The Online Quizbowl in the West

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Arras Agility
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The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by Arras Agility »

Because of The Situation, almost all if not all quizbowl tournaments that will happen this fall will probably be online. Although online tournaments are worse than in-person ones in many respects, one upside they do have is that online closed tournaments that have more than one mirror don't need to adhere to the same "circuits" as in-person tournaments do. This is actually a benefit for small circuits in geographically compatible time zones, which can unify mirrors to have healthier fields without requiring nearly as much traveling, especially because there's likely to be attrition from taking quizbowl online that might make having larger fields harder in any case.

Since basically every college circuit in the West (both Californias, the PNW, the Mountain West, the Southwest) fits these criteria, I propose that set head editors for next season plan to have a unified Western mirror instead of separating out those regions. Justine French and I have brought up this plan to several clubs in these regions and haven't heard objections. (Of course, this assumes that there will be regional tournament mirrors; that's not quite a community norm, but I think it makes sense. If there are multiple mirrors of a set, splitting them up so that their teams that are as much as possible in the same zone is as good a criterion as any, since timezone issues have turned out to be somewhat significant in online tournaments so far.) Our circumstances probably don't apply to other regions, but I think this step would be very beneficial to Western teams.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by cchiego »

This sounds reasonable and a good idea for building up a Western circuit.

Can this also then be accompanied by attempts by whomever is awarded official hosting privileges to reach out to schools such as: Reed, Whitman, Pacific, Santa Clara, Gonzaga, Lewis and Clark, Occidental, Mills, St. Mary's, Point Loma Nazarene, all of the Cal State Us, the UCs that don't have quizbowl teams, Redlands, Western Washington, Oregon State, various Community Colleges, other schools like Northern Arizona and UNLV/UN-R that really should have quizbowl teams, etc.? Given the breakdown of geographic barriers, it would be nice to see some attempts at outreach to build up some non-UWash, Berkeley, Stanford, UCLA, and UCSD teams at these Western mirrors, particularly for Collegiate Novice and ACF Fall. I am happy to work with whomever is interested to gather potential contacts and work with any interested parties at these places, but I think that it would be ideal to view this as an opportunity for outreach to new people and places who might otherwise not have the resources to start a team and make trips to various mirror sites.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by Smuttynose Island »

Arras Agility wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 1:17 am Because of The Situation, almost all if not all quizbowl tournaments that will happen this fall will probably be online. Although online tournaments are worse than in-person ones in many respects, one upside they do have is that online closed tournaments that have more than one mirror don't need to adhere to the same "circuits" as in-person tournaments do. This is actually a benefit for small circuits in geographically compatible time zones, which can unify mirrors to have healthier fields without requiring nearly as much traveling, especially because there's likely to be attrition from taking quizbowl online that might make having larger fields harder in any case.

Since basically every college circuit in the West (both Californias, the PNW, the Mountain West, the Southwest) fits these criteria, I propose that set head editors for next season plan to have a unified Western mirror instead of separating out those regions. Justine French and I have brought up this plan to several clubs in these regions and haven't heard objections. (Of course, this assumes that there will be regional tournament mirrors; that's not quite a community norm, but I think it makes sense. If there are multiple mirrors of a set, splitting them up so that their teams that are as much as possible in the same zone is as good a criterion as any, since timezone issues have turned out to be somewhat significant in online tournaments so far.) Our circumstances probably don't apply to other regions, but I think this step would be very beneficial to Western teams.
While it certainly isn't the community norm to host multiple online mirrors of a set, moving forward I think it will be a necessity. Additionally, I think it will become important for institutions to host events. Otherwise interest will rapidly outstrip staff availability, as we've seen with recent online mirrors.

Consolidating some regional mirrors, I think, makes sense. This is especially true of less well attended events. I'm not sure if every set needs only one West Coast mirror though. For more popular events, holding multiple mirrors allows for additional flexibility for teams in deciding when to play the set. It also increases the number of fundraising opportunities for teams. Those sets that can sustain multiple 10+ team fields should explore having multiple mirrors on the West Coast in order to maximize attendance.

Additionally, as travel is no longer a concern, I would like to see some experimentation with who different mirrors are aimed at. With travel no longer being a concern, it becomes more feasible to run separate mirrors for teams of differing strengths (self-selecting of course). The PNW experimented with this somewhat by running an online novice online mirror of Delta Burke, although a companion event for non-novice teams was not held. Running multiple mirrors in this case may even help with outreach if efforts are made to recruit new to quizbowl schools.

Edit: Added a bit about outreach.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by Shahar S. »

If we're going to have to play regional tournaments online next fall (which, as Alistair pointed out, is looking increasingly likely), I think we should consider zoom as a platform as opposed to discord. Obviously zoom tournaments would be more complicated from a logistical standpoint, but there is an air of legitimacy and comfort you get from actually being able to see your fellow competitors that I feel is lacking in current discord tournaments. There also appears to be less sources of "client side" confusion on zoom, but in my opinion that's not a huge factor. Even if we don't switch to zoom, I think making more use of the video feature on discord would help significantly.

