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Super Challenge discussion thread 2014

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Solfrid Cristin
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Norway
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 Message 1 of 432
18 January 2014 at 3:35pm | IP Logged 
This is the thread to discuss adjustments to the Super Challenge rules before we start again in May 2014.

The rules for the Challenge which has just finished is in the link below, and when the time comes I will adjust
them.

SUPER
CHALLENGE TOTSL INFO REFERENCE THREAD 2013


I want to make this round simpler, as there were way too many options this time round.

The first point is that it will not be possible to sign up for half Super Challenges, only full Super Challenges. I
want this to be simpler and closer to my original idea this time. However, you may still be named as the
winner of half a challenge when we finish. If you find that confusing, I will explain.

1. Everyone signs up for a Super Challenge, whether their personal plan is to finish a full one or not. And
when we get to the end of the year, those who fulfill the requirements for a full SC will be named winners of a
full SC, those who fulfill the requirements for a half one, will be named winners of that, and we may even
consider 1\4 of a challenge. The results at the end of the year will decide. You could even do a double Super
Challenge should you so wish, but everyone registers for a regular Challenge in one or more languages. The
point of the Challenge is to be motivated to do as much as possible - so why limit yourself to 50 films when
you might have done 70? If you get demotivated by a goal that seems unreachable, you are perfectly free to
decide, and to state publicly that your plan is to do only half a challenge.

2. I like the idea of a star system, so if Surrealix can fix a star for every 1/4 of a challenge that people
complete that would be great.

3. Only reading and watching films are necessary for the challenge, but if it is ok. for Surrealix to keep the
columns for speaking and writing that may be kept as an optional.

4. All levels from A1to C2 may compete with the same amounts of films and book, but if Surrealix can add a
column for people to note their starting level, that would be great. Doing half a challenge in Chinese starting
from A1 is not quite the same as half a challenge in French starting from C1.

This much is clear. Then comes the things we need to discuss, the main one thing what one full Super
Challenge should be.

I see three different models, given that a lot of people has mentioned that the reading part was a lot harder to
fill.

A) We keep the current requirements 100 films and a 100 books/10000 pages.

B) We keep the 100 books but we double the amounts of films (100 books, 200 films)

C) We keep the amount of films but half the amount of books ((100 films, 50 books).

Personally I like the simplicity of the equal numbers - hence option -A) - but I am open to your input on this
one. I do not want the Challenge to be almost impossible to do.

What are your thoughts, and which points have I forgotten to ask about, that we still need to decide on?

Let the discussion commence:-)


Edited by Solfrid Cristin on 18 January 2014 at 3:58pm

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emk
Diglot
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United States
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 Message 2 of 432
18 January 2014 at 4:22pm | IP Logged 
Great ideas, Solfrid! Sorry to be so slow responding to your PM; I've been taking care of sick kids this week and trying not to fall to far behind on my French statistics course.

Personally, I would really like either (B) or (C). I know, the numbers aren't as pretty! :-) But listening is super, super important, and it's too easy to neglect it while wrestling with all those books. I know I did a bit. So I want to encourage listening more, because listening rules.

So here are two ways we might do it:

(b) 100 "books", 200 "films", with quarter, half and full Super Challenges

Basically, what we did last time, but double the films. This is definitely doable when learning a related languageā€”I know Patrick did 100/300, and I had completed 50/100 by the half way point, after which I stopped counting films.

(c) 50 "books", 100 "films", with half, full and double Super Challenges

But you know, I totally think it would be cool if more people could finish a challenge. So we could drop down to 50/100 as the basic challenge, but keep 100/200 as option for those of us who are extremely crazy. ;-)

But if we don't want the double version, then we should go for 100/200 as the Challenge. I really want 100/200 to appear somewhere, because I'm a bit nuts that way.

Anyway, once we decide on the rules for this year's challenge, I'll start handing out pretty blue "ribbons" for the 2012/2013 challenge. These will appear under your name on every post, just like the TAC ribbons you see on Solfrid's posts.
9 persons have voted this message useful



daegga
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Austria
lang-8.com/553301
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 Message 3 of 432
18 January 2014 at 4:23pm | IP Logged 
Option C seems most reasonable to me.
Doing the math, you'd need to spend 15 minutes on films and read 8.33 pages (~10-20min)
per day to complete the challenge in 20 months, that should be doable.
3 persons have voted this message useful



patrickwilken
Senior Member
Germany
radiant-flux.net
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 Message 4 of 432
18 January 2014 at 4:27pm | IP Logged 
Solfrid Cristin wrote:

A) We keep the current requirements 100 films and a 100 books/10000 pages.

