In which we look at our equipment

Byram Hills was the tournament where I tested my Chromebook. I will admit that there was a Mac and a printer and all kinds of accouterments in the trunk of the car, just in case, but I figured an all-electric scenario ought to work fine with something like a Chromebook. It did. Aside from the five minutes or so when tabroom decided to go on vacation, and we started wishing we had printed out results sheets (all of which was done during Bronx’s visit, making them now insist that we keep 30 printers on hand, just in case), which we wouldn’t have done anyhow, and in case you are unaware of it, while there is a way to print with a Chromebook via network you can’t just plug in a USB cord, an aside which has now added so many commas to this sentence that I’m afraid to go on, I never felt bereft. In fact, the fast loading time alone was worth the price of admission. My MacBook takes quite a while to get going, either from sleep or coma, while the Cb pops on in a few seconds. I bought the Cb during the last Amazon Prime sale, and it cost about $150. I had been planning on getting the next gen MacBook Air when it’s finally announced, but I don’t think that will be necessary anymore. The Cb weighs virtually nothing, and it does the job. If I need to do something more complicated, I have enough older computers around the house that I won’t be terrible hamstrung. But at tournaments, there’s tabbing, Spotify, Sporcle and mail. Hell, I could do it all on my phone if the screen were bigger, and for that matter, we have tabbed once or twice from restaurants or buses when emergencies arose. We are definitely slouching toward Bethlehem.

In unrelated news, I’ve been listening to Ready Player One and I have never so much wanted to own a serious game-playing machine…

Sticking with tech, I doubt if I’ll upgrade to an iPhone 7, since the two-year-old 6 works fine, but I’m happy to see that it really is faster and has a better camera. I’ve been getting into iPhone photograpy, and I have a lot to explore with the various apps I already have, but no photographer ever said they wanted a less sharp lens or a non-optical zoom (or at least no photographer ever wanted that as a default). For the week we spent in New Orleans (last week, that is), I decided not to bring my little SLR, and to rely solely on my phone. I was not unhappy with the results. I won’t say I’ll abandon the SLR any time soon, but I won’t be so quick to throw it into the bag… And, oh yeah, in addition to starting to think vaguely about a game console, again, I’m wondering if I might give the new Apple Watch a try. Nothing definite, but I’m thinking about it. I do feel that he who is tired of lusting after new tech is tired of life, to paraphrase Dr. Johnson.

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In which we discuss a nice point of MJP

Every tournament seems to have its own situations that arise and have to be dealt with. Since we had done a limited MJP at Byram Hills last year, I set it up to happen again, with three equal tiers plus a strike or two. I mean, it was a small tournament, but nevertheless, most people really like prefs. Or let’s say that most people will use them, maybe out of self-defense if nothing else. But that’s been my point since day one. Prefs allow you to put some spin on the ball regardless of your style. Nevertheless, I knew that prefs would be problematic with a small pool, and I asked people to be generous with their rankings because there was only so much tab can do with that kind of pool. A couple of schools cooperated and didn’t rank at all, considering that the tournament was the first of the year and that people should be getting experience in front of as many judges as possible, especially if they were at the younger end of the spectrum. That’s one of the things about BH: it attracts both the lightly and the heavily seasoned. I like that in a tournament.

We managed to do pretty well pref-wise overall, and if nothing else we were mostly mutual. But when we got to elims, something came up that’s worth sharing. In fact, I found it so worth sharing that I’ve added a new page to the TD Toolkit, containing little extra notes on things that didn’t fit elsewhere (or, maybe more to the point, that I’m too lazy to fit in elsewhere). I’ll keep adding to it as things come up. Here’s what happened at BH that I want to talk about; I’m simply pasting in what I put in the Sidenotes.

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A Complicated Wrinkle regarding MJP Panels

This is what we might call a nice point, and it’s worth knowing about.

When I was working with the Paginator at some point last year, he noticed that debaters were getting judged in elims by people who had voted against them in previous elim rounds. There is a button that prevents being judged by someone who has voted against you, and we had selected that option. But it was happening anyhow. So we went to tabroom and filed a notification that the option wasn’t working. But, in fact, it was. The thing is, the option was moot. The tournament we were running was using MJP, and if you have prefs, they are prioritized over other issues. That is, if your judge was ranked a 1 in the octafinals, and your judge votes against you, your 1 ranking does not magically become a strike in the quarterfinals.

I guess one could make an argument against this, but the logic seems pretty strong to me. Once we accept and use prefs for a tournament, those are the prefs for all of that tournament. Given how much we’re trying to optimize panels in tab (and, presumably, how much the software is trying to optimize panels), the idea that rankings are not fixed for the tournament is nightmarish. Also, it really doesn’t make sense. The idea behind MJP, like it or hate it, is that you rank a judge because that judge is the kind of judge you like to debate in front of, not because that judge always picks you up. After all, the judge you gave a 1 to is the same judge your opponent gave a 1 to. If the rationales for those 1s was a guaranteed win, you have some learning to do. At the point where rankings are mutual, they inherently become preferences for style over an assumption of a victory. (Actually, the idea that MJP is a path to guaranteed victory is an old one that came up back in the earliest days of the option, when dinosaurs still roamed the earth. We should be past that by now.)

