I'm inclined to agree more with Matt than Jer
here. One of the reasons CBI can put on the show it
does is because it's dinky -- twelve teams in R4, for
example, 8 in R14. I forget the number there was at NAQT
Mid-Atlantic, but I remember it being in the neighborhood of
thirty -- meaning JHU had to *find* fifteen rooms and
thirty staffers with a clue (important aside -- of the
staff you saw at CBI, how many were actually qualified
to moderate matches?), get 15 buzzers together, and
run the whole thing in such a way that everyone got a
decent number of rounds, and run it between Saturday
evening and morning. If CBI put half the effort into
steak that they did into sizzle, they'd have a decent
tournament on their hands. Do invitational tournaments, or
do NAQT and ACF, need to charge their entire field
more money so that only those who want to can eat
preprocessed food in a ballroom instead of a fast-food chain?
QB socialization has handled and will handle itself;
I personally the instant JCV is packed up am taking
the Metro to a karaoke bar in Arlington and anyone
who wants to join me can.
Edmund