Champaign, Illinois
SCRABBLE® Club #590

Directed by John Fultz

News from the NSA

By John Fultz

Last modified on Friday, December 01, 2006

Because I'm willing to filter through hundreds of messages a week that often boil down to flame wars concerning OSPD vs. SOWPODS, score-based ratings vs. non-score-based ratings, what to do about ISC cheaters, and every Joe Schmoe's idea of what Hasbro has or hasn't done for us lately, I get to see a few gems of communication from the NSA or from expert players which I wish could have been distilled and made widely available to players everywhere. Sometimes these things show up in the newsletter, but sometimes not.

So, here's my distillation of crossword-games-pro and tournament directors mailings that I think the average club and tournament-goer might find interesting.

Click directly on each post to reveal it.

Posts from NSA personnel

• Chris Cree, 11/30/2006: 2007 PLAYERS' CHAMPIONSHIP
  • I am pleased to announce that an agreement has been reached with the Dayton Convention Center in Dayton, Ohio to house the 2007 Players' Championship August 3-8, 2007.
    
    The reasons for this choice include:
    
    Reasonable geographic centrality, reasonable accessibility, an incredible amount of meeting space for playing, registration, after hours play, etc., a very reasonable rate for the facility and hotel rooms, and a "medium sized fish in a medium sized pond" scenario to name a few. One of the most significant reasons is that a Scrabble player, Lois Greene, is the director of the Dayton Convention Center, and therefore, knows from national tournament experience a great deal about what it is that we need.
    
    The host hotel will be the Crowne Plaza which is joined by skywalk to the Convention Center at a room rate of $99/night. It is my understanding that this rate includes a king or two queen sized beds.
    
    I stayed at the hotel the past two nights and found the accomodations to be pretty darned good.
    
    ****PLEASE DO NOT make hotel reservartions until we announce the reservation code****.
    
    There are so many things to be done - this is only Step One.
    
    Step Two - Find a director who has lots of experience directing major events. OK, got one. Mary Rhoades has agreed to direct this event. No doubt she will assemble a crack supporting cast.
    
    She will also arrange for The Players' Championship to have a website. She said that she will have this done by year's end.
    
    The schedule, divisions (we are shooting for 6 divisions), prize money, hotel registration info, best air routes and fares, answers to the questions that we will get, etc. - details to be announced on our website, CGP and OSPD by year's end, but no later than January 15, 2007.
    
    The only way that this thing will work is with the support of the players - both in attending the event and by room nights purchased at the host hotels.
    
    Not everybody is online, so please spread the word.
    
    Game on!
    
    Chris Cree
    
• Chris Cree, 3/5/2006: Meeting with John Williams
  • Dear Players,
    
    The following is the promised report after my meeting with John Williams last Friday, March 3 in New York City:
    
    The first thing to do was to try to define the role of Player Delegate. Basically, what John has in mind is for the position to "...keep the NSA on its toes about issues that slip through the cracks." That led to a discussion of the channels of communication as they now exist. John Williams is the Executive Director of the NSA, Joe Edley is the player representative (though now a part time employee of the NSA) and, to me the most important, your Advisory Board. When you have an issue or issues to bring forward, your Advisory Board representative is your first step. Your particular representative is the one geographically closest to you. I will repost that list at the end of this report. John reiterated that he will do the "Ask the Executive Director" feature before month's end and that he has already answered a few privately written emails and said to those he answered that it was all right to post the response onto our two email groups. So, send him your questions.
    
    At the end of that part of the discussion he said who knows what role the player delegate will end up taking - it is a new position. I told him that I had said the very same thing to someone by email the day before - that the role will evolve in the coming months and will continue to evolve with the next delegate. I jokingly said that OMBUDSMAN means "MAN - person", "OM - all" and "BUDS - Bunch of UnDefined Stuff" (I actually used a different word than "stuff").
    
    This position is not a part of the Advisory Board.
    