I know people have had debates about zoom vs. discord before, but if tournaments, especially local tournaments, are going to be online for the time being, I think we need to revive the conversation on where we want to run them. Ultimately we want people to feel like they're playing a legitimate version of quizbowl, and I think people able to see each other's faces is an underappreciated and vital part of that.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by naan/steak-holding toll »

My experience with Discord video games on DECAMERON suggests that the platform is more than capable of handling relatively small groups of people on video calls. Moreover, Discord does not require licenses to operate such tournaments, has a much more intuitive room system, and comes with a bunch of useful bots that help make assigning roles much easier.

Not my place to dictate how the West Coast chooses to operate its tournaments, but more broadly, I have concerns about Zoom's ethics as a company and would strongly prefer we not support them as a community.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by CPiGuy »

Strong co-sign Will -- Discord video is at least close enough to Zoom's that the added logistical benefits of Discord make it worthwhile. (Not that Zoom sucks. It's just worth trying Discord video, I think.)
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by Shahar S. »

Well if that's the case, great! Let's run some summer discord tournaments with video and see if any issues arise. If not, maybe we can start implementing discord's video feature more often.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by rylltraka »

I am old and way removed from the community, but am also going to be bored and at home for the next six months and would be happy to help out anyone who wants help.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by Ciorwrong »

Shahar S. wrote: Sun Jun 14, 2020 6:33 pm Well if that's the case, great! Let's run some summer discord tournaments with video and see if any issues arise. If not, maybe we can start implementing discord's video feature more often.
We are tentatively thinking of running summer online practices for anyone in the Pacific Time zone. Details will come later (we just finished our spring quarter) but these practices could be a good opportunity to test out Discord video.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by vathreya »

Ciorwrong wrote: Sun Jun 14, 2020 9:44 pm We are tentatively thinking of running summer online practices for anyone in the Pacific Time zone. Details will come later (we just finished our spring quarter) but these practices could be a good opportunity to test out Discord video.
UW will also be hosting online summer practices over Discord, in our server here: https://discord.com/invite/sFevHKB. Practices will occur on Wednesdays (starting this Wednesday) and Sundays from 6-8 p.m. (the date and time may change in the future, but this is it for now). We welcome everyone who would like to join. We may try out discord video, but that is still uncertain.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by vathreya »

Shahar S. wrote: Sun Jun 14, 2020 4:14 pm If we're going to have to play regional tournaments online next fall (which, as Alistair pointed out, is looking increasingly likely), I think we should consider zoom as a platform as opposed to discord. Obviously zoom tournaments would be more complicated from a logistical standpoint, but there is an air of legitimacy and comfort you get from actually being able to see your fellow competitors that I feel is lacking in current discord tournaments. There also appears to be less sources of "client side" confusion on zoom, but in my opinion that's not a huge factor. Even if we don't switch to zoom, I think making more use of the video feature on discord would help significantly.

I know people have had debates about zoom vs. discord before, but if tournaments, especially local tournaments, are going to be online for the time being, I think we need to revive the conversation on where we want to run them. Ultimately we want people to feel like they're playing a legitimate version of quizbowl, and I think people able to see each other's faces is an underappreciated and vital part of that.
For what it's worth, in my opinion, Discord video is probably a better option. While playing Cambridge Open Online through zoom, my laptop overheated and quit the zoom app in the middle of the round. Unfortunately because they could not re-form the breakout rooms in order to let me in, I was effectively locked out for the rest of the round (which, fortunately, was only 1-2 tossups). A big advantage to Discord video I see is that it's easier to join/re-join, and that you can join it on mobile, making it easier for players with technical difficulties to re-enter rounds when an app crashes.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by Arras Agility »

vathreya wrote: Mon Jun 15, 2020 12:21 pm UW will also be hosting online summer practices over Discord, in our server here: https://discord.com/invite/sFevHKB. Practices will occur on Wednesdays (starting this Wednesday) and Sundays from 6-8 p.m. (the date and time may change in the future, but this is it for now). We welcome everyone who would like to join. We may try out discord video, but that is still uncertain.
The UCSD team will be attending these; I'd encourage other interested teams (especially West Coasters) to show up also.
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Re: The Online Quizbowl in the West

Post by vathreya »

vathreya wrote: Mon Jun 15, 2020 12:21 pm UW will also be hosting online summer practices over Discord, in our server here: https://discord.com/invite/sFevHKB. Practices will occur on Wednesdays (starting this Wednesday) and Sundays from 6-8 p.m. (the date and time may change in the future, but this is it for now). We welcome everyone who would like to join. We may try out discord video, but that is still uncertain.
Forgot to mention this earlier, but UW's summer practices are actually on Wednesdays from 6-8 and Saturday from 4-6 p.m. I got the timing wrong in my first post, but these are the actual times. Apologies for the miscommunication.
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