In a tournament where there are no prefs, on the other hand, it does make sense to block judges who have voted against you, which tabroom will do automatically. When there’s no prefs guiding the hand of tab, one judge on a panel is presumably just as good as any other, until the point where that judge has just voted against a student. Since it is no big deal to put in a different judge, and not doing so can easily have a negative effect on the debater who didn’t pick up that ballot last time, especially on the same side, it makes sense to avoid this situation. Everyone is happier (who wants to judge a kid you just voted against?) and no one is unhappier. But only in a pref-free universe. Otherwise, the prefs stand until the final round is over.

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In which we ponder e-ballots and judges who are too cool for the room

Over the last weekend Kaz and I spent a lot of time talking about e-ballots, specifically e-ballots at Princeton. It’s an interesting discussion, and there were events at Byram Hills that could impact the ultimate decision.

Last year at the Tiggers we were in 7 different buildings on Friday, and 6 on Saturday.  A half hour before the scheduled time of each round, we had a judge call and distributed paper ballots. Although we were lenient on Friday, as people were finding their way, we were ruthless after that, levying fines to anyone who didn’t show up to pick up a ballot. Given that there was a two hour break between rounds on Saturday, there was no conceivable excuse not to show up on time. Nor, for that matter, were there too many people who didn’t. The tournament ran totally on time. (By the way, we also had a way of texting results, which took the pressure off if someone was way far away.)

My main objection to e-b’s at the Tigs is based on the fact that there are simply too many judges too cool to hit the start button in the world at large. Needless to say, there are also noobs who may or may not be prepared to submit e-ballots, but they can be trained; we did that at Byram Hills (and plenty of other places in the past). It’s the too-cool contingent that is the bothersome one. In a e-b situation, the only way the tab room knows that things are operating smoothly is when we can see on our screens that a round has started. At a tournament with a single building, like Bronx, if someone hasn’t hit start, we have a dozen myrmidons posted throughout the building to quickly assess the situation. At Pton, with 7 buildings, we will need myrmidons in every single building to assess the situation. There are a number of reasons why a round doesn’t start. Not enough debaters? Well, we can solve that a variety of ways. Judge not in the room? We can solve that a number of ways. Judge too cool to hit the start button? Well, we can solve that too, but what a waste of time. I’ve mentioned before that I’ve had people make strong arguments to me that I’m an idiot for not doing e-ballots, and those people have been the same ones who notoriously don’t hit start. Great judges on a certain level, absolute non-professionals on another level. They just don’t get it. Every time we chase down a judge who is in a room judging is time we could have been spending solving a real problem. Multiplied by 7 buildings? Oy. (And I'm not even going to get started on the judges who hit start the minute they get an assignment, when for all they know both their teams have been devoured by hungry dragons on the way to the round.)

At Byram, a couple of our highest ranked judges were simply incapable of officially starting a round. There is no excuse for this. The wireless worked fine. It is simply unprofessional behavior on their part. I was feeling vindictive and thinking about punishing those judges with down-4 pairings, but I didn’t, because that would be more punishing to the debaters who needed those highly preffed judges in their bubble rounds.

Aaargh.

CP claims that we simply need to educate the world for e-b’s, and that my not using them delays that education. I think he’s right about that, as far as it goes. But all the too-cools are beyond education. They know the ropes. They are being, consciously or unconsciously, obdurate. They’re the bigger problem.

Anyhow, we’ve sent feelers to the Tigs presenting the problem of the many buildings, and asking if they have staff that can be in place in all of them. Kaz also suggests a mandatory opening judge meeting, which is fine, but she agrees that the too-cools never attend a judge meeting because, well, they’re too cool for that. Honestly, we’ve had other too-cool problems in the past at the Tigs, where the best and most highly preferred judges saw their stints in NJ as hireds as a weekend vacation and not a judging gig. So I’m worried. Will we try it? Probably. Will it work? Your guess is as good as mine.

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In which our season takes off

And so we begin. This weekend was Byram Hills, and I have to admit, it was fun moving all the pieces again. It’s been a while.

The tournament began with a little round robin. And here’s the thing about rounds robin that a lot of people don’t seem to understand. If every person brings a judge, it’s not enough judges. You’ve got to have a spare or two (or more) on hand to make things work. Originally, all they had were one for one, and no matter what I did I couldn’t make that happen. Fortunately, Zach F who was running things had an extra on the line that he was able to reel in quickly, and everything worked out. I remember this happening last year when Benko was forced to jump in and judge rounds. I’ve never seen a tournament of any sort with too many judges, and doubt that I ever will.

