This angers me...a ton....

[EmersonHerrmann]

http://msn.foxsports.com/other/story/9510204?GT1=39002

Yeah, it's considered a sport still....although they do the same thing EVERY, SINGLE TIME!!! Now they may have their little freaking variations with teams and whateva, but the speedcubing is 1000x more of a sport than cupstacking will ever be. Doesn't solving a Rubik's Cube in 7 seconds get ANY MAJOR NEWS COVERAGE???? Such BS....

Edit: Ok, I think I got a little out of line....I'm just angry at the news people who posted it there, as you can see by the end of the post...sort of. Look at the post one page 4

 

[Gparker]

LOL


tiger woods of cup stacking.

Then i guess Erik is the Michel Jordan of cubing?


but that is kind of messed up, i didnt see one thing in the last 2 monthes about cubing in the paper or TV. and theres been alot of WR's broken

 

[Three Days Grace Fan]

i hear that! i think that at LEAST the world chapionship should get covered by huge news companies, and then the open compitions should be covered by the local news.

 

[JLarsen]

Well it's not big enough in the world yet so they'll get all the information wrong like they used to with Formula One racing decades ago. They'd butcher the hell outta the information.

 

[Kian]

in all honesty, the vast majority of people wouldn't consider cup stacking or cubing sport. And I don't disagree.

 

[pjk]

Why can't speedstacking and speedcubing both be sports? Speedstacking shouldn't tick you off...

Also, you realize that the even they are talking about it the World Championship, right? If Erik set the WR at Worlds, I'm guessing it would have got a lot more attention.

 

[qqwref]

Still, speedstacking is just a single repetitive motion, and all it requires is hand speed and practice. In comparison speedcubing requires hand/finger speed, good recognition, memory (since you have to be able to recall one of over a hundred different situations, if you use Fridrich), and problem-solving ability (for any intuitive steps such as cross). Speedcubing is a much more difficult and 'deep' sport than speedstacking in my opinion, so I'm also bothered by seeing speedstacking get more and better press coverage than cubing.

On the other hand, the truth of the matter is that speedstacking will always be more popular simply because it is ridiculously easy. Literally anyone can do it... there are no mental or physical hurdles to overcome to be able to do a cycle - you just learn the motions. The fact that it is so trivial (and that cubing is so difficult at a beginning level) means that fast speedstackers will always have more fans. If anyone can try speedstacking, anyone can be impressed at a fast cycle... if few people can solve a cube, few people will know how impressive a fast time is.

In public I don't really feel proud of being good at cubing... it is almost embarrassing because of the way people think of it. Instead of being an extremely impressive skill, people think that it requires so much practice and intelligence that only a dork with no social life could be good at it. While this may be true of other sports as well - golf, for instance, is almost completely based on technique and mental skill - cubing is so hard to get into that instead of being impressive it just looks like a waste of time.

 

[Odin]

Speed stacking and speed solving is very similar: We scramble then solve as fast as we can, They stack and un-stack as fast as they can.IM FIRING UP MY FLAME SHEILDS

 

[IamWEB]

Speedcubing is much more complex.
Didn't speedstacking start first (not counting the 80's)? And it was also something new, with their own company starting out. Rubik's Cubes are well known, and they have been around for awhile, and the crave has been starting up again. We can't really make our own company, because there's already Rubik's for that.
We're using a toy/puzzle companies for our own enjoyment, and are turning it into our own thing.
Speedstacks introduced itself as a mini-sport...

Not easy to explain, but it's easy to see why there are able to be more successful. But we can easily change that, get more people involved, get more organized, we need money. I remember Erik mentioned wanting a sponsor. As long as he was winning comps, a sponsor could pay for him to go to competitions. So much to do...
We're still somewhat early in speedcubing/cubing's comeback, so we can expand.
Not to take from speedstacking's popularity, but to add on to our own.

 

[JTW2007]

Yeah, they have fast hands. But we have fast hands AND we think while we move fast.

 

[brunson]

We should get rid of Magic.

 

[JTW2007]

Yeah. I agree.

 

[blah]

We should get rid of Magic.

Bob, got anything to say about that?

 

[blah]

Nearly 700 athletes from a dozen countries — including Colombia, New Zealand, Switzerland and Taiwan — traveled to Denver for the tournament.

