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Proposal: changing time limits and #of advancing people during a competition

Erik

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During or right before competitions time limits or the number of people that advance in the next round are sometimes suddenly changed.

I think it's a really bad thing if the organization makes one of the following changes:

- less people advanced to the next round
- time limits are harder to meet

In other words: if they make changes that are a disadvantage for the competitors.

Why?

There are a lot of cubers that look at their chances of advancing into the next round when registering for a competition. After all, if you only get 2 instead of 5 attempts at something, or if you know you will probably not make it into the next round, your competition might be over quicker than you'd like. If you know you will not be able to advance in event A, you might consider not competing and only practice event B.
Registering or not (for the whole competion, or just certain events) is something you can decide on forehand based on these time limits.

I think it is unfair to "change the rules while playing the game". After all you payed your registration fee to compete in the events that were promised to you.

What I propose:

Either:
- forbid the organization to make time limits harder, or decrease the # of competitors advancing into the next round, during or right before the competition
or
- disencourage the organization to make time limits harder, or decrease the # of competitors advancing into the next round, during or right before the competition

It can happen that for unforseen reasons you have to save time. For example: if there is an incident, a fire drill etc. I think such reasons are the only valid reasons for making time limits harder. That's why I put the or in my proposal. However, the reason time limits are changed or the # of competitors is being decreased is mostly a bad time schedule. So if you are a clever organization: you make a time schedule which you can make less strict if possible, not stricter if necessary.
 

ryanj92

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The only thing I can see happening because of this is rounds of events being cut from competitions instead, to make up the time :p

As somebody who sits around the cutoff time in several events, I do know this frustration (I had to forfeit a 6x6x6 mean at nottingham open, which i assisted in organising, in order to get back on schedule). And you're right, I don't think that competitors should suffer from bad event planning. But disallowing changes in the cutoff time alone isn't going to stop this from happening (including the unforseen reasons which you mention), and personally in all cases I would rather change a cutoff/round size and disappoint maybe a few people, then have to make up the time by removing some rounds instead and disappointing more people.

So I guess what I am saying is that yes, we should encourage more sparse schedules :p (obviously that is not what competitors want, but that is the responsibility of the organisers)
 

Sebastien

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Brilliant. If this gets adapted, I would just not upload any time schedule for any of my competitions until a day before each competition just to be safe.

As long as this does not get adapted, I will continue to follow the following principles:

1. Publish a time schedule when anouncing a competition, which is not too strict but still based on the number of competitors I predict for a competition at that time. Such a schedule definitely provides a way better idea of thefinal competition to every person interested than a "definitely cannot become stricter" dummy schedule.
2. Better cut a few time limits before the competition than refuse lots of competitors, in case that my estimations are massively exceeded.
 
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Erik

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Brilliant. If this gets adapted, I would just not upload any time schedule for any of my competitions until a day before each competition just to be safe.

As long as this does not get adapted, I will continue to follow the following principles:

1. Publish a time schedule when anouncing a competition, which is not too strict but still based on the number of competitors I predict for a competition at that time. Such a schedule definitely provides a way better idea of thefinal competition to every person interested than a "definitely cannot become stricter" dummy schedule.
2. Better cut a few time limits before the competition than refuse lots of competitors, in case that my estimations are massively exceeded.

Why do you feel the need of ridiculing my proposal? It is quite disrespectful and childish. This is not the first time.

Don't you think organizers should try everything they can to prohibit changing time limits right before or during the competiton?

Your principles are fine but I think you misintepreted my proposal:
I didn't say anything about making time limits stricter in the weeks or months there are before the competition. I specifically focus on during the competition and the few days before where competitors can still change their events if they notice they can't meet the time limits. Of course you can/should make your time limits stricter if you notice your competition is getting more competitors than you initially planned. Still, you should also look at things from the perspective of the competitor and do your utmost best to prevent making last-minute adjustments.
 

goodatthis

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I fullheartedly agree with you on this, there have been several times that I have not been able to get an average in certain events because of a changed cutoff. I also think that tentative events should NOT be given majority over the original scedule by lowering cutoff times, as I've seen at 2/4 competitions I've gone to.

But we do need flexibility in a schedule, and I like your idea about building more time in case of incidents. Maybe there could be a fall-back schedule with cutoffs to handle being behind schedule?
 

TimMc

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It's not fair to change time limits on the day of a competition. Competitors may feel betrayed if the time limits are made stricter on the day of the competition. And prospective competitors at home may get annoyed if they find out that the originally posted strict time limits were significantly reduced on the day.