B) We keep the 100 books but we double the amounts of films (100 books, 200 films)

C) We keep the amount of films but half the amount of books ((100 films, 50 books).


Option A & B are 16 pages/day.
Option C is only 8 pages/day.

Personally I don't think it would be Super Challenge at 8 pages/day, so I would prefer options A or B.

In terms of films - 100 films is simply not enough over 20 months.

If you assume people read 20pages/hour, then 10000 pages will take 500 hours of reading. 300 films (assuming 90mins/film) is 450 hours of viewing.

Of course we don't need to keep the sections of the challenge equally hard in terms of time, but I would go for option B to allow participants to keep counting films they see towards the challenge.

Solfrid Cristin wrote:

Personally I like the simplicity of the equal numbers - hence option -A) - but I am open to your input on this
one. I do not want the Challenge to be almost impossible to do.


I like the simplicity too, but a book isn't 100 pages long, so it's really not equal anyway. The average length of the books I read for the SC was 461 pages (that was mostly Harry Potter and the like).

This actually makes sense as the average length of a book is about 100000 words, which at 250 words/page is 400 pages: http://storytime.booklamp.org/2012/03/19/how-long-is-the-ave rage-book-a-concrete-answer-to-a-longstanding-writing-faq/

So if you want to keep simplicity, why not redefine a book to be 50 pages long (no more crazy than 100 pages) and then have a 200 book, 200 movie challenge?

Or if you want something closer to reality have a 25 book/250 movie challenge (10000 pages) or 20 book/200 movie (8000 pages) challenge or something like that?



Edited by patrickwilken on 18 January 2014 at 5:31pm

1 person has voted this message useful



Serpent
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Russian Federation
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 Message 5 of 432
18 January 2014 at 5:01pm | IP Logged 
Or 100 books, 100 movies. After the adjustment for the difficulty of reading, even more people will want to do more than one language (although with more reasonable goals than in the beginning of the previous challenge). No need to discourage that.

If you ask me, 16 pages a day doesn't sound any more epic than 8 pages a day. It's the "keep that up for 20 months" part that makes it challenging, and we know it's not so linear anyway. Sometimes 5 pages a day feel like an achievement, like in the beginning or when you're busy. While at the end of the challenge 50-100 pages a day should be doable.

No matter how exactly we word it wrt books, seems like emk's idea for a star for 50 "movies" or 2500 pages is the best so far. I also think it would be great to count 4 stars as a completed challenge, no matter how you combine them.

As for being forced to "aim for the stars"... my main issue here is that you'll be shown discouraging stats all the time. Like having to read 4 books per week, when you've read only 4 total so far (and this gets worse and worse as the challenge nears its end - during the last week it said I had to read 500 pages a day in Croatian :S). But this can be resolved by always showing the "recommended pace" for reaching the next star within 6 month or before the end of the challenge, whichever happens first.

Edited by Serpent on 18 January 2014 at 5:08pm

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patrickwilken
Senior Member
Germany
radiant-flux.net
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 Message 6 of 432
18 January 2014 at 5:08pm | IP Logged 
Serpent wrote:
Or 100 books, 100 movies. After the adjustment for the difficulty of reading, even more people will want to do more than one language (although with more reasonable goals than in the beginning of the previous challenge). No need to discourage that.


I have no problem with a 4000 page challenge or whatever, and actually it would be nice if the challenge was more doable for people, so long as EMK says there is the chance for some crazy people to aim for the double-gold prize. :)

Assuming you count a book as 400 pages, then you could have:

10 book/100 movie SC
20 book/200 movie double-SC
30 book/300 movie triple-SC
etc

Edited by patrickwilken on 18 January 2014 at 5:16pm

2 persons have voted this message useful



Serpent
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serpent-849.livejour
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 Message 7 of 432
18 January 2014 at 5:16pm | IP Logged 
Haha I meant that if we change a book from 100 to 50 pages, we can as well keep the original 100 books, 100 movies challenge :)
1 person has voted this message useful



patrickwilken
Senior Member
Germany
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 Message 8 of 432
18 January 2014 at 5:23pm | IP Logged 
Serpent wrote:
Haha I meant that if we change a book from 100 to 50 pages, we can as well keep the original 100 books, 100 movies challenge :)


Sorry. :)

But if do more realistically call a book 400 pages, then we get these nice 5/50, 10/100, 20/200, 30/300 challenges.

I would like to do a 20/200 challenge or even 30/300 or 40/400, and it would be nice to have the 10/100, which is actually less reading that the half-SC from last year (4000 vs 5000 words).

Edited by patrickwilken on 18 January 2014 at 5:27pm



1 person has voted this message useful



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