They should really take a look at our Worlds.

Athletes. Wow. Athletes.

 

[Kian]

We should get rid of Magic.

I don't see the logic in getting rid of events. If a competition doesn't want to host it, that's fine. I don't see what it hurts to have an event still be official, though. Even though I think magic (as it is now) is silly, I don't see the mere fact that we have some records on the WCA database being any problem.

 

[byu]

We should get rid of Magic.

I don't see the logic in getting rid of events. If a competition doesn't want to host it, that's fine. I don't see what it hurts to have an event. Even though I think magic (as it is now) is silly, I don't see the mere fact that we have some records on the WCA database being any problem.

They should "disable" it like they did to the Old Multi-BLD. The results are still there, but nobody competes anymore.

 

[JustinJ]

We should get rid of Magic.

I don't see the logic in getting rid of events. If a competition doesn't want to host it, that's fine. I don't see what it hurts to have an event still be official, though. Even though I think magic (as it is now) is silly, I don't see the mere fact that we have some records on the WCA database being any problem.

I agree. Magic takes away practically no time from a competition, and if people enjoy it, why get rid of it? It also doesn't seem fair to get rid of an event that people have practiced to get fast at. It makes all of that practice a waste of time.

More on-topic, I agree with what IamWEB said. Speedstacking is, on the exterior, a competitive sport, whereas on the outside a Rubik's cube is simply a puzzle, and the average person never sees the competitive nature of it. (if that's what he meant) So obviously Speedstacking is going to gain more attention as a sport.

 

[brunson]

We should get rid of Magic.

I don't see the logic in getting rid of events. If a competition doesn't want to host it, that's fine. I don't see what it hurts to have an event still be official, though. Even though I think magic (as it is now) is silly, I don't see the mere fact that we have some records on the WCA database being any problem.

I was pointing out the double standard. Subtlety is apparently lost on many here.

 

[abr71310]

Well it's not big enough in the world yet so they'll get all the information wrong like they used to with Formula One racing decades ago. They'd butcher the hell outta the information.

Then why did the WC2003 and WC2005 get so much attention? Especially after Dan Knights set the WR of 20.00 average of 5 at WC2003? He was on a bunch of TV things, and WC2005 had at least enough reception to make it to local / national Canadian television... and even a documentary!!!

I've yet to see a speedstacking documentary...

More on-topic, I agree with what IamWEB said. Speedstacking is, on the exterior, a competitive sport, whereas on the outside a Rubik's cube is simply a puzzle, and the average person never sees the competitive nature of it. (if that's what he meant) So obviously Speedstacking is going to gain more attention as a sport.

On the topic of "athletes", we had a discussion in my SCIALL class about the definition of a sport.

We came to the conclusion that a sport must involve the following aspects:
-- Usable equipment that can be modified slightly without changing the nature of the game.
-- Competitors that either play on a team or individually.
-- Standard set-up for each game / match.
-- Needs to be practiced and honed to get better at
-- Requires some form of skill other than that of physical ability.

Under those conditions, both Speedstacking and Speedcubing fall under the definition, yet the kids in my class were all quick to jump on me for saying that cubing was sport (just cuz I'm always doing it... o_O).... nobody said ANYTHING against speedstacking being a sport.

I don't understand the world...

I also don't get why one thing would get more attention for being a (somewhat) localized "sport" (I will NEVER consider it a sport until they get national teams for a competition held in some country with mass media coverage and betting rings... LOL), like speedstacking, and something like speedcubing is ignored the second the media finds some other gopher-wagon (for lack of a better phrase) to pounce on the second the opportunity comes...

 

[moogra]

Speedstacking is as lame as magic is. I'm decent at magic, and that's only because I've practiced it a LOT. I bet if I spent the time on speedstacking, I could be nearly as good as any of those people. They probably stacked a few thousand times. I've solved a magic a few thousands times. Both take no brainpower.

Speedcubing takes much more skill. You can stuff as many algorithms into your head but it still takes quick thinking. I know a person who knows just as many algorithms as I do and solves it in 35 seconds. I can nearly solve 2 or even 2 before he can solve it once. I'm not even considered fast.

My point is Speedcubing is every bit a sport as speedstacking. To me, both aren't real sports, just great hobbies (but I've never tried speedstacking, i'm relating it to magic).