by Get Lynned » Mon Sep 12, 2016 8:04 am
Fred,
(edit as of 5:55 pm)
My complaint was not a mere "oh no, they're using NAQT, argghhhh format wars". Between the weekend and this morning, what was understood was Bob's set was in the works of getting set up for a mirror @ Waynedale, but for some unknown reason it was changed to NAQT and all of the sudden it's evidently under new direction. Roughly 48 hours had gone by between both my first post and Bob's post and there wasn't a response, and Bob hadn't yet been filled in on what happened. At the time, in the moment it came off as a sketchy situation because not many details were given and Cortney didn't respond to either of the first two replies. The situation before Bob received the email explaining what happened looked like something unorthodox was going on. I know Bob worked rather hard on his set and was earnestly trying to raise money for his club at Eastlake North, so the idea that Bob may have lost out his mirror to the lowest bidder was bothersome.
(Original Post)
Last week, the hosting school contacted Bob Kilner about using his OAC set, where all the tossups are pyramidal (emphasis on the fact it is pyramidal, because there is likely still the idea that OAC = non-pyramidal.) Within the past two years, Bob (who formerly coached at Garfield Heights in the 2000's) started a quizbowl team at the high school he now teaches at and in an effort to raise money for his school to do more events this academic year, he wrote this set in the hopes of teams playing it at his main site as well as receiving $10/team at any mirrors.
It was mentioned on here in the past week that Waynedale HS was looking to host a mirror of Bob's set. Bob, as evidenced by his post, was under the impression that he was going to have a mirror in play. Instead he found out he wasn't going to end up with a mirror via this tournament announcement. If him finding out via a third party and not directly they didn't want to mirror his set was the only thing wrong here, then this wouldn't be an issue worth posting about.
What is troubling is Bob mentioned in the last week or so, on here, that he might have a mirror of his set at this school only for someone who lives roughly 100 miles from this school to post that he, evidently, managed to convince the hosting school to use NAQT instead. Again, NAQT is more expensive and given that it is an A-set, it is probably a leaner set in terms of clues versus the regular IS set, and more generally since it is NAQT fewer pyramidal tossups in a packet (20-24 depending on how many are played,) than this OAC set; which has 30 pyramidal tossups in a packet (ten category tossups that are pyramidal, 20 in the lightning round.)
To clarify, my derision isn't directed at the coach of the hosting high school. What is wrong though is someone undermining the product and potential deal in place, one that would benefit not just the hosting school but also the school of the set's writer, for really no good reason. There was no mention on our calendar discussion this year that Cortney Bird/OQBA had any interest in running this tournament or that it'd even get the OQBA label slapped onto it. It is mentioned on here within the past week or so that this school might host the OAC set, and then within a few days later it's announced all of the sudden that instead it's now running an NAQT set with it being an event of this "OQBA." Hmm... it's mystifying how that comes about. Could it be that someone from this OQBA, possibly the person who wrote this tournament announcement himself, contacted the hosting school's coach and convinced them to do NAQT and run it under his label after seeing they were looking to host a different set instead?
While I respect you and what you do, Fred, I just don't buy the rhetoric of "you can't complain about someone using NAQT" in light of what I've posted. Just because questions come from a certain vendor doesn't mean their usage supersedes the ethics upon which we operate as a quizbowl scene. I'm not going to sit back and think "thank goodness they're running NAQT", not when someone disrupts a potential deal-in-place that not only benefits another Ohio program but is also a better economic value.
Last edited by
Get Lynned on Mon Sep 12, 2016 4:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Thomas Moore
Ohio Wesleyan '18
Retired from online, for good.