It can be difficult to guarantee that "50" competitors will proceed to the second round if 60 out of 70 registered competitors show up on the day of the competition.

Increasing the number of competitors going through to a final might annoy competitors who were under a lot of pressure to perform well to make the top-8 only to find out that 16 will now be put through...

Are there any other factors that would complicate a schedule other than some competitors not showing up? It'd be nice to keep things constant and predictable...

Tim.
 

Ninja Storm

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I think organizers should have more lenient schedules and have more tentative events, instead of promising everything to competitors.

This puts the organizers in a position where they don't feel pressured to meet the needs of everyone showing up (some parents feel the need to ensure their kid gets to compete in their signature event) and prevents competitors from saying "You said that there would be this and that, now you're changing it!"
 

Sebastien

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Why do you feel the need of ridiculing my proposal? It is quite disrespectful and childish. This is not the first time.

I'm not ridiculing anything, I am absolutely dead serious. If there is ever going to be a rule that forbids making time schedules stricter no matter what, I will no longer publish any time schedule before a competition takes place. It is a simple fact that making safe predictions of the future is impossible, so this is the only way to be safe.

Don't you think organizers should try everything they can to prohibit changing time limits right before or during the competiton?

No, I definitely don't think that organizers should try everything they can to prohibit changing time limits right before or during the competiton, while I still think that organizers should try to prohibit changing time limits right before or during the competiton.

There is only one best thing that you can do to prohibit changing time limits right before or during the competiton, and that is not holding a competition. You will probably think again that I am ridiculing your proposal, but I just want to point out what happens if you just focus on one objective of the optimization game "perfect competition schedule". As long as you you try for more than "never tighten afterwards", e.g. "most events" or "most solves for everyone", there is always the possibility to be in trouble at a later point. Don't forget that more events/rounds/solves makes a competition more attractive to most people.

Your principles are fine but I think you misintepreted my proposal:
I didn't say anything about making time limits stricter in the weeks or months there are before the competition. I specifically focus on during the competition and the few days before where competitors can still change their events if they notice they can't meet the time limits. Of course you can/should make your time limits stricter if you notice your competition is getting more competitors than you initially planned. Still, you should also look at things from the perspective of the competitor and do your utmost best to prevent making last-minute adjustments.

Ok, so what would you suggest as the exact point in time when I can make the last adjustments to a time schedule?

Also, the perspective of which competitor should I consider? Of course some slower copetitor won't like if a schedule becomes stricter a few days before the competition. However, the possible 20 last minute registrants that are only accepted as a result of the time schedule change will surely not complain.

Basically you will have to choose one of the following when getting more registrations than expected:

1. Tighten the schedule.
2. Refuse more competitors.
3. Running late.

None of these options are great, but in my opinion you are proposing to forbid the least worse of those options.
 

Erik

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I'm not ridiculing anything, I am absolutely dead serious. If there is ever going to be a rule that forbids making time schedules stricter no matter what, I will no longer publish any time schedule before a competition takes place. It is a simple fact that making safe predictions of the future is impossible, so this is the only way to be safe.

We must use different dictionaries. There are more polite ways that actually invite a usefull discussion than a sarcastic "brilliant", followed up by an organization strategy in which people will be afraid to register.
Btw: if you read my proposal well, you'll I am not only talking about a possible rule that "forbids" something.

No, I definitely don't think that organizers should try everything they can to prohibit changing time limits right before or during the competiton, while I still think that organizers should try to prohibit changing time limits right before or during the competiton.

Although you make it sound like we disagree, I think we actually do agree here. I'm sure competitors would understand it if there is a valid reason (other than a bad time schedule) for changing the time limits.

There is only one best thing that you can do to prohibit changing time limits right before or during the competiton, and that is not holding a competition. You will probably think again that I am ridiculing your proposal, but I just want to point out what happens if you just focus on one objective of the optimization game "perfect competition schedule". As long as you you try for more than "never tighten afterwards", e.g. "most events" or "most solves for everyone", there is always the possibility to be in trouble at a later point. Don't forget that more events/rounds/solves makes a competition more attractive to most people.

Although I get what you are trying to say, I can't think up a scenario in which an organizer would be forced to change the schedule other than things like fire-drills.

Ok, so what would you suggest as the exact point in time when I can make the last adjustments to a time schedule?

Also, the perspective of which competitor should I consider? Of course some slower copetitor won't like if a schedule becomes stricter a few days before the competition. However, the possible 20 last minute registrants that are only accepted as a result of the time schedule change will surely not complain.

