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Summer's #1 dance show has come to the fall season, and Usenet's #1 prediction contest has followed! You pick the dancers who you think will go the farthest. The longer they last, the more points you score. At the end of the season, the player with the highest score wins.
1. This contest is open to all subscribers of the alt.tv.american-idol newsgroup (ATAI, for short), regardless whether they are regulars, semi-regulars, or lurkers. There is no limit on the size of the field. The more, the merrier. Non-ATAI members who visit my website, the Game Show Warehouse, can also enter if they so desire.
2. On the morning of Thursday, November 12, 2009, the day after the third elimination, I will post a call for entries on ATAI. Players wishing to participate may either reply to the newsgroup or e-mail me at tjwuthrich[at]verizon[dot]net. (Remember to replace the words in brackets with the punctuation they describe.)
1. Each player wishing to participate will be given 100 Certainty Points (CPs) to distribute among the fourteen remaining dancers however he/she wishes, based on how certain he/she is that each will be crowned America's Favorite Dancer.
2. The following restricitions apply on dividing your CPs:
Other than that, you have complete flexibilty. You can give CPs to all fourteen dancers, or to just four of them, or anything in between, as long as you comply with the restrictions above.
3. If an entry is determined to be invalid, the player will be notified of what he/she did wrong and will be asked to try again.
4. If I receive multiple entries from a single participant, I will accept his/her latest valid entry. In other words, I will assume that subsequent entries are updates to old entries.
Let's use season 3's finalists as an example. If you were 40% certain that Dominic would win the competition, 30% certain that Hok would win, 25% sure of Sabra, 3% sure of Lacey, and 2% sure of Ashlee, your entry would look like this:
Dominic - 40 Hok - 30 Sabra - 25 Lacey - 3 Ashlee - 2
Last names, initials, or nicknames are optional, but make sure I know where the CPs are going. Also, they do not have to be in any order, although I would advise arranging the names alphabetically to make the "record-keeping" a little easier. Just don't try to give points to people like Joshua Allen (wrong season), Adam Lambert (wrong show), or Nigel Lythgoe (cheater! J). Theoretically, you are allowed to put CPs on a Top-20 dancer eliminated in the first three weeks, but I don't recommend it.
5. Entries must be timestamped before Tuesday, November 17, 2009, 5:00 pm Eastern Time (4pm CT/2pm PT)--three hours before the fourth performance show airs in the Eastern and Central time zones. Make sure to include the name you wish to go by in the standings. If you do not sign a name, I will take the name in the "From" header of the entry.
1. The performance stage of the competition begins with 20 dancers, 10 men and 10 women, who are coupled at random. Each Wednesday, one man and one woman are eliminated from the competition, by the judges in the first five weeks and by viewer vote thereafter. In the fall season, this continues until there are six dancers left, and the dancer with the most vote in that eighth and final week wins the title of America's Favorite Dancer. As dancers are cut, they are assigned placements based on how many weeks he/she lasted. For example, the two finalists cut in Week 1 are given a placement of 1, those in Week 2 are given a 2, and so on up to 8 for the five runners-up and 9 for the winner. This placement is multiplied by the number of CPs you have placed on that dancer, and your total score is determined by adding up the multiplied points. The player with the highest score at the end of the season is the winner.
Going back to the season 3 example above--which was nine weeks with four dancers competing in the final week--you may recall that Sabra won, Lacey also reached the final four, Dominic was eliminated in the seventh week, Hok went out the week before, and the judges cut Ashlee after the first week. Here's how your final score is calculated:
| NAME | CPs | PLACEMENT | SCORE |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dominic | 40 | 7 | 40 x 7 = 280 |
| Hok | 30 | 6 | 30 x 6 = 180 |
| Sabra | 25 | 10 | 25 x 10 = 250 |
| Lacey | 3 | 9 | 3 x 9 = 27 |
| Ashlee | 2 | 1 | 2 x 1 = 2 |
| GRAND TOTAL | 739 | ||
2. In the event a dancer leaves from the competition during the entry period and is replaced by another dancer, the alternate shall assume all CPs placed on the departing finalist. Any affected players may still make changes if they feel they need to.
2a. If a dancer leaves from the competition without actually being voted out (i.e. injury, personal reasons, etc.) over the course of this contest and is replaced by a previously eliminated finalist, such as Comfort replacing injured Jessica in season 4, the placements will be determined as if the departing finalist was eliminated that week.
The Certainty Contest is a game of strategy. To win, you want to place the most CPs on the dancers you think will last the longest. Using the rules above, the best possible entry is 50 CPs on the winner, 48 on one runner-up, and 1 on each on two of the others, which would result in a score of (50 x 9) + (48 x 8) + (1 x 8) + (1 x 8) = 850 points. However, if your 50- and 48-CP dancers go out in the first week, followed by both your 1-CP dancers in week 2, you'd have the lowest possible score of (50 x 1) + (48 x 1) + (1 x 2) + (1 x 2) = 102 points. However, since the contest starts three weeks into the performance stage, you get the first three weeks for free! Therefore, your final score will fall somewhere in between 402 and 850, with the average score being 626.
