Johnny
Regular
so you think that the scramble is not a factor in who gets wr? It totally is.
Cubing generations
- Thread starter shadowslice e
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so you think that the scramble is not a factor in who gets wr? It totally is.
sqAree
Veteran
It's maybe not useful to look at 3x3 because the current hardware is already almost perfect. Who dominates at other events hardware-wise? Also, the fact that many other events are trained and available in comps tells something about the current generation, compared to the past where it was only 3x3.
Johnny
Regular
I think it's perfect by our current standards. There are certainly other possible mechanisms that are much better that we haven't figured out yet.
Sajwo
Veteran
- Brand is dominant when 100% of cubers use the cube from only one brand (never happened in cubing history).
- The scramble is the major factor in getting a WR.
I love your reasoning.
Johnny
Regular
1. A brand is dominant when a significant and easily recognizable majority use cubes from one brand
2. Obviously a 10 second solver isn't getting a WR, but amongst people who average the same it's going to come down to the scramble
Johnny
Regular
Ultimately though this is just my opinion, I don't have a particularly notable level of credibility so I'm definitely aware that I could be wrong
Sajwo
Veteran
1. 3x3 Moyu is fitting into this definition
2. It comes down to solution and tps. Scramble may be a trash
Johnny
Regular
IDK, I think the thunderclap is popular enough to challenge the notion that MoYu has a significant and visible majority
And I want to mention that Lucas Etter is slower than Feliks on average, so if Lucas got a trash scramble he wouldn't have gotten WR
Johnny
Regular
And he got the WR on an average that wasn't particularly fast for him
Sajwo
Veteran
Getting a scramble that is not a trash isn't considered lucky. And that's what you said - you have to get lucky. 4.90's scramble was nothing special, the major factor was Lucas's skill
Johnny
Regular
His WR time was over a second faster than all of his other solves at that comp, over 2 seconds faster than all but 1 of his other solves
That is a statistical anomaly
qwertycuber
Regular
I wonder if this is a cycle, and a lot of people will start losing interest in cubing, because records are becoming harder to beat, and cubing will come back years later.
miningchr1s
Member
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The last cube craze only last for about 5 years. The one we're in has been going on for about 9+ years
Dene
Premium Member
I'm gonna do something unusual and completely disagree with Mr. Hardwick. I don't think it makes any sense to tie each generation to a new hardware development. It might kinda work for 3x3 developments, and certainly there have been a couple of huge shifts in 3x3 hardware (Rubik's -> the old numbered types (A3; F2; etc.); and then from those types -> Dayan). But then ignoring things like the introduction of ES, and V-cubes, and shengshou, doesn't seem to make any sense to me. Because these things didn't all nicely come out in synchronisation, it'd be difficult to come up with distinct generations.
I also disagree with people that think the shift from Dayan to Moyu was significant. Moyu isn't really that much better, and certainly didn't represent a total conceptual shift. Anyone who was around before before Dayan would understand what I mean. I understand the idea that most people were using Dayan, and now they're using Moyu, but in terms of hardware development there isn't really much difference.
I think a model that is more flexible makes sense. Here I've come up with something based around periods of time, which are deliberately vague, and built around developments in number of participants, the WCA, hardware, and significant contributors.
Based on this list, I kind of belong in Generation 2, as I learnt to cube in the 90's. In saying that, I was slow and had no external involvement. I eventually got more involved, and fully into speedcubing in 2007, which would make me gen4. But the only reason I got more into it is because my friend told me about something he had seen in the news, and the reason he told me was because he knew I was into the Rubik's Cube. I can also say with near certainty that, had there been a cubing competition in New Zealand before 2007, I most likely would have gone. As such I put myself into the rare gen2 category.
I also disagree with people that think the shift from Dayan to Moyu was significant. Moyu isn't really that much better, and certainly didn't represent a total conceptual shift. Anyone who was around before before Dayan would understand what I mean. I understand the idea that most people were using Dayan, and now they're using Moyu, but in terms of hardware development there isn't really much difference.