    We spoke of future national championship sites and lead time for the players to plan travel and off time from work as well as geographical parity in the chosen sites. He said that with the year-to-year budget and never knowing if funding will even happen in a given year, he cannot commit to a place on a timely basis and therefore, has much less to chose from. I asked, "Why wait for a budget?". For him, the issue is signing a contract with a hotel not knowing if that commitment could be fulfilled and being financially liable if in breach of an agreement. I suggested that he might go ahead and look for the place now anyway and put the proposed contract in Hasbro's hands. If Hasbro signs it, that would mean that he more than likely has a commitment from them to him for that following year. If they don't, that should tell him something as well - better to know up front.
    
    In addition, in 1987, when Coleco owned the game, they withdrew funding from the nationals and WE HELD ONE ANYWAY. At the last minute, Coleco chipped in $5,000, but the event was going to take place irrespective of their support with the efforts of Johnny Nevarez, Joe Edley and many others and had the support of the players. That led to me telling him (again) that our little group of players will do what has to be done to continue to hold events. He said that Jane Williams was in charge of the hotel search process and to talk to her. I said that to me the whole point of this position was to talk to HIM and then HE could tell HER. Plus, he does see her a tad more than me. I will follow up with them both, but I get the feeling that my proposal received a less than enthusiastic response. It's his company and he can do as he wishes, but to me, that is a very simple answer to an age-old problem.
    
    Someone had asked why we do not allow non-members to enter the National Championship. His eyes grew a tad larger and he said that then no one would have to be a member. I offered the solution to advertise the National Scrabble Open as just that - open to anyone with the entry fee $20 higher for non-members and that with their entry would come a year's membership - done.
    
    I brought up the ratings issue and told him that I felt that since I have taken this position that it would not be proper for me to chair a ratings committee, if a new one is to be created, though I would offer my services as mediator to move discussions along and help get to a quick, simple resolution. We left the meeting with each of us to think that one over and talk within the next two weeks.
    
    The last issue to come up in our 90 minute meeting was that of proper lines of communication from me to the members. I came up with the following:
    
    This will be my only post to our two Yahoo groups in the capacity of delegate. Neither are official NSA sites. So, I will avail myself of the NSA's online newsletter in which I will post an edited version of this report that will include my email address. I will respond to private email at ccree@earthlink.net. I will not respond to public email in these forums about issues other than my personal opinions about "regular" stuff just like you all do as I might miss one or more questions about issues and that omission could be construed in a negative way (oh really?).
    
    These are times when John and the NSA are more nervous than I have sensed in a while. The spate of interest that we had as a result of "Word Freak", "Word Wars", "Scrabbylon" and our broadcast championships feels like it is rapidly dissipating. Our membership seems to hover at about the same number. Board sales are off considerably and with that came a huge cut (approximately 40%) in the annual budget from Hasbro. Changes in thinking are in order. Push for membership is in order. Think about it. Talk to your representatives - give them some ideas. The best ideas will come from the players.
    
    Chris Cree
    
    Your Advisory Board:
    
    John D. Williams, Jr
    NSA Executive Director
    (631) 477-0033
    info@scrabble-assoc.com
    Joe Edley
    NSA Director of Clubs and Tournaments
    (631) 477-0033
    je@scrabble-assoc.com
    AB Members appointed January 1999:
    Robert M. Kahn
    Plantation, FL
    anagramz@aol.com
    AB Members appointed January 2003:
    Mike Baker
    Portland, OR
    mikebob@pacifier.com
    Lynn Cushman
    New York, NY
    fuzzmoz@aol.com
    Matt Hopkins
    Philadelphia, PA
    hopkinsmatthew@hotmail.com
    Lisa Kessler
    Toronto ON, Canada
    likes@primus.ca
    Cynthia Seales
    Stone Mountain, GA
    zky7@cdc.gov
    Randall Thomas
    Calgary AB, Canada
    byte.mine@shaw.ca
    Rick Wong
    San Jose, CA
    kablooey@yak.net
    AB Members appointed January 2004:
    Gregg Foster
    Manchester-by-the-Sea, MA (please provide email address)
    Susan Hoehn
    Minnesota (please provide email address)
    Mary Rhoades
    Texas mrhoades@comcast.net
    
• Jim Pate, 2/28/2006: Official corrections to the OWL2
  • Dear cgp members,
    
    The list below shows all of the official corrections to the OWL2 which becomes our official word source on March 1. The NSA has authorized me to communicate this information to the Yahoo groups to which I belong. At some point in the near future there should be a direct link from the NSA home page to this same list of corrections on the NSA site.
    
