I hate Will Shortz.
Mel Rosen
>
>I particularly hate clues that come from non-literary sources. He loves
to
>do this. Why drag commercialism into it? Another example in yesterday's
>puzzle: Lemonlime drinks. Sprites! There's a perfectly adequate
>alternative definition.
>
>Also, who the heck watches daytime TV? He uses television in general for
>a source way too often.
>
>And he purposely stretches the meaning of words to the point where the
>answers are things we don't say or aren't used.
>
The NYT chose Will Shortz as puzzle editor in large part because his
philosophy matched what the NYT wanted to accomplish...namely, to bring
crossword puzzles up to the current day. In case you hadn't noticed,
current practice in Dell Champion puzzles, in Newsday, in The Crosswords
Club, in The Uptown Puzzles Club, and in The Crossword Puzzles of the
Month Club is to emphasize "facts about stuff" and today's culture, not
dictionary definitions. And to rely almost exclusively on words you are
actually likely to use in real conversations. (When did you EVER use
"esne" except to discuss a crossword puzzle?)
A recent Wall Street Journal article talked about the NYT change, and Mr.
Shortz acknowledged his style (or, at least, the change in style)
displeased some solvers. Find and read that article for Will's own words
on the matter.
>He really annoys me.
Then (1) turn to puzzles you prefer, or (2) write directly to the NYT,
or (3) do both.
Venting/flaming here is unproductive in the grand scheme of things.
MEL ROSEN XKP...@prodigy.com
Stephen LaVelle
: Bring back Eugene T. Maleska!
Alas. The esteemable Meistro of the crossword is dead...And even if he
weren't, I'm not sure he would want the job these daze (sic).
Eugene (god rest his soul) was of another era...An era in which, when a
person spoke to you, he wanted you to understand, for he meant every word.
Since the BEATNIK discovered THE BLACK MUSICIAN and together they invented HIP
the language has changed and there's no going back from
here...Incidentally, there's a great record--yes,record-called HOW TO
SPEAK HIP..funny as hell w/categories like
PUT-ON
PUT-DOWN
COME-ON
COME-DOWN
BRING-DOWN...w/explanations..pub.1960?..
But I digress. The thing I object to about Will Shortz is that he
personalizes the puzzle out of all human context save his own OBSCURE sence
of what a pun is. I don't mind that the answer to a puzzle is def.#9 in
the dictionary of obscure Urdu ideoms....But if it's not in SOME
dictionery SOMEWHERE then it'd better legitimate street argot or I feel
abused.
***********************************************
THE BEATINGS WILL CONTIUE UNTIL MORALE IMPROVES
***********************************************
--
ste...@freenet.columbus.oh.us
CoxRathvon
and the change in style at NYT. In our view, Eