Science Olympiad 2013-2014

[chalker]

Official rules are released late in the year, but last year, Solon had a PDF file of likely rules for each event, as well as other schools. How trustworthy do you think these rules are?

When do other schools receive a Pdf of likely rules for each event? Why aren't they posted for everyone to review?

In the past, rules have only been provided via a printed manual. We historically haven't generally released electronic versions in PDF or via any other format or platform.......I can also pretty much assure you that PDF versions will never be publicly released. There are 2 primary reasons for this:

1. We need to make sure everyone has the current version of the rules. There are various drafts that get circulated around internally, and if they were to be widely released we'd encounter tons of issues with people showing up at competitions using old or wrong versions of the rules.

2. The sale of the manuals is one of the few revenue streams for the SO organization. The vast majority of us involved with SO do it on a volunteer basis, but there are certain expenses that are unavoidable in any large endeavor like this. Sales of the printed manuals help pay for those expenses, and if we made them electronically available they would be widely copied, reducing the overall revenue.

[Skink]

PDF copies of the rules have circulated in the past early on in the season, though I don't know at what level of SO this started (higher than I, obviously, because I didn't make those scans). And I'm not just talking the barebones event supervisor copies that lack the cute clip art in the printed manuals; they were identical to the printed versions. I haven't seen this for several seasons now, so it's conceivable that practice has since been stomped out.

[Beastybob12345]

The forums are all updated events right?

[hexagonaria]

The forums are all updated events right?

Not yet. I suppose they will be updated when the legitimate rules come out. You can see what the events are at soinc.org though.
Cheers.

[chalker]

PDF copies of the rules have circulated in the past early on in the season, though I don't know at what level of SO this started (higher than I, obviously, because I didn't make those scans). And I'm not just talking the barebones event supervisor copies that lack the cute clip art in the printed manuals; they were identical to the printed versions. I haven't seen this for several seasons now, so it's conceivable that practice has since been stomped out.

Yes, we watch for this closely. Some people still scan in the individual pages of the printed rules manuals then circulate those PDFs, but we highly discourage that.

[noodleluvr]

Does anybody know how many people can do Robo Cross?
is it 2 or 3?

[mrburrito]

It was two the last time it was an event.

[ScienceOlympian]

YAY! The official rules are coming out on September 3rd!
It was on the website.

[Unbihexium]

In the past, rules have only been provided via a printed manual. We historically haven't generally released electronic versions in PDF or via any other format or platform.......I can also pretty much assure you that PDF versions will never be publicly released. There are 2 primary reasons for this:

1. We need to make sure everyone has the current version of the rules. There are various drafts that get circulated around internally, and if they were to be widely released we'd encounter tons of issues with people showing up at competitions using old or wrong versions of the rules.

2. The sale of the manuals is one of the few revenue streams for the SO organization. The vast majority of us involved with SO do it on a volunteer basis, but there are certain expenses that are unavoidable in any large endeavor like this. Sales of the printed manuals help pay for those expenses, and if we made them electronically available they would be widely copied, reducing the overall revenue.

What are the true advantages of providing a printed manual as opposed to having completely digital distribution of rules? Would it not be more in the spirit of Science Olympiad to have every team get the rules instantly instead of at different times as per snail mail? What is the reason the official rules aren't simply distributed electronically? I understand the revenue stream business, but a simple way to discourage spreading of said rules would be if either a) one was required to purchase a copy to register a team and/or b) watermark the digital copies with the team name that bought it: if they attempt to distribute that pdf, they will be caught easily, in which case, some sort of action can be taken against them. Penalties such as disqualification for publicly spreading rules online, as opposed to "discouraged" (a light slap on the wrist). If people wish to make copies of rules, they will, there's no question about that it would only take 5 minutes to scan a rules packet, but most legitimate teams interested in Science Olympiad will pay to support it even if they can get the rules another way. This sort of thing is evident with software piracy, where people pirate software, and many after seeing it go out and buy it to support a group or person who created it. Besides that, in the case of even large software companies the amount of pirated copies hardly even approach 1% of the legitimate copies out there, why would the scioly rules be any different in that respect?

[fozendog]

Having to put team names on each rules packet and individualizing them would probably be too much work for Soinc and when you register to be a team, you are given a rules manual. Distributing them online/electronically would just cut out a step for teams to send it out on the internet and not have to do the work to scan it.