    Currently these corrections are shown near the bottom of a page on the NSA site at:
    
    http://www.scrabble-assoc.com/boards/dictionary/index.html
    
    I hope that everyone enjoys using the new OWL2. The Dictionary Committee worked hard to get this project completed, and I am very grateful to the members of that group and to all of the other NSA members and Scrabble crossword game players who assisted us in both large and small ways throughout this effort.
    
    Sincerely,
    Jim Pate
    Chair, NSA Dictionary Committee
    
    ---------------------
    additions:
    page 98 CRABAPPLE
    page 98 CRABAPPLES
    page 118 DEVELOPPES
    page 186 GODDAMNDEST
    page 279 MUNCHABLES
    page 485 VIREONINES
    
    deletions: page 98 CRABABBLE
    page 98 CRABABBLES
    page 186 GODAMNDEST
    page 491 WEAPONEERED
    ---------------------
    
    =====================
• Joe Edley, 2/21/2006: On moving forward with the ratings studies, and a backwards look
  • Okay, it's not pretty, but my job has never been defined by the Ratings program, and this past year I've never been busier with all sorts of issues that cut into other parts of my job.
    
    The Ratings Committee was formed to study our many issues with it. Originally, if I'm not mistaken, Dan Stock was made the leader (my intuitive assignment, which turned to be good for the group, and not so good for Dan---or was it?). Jeff Widergren, John Chew, Robert Parker, Steven Alexander and Jerry Lerman were the principal members for a long time. If I've forgotten someone, please let me know, one of you.
    
    I wasn't privy to all of the emails. There was a flurry of activity for quite a while. Perhaps up to two years or more. Robert Parker was working on his PHD thesis I believe, and his thesis was PRECISELY what we were looking for. It was on rating systems.
    
    After extensive research into the subject he came to believe, along with several others on the committee, that there was a very high corollation between a SCRABBLE player's game strength to three factors: number of wins, how much below your opponent's average score you are able to keep your opponent, and how much your raw score is (or was it spread, my memory fails me here).
    
    At the same time as he was making that determination, the others on the committee were coming to believe, or at least the group was locked into a no-win situation where the majority of members believed that any obvious changes to the current system (and as far as I can tell after reading every proposed change this includes every proposal made on CGP but two) would only be a temporary fix that would need fixing again down the road in the not-to-distant future.
    
    I can't say that I necessarily believe that's true, but that's what the committee seemed to think (please correct me if I'm wrong).
    
    However, they were all gung-ho to test Parker's theory. Okay. But in order to do this, we would need to collect scores and study the results. More: We would need to collect scores from +90% of all tourneys. Not just a few. Because the study of his theory demanded extensive corollation over time. And if games were lost, the data wouldn't necessarily be valid.
    
    Therefore, how to get the scores?
    
    Now, you haveto understand that getting electronic results from Directors is a recent phenomenon, relatively speaking. Sure, we introduced it several years ago, but it was slow getting most directors to return results in that format. Lot's of directors weren't comfortable with computers.
    
    At the same time, please understand, that my job was to HELP directors with their work load. I needed to help the less energetic directors with their setups, results, various rulings that needed to be decided, etc. NOT MAKE THEIR LIFE MORE DIFFICULT BY RECORDING SCORES. But luckily, because of various factors, there has been a strong growth in the number of directors willing to return electronic results. And this last year we made it mandatory, and that's been WONDERFUL! However, even with returning results electronically, to have to insist that the directors record all of the scores would invite so many mistakes that I knew it wasn't going to work unless we had a program that directors used to input at their tourneys and then press a button to do all the work to return to the NSA what we needed.
    
    Jeff Widergren was unwilling in the early years to give us his program. We couldn't afford to pay him, and so in comes two different people, both programmers, who shall be nameless, who at very different times agreed to write a program that our directors could use to run their tournaments. This is what I was waiting for. but in each case, after over a year for each of these eager beavers, they wussed out on us. However, they did it for the RIGHT REASONS. We weren't paying them, and they both had families to take care of and new businesses to ensure were successful. So, right there, several years were lost---at times when for a long time I was certain we would get our program.
    
    Then, finally, Jeff agreed to modify his program, JDW and he agreed on a modest price, and we thought the program would be ready in early 2005. (There's a lot missing from this account---like--why not use Fontes program or Chew's program---but in both of these cases, there were/are good reasons why we didn't want to go that route.---mainly it had to do with flexibility and ease of use for more and more less-educated directors---that's simplified and could be argued many ways, but I'm not going there...)
    
    Unfortunately, the program was NOT ready then. It is NOW, and with Chew-willing, he will get it on our website by this time next week, along with a Manual to show directors how to use it. All this year we've had a committee working on giving Jeff feedback in order to make the program even more user-friendly (among them: Rhoades, Sherman, Tiekert, Slivka, Green, Hoehn...). And then Chew has to co-ordinate getting the results from Jeff's program to collect the scores and process them. I still don't know exactly how that's going to be done. Perhaps Jeff and Chew can clear that up for us. Because right now when a director sends me the results, I get the non-score version. Chew is supposed to get the score version. At least that's my intention. And, guys, if that's not happening, then we need to fix that.
    
    So, if we can get more and more directors to start to use TourneyMan (and by the way, I urge directors to join nsa-td@yahoogroups. com to get help THERE with the program from Jeff and others who've used it), then we can start to study the results of score and spread. but the results won't be finished for at least a couple of years at least. To join, send a message to nsa-td-subscribe@yahoogroups.com and also one to Sherrie at saint@pobox.com. This bulletin board we're opening up to ALL directors NOW. You don't have to be a tourney director to join.
    
    Okay, now to the 2nd suggestion that was proposed. Slowly, as time passed, the Ratings Committee members left the group. Dan, who was SO GOOD at guiding the committee, was taking too much time from his relationship, and it suffered. Although ultimately, I understand he's a much happier guy these days! Both Jerry Lerman and Jeff quit as well. Chew has been so busy with so many opther projects that he doesn't even look up when anything's discussed. Only Stenen Alexander is left.
    
    Steven and I have had a discussion, briefly, on the potential of the Glicko system, mentioned here on CGP I say, let's explore it. Having two numbers represent each of our ratings makes much more sense than just one. A rating of 1800, with a second rating of 50 (just a broad example) would indicate that the player is rated 1800 and fluctuates to the degree of 50, whatever that might mean----but that would be higher than someone rated 1800 with a fluctuation number of 100 (my guess is that it would be higher---but we have to study the system to define what higher-lower means). However, right now, with only one member left, I have left it to Steven to interview and take on the task of educating and preparing future Ratings Committee members. It is a daunting task because there is a steep learning curve (right Steven?). and Steven is a relatively new family-man and a very busy guy.
    
    I think if any mathematicians out there want to help out, I suggest you email Steven Alexander and give him your qualifications. He will likely point you in certain directions to read up on a lot of material and ask you to report back. If you're ready for the nitty-gritty, then we can proceed even without scores.
    
    Note on using scores: The conception for using scores in the ratings would be to use only the most recent games. Perhaps the last 100-200 games you've played. This would to a certain extent (once you've played 100-200 games) stabilize your rating such that any blip of a big score or loss won't hurt your rating. In the end, from what I read the naysayers are simply overreacting to the concept without realizing the full potential and benefits. Marlon, listening? Unless you know the exact formula, you're just naysaying to the wind. Hey, I'm going to be a big critic of this system if there is any chance that playing for score is more important than winning, so let that be known, okay? Let the study be made public and let's have at it at that point. What we need are concrete examples and concrete criticisms, not naysaying without seeing what would actually happen. If we had data, we could discuss it more properly with a more productive dialogue. Case in point: It's ALWAYS going to be more important to WIN rather than save spread, once you've played your first 100 games. Okay, maybe your rating would theoretically change with fewer than that many games, but guess what? We can build it into the system that everyone can have an average result for their last hundred games right at the start. So that there would be no unduly heavy-loaded ratings changes at the start. By doing that we can address and meet the complaints of the most ardent against the system. But that's just one example. it needs more studying.....
    
