CONTEST #4

[Bill Salot]

Because of a ballooning backlog of qualified contest compositions, the Unofficial World Championship Checker Problem Composing Contests are continuing back to back.

Because of an increasing corps of competent composers, Contest #4 now contains five (5) incredible concoctions cunningly crafted to shock the coolest combatant and confuse the occasional computer with the cavorting capers of kings at play.

Please go to the Contest Page at http://www.usacheckers.com/problems/show_contest.php, review the composers’ solutions, and vote for the problem you deem the best of these five. The polls close at midnight, May 27, 2012.

Bill Salot

[Irma Sierra]

in Escaped for prisioner there are 13 red checkers.....hmmm

[Bill Salot]

Irma,

One of the beauties of problemathology is that its scope is broader and deeper than the game itself. Problems are not retricted to only settings that can arise in games.

By the way, did you notice 13 checkers was not enough to sustain the draw?

I hope you are a voter in every contest.

Do you have a Mexican problem?

Bill Salot

[Alex_Moiseyev]

Problems are not retricted to only settings that can arise in games.

Interesting statement I would address you to T. Wiswell problems. "Acceptable" initial setting is important and impresssive and looks always better (in my eyes) than "mixing mosaic" of 31 pieces on the board !

[Irma Sierra]

Hola Mr Salot, maybe that is the problem of the problem, too many checkers, I would love to see how it started to get to that point having 13....
I had voted in the contests, I dont have a mexican problem....or american or brazilian or whatever! jejeje

[Bill Salot]

Irma,
Your vote is appreciated.

Alex,
I presume you won't vote for any of the problems in Contest #4 because none of them are acceptable to you. Please realize that if we did not accept them, there would be no Contest #4. Maybe, if you enter an acceptable problem in a future contest and win with it, our composers will then seek to emulate your precedent. If and when a composer makes a change in problem style, it will be because he or she chooses to do so, not because of any rules on acceptable appearance. Let the composers be guided by the voting public, not by the opinion of any individual, alive or deceased. I am learning from their votes. I believe you can too.
Bill Salot

[Irma Sierra]

Thank you Mr. Salot!

[Irma Sierra]

Me again.... I think there is a problem in the problems page because I could vote twice, I just wanted to see what problem was winning and pooon, it said: thanks for voting, BUT this was the second time....

[Bill Salot]

Irma, Thanks for the alert.
Are you sure you pushed a voting button a second time? The voting buttons should have disappeared after your first vote.
Jason thought he had duplicate voting blocked after he deleted extra votes in Contest #2.
I'll ask him to look into it again.
Bill Salot

[Irma Sierra]

I am very sure Mr Salot, it was offering me to vote and i had done it already....

[Jason Solan]

Irma, Sorry you were able to vote twice.
Voting is tied to an IP Address. For most people, that doesn't change often, unfortunately yours must've changed since you originally voted. I was able to look up the IP Address you made your last post from and eliminated the vote to the contest for it.

I've also added a button to see the results if you've already voted, but the system doesn't recognize that you've voted. This should help reduce double voting.

[Irma Sierra]

Jason, I went to the contest, it was offering me to vote or asking me if i already voted and said yes and saw the results.....but didnt check if i could vote again....

[Irma Sierra]

I closed the window, oppened it again and could see the results, not the option for voting...tomorrow i check again....

[Eric Strange]

I do think something else needs to be done for voting. Tying to an IP address and blocking proxies is not very reliable. Anyone could connect to VPN's and vote multiple times.

Cable IP's do not tend to change often but DSL tends to change IP's everytime the modem is unplugged and plugged back in.

If someone is tethering their cell phone to a computer to get internet. That IP will change every time you re-tether the connection.

There has to be another way to handle this, that is more reliable or at least more difficult to cheat.

[Jason Solan]

I do think something else needs to be done for voting. Tying to an IP address and blocking proxies is not very reliable. Anyone could connect to VPN's and vote multiple times.

Cable IP's do not tend to change often but DSL tends to change IP's everytime the modem is unplugged and plugged back in.

If someone is tethering their cell phone to a computer to get internet. That IP will change every time you re-tether the connection.

There has to be another way to handle this, that is more reliable or at least more difficult to cheat.

Look at the userbase we're talking about and look at the type of contest we're talking about. I believe the voters to be honest people and no significant prizes are being awarded. In short there is no incentive to cheat.
Without forcing a login there is no reasonable way to avoid potential issues.
The other often used option is to tie a vote to a cookie, but thats even less reliable than an IP address in my opinion.
If the contests gets bigger and prizes are offered, logins may have to be an option. Right now I think we should just enjoy the increased interest in problems/composing.

And Irma, my hope is that you would not be seeing the vote option right now. I switched your duplicate vote to say "I've Already Voted", which should last until your IP changes again.