I think a model that is more flexible makes sense. Here I've come up with something based around periods of time, which are deliberately vague, and built around developments in number of participants, the WCA, hardware, and significant contributors.
- Generation 1: Those who got involved when the Rubik's Cube was first introduced, during the initial craze of the early 1980's.
Significant Moments: The Rubiks Cube was introduced; The original 1982 WCs; Fridrich and Petrus became the first big names - Generation 2: Those who started cubing when the Rubik's Cube was dead, starting from the end of the initial craze, up until around about the year 2000.
Significant Moments: Dene was born - Generation 3: Those who began cubing during the resurrection of the Rubik's Cube in the early-to-mid 2000's.
Significant Moments: The Yahoo group was formed and eventually started growing massively; The 2003 WCs; The formation of the WCA; Competitions began occurring frequently throughout the USA and Europe - Generation 4: Those who came into cubing in the first post-resurrection boom from around 2006-2010.
Significant Moments: Speedsolving.com took over from the Yahoo group; YouTube tutorials started going up; Erik and Matyas dominated for a period; Matyas was banned for cheating; Numbers of competitions and competitors grew significantly; WCA Delegate numbers started growing; WCA regulations underwent major developments; Cube hardware improved for speed; V-Cubes revolutionised bigcubes and heavily influenced the design for the dominant Dayan Guhong - Generation 5: Those who came into cubing in the second post-resurrection boom from around 2010-present.
Significant Moments: The WCA had major structural changes, with a regulations committee overhauling the regulations, and the introduction of the disciplinary committee; Tyson Mao resigned from the WCA Board, which lead to a number of changes within the Board, with Ron van Bruchem being the only "original" remaining; The Rubik's Cube got significant exposure in the media, leading to more and more people getting involved, causing a total blow-out of competitions and competitor numbers; Feliks smashed through barriers and completely dominated
Based on this list, I kind of belong in Generation 2, as I learnt to cube in the 90's. In saying that, I was slow and had no external involvement. I eventually got more involved, and fully into speedcubing in 2007, which would make me gen4. But the only reason I got more into it is because my friend told me about something he had seen in the news, and the reason he told me was because he knew I was into the Rubik's Cube. I can also say with near certainty that, had there been a cubing competition in New Zealand before 2007, I most likely would have gone. As such I put myself into the rare gen2 category.
henrysavich
Veteran
5 generations definitely makes the most sense, and I'm inclined to best agree with Dene's model. Here's my very similar structure with some notes.
Generation 1: The Originals (Conception - 1983)
The people who started during the initial craze. It's hard to differentiate non-cuber from cuber during this time period, but certainly some people were notably more devoted. World championships 1982 can be seen as this generation's final hurrah.
Speedsolving theory: The formation of the idea of step based methods using algorithms, which is now realized as an essential central idea in all methods. Corner's first proved most popular, perhaps due to it being the most intuitive?
Hardware: Rubik's brands cubes were pretty much the only cube on the market, excluding poor quality knockoffs.
Generation 2: The Dark Ages (1983-2003)
The winds of popular culture were no longer at the backs of cubers, and there had not yet been an organization established to give a strong sense of legitimacy to the sport. The dark ages are the gap between the original craze and the WCA where the Rubik's cube experienced its least popularity since its conception.
Speedsolving theory: Most of the methods we use for speedsolving today were formed, though seemingly lacking compared to the theory-filled methods we have today.
Hardware: Still Rubik's, more experimentation with modding
Generation 3: The Revival (2003-2008)
The formation of the WCA gave a second wind to the hobby, one that has carried on to present day. If we were to divide the history of cubing in half, B.C./A.C. style, I think this would be the point. Competitions began being held, the WCA became synonymous with official, and times decreased rapidly.