    But first, lets' get some highly-experienced math folks to join the discussion and add weight to our results and interpretations.
    
    Who's game for that?
    
    Joe Edley
• Joe Edley, 2/16/2006: On a very positive note
  • THought many of you might be interested in how I'm reacting to the new situation.
    
    I'll be working approximately 18 hours a week on NSA related work beginning March 1. From home.
    
    Except for the salary cut it's practically ALL good news for me. Not so for everyone, but this should be a wake up call for our more doubting Thomas'es.
    
    I will be continuing to do the puzzles for the newsletter, tournament ratings, results, and answer questions that the current NSA can't put on an FAQ or answer themselves. I'll continue to answer my email, but I WON'T be scheduling or posting to the Internet tournaments anymore. I will train Sara to do that from March 1 on. She will also be taking the time to review the Directors Tests and sanction the new directors.
    
    I will continue to be on the Rules Committee---in fact I will be taking on the task of reviewing the rules issues brought up over the last few years, running them by the Rules Committee and putting lots of resolutions on a new part of the website---a Director's Guide. So, it will slowly gain in weight in cyberspace over the course of the year as we refine our interpretations of the rules even if we don't actually add any more new rules.
    
    The newsletter will eventually be put online. While some of you might scoff, if you can read this, you should be ecstatic! We can do so much more with the unlimited amount of cyberspace we have.
    
    The positives for me are HUGE: I don't have to study while driving anymore. I can actually look at my cards for more than a fraction of a second. :-)) Plus I'll save about $20-$30 a week on gas and wear and tear on my car.
    
    I immediately have 3 ideas for non-SCRABBLE books (but two are related to words) that I will be fleshing out and proposing to my agent. She's already said she likes two of them and I haven't shown her the 3rd yet.
    
    I'm going to look into teaching our game in a variety of venues around the NYC area. Mostly for beginners, but if there is enough demand for an intermediate course (think >800, <1200 ratings), that can be arranged as well. And I'll have time to put together materials to teach prospective teachers how to teach our game. I've been wanting to have the time to do that for a long time.
    Plus, I've had a couple of really good games sitting around my house that I created years ago, and a ton of puzzles that I want to have time to get out to the public, perhaps via a website. I just need to hook up with a couple of programmers who are interested in joining my venture for a website for "brainy puzzles and games." That's been my true love since I was 13 years old. Any professional programmers out in CGP land interested? I've already had a couple of bites from a couple of programmers I've already talked to. But I may need more. My head is full of puzzle ideas. The success of Sudoku has given me the feeling that the time is right for my kind of puzzles to be popular. You may not know what those kinds of puzzles are, and you might not care, but for those who like to "think ahead" or know what that's like in a puzzle (not the kind I do in the SN), you might want to stay in touch. As soon as I can get a website up and running I'll probably put some of them up for grabs.
    
    Anyway, I'm not going to stop helping run the NSA, but I will be devoting more time to other pursuits. Oh, and Laura and I have just gotten word that we "got" the house we were looking at, though we haven't signed any contract yet. It's in Port Jeff, and I'd guess we'll be there for at least another 7 years, til at least Amber graduates HS. So, while I have the challenge to increase my income in the coming months, I've the commitment, good health (jogging and tai chi don't hurt) and energy and positive attitude to look forward to this exciting prospect.
    
    See y'all in Dallas next month.
    
    I'll be writing another email on the Ratings System later over the weekend. Kind of a history of sorts and a sight to the future. There has been a steady progression toward a new system, but I understand why it hasn't looked that way, because of several setbacks we've had. But while it may look to any reasonable observer that nothing's being done, that's not the case. I'd like a new system as much as anyone here on CGP. In case you haven't noticed, it affects me just like anyone else. I've just been lucky in the last couple of years and not dropped off the high end yet. That may change next month, who knows?
    
    Joe Edley
• John D. Williams, 2/16/2006: NSA: IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT
  • To all members of the SCRABBLE community:
    
    We have had several discussions and meetings with Hasbro senior executives these past few weeks regarding the NSA and future activities and have a number of things to share.
    