I have to admit that tabbing from home is sort of cool. Not that there was that much to do in the RR once things were set up originally, aside from putting together the final round. But still, my little phone would buzz whenever rounds started or finished, as I puttered around the house doing the things I do when I’m in puttering mode. It wasn’t till after lunch that I moseyed across the county to Armonk, where BH is. I have no idea why they don’t call it Armonk Hills, since Bryam is nowhere near there. Nor, for that matter, are there any hills. What can I say? You could look it up; I’m not that interested.

With the exception of one year, I’ve been at BH from the start, back when they were running in the depths of winter. I was a little hesitant about the move to early birding in September, but it’s worked out fine. But only for varsity. We tried to fill Academy divisions, but we just didn’t get any takers. I think the thing might be that the tournament, while having a few heavy hitters at the top thanks to the RR, is already perceived as being accessible for younger students. Which it is. Academy has proven redundant. As compared to Monticello next month, where the Academy divisions fill and the varsity divisions go wanting. Anyhow, we weren’t exactly bursting at the seams, but the numbers were quite good enough that we weren’t killing ourselves with pullups, which is the bane of the smallish tournament. People were debating the people they should have been debating in their brackets, which is why there is bracketing in the first place.

The tournament was not without its issues. There was a health emergency, which reinforced everything we say about chaperones and competent adults on hand. We were lucky that we had more competent adults than we knew what to do with. For the first time in anyone’s memory, there were plenty of administrators on hand for a tournament. Usually the administration is out the door on the Friday of a tournament before the buses even leave, unless there’s some poor schmegeggie principal or assistant principal who feels compelled to welcome the teaming hordes, which never have any interest in being welcomed. The movement away from opening, closing or middling assemblies has been steady over the years. When I first started, they were inescapable. Nowadays, they're rare as can be. I have mixed feelings about that, but that’s a subject for another post.

In tab there were me and Kaz and the Paginator, although the latter was brevetted there by us only because we needed someone to have someone around to complain all weekend. Actually, all he ever complains about is me, and his complaint is that I am always complaining about things, but that is beside the point. Tabbers are hard to find, and one doesn’t let one leave one’s grasp, especially if you can throw him into the odd round when you want to pull off a single flight on a Friday night. Or if he starts complaining too much.

There’s a couple of technical things I’ll talk about next time. There’s always a new wrinkle or two at every tournament, maybe something new about tabroom or just process in general, and I want to start capturing those things more effectively than just complaining about discussing them here.

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In which we switch over to a day at the DJ

In the average day at the DJ, I do a bunch of different things. Among them today I handed in the edit of a book, wrote some copy, edited some other people’s copy, looked up Boxcar Willie and found out that good old BW is no longer with us, Googled the phrase “predictable as…” and got nothing useful but did discover the Neverending Story slideshow, got sidetracked on Twitter by the fact that September 1 is Back to Hogwarts Day, read a bit of a novel that practically put me into a state of permanent depression but I got my revenge by writing a really snarky review, listened to a bit of futile employee ranting, said farewell to an employee on her last day, listened to another bit of futile employee ranting, ran out for Chinese takeout that I ate at my desk while doing the crossword puzzle (just my average time today, sigh), turned over the two calendars on my wall to the new month, sent a book to our Canadian editor to see if I can trick her into getting it edited for us, read a bit of a different novel that I couldn’t make heads nor tails of and therefore quickly put aside with another really snarky review, gave away my broken iPad to my production assistant after resetting it back to factory clean so that she doesn’t steal my identity and start buying everything that isn’t nailed on Amazon, threw in the keyboard/cover that I never did like because it weighs too much, marveled that the company Kindle she was working on is so old that it still has Gutenberg’s fingerprints on it, communicated with Kirby C a couple of times about the relative lack of shenanigans on the Rather Large Bronx waitlist that he is about to clear, responded to another tournament director about a local coach who doesn’t pay her debts of honor by pointing out that her total and complete lack of honor renders those debts invisible to her (don’t get me started), had a cup of tea, read a little bit of another book about four friends who get together and reveal secrets and put it down because I didn’t care about any one of them much less all four of them and gave it a less than snarky review because my snark dies down as the day goes on, took a break and watched a little of a walking tour of Disney Springs, read the latest Publishers Weekly (and I am looking forward to Alan Moore’s Jerusalem, but for myself, not the DJ), tried reading another book but it was too literary for a series that prefers straightforward narrative—

By the way, the part of my job that involves choosing books does not necessarily mean reading them. I start reading them, and if I like them, I keep reading them, but I’m not getting paid to read, I’m getting paid to find books. At the point where I determine a book won’t work for us, it’s my job to go on to the next one. So occasionally I get paid to sit and read and enjoy myself, but as far as this stuff goes, I get paid to read as little as possible of stuff I don’t enjoy. There’s plenty of that to go around. I also edit books for the series, about half of my time overall although not today. That’s a whole nother biz entirely.

—and wrote up a review of that one, and finally grabbed one more for the road, hoping, as always, for the best. The worst days I spend are the ones I spend sifting through unusable books. It’s boring and feels unproductive. But then you read a good book, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon, and all the bad ones disappear.

And that’s how I earn the big bucks.

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