Speedsolving theory: CFOP/ Fridrich had become the strong favorite of speedsolvers, and the theory started becoming more populated with tiny time-saves and tricks. Roux was conceived by Gilles Roux, which would lay dormant for a while until years later.
Hardware: First speedcubes, but still significantly worse than modern day cubes. Modding was often required to improve quality to competetive levels.
Generation 4: The NewCubers (2009-2012)
Feliks Zemdegs enters the scene and rapidly pushes the limits of cubing. Competitions exploded in number, and hardware significantly improved. The popularit of speedsolving booms, prompting changes within the WCA and their regulations to accommodate the higher amounts of people.
Speedsolving theory: Roux and ZZ start gaining popularity, though still dwarfed by CFOP. Lots of effort goes into optimizing algs, mainly OLL/PLL
Hardware: Enter Dayan, whose cubes represented a drastic jump in quality from its predecessors. Shengshou also releases cubes that dominate the market for pretty much every event besides 3x3, though they often require modding.
Generation 5: Modern Era (2013-Present)
An perioddefined by competitiveness, both in speedcubing and speedcube manufacturing. Feliks starts to lose records to more specialized cubers, which perhaps indicates a future without "all-rounders". The number of competitors and competitions remains rapidly increasing
Speedsolving theory: Methods diversify, Roux and ZZ are generally accepted as having roughly equal merit to CFOP, though CFOP remains most popular. Supplementary alg sets for seemingly anything are generated, as well as people who have put in the effort to learn them. Overall, it seems the community has shifted towards a more exploratory approach to speedsolving
Hardware:The market explodes, Dayan loses it's dominance to Moyu, which now seems to be losing it's dominance to various other manufacturers. Modding puzzles has become a thing of the past, except perhaps for the Shengshou megaminx. Quality wise we no longer see huge improvements, rather slow shifts to accommodate personal preference.
Generation 1: The Originals (Conception - 1983)
The people who started during the initial craze. It's hard to differentiate non-cuber from cuber during this time period, but certainly some people were notably more devoted. World championships 1982 can be seen as this generation's final hurrah.
Speedsolving theory: The formation of the idea of step based methods using algorithms, which is now realized as an essential central idea in all methods. Corner's first proved most popular, perhaps due to it being the most intuitive?
Hardware: Rubik's brands cubes were pretty much the only cube on the market, excluding poor quality knockoffs.
Generation 2: The Dark Ages (1983-2003)
The winds of popular culture were no longer at the backs of cubers, and there had not yet been an organization established to give a strong sense of legitimacy to the sport. The dark ages are the gap between the original craze and the WCA where the Rubik's cube experienced its least popularity since its conception.
Speedsolving theory: Most of the methods we use for speedsolving today were formed, though seemingly lacking compared to the theory-filled methods we have today.
Hardware: Still Rubik's, more experimentation with modding
Generation 3: The Revival (2003-2008)
The formation of the WCA gave a second wind to the hobby, one that has carried on to present day. If we were to divide the history of cubing in half, B.C./A.C. style, I think this would be the point. Competitions began being held, the WCA became synonymous with official, and times decreased rapidly.
Speedsolving theory: CFOP/ Fridrich had become the strong favorite of speedsolvers, and the theory started becoming more populated with tiny time-saves and tricks. Roux was conceived by Gilles Roux, which would lay dormant for a while until years later.
Hardware: First speedcubes, but still significantly worse than modern day cubes. Modding was often required to improve quality to competetive levels.
Generation 4: The NewCubers (2009-2012)
Feliks Zemdegs enters the scene and rapidly pushes the limits of cubing. Competitions exploded in number, and hardware significantly improved. The popularit of speedsolving booms, prompting changes within the WCA and their regulations to accommodate the higher amounts of people.