    As I am sure many of you know from the news, this is a very tough time for many major corporations in many industries - the toy and game business among them. Hasbro has recently reorganized and streamlined their organization and are asking us to do the same. The games portion of Hasbro's business is off in general and SCRABBLE game sales are down significantly as well. (MONOPOLY and TRIVIA PURSUIT are down as much). As a result, there will be very substantial cuts in our funding from them for 2006, somewhere between 30 and 40% of our total budget. Hasbro has assured us that more money could be restored for 2007 should the business climate change.
    
    With that in mind, starting March 1st there will be these significant changes:
    
    #1 Joe Edley will be leaving the NSA offices and working on a consulting basis. He will still be very actively involved in many NSA projects, both routine and new. He will remain on the Advisory Board and the Rules Committee, be an active contributor to the revamped SCRABBLE NEWS and continue as liaison to the players. We will miss Joe terribly on a day-to-day basis. More on this to follow.
    
    #2 Another change will be the end of our terrific program with ProLiteracy Worldwide. We have worked with Literacy Volunteers of America (LVA) and ProLit affiliates for over 10 years and are sad to part ways. Not only was it a great way for them to do some serious fundraising, but selfishly, it was very rewarding for all of us here at the NSA. Our staff will continue to do some work on a volunteer basis for this cause and are starting with word judging at a large ProLit event on Long Island in March.
    
    #3 The NSA can no longer provide prize packages for local NSA sanctioned tournaments. We are looking into setting up a system with NSA Word Gear where Directors holding events could get discounts by entering a special code at checkout. Watch for something around April.
    
    #4 Our US SCRABBLE Open budget, as well as that for our School Championship, are both cut, but we are in serious meetings here about how not to compromise the best part of those events: playing SCRABBLE and socializing. The total prize money for now will remain the same although there may be some slight changes in the allocation.
    
    #5 Retroactive to 1/1/2006 basic NSA and School Budgets are cut as well. We have already moved our school news online as of January, featuring a monthly edition rather than a quarterly one. Oddly enough, this will save a tremendous amount right there, and we will have more eyes to share it. We've already had a great response from teachers, parents and students.
    
    #6 The NSA offices will be officially closed on Wednesdays.
    
    #7 Other changes are in the works. We are in the midst of updating the NSA website as well and hope to share some exciting new features midyear.
    
    #8 We are also in the process of converting the SCRABBLE NEWS to an online publication by the end of the year. The good news is that it will become a monthly publication with much more timely information in regards to announcements, tournament results and the like. We will also be looking for volunteer contributors to the publications. There will also be many other new features. A printed, mailed version may still be available to those members who prefer it, but it will probably be a little more expensive and will have less material as the online SCRABBLE NEWS will have much more space. We're still working on this.Details to follow.
    
    #9 I will be doing a series of online chats during the course of the year. NSA members will be able to write log on and "watch" the discussion as well as ask questions. The first one will be announced within the next couple of weeks.
    
    The good news is that the U.S. SCRABBLE OPEN is on solid ground for this year. The National School SCRABBLE Championship, while somewhat modified, is ready to go for April. We even have the mandate to do a pilot college program. In addition, as announced earlier, we are working hard to find additional sources of revenue. This takes time, though. So be patient. We'll report on progress in this area.
    
    The staff of the NSA is all set to tighten our belts and work hard to keep our organization vibrant and growing and, with your help, we'll accomplish that and more. We realize there are many unanswered questions - for all of us. But we'll keep you posted in all areas as we go along.
    
    Sincerely,
    
    John
    --
    John D Williams, Jr, Executive Director
    National SCRABBLE Association
    

Other interesting posts

• Michael Thelen, 4/18/2006: 2006 Addendum Lists for 2004 Wordbook
  • Mike Baron and I have created a printable 4-page document containing updates for The Complete Wordbook for Game Players.  Actually, it's 4 one-page documents, because I haven't found a good way to merge PDF files.  Anyway, this document is available on the Utah Scrabble web site, here:
    
    http://utahscrabble.com/wordlists.shtml
    
    You'll find the pages listed under the section labeled "OWL2 Addenda to The Complete Wordbook for Game Players by Mike Baron".  The document contains OWL2 updates for several Wordbook sections, including:
    
