if so, I'm sorry.)

 

[Kit Clement]

Here's where I get a little confused. Does the competitor have to realign it? As I read A3c2, there's an implication (which I'm not sure is clear enough, but it is implied) that the puzzle must be closer to correctly aligned after the adjustment than it was before the adjustment. So if a 3x3x3 were 30 degrees off and you realign it to make it 5 degrees off, that would clearly meet the regulation. But what if, for instance, the 3x3x3 was 5 degrees off, and you made it 10 degrees off? I actually see A3c2 as implying (but not very clearly stating) that this would not be acceptable - it's not aligning the faces; it's misaligning the faces ("the competitor may align the faces"). And one could see where making such an adjustment might actually help - it could make it easier to corner-cut, for instance. So perhaps such a silly example is actually important? (But I hope not, because I think watching for a 5 degree misalignment is essentially impossible to ask of judges.) Ability to corner-cut really can make a mess of these regulations if we want to protect against people taking advantage of misalignments.

To give an example (fortunately, I've never seen this in competition yet), if you as a delegate saw some competitor who always made a slight turn (just a few degrees) on their 3x3x3 during inspection to match the first turn they're going to make in the solve, would that constitute sufficient grounds for DNF? And if so, on what basis? Because of what I mentioned above with A3c2? I'm afraid this could get quite ugly for judges.

(I have a feeling Ron would say I'm just making this more complicated than it needs to be. Perhaps I am; if so, I'm sorry.)

You would be right in saying that this isn't really covered by the regulations -- and it probably should be. In reality, this probably happens more often than we notice, with competitors just barely misaligning faces more than what they were originally. I think the main thing to watch for is intentionally misaligning faces in order to make the first move a smaller turn, which would be up to the judge's discretion. This isn't covered by the regulations, and in reality, competitors don't have much to gain from this slight misalignment. However, I don't think it would hurt to add a regulation to allow judges to award DNFs to competitors for intentionally misaligning the puzzle in a way that's advantageous for the competitor.

 

[Ross The Boss]

to be honest, i don't think that this thread makes much sense. some of the arguments i have read seem to assume that everyone who takes a personal video is obligated to put it on the internet. it is not unfair to make use of evidence that someone willingly made available.

example: in the first round of my last competition, my hand slipped during inspection of a solve causing one face to make a full turn. i dropped the cube and didn't know which face i had turned. the judge said nothing so i just continued on as if nothing had happened. this entire thing was caught on video, but i decided not to upload it to youtube because of this. now it isn't like i was too concerned about the result being changed seeing as it is not even close to a record solve, but i simply didnt want to deal with any sort of social ramifications. that video is my personal property, and i can do with it what i wish, and if i happen to make a poor decision, i should face the consequences for it.

 

[Ranzha]

By A3c2, Square-1 may be aligned up to 45 degrees if the puzzle comes in a state where "/" moves cannot be performed. You could argue that this realigning can only be done when "parts of the puzzle are not fully aligned," and from the video, it appears that Kunaal's square-1 came fully aligned. However, this is subjective, as in reality, every puzzle is going to be at least marginally misaligned. Thus, I would believe any turn under 45 degrees in inspection is actually valid by the current regulations.

Scrambles for Square-1 to my knowledge leave the puzzle in a sliceable state. After checking 100 scrambles generated by TNoodle, this appears to be the case.

Of course we could get into discussion of making sure the puzzle doesn't misalign between the scrambling table and the start of the inspection phase, but that's a whole other issue.

On-topic: Having video evidence has allowed for regulation-abiding calls to be made. It serves a good purpose and allows discussions about the regulations to take place where things may be fishy. However, considering Justin's point and the logistical complexity of running one camera per station at all times, I feel that we cannot possibly cover as many bases as we would like. I do, however, like the idea of a judge instructional course requirement. It could be like a WCA-given certification after taking a comprehensive test on judging procedure. I'd be willing to assist with making such a test.


EDIT:

i should face the consequences for it.

Intentional pun?

 

[Ninja Storm]

Personally, I wouldn't mind video evidence to be used by the WCA.

However, I'd much rather have consistency with this topic.

At Harvard Spring 2012, I accidentally reset the timer before the judge wrote down my time. I had video evidence of my times, but the judge refused to watch the video and write my time down.

I DNF'd both attempts(which may or may not have solidified my standings into the 2nd round of 3x3, another mistake at the competition.)

Either use all video evidence to support or hinder solves, or use none. Don't cherry pick whenever it's relevant to records.

 

[Kit Clement]

Personally, I wouldn't mind video evidence to be used by the WCA.

However, I'd much rather have consistency with this topic.

At Harvard Spring 2012, I accidentally reset the timer before the judge wrote down my time. I had video evidence of my times, but the judge refused to watch the video and write my time down.

I DNF'd both attempts(which may or may not have solidified my standings into the 2nd round of 3x3, another mistake at the competition.)

Either use all video evidence to support or hinder solves, or use none. Don't cherry pick whenever it's relevant to records.

A6f) The competitor must not reset the timer until the judge has recorded the result on the score sheet. Penalty: disqualification of the attempt (DNF), at the discretion of the judge.
11f) Decisions about an incident may be supported with video or photographic analysis, at the discretion of the WCA Delegate.

The judge's discretion is used on awarding DNFs on a competitor resetting the timer, and the judge cannot look at video without delegate approval. The discretion a judge/delegate has in these situations may not be the same for all reset situations, but the regulations don't require it to be consistent. And that's a good thing, because each incident is different.

Scrambles for Square-1 to my knowledge leave the puzzle in a sliceable state. After checking 100 scrambles generated by TNoodle, this appears to be the case.

Of course we could get into discussion of making sure the puzzle doesn't misalign between the scrambling table and the start of the inspection phase, but that's a whole other issue.

Yeah, scrambles for Sq1 are always in a sliceable state. I was more concerned about Kunaal's Sq1 being misaligned during the transfer.