GE is not Entertainment Value

[luvs me sum mello!]

You're trying to tweak a flawed system. It needs an overhaul. Two suggestions in no particular order.

Suggestion 1:

Get rid of the on-field judges. If a visual or sound can't make it off the field it shouldn't be reflected in the scores. I really don't care what the show looks or sounds like from the back hash. Small shows should be judged from the box or top of the stands. Big shows should be judged from various elevations in the stadium.

This will force corps to write in such a way that everything has to project to the audience. It will allow the drum lines to play some stuff that will project to the stands and discard some stuff that is just there to build points with the guy standing five feet in front of them. It will allow the brass a little more leeway to shove some more air through the horns without a guy standing there with his head in their bell. It's not like the corps will start overblowing everything if there isn't a judge in their face. Overblowing becomes counterproductive at a certain point because the intonation goes to crap and that makes the horn line sound quieter.

I don't want to see the drum line march up and down the 50 yard line. I just want the big brass sound back. Star 93 was as artsy fartsy as it gets but they could peal paint with that beautiful brass line.

Suggestion 2:

Bring back the G-bugles. It isn't just a matter of them being louder. They had a different sound that made the corps different from your run of the mill marching band. Compare 88 Phantom Regiment to 08 Phantom Regiment. The brass sounds totally different. Compare the 2010 Madison Scouts to the 88 or 95 Madison scouts and you will find the same thing. You can't change the instruments the musicians play and then try to pretend that they sound the same. Of course they won't sound the same. It is absurd on its face. It's like if you had a drum and fife corps and replaced the fifes with flutes and then said its the same thing, nobody will notice.

I believe I speak for the audience with this comment.

Counter 1: The reasons you listed are not, at all, the reasons for on-field judges.

Counter 2: Ya ya ya, G Bugles are the Pwnz. You're right. 80's brass had a totally different sound. They sounded like a warm up room at middle school region auditions. You know the sound. When all day 7th grade kids decide to "out play" everyone else in the room by throwing their lips through their horns. It sounds like garbage, but It sure is Loooud!!!!1! Case in point - PR baritone soloist in 89. I expect my 3rd band kids to play with better tone then that.

So no...you speak for your jaded generation, not "the audience."

[Michael Boo]

What criteria would you propose for evaluating EV?

It's very simple. I would be the lone person to be allowed to give a score for this. I promise to call it exactly and fairly, as if God were to fill out the score sheet. It's so obvious to me this is the way it should be done, I'm shocked I'm the first one to say it publicly.

Of course, if there are 20,000 people in the stadium, 19,999 will have a different opinion than me and they will also wonder what others are missing when they don't view what entertainment value as they do. And that's the way it should be. Each of us perceives entertainment value according to our own criteria.

But I'm still the only one to get a vote.

[luvs me sum mello!]

It's very simple. I would be the lone person to be allowed to give a score for this. I promise to call it exactly and fairly, as if God were to fill out the score sheet. It's so obvious to me this is the way it should be done, I'm shocked I'm the first one to say it publicly.

Of course, if there are 20,000 people in the stadium, 19,999 will have a different opinion than me and they will also wonder what others are missing when they don't view what entertainment value as they do. And that's the way it should be. Each of us perceives entertainment value according to our own criteria.

But I'm still the only one to get a vote.

Makes sense to me.

[vferrera]

It's very simple. I would be the lone person to be allowed to give a score for this. I promise to call it exactly and fairly, as if God were to fill out the score sheet. It's so obvious to me this is the way it should be done, I'm shocked I'm the first one to say it publicly.

Of course, if there are 20,000 people in the stadium, 19,999 will have a different opinion than me and they will also wonder what others are missing when they don't view what entertainment value as they do. And that's the way it should be. Each of us perceives Effect according to our own criteria.

But I'm still the only one to get a vote.

fixed.

Edited August 10, 2010 by vferrera

[Michael Boo]

Makes sense to me.

And that is why, when I'm declared President of the World, you will be my Vice President.

[vferrera]

And that is why, when I'm declared President of the World of Warcraft, you will be my Vice President.

fixed again.

[Michael Boo]

fixed.

No, it wasn't fixed because it wasn't broken. I perceive what is entertaining according to my own criteria, and I suspect lots of others do as well. Perhaps I should have said that each of us perceives General Effect and entertainment value according to our own criteria, realizing that for many, they are inseparable.

But look who I'm debating with; someone with whom I debated Jung's concept of collective unconsciousness and Skinner's operant conditioning while we both marched in The Cavaliers.

[Wadep66]

DCI has judging measuring performance and effect just like figure skating. Part of it is artistic merit and part of it is technical merit. Would you suggest the crowd get to vote on which skater is better?

The GE caption is so subjective because it so widely encompasses artistic value, emotion, etc and it's really hard to define exactly how to measure that. If I really think about it on those terms I'm actually surprised the scores are as consistent as they are in GE. It will ALWAYS be controversial because somehow you have to remove bias about individual tastes (i.e. all those people on here who don't care for a certain high-scoring show) and still award based on content. Since we all have biases and aren't judging there will always be those that say "I don't see how they're scoring that in GE". I do it!

If the emotional, intellectual, etc. is REALLY in the show, then the crowd really should be connecting with it in those same ways so in that way the audience is the target of what good GE should be representing.

I'm sure as many times as the adjudication has changed over the years, no matter how it is done, there will always be those who are displeased, including the corps directors who came up with it in the first place. That's just kinda how life is I guess.

[Wadep66]

Isn't this why the G7 proposed to Drop GE to 30 pts, Music stays at 30, Visual stays at 30, and 10 pts for Fan Voting via text at the show site?

Sure 10 pts for fan voting "could" be a popularity contest based on geography, but more often than not .... it's because the corps knocked their socks off that they would earn the vote.

For all the things I disliked about the leaked proposal ........... this notion, I liked.

That will work really well until the geek patrol figures out a way to do some whacked=out mass voting to unfairly give one corps points over another. Isn't this why the voting for the Murfreesboro show performance order was stopped? Somebody figured out how to trick the system into thinking he was several thousand different people and ruined what could have been a way for the intent of what you mention above to have some bearing on the outcome.

Edited August 10, 2010 by Wadep66

[DarrenE]

They sounded like a warm up room at middle school region auditions. You know the sound. When all day 7th grade kids decide to "out play" everyone else in the room by throwing their lips through their horns. It sounds like garbage, but It sure is Loooud!!!!1! Case in point - PR baritone soloist in 89. I expect my 3rd band kids to play with better tone then that.

And I'm accused of trolling?

If you're claiming your middle school band is better than the 89 Phantom Regiment I'm going to need some proof of that. Why aren't you the director of one of the top corps if that is true?