Basically you will have to choose one of the following when getting more registrations than expected:

1. Tighten the schedule.
2. Refuse more competitors.
3. Running late.

None of these options are great, but in my opinion you are proposing to forbid the least worse of those options.

Of course choosing any point in time will be arbitrary. Something around 1 week before the competition I guess. It should be long enough so that the organizer will probably not have started to print scorecards. Please remember I am mostly focusing on during than before the competition.

As to your example: it is not a smart idea to still let people register a few days before the competition (which is the only possibility that your scenario would be occurring), because of the time schedule and also because you want some time to print score cards etc. This is why it's unnecessary to change your schedule the few days before and especially during the competition.

So the worst case scenario that could occur imho is: a week(ish) before the comp you have 20 more competitors, you change the time schedule and inform the competitors why. Not much harm is done.
 
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Sebastien

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Btw: if you read my proposal well, you'll I am not only talking about a possible rule that "forbids" something.

I never claimed that. You are proposing X or Y. I'm fine with Y but I don't really care enough to comment on it. I consider X terrible though, so I'm argueing against it. What's wrong with that?

Better don't start discussing with me about logics. ;)

Although I get what you are trying to say, I can't think up a scenario in which an organizer would be forced to change the schedule other than things like fire-drills.

Here is the simpliest scenario: terrible organisers. :) While I like that you assume organisers to be good in general, we both know that this is not always the case. So what happens if you have bad organisers and a bad schedule? And what happens if you have to leave a venue at a certain time? As long as there are scenarios where there is no choice but lowering time limits and/or dropping events (btw, does that count as tightening a schedule in your opinion?), it is just not suitable to forbid this option. At least not as long as you don't want the competition to be invalidated, because a bad organiser drove it into a situation that violates the regulations.
 

Erik

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I never claimed that. You are proposing X or Y. I'm fine with Y but I don't really care enough to comment on it. I consider X terrible though, so I'm argueing against it. What's wrong with that?

Better don't start discussing with me about logics. ;)

I just mentioned it, because you completely left it out. I never said you only claimed that X was my only possible solution ;) (talking about logics or talking about reading here?)

Here is the simpliest scenario: terrible organisers. :) While I like that you assume organisers to be good in general, we both know that this is not always the case. So what happens if you have bad organisers and a bad schedule? And what happens if you have to leave a venue at a certain time? As long as there are scenarios where there is no choice but lowering time limits and/or dropping events (btw, does that count as tightening a schedule in your opinion?), it is just not suitable to forbid this option. At least not as long as you don't want the competition to be invalidated, because a bad organiser drove it into a situation that violates the regulations.

Bad organizers and bad schedules theoretically happen, it's the organizers responsibility that he runs the competition. Delegates are usually willing to help setting up an achievable time schedule! Maybe it should become a defined task of the delegate to do a quick-check on the schedule, a few days before the competition. That doesn't take much time. After all delegates are normally taken after organizing some competitions themselves. So again: no reason you can't have a decent time schedule. If you are unsure: plan some extra time. It's not like organizing a competition is as easy as solving a Rubik's cube :p If you are not sure you are a good organizer, then don't organize.

If you have to leave the venue at a certain time? Then make sure your competition has a decent schedule. I'm sure you know when to get out sooner than the day of the competition itself.
 

Carrot

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How about something like:
- A competition needs to have a schedule published at least 2 weeks before the competition starts.
and
- A competition may not change/update the schedule if there is less than 7 days till the competition starts.

This allows organisers to upload preliminary schedules so competitors can get an idea of what's happening, and it allows competitors to know that if they are looking at the schedule less than a week prior to the competition, then there will be no changes.
 

Noahaha

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I think two things need to happen:

1. Competition websites need to make it more clear that time limits and # of people advancing are only tentative and are based on how smoothly the competition is running. I think that a time limit that is not accompanied by a disclaimer should not be subject to change.

2. Every non-tentative event needs to happen. I've been to two or three competitions where an event or a second round was cancelled due to time constraints. Sometimes people will travel for hours just to compete in a certain event, so it is never ok to cancel one that has been announced as happening.

I think that organizers should use tentative events more often. That way even if absolutely everything goes wrong, you can still satisfy everyone's expectations by holding the announced events, and if everything goes well you can make some extra people happy too.
 

tseitsei

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I think two things need to happen:

1. Competition websites need to make it more clear that time limits and # of people advancing are only tentative and are based on how smoothly the competition is running. I think that a time limit that is not accompanied by a disclaimer should not be subject to change.