    - Two-Letter Words and Their Hooks
    - Three-Letter Words
    - Four-Letter Words
    - Words With 70+% Vowels
    - Multiple I- and U-Dumps
    - Six-Letter Words with Four Vowels
    - Eight-Letter Words with Five Vowels
    - The JQXZ Non-Bingo Word List
    - Short Words That Do Not Take S-Endings
    - Short Words That Take Surprise S-Endings
    - The High Fives
    - Type I Sevens by Bingo Stem
    - Type I Eights by Bingo Stem
    - Type II Sevens
    - Type II Eights
    - Type III Sevens
    - Type III Eights
    - Eights From Seven-Letter Bingo Stems
    - Common Word Endings (-ING/S, -LIKE, -ABLE)
    - Five-Letter Words
    - Six-Letter Words
    
    We hope you find these lists useful.  Feel free to download them and distribute them far and wide!
    
    --
    Michael W Thelen
    
• Scott Smith, 3/2/2006: ISC (and the TPG group)
  • As I believe I am the only person actively checking for new requests to join the TPG group let me throw out a few tips and a couple caveats.
    
    1) The TPG (Tournament Players Group) is an ISC group for NSA members only.
    
    2) To join the TPG: type "gjoin TPG YourName YourCurrentNSARating" for example gjoin TPG John Doe 1471
    
    3) If you don't submit the information exactly as it is written above I will most likely just reject it without bothering to look if your are actually a member. I get a ridiculous number of requests to join from non-NSA members and my first level of filtering is did you submit the request correctly.
    
    4) I have to manually approve or reject all requests. So depending on how often I'm on ISC it may take a few days to get approved. Patience is a virtue.
    
    5) Annoyance #1 The system doesn't automatically send you a message when I  approve your request. The only way to truly tell you were accepted is to type "finger YourUsername" and at the bottom of that output it will tell you what groups you are in. Conversely if you "finger SomeOtherUserName" you can see if they belong to TPG.
    
    6) I think this is important. There is a chat channel set up for the TPG group, it is channel 120. You do not get joined to this channel automatically you must join it yourself by typing "channel +120". To talk on this channel after you join it type "tell 120 AndYourMessage". I think this is the best way to arrange games with other NSA members. But it is currently used by almost no one. Why is it the best way? See point 8.
    
    7) To request a game with only other TPG members. Type "gseek TPG" This will  send a request to all TPG players who aren't playing and meet your match criteria.
    
    8) Annoyance #2: There are a few problems with gseek that I've never been able to get carol to fix. The biiggest is that the request only goes to people not playing and who a) meet your match criteria and b) you match their match criteria. Why is this a problem? Well lets say 40 TPG members are online when you send your gseek. Now lets say 20 are currently playing. So those 20 will not see your request. Now lets say you are rated 1450 on ISC. If your minimum rating requirement is set to 1400 no players under 1400 will see your request. Now lets say all the players over 1500 have their minimum set to 1500. None of these players will see your request. Which means the only people seeing your request are TPG members who not currently in game, and whose rating is between 1400 and 1500. Which may only be 2 or 3 people. This gives you a low probability of finding a game this way.
    
    9) This is why I think using channel 120 is the best way to find NSA players to play. But it will only work if a) Most NSA players on ISC join TPG. b) All members of TPG turn on channel 120. c) More people use the channel to look for games with NSA players.
    
    Ok this is gotten really long winded and I apologize but I wanted to get the info out to people.
    
    Scott Smith
    Director Club #564 Erie, PA
    zedo on ISC
    Operator of TPG group
• Seth Lipkin, 2/4/2006: cross-tables.com - Tournament searching, finally
  • That Australian site linked earlier today on CGP put my tournament searching to shame, so you can now find past tournaments by name / year / location on cross-tables.com:
    
    http://www.cross-tables.com/tourneys.php
    
    On a given player's page, tourneys can now be sorted in reverse chronological order. Click the black arrow next to 'date' to switch back and forth.
    
    In addition, when you're looking at a particular player's page, you can search for a different player in the new control at the top right.
    
    Thanks to Joey Mallick and Rebecca Soble for the great suggestions.
    
    --
    Seth Lipkin