Speedsolving theory: Roux and ZZ start gaining popularity, though still dwarfed by CFOP. Lots of effort goes into optimizing algs, mainly OLL/PLL
Hardware: Enter Dayan, whose cubes represented a drastic jump in quality from its predecessors. Shengshou also releases cubes that dominate the market for pretty much every event besides 3x3, though they often require modding.
Generation 5: Modern Era (2013-Present)
An perioddefined by competitiveness, both in speedcubing and speedcube manufacturing. Feliks starts to lose records to more specialized cubers, which perhaps indicates a future without "all-rounders". The number of competitors and competitions remains rapidly increasing
Speedsolving theory: Methods diversify, Roux and ZZ are generally accepted as having roughly equal merit to CFOP, though CFOP remains most popular. Supplementary alg sets for seemingly anything are generated, as well as people who have put in the effort to learn them. Overall, it seems the community has shifted towards a more exploratory approach to speedsolving
Hardware:The market explodes, Dayan loses it's dominance to Moyu, which now seems to be losing it's dominance to various other manufacturers. Modding puzzles has become a thing of the past, except perhaps for the Shengshou megaminx. Quality wise we no longer see huge improvements, rather slow shifts to accommodate personal preference.
cmhardw
Premium Member
Wow, Dene and henrysavich those are good models. Thanks to all those contributing a model to the discussion, as discussion in a thread like this builds on the ideas in the earlier posts.
Matt11111
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Without a doubt, cubing has gotten a ton bigger since 2013 or so. I would say I'm a fifth generation cuber, and so would some of my friends, who I got into cubing (actually, a few picked up the hobby before I met them). When I started getting into speedcubing, I had no idea how popular the hobby was. As DG said, there were over 500 competitions last year, over ten per weekend. That is a ton when you think about it, especially when you consider that few competitions take place during the week, if any at all (well, Worlds and Nats start on a Friday, but does that really count?). And I live in New York City. Competitions around here have 100 competitors regularly. The fact that there are over 100 people willing to come out to get together and compete, even though they know they'll most likely lose, just goes to show you how big of a community speedcubing really is. And competitions definitely don't have too much of a competitive feel, it's just a lot of really nice people showing off their skills. 2003's Rubik's Cube World Championship had 83 competitors. 2015 saw over 400 competitors, so cubing has undoubtedly become a much more popular sport.
As for hardware, DaYan was definitely the most popular before MoYu came along, but then what? Is MoYu still the best? Or have QiYi and YuXin and the likes taken them down? Welp, I guess it all comes down to personal preference. I think that by now, the speedcubes of today aren't going to become much better (although I bet people said that back in the days of DaYan's dominance), but the slight differences in how each cube feels and how people perform with each one will probably give us the answer to this question. If I had a MoYu AoLong v1 and I got the best times with it, compared to the QiYi Thunderclap and the YuXin 3x3, I'm not going to let other people's mains dictate what cube I choose to use. With the wide variety of cubes on the market today, there are more than enough for someone to find the cube that fits their turning style the best. So at the end of the day, it really comes down to what kind of turning style do most people have, and which cube can they agree fits their needs?
Welp, those are just some thoughts of mine about cubing today. Feel free to tell me how badly all this crud was written. Good night everybody.
As for hardware, DaYan was definitely the most popular before MoYu came along, but then what? Is MoYu still the best? Or have QiYi and YuXin and the likes taken them down? Welp, I guess it all comes down to personal preference. I think that by now, the speedcubes of today aren't going to become much better (although I bet people said that back in the days of DaYan's dominance), but the slight differences in how each cube feels and how people perform with each one will probably give us the answer to this question. If I had a MoYu AoLong v1 and I got the best times with it, compared to the QiYi Thunderclap and the YuXin 3x3, I'm not going to let other people's mains dictate what cube I choose to use. With the wide variety of cubes on the market today, there are more than enough for someone to find the cube that fits their turning style the best. So at the end of the day, it really comes down to what kind of turning style do most people have, and which cube can they agree fits their needs?
