Kelly asks why the NAQT distribution is secret. My answer is unofficial -- my own, not the company's. First, it's only "sort of" secret. It can't really be a top secret thing, because anybody who cares to can pretty much plot our distribution just by looking at some of our sets -- every set we've ever produced remains available. With some caveats: the distribution for our collegiate sets (SCT and ICT) differs a little from those of our high school/novice sets (IS series), and both differ in some ways from our mix for Intramural packets. Also, NAQT's been doing this since 1996, and--surprise--we have altered our distribution quotas in certain ways over that time, as experience has suggested to us. And that, in my opinion, suggests the single most compelling reason for us not to chisel a precise recipe, at least at the more detailed levels, in stone somewhere public. When our recipe is an internal matter -- even though generally transparent to anyone who really wants to analyze our sets -- we are much freer to nudge categories up or down a little as our growing experience (or player feedback) suggests, without having to go through a round of public debate about it. Though created out of and for the quizbowl community circuit, we *are* a private partnership, not a public trust, and wish to make our own judgments about these things without tying our hands. There are NAQT quotas, minimums and maximums, for all sorts of sub-categories within our major categories. The sub-categories--both their percentages and their very definitions--are more prone to change than are the numbers for the mega-categories, and I think we have no real interest in telling the world how we manage that. As Bill pointed out, we are after all in business competition with other for-profit question-writing companies. What our general mix is for the mega-categories, however, it seems to me is rather pointless to try to keep secret, as it's pretty transparent to anyone who wants to look hard at a couple of our sets. I think it makes more sense readily to describe that broad outline by way of *advertising* than to act as though that's a dark secret we fear you'll learn. :) How to define where certain things go can remain murky, but anyone who wants to look can freely determine that for our most recent collegiate sets, with 560 total tossups, History, Literature (including Mythology), and Science are each going to get the same number, a little over a hundred each; Geography, Fine Arts, Current Events, and Popular Culture (including all film, old and new) will be at or slightly over 40 each; Social Science and Philosophy/Theology will total collectively in the mid-30s, and Sports and General Knowledge both in the low 20s. Bonuses would be much the same. More precise breakdowns within those categories I think we have no interest in posting, but the evidence for you to draw your own conclusions is out there in the packets themselves.
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