2. Every non-tentative event needs to happen. I've been to two or three competitions where an event or a second round was cancelled due to time constraints. Sometimes people will travel for hours just to compete in a certain event, so it is never ok to cancel one that has been announced as happening.

I think that organizers should use tentative events more often. That way even if absolutely everything goes wrong, you can still satisfy everyone's expectations by holding the announced events, and if everything goes well you can make some extra people happy too.

+1
 

hcfong

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In my opinion, a well-planned competition does not to change time limits, cutoffs or number of competitors proceeding to the next round. A good organiser knows his venue, how many timers he has available, has a good idea of what solve times can be expected, knows roughly how much time it takes to start up an event and changing groups, and most importantly, is aware of his own limitations as to the number of competitors he can handle. I think in most cases an organiser needs to adjust time limits, it's because the organiser has got one of the above wrong or he has got it right, but just ignored it and allowed more competitors to attend the competition than he, the venue or the number of timers can handle. I believe that when an organiser gets into trouble with his schedule because of bad planning, he should not be allowed to change his schedule. It is the organiser's responsibility to make sure the schedule is achievable and if he has been overambitious with scheduling events and time limits, then it's his responsibility to ensure that the competition goes ahead as planned, even if this costs him money because of extra rent for a longer venue hire. I would say this is part of the learning process.

Of course there can be unforeseen circumstances when, no matter how good your planning was, things do not go according to plan. I believe there was a competition in the northeast of the US where because of extreme weather conditions, the venue for a competition was unavailable and the organiser and delegate had to look for a new venue on the day itself. In these sort of cases, I think it is reasonable to allow adjustments in the schedule and/or time limits.

In short, if an organiser gets into trouble with his schedule because of his own bad planning, he needs to sort it out and make sure the competition goes ahead as planned and published.
If an organiser gets into trouble with his schedule because of circumstances he could not have reasonably foreseen, that changes in the schedule could be allowed at the discretetion of the WCA delegate.
 

shelley

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Of course there can be unforeseen circumstances when, no matter how good your planning was, things do not go according to plan. I believe there was a competition in the northeast of the US where because of extreme weather conditions, the venue for a competition was unavailable and the organiser and delegate had to look for a new venue on the day itself. In these sort of cases, I think it is reasonable to allow adjustments in the schedule and/or time limits.

Unforeseen circumstances like this are why planning guidelines shouldn't be codified in the regulations. You know what they say about the best laid plans of mice and men.
 

Laura O

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Obviously I have a different view on competitions or at least on attending them. I've been to nearly 60 competitions in the last 5 years and I can't remember a single one where I registered because of a time-limit. Of course, events can be a good argument (at least more or less uncommon events like feet or FMC mean) but I don't think that the complete removal of events happens that often.

But apart from that and back to the topic: if we had such a rule, what would be the penalty for changing the schedule too late? Who should be blamed?
And how can you find out who is responsible and distinguish between unforeseen circumstances and just failure?
I don't think this is possible at all.
 

dlo

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In short, if an organiser gets into trouble with his schedule because of his own bad planning, he needs to sort it out and make sure the competition goes ahead as planned and published.

I'm not sure how you see this working. You can't just "will" the competition back on schedule. Yes, it would be preferable if posted schedules were reasonable and achievable. However, in the case that it does not (which could happen due to something as simple as a timer breaking), there's limited options on how to get back on schedule. Running late is not always an option, even with paying more. Also, what if competitors can't stay late to compete in event X? Does that also count as a violation of the posted schedule?

As others have mentioned, a big issue is codifying this as a regulation. What is the penalty for running behind schedule? Is it that the competition must run until all scheduled events have been run, possibly late into the night or the next day? Or is the competition considered void because of a failed schedule? That doesn't seem to be a better solution. In a practical sense, the way to get around this type of regulation is to declare everything as tentative in order to have the flexibility we currently have.
 

Bob

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The only times I have seen this done is to avoid the complete removal of another event. For example, at LSC 2013 last year, we had 30+ day-of competitors, most of whom were over 1 minute solvers, and more than 50 people registered for the competition in the last week that registration was open. As a result, cutoffs had to be much stricter than anticipated. If I had announced cutoffs on the website beforehand (I do not anymore because people cry when I have to change them), I would not have been able to keep them. My options were to either make the cutoffs stricter or eliminate an event entirely. Which do you consider to be the better option?

Sometimes it's not bad planning, it's unforeseen circumstances.
 
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