Re: ICT Comments

R. Robert Hentzel <*topquark_at_rhentzel.yahoo.invalid*> · Wed, 16 Apr 2003 21:32:47 -0000

> A lot of people at the tournament agreed with me about the 
questions, 
> but some of them seem resigned to the problem.  (I think that's why 
> no one else has posted a complaint yet.)  Others even thought that 
> NAQT had written a lot of bad questions intentionally: I had 
> conversations with several people who thought that NAQT 
intentionally 
> began tossups with bad clues to increase the number of powers and 
> make the game more "exciting."  I personally think that a wide 
> variety of people work for NAQT, ranging from CBI retreads to 
> competent and dedicated (but not outstanding) players to a handful 
of 
> talented and capable writers and editors.  Unfortunately, the least 
> competent people have a really big impact on the company's final 
> product, and NAQT's highest priority has never been to produce a 
> fantastic ICT.

naqtrauma --

I must take exception to your implicit claim to know NAQT's 
priorities; NAQT considers its premier tournaments to be the ICT (at 
the collegiate level) and the HS NCT (at the high school level) and 
invests an extraordinary amount of time trying to make those events 
live up to our expectations, certainly more than is put into any 
other project during the year.

The ICT is a consistent money-loser and time-sink for NAQT; even 
considering every possible practice question sale, new team 
formation, or IM sale that could possibly be linked to its existence, 
it is among the least financially worthwhile things that we do.  It 
also generates more complaints, ridicule, and personal attacks than 
anything else that we do--we certainly aren't doing it out of a sense 
of personal aggrandizement or with expectations of basking in warm 
fuzzies for the rest of each April.

NAQT strives to put on a first-class tournament with top-notch 
questions, superb staff, and everything else that should go along 
with an event catering to teams that have invested thousands of 
dollars in travel and, more importantly, hundreds of hours practicing 
and preparing for the event.

We run the ICT out of a love of the game and look forward to it every 
year, in spite of whatever professional critiques and personal 
insults are posted in its aftermath.  My rough calculation is that 
NAQT members invested roughly 925 hours writing, editing, 
playtesting, and doing logistics for the ICT, the sole goal of which 
was to run a tournament that people would enjoy, would feel was a 
worthy finale to their season (or playing career), and would seek to 
emulate at their own events.

I respect your right to be disappointed with the outcome, or even to 
regard it as fatally flawed (and to let us know exactly how), but it 
*has* historically been our most important priority to run the 
finest, fairest, most competitive, and most exciting championships in 
the world of quiz bowl.

-- R. Robert Hentzel
President and Chief Technical Officer,
National Academic Quiz Tournaments, LLC