Welp, those are just some thoughts of mine about cubing today. Feel free to tell me how badly all this crud was written. Good night everybody.
qwertycuber
Regular
Do any of you think there will be a generation where the records are really impossible to beat?
nvpendsey
Regular
How is this classification hardware wise (read market dominance wise)? (I don't know the years since I am a cuber from the fifth henrysavich-ic* generation cuber.Someone plz provide the dates.)
1. The Rubiks Era : Starts from the invention of the Rubiks cube upto the invention on V-Cubes.
2. The Verdes Era : Starts from the invention/manufracturing of V-Cubes to the start of dayan.This is also the start of speedcubing and speedcubes.This era hard a negative feeling about knockoffs like Shengshou and later dayan.
3. The Dayan Era : The 'knockoffs' now become popular and much more faster.People lose interest in vcubes and other manufactures of the previous era.There is an explosion in the speedcubing markets and cubing world. Speedcubes are now available to the general public.
4. The Moyu Era : This should be divided into two parts
4-A) The Domination : The new company Moyu starts to dominate the markets, and it soon dominates the entire market unlike dayan which only managed to dominate the 3x3. At this point, probably every second cube is a Moyu.(someone plz confirm this)
4-B) The fumble (2014-15) : Some small companies like qiyi and yuxin now become QiYi and Yuxin by there releases of 3x3 and 5x5(&11x11) respectively. QiYi begins to dominate the side-puzzles like square 1.
Some of these eras would overlap.Also from somewhere in the dayan era, Shengshou tightens it grip on the big cube market.It also occupies a niche by manufacturing the only 8x8s , 9x9s and 10x10s on the market
According to me, during the Moyu era, we (humans) reach a saturation point in speedcube hardware.Almost every mechanism we can think of is already there.The Moyu era is divided into two parts for much more precise description of the market.If Moyu loses its dominance then there would be '4-C) The decline' part of this era.
PS:Note the capitalization of company names.
*=Can we please refer the generation according the the username of the person who (first) posted them.Also which sounds much better henrysavich-ic or henrysavich-ion.
1. The Rubiks Era : Starts from the invention of the Rubiks cube upto the invention on V-Cubes.
2. The Verdes Era : Starts from the invention/manufracturing of V-Cubes to the start of dayan.This is also the start of speedcubing and speedcubes.This era hard a negative feeling about knockoffs like Shengshou and later dayan.
3. The Dayan Era : The 'knockoffs' now become popular and much more faster.People lose interest in vcubes and other manufactures of the previous era.There is an explosion in the speedcubing markets and cubing world. Speedcubes are now available to the general public.
4. The Moyu Era : This should be divided into two parts
4-A) The Domination : The new company Moyu starts to dominate the markets, and it soon dominates the entire market unlike dayan which only managed to dominate the 3x3. At this point, probably every second cube is a Moyu.(someone plz confirm this)
4-B) The fumble (2014-15) : Some small companies like qiyi and yuxin now become QiYi and Yuxin by there releases of 3x3 and 5x5(&11x11) respectively. QiYi begins to dominate the side-puzzles like square 1.
Some of these eras would overlap.Also from somewhere in the dayan era, Shengshou tightens it grip on the big cube market.It also occupies a niche by manufacturing the only 8x8s , 9x9s and 10x10s on the market
According to me, during the Moyu era, we (humans) reach a saturation point in speedcube hardware.Almost every mechanism we can think of is already there.The Moyu era is divided into two parts for much more precise description of the market.If Moyu loses its dominance then there would be '4-C) The decline' part of this era.
PS:Note the capitalization of company names.
*=Can we please refer the generation according the the username of the person who (first) posted them.Also which sounds much better henrysavich-ic or henrysavich-ion.
Sajwo
Veteran
I think it might be possible in ~50 years. Sad thing is that we don't even know if WCA will survive such a long time