The safest strategy is to assign CPs evenly to all fourteen available dancers. This works out to 7 CPs per dancer with two of them getting an eighth CP, since 100 is not evenly divisible by 14. This raises your minimum score to (8 x (4 + 4)) + (7 x (5 + 5 + 6 + 6 + 7 + 7 + 8 + 8 + 8 + 8 + 8 + 9)) = (8 x 8) + (7 x 85) = 659 points, but the best you can do is (8 x (9 + 8)) + (7 x (8 + 8 + 8 + 8 + 7 + 7 + 6 + 6 + 5 + 5 + 4 + 4)) = (8 x 17) + (7 x 76) = 668 points. Since this method offers very little deviation, the better strategy is to take risks, but watch out. If your 50-CP dancer commits a technical error in Week 4 that Nigel calls him/her out on, your risk could backfire.
1. After the contest has begun, if a dancer whom you have given CPs makes judge Mary Murphy do her distinctive "hot-tamale train" scream during any performance show before the final four, you will get one additional CP for each remaining dancer on whom you gave CPs at the start of the contest. For example, if you gave CPs to six dancers and Mary puts three of them on the hot tamale train, you get 18 bonus CPs (BPs). After that week's result show, players distribute their BPs among the remaining dancers on top of any CPs they have remaining.
2. BPs may be added to previously placed CPs to give a dancer more than 50 CPs total, but you can't place more than 50 BPs on the same dancer in the same week. In other words, if you should earn more than 50 bonus CPs in a given week (not likely, but it's possible if Mary screams her head off), you can't just give them all to the same dancer. Other than that, there is no minimum on how many dancers may receive BPs. Also, you do not have to already have CPs on a certain dancer in order to give him/her BPs.
3. CPs previously placed on one dancer cannot be redistributed to another. For example, using season 6's dancers, let's say you have 96 CPs remaining, 48 CPs each on married couple Ashleigh and Ryan, and you earned 8 BPs this week.
Ashleigh 56 Ashleigh 52 Ashleigh 50 Ashleigh 48 Ashleigh 27 Ashleigh 48
Ryan 48 Ryan 52 Ryan 50 Ryan 48 Ryan 27 Ryan 48
Kathryn 4 Nathan 8 Mollie 50 Bianca 8
OK OK OK OK NOT OK Legal, but not recommended
4. Just as before, if a bonus entry is ruled invalid, the player will be notified of his/her mistake and asked to try again, and entries may be changed until the deadline.
5. Should a dancer be replaced during a bonus entry period, the alternate shall assume any bonus CPs placed on the departing finalist during that period. Previously placed CPs do not change hands.
6. These BPs must be placed before the following week's performance show begins on the East Coast, usually Tuesday at 8pm ET/5pm PT. Unused bonus CPs cannot be rolled over from week to week, sorry. Bonus entries may be submitted either by replying to the weekly standings post on ATAI or by e-mail.
1. Once the show starts, all you have to do from then on is root (and vote) for your favorite dancers. After the East Coast airing of the results show--usually within 24 hours--I will post the weekly leaderboard showing the current scores, remaining CPs, and any bonus CPs for all participants. If you live in the Mountain or Pacific time zone, however, please be advised that the standings may be posted before the show airs on your Fox station (if I do it Wednesday, it's one less thing I have to do on Thursday). You might also be an irrepressible fan of Criminal Minds, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, or Modern Family and watch SYTYCD on tape or DVR later. Either way, this post may be considered a spoiler.
2. If the CPs on an otherwise valid entry do not total exactly 100, the individual CPs will be proportionally calculated. For example, a split of 50-20-11-9, which adds up to 90, would become 50-25-14-11.
3. The other Certainty Contests include an aggregate entry, a false entry calculated by the average number CPs for all the contestants. But this contest will feature a battle of the sexes by creating two aggregates, one for the male players and one for the female players.
4. Because I, commissioner of the SYTYCD Certainty Contest, have no advance knowledge of how the votes will go (how can I, since the result shows are live on the East Coast from here on out?), I have the option to participate as well.
5. On the weekly leaderboard, players will be ranked based on their expected score, the average of the highest and lowest possible scores they can achieve. According to CC creator Nathan Sanders, this gives a more accurate picture of who has the best chance of winning the contest than ranking by best-case or worst-case score. All three of these scores will match the current score after the final week.
6. If two or more players are tied for first place at the end of the season, the player who has given the most CPs to America's Favorite Dancer will win. If the players are still tied, the player who has given the most CPs to the runners-up will win, and so on. If the tying entries turn out to be identical, the player who submitted his/her entry first will be ruled the winner.
7. In case any event not outlined above takes place, the commissioner (which am I) reserves the right to make an executive decision.
8. The winner won't receive a trophy or any other kind of tangible reward, but you can't put a value on the bragging rights over the rest of the group.
Remember, contest entries are due Tuesday, November 17, 2009, at 5:00 pm Eastern Time.
If you have any questions, e-mail me at tjwuthrich[at]verizon[dot]net. (Again, substitute the proper punctuation for the words in brackets.) Enjoy!
-- Jason Wuthrich
This contest does not now nor will it ever challenge 19 Entertainment or dick clark productions, inc. for ownership for So You Think You Can Dance.
For more Certainty Contest action, visit Nathan Sanders's Survivor Contest or Peca Fan's Amazing Race Contest.
Return to the results page or visit the Game Show Warehouse.
