So You Wanna Fight? ATS Debate Tournament (Tournament Update)

I'm starting to play catchup again. I've noticed that a few Youtube videos have been used while I wasn't paying much attention. Video and Audio Files are not allowed and will be removed prior to judgment. Please read the rules guys.

reply to post by The Vagabond


Oh, oops. I used 2 of them I believe.

Apologies..

reply to post by The Vagabond


They can't be cited or they can't be used, as in embedding them? I believe that I endirectly referred to a youtube video, though I didn't embed it, nor did I base an argument off of it. I simply referred to Carl Sagan's "flatland", then linked to the video (not embed) for reference.

--airspoon

Referring to content from a video is fine, but judges almost certainly wont actually hunt down the video and look at it. We prohibit embedded video/audio because it can circumvent character limits and takes away the necessity of debaters using their own skill to drive home any support offered by references.

reply to post by The Vagabond


Vagabond, whats happening with the junior tourny? I realise that debates may still be under way but since my opponent lost via forfeiture I've been waiting for a new debate and opponent and it seems to be slow going?

I won't be able to assign you another opponent until all JT debates are finished and judged. Things move faster as the tournament progresses, but in the early rounds with so many people and many of them not as experienced (not to mention the holiday) things can move a bit slow.

reply to post by The Vagabond


Yep, thats fair enough.

Will I get a U2U when I've been assigned a new opponent? Or do I have to keep checking the Debate forum?

I send out u2us to everyone at the start of matches

U2Us have been sent to get the two stalled debates moving again. All debates will be concluded soon. Judging for the Senior Tournament Round 2 should be complete and Round 3 matches posted probably by Tuesday or Wednesday (I'd like to say Monday but that depends on one Round 2 debate that may still go on to its conclusion if saltheart foamfollower is able to continue).

Originally posted by The Vagabond
depends on one Round 2 debate that may still go on to its conclusion if saltheart foamfollower is able to continue).

I really really really don't want to win two rounds by default. Sigh, I'm thinking I'm going to need to post cause I don't want people waiting on us.

I am extremely sorry for how long judging is taking you guys. I'm ignoring football today to try and finish up the ones that aren't handled already.

How would you guys feel about going back to the old school word limits (800 words, or 4,000 characters) next round so that judging can be a little clearer and less demanding?

I have mixed feelings.

On one hand, it would be an interesting exercise in making arguments more concise and could result in some better thought out arguments.

On the other hand, the Socratic Question Stipulation would help to impinge upon word count for original argument...and as well there are some opponents who have demonstrated a need for a 10,000 character limit (at least since I have forgotten what it feels like to limit an argument to 800 words...it's still tough with more than double that)...

I am on the fence and would indeed be up for consensus though tipping the deck in the middle of a tournament is strange since the amount of debates to judge, by design, grows smaller and smaller each round...

Mixed feelings too in a way.

I feel the socratic question system would have to be changed slightly to accomodate the lower word count, and arguments would have to be much much much less indepth to stay concise.

At the moment am having trouble at times defining everything within the debate and having time/words to debate at the same time. It could put the person doing the defining at a disadvantage.

Perhaps a hybrid system might even be better? Either limiting the number of words in seperate posts or limiting the total words used in the entire debate. Sometimes opponents don't give you much to play with, and other times they throw down a lot in one go, but I imagine it should ebb and flow a bit.

Are judges complaining about the word counts?

i wouldn.t change a running system

maybe a nice try for the next tournament or next challenges what ever.

i usually feel a necessity to quote the socratic questions of my opponent to make it clear what i am talking about when replying.
and reducing character or word count won.t be helpful in that regard

and maybe i am a bit more than mixed in that regard - i have started with 10,000 char. count - that.s my old school
the other system is new to me


and since judging takes so long - it would be nice to have a break over christmas and new years eve!

reply to post by The Vagabond

How would you guys feel about going back to the old school word limits

Reducing to 4000 characters would make it a viable tactic to ask pointless socratic questions simply to compell an opponent to waste most of his post answering them rather than discussing his points. But having compulsory socratic questions does add to the debate. I would prefer that this not be done.

Suggestion:
Separate judges for each tournament. That would cut down reading in half. If you check the original post of this thread, it states quite clearly that there would be "approximately 16" participants. Then after judges signed up, you guys doubled their workload by having two tournaments. Kind of unfair to them.

reply to post by LordBucket


I probably should not have sent out that mass U2U stating...

"Judge not lest you be Judged"

Hindsight it's always 20/20!

reply to post by orange-light

it would be nice to have a break over christmas and new years eve!

Tourny admins might want to decide in advance how this is to be handled. Personally, when I signed up I expected it would be over by mid November. Others probably assumed similar. We're now a week into December and not quite finished with round two.

Most of the remaining competitors are die-hard ATS-ers who will probably be here through the holidays anyway. But what about the judges? Nobody benefits from having judges be resentful that they need to choose between spending hours reading or simply glossing over opening posts and deciding there.

Since the participants are more likely crazies who will fight through hail and snow, but the judges might not be...we might allow the tournament to continue, but plan to have judging occur in January. But that means that judges will return from a month off to a pile of posts more massive than they can resaonably be expected to sit down and read.

If we do wait, that's going to be a month of downtime coming at the end of four months total past the time people originally signed up for this. As some of the people who have withdrawn have pointed out, their lives have changed, they've been deployed, etc. in the time since they signed up. If we adjourn for a month, we're likely to have more withdrawals.

Even if we start round three now, it's unlikely that we'll be able to finish round four before people start leaving for christmas. There are likely people who have plans for trips as early as the 17th. Being almost done, and having only the final round left, but put on hold for a month is not ideal.

I don't have an easy answer for this.

Note to other competitors: the current state of affairs is not totally because of administration. A lot of us have allowed opponents to go several days past their allotment without posting to cut off their turn. Stop that. If somebody goes over their time, post and they forfeit their turn. Yes, you're a good team player and fair, congratulations. Thank you. But nobody wants this tournament to still be running in March. Hurry up.

All said, I'm one of the die-hards who will be here posting on christmas day if that's what it takes. But it's not reasonable to expect everyone else to do that.

Conclusion
Personally if I were in charge, I would do the following:

Announce round two winners now, or soon.

Don't post or announce topics for round three

Resume round three on January 5th

Accept withdrawals and move on

Manage it better next time

edit on 6-12-2010 by LordBucket because: (no reason given)

I personally do not support a month long delay...

reply to post by LordBucket


You know I stepped up to carry round one at the last minute and got saddled with the whole damn thing, and it's the biggest tournament we've ever had- I won't even get into magnitude of the priorities that have been causing the delays- suffice it to say that they have merit. So with all due respect to how much more about you may or may not know about the debate forum as compared to me, I say be patient.