The end of the eleven top ten

I look at the new iPad and have no interest; my good Republican cloth coat original iPad still does the job perfectly well. No wonder my LD list seems so out-of-date.

4. Fast thinking
You have to be able to think fast, both in CX and when prepping rebuttals. Preparation in advance of a round, and remembering the responses you've already developed -- rather than creating them on the spot -- is the best approach because it requires that you save your fast thinking for the unexpected, while using your memory for the predictable.

This one is interesting. For lots of debaters once upon a time, responding to arguments meant, for all practical purposes, making something up on the spot. Over the years we’ve evolved into finding the response on your computer (not true when this was written). Fast thinking is still required, but the skill is totally different. Before it was fast creative thinking, now it’s fast recalling. You know you’ve got the response there somewhere; you’ve just got to find it. This is actually a good skill, learning to organize in such a way that when you need something, you can find it. The way this is worded wouldn’t require much if any rewriting for PF.

3. Time management
Use your all time in a round correctly. Your constructives should be timed perfectly. 1ARs should be half and half Aff and Neg (although some varsity think 1:30/1:30 + 1 for V/C analysis, overviews, underviews, middleviews, views of the lake from the cabin, the view from tab, a dim view of the proceedings as a whole). NRs should end with a minute or two of crystallization, while 2ARs should be all crystallization. Use all your prep time, even if it's only to take a deep breath.

Well, when was the last time you heard a 2AR that was all crystallization? Nowadays they just replay all the arguments and give you 27 sufficient and independent reasons to affirm as if they really believe there could be such a number. Judges buy into the pretense, presumably because they get caught up in the magic. Dream on. Still, voting issues are required…

Anyhow, using time efficiently is always important; this can be easily revised for PF rounds, although the emphasis on using prep won’t be so important because there isn’t much of it and it’s mostly spent finding files.

2. Judge adaptation
Since ballots come from judges, working with your judges is, at least according to the HH coach, who will always rank this as #1, the greatest key to success. With former debaters and coaches, you can confidently use a certain measure of speed and LD lingo (almost always -- you'll know the exceptions). With parents, assume that they are rational adults who would like you to be clear and simple in your analysis (see Simplicity, above). They'll also respond to knowledge and confidence, not to mention speaking well. They will be less accepting of speed. If you actually know the individual, that is, if you know the judge, you are best off, because you can -- and must -- adapt to what you know that judge likes.

Here’s the deal about public speaking, aside from high school forensics. Rule number one is to know your audience, and adjust your speech accordingly. Let’s say you are giving a talk about the future of personal computing. If you are giving this talk at Apple HQ, you would do it differently than if you were giving it at my mother’s nursing home, even though the content would be roughly identical. You have to know what it is that your audience knows, and doesn’t know, so that when you’re addressing them, you don’t lose them. If you tell them what they already know, or talk in terms they don’t know, they’re lost.

In LD, back in the day when at any given tournament you could be judged by a wide range of adjudicators, this was absolutely the number one rule of debate. Nowadays, where you can engineer your way through MJP to a reasonably narrow band of judges at least in your most important rounds, it is still required—you will get the odd inexperienced judge, or a coach like me wheeled out from tab because no one else will fit, etc.—and you have no choice but to slow down and simplify, or lose (provided your opponent is smart enough to slow down and simplify; if neither of you do, you both deserve to lose the ballot coin-flip that will transpire, at least metaphorically). Adaptation is still required, but not from round to round, and hence, it is not a top priority.

There isn’t a lot of need for judge adaptation in PF at the moment, given that most PF judges do tend to be lay, even though some of them might be mightily experienced. All of them want what PF proclaims to offer, which ultimately is good speaking and clear points and big picture. So, for entirely different reasons than with LD, this doesn’t loom all that large.

1. Knowledge
There is no such thing as too much research. At the highest levels of debate, all debaters are created roughly equal skillwise; it's the work they do in advance that can make the difference. Contrariwise, if you don't know it, don't use it. Know what you know and avoid what you don't know. Of course, the more you know, the less you'll have to avoid!

It was revolutionary when the Sailors voted this number one over judge adaptation. A sign of the future, you might say. I’d reword this a tad, perhaps, but knowing your topic inside and out is the best thing you can do in aid of winning a round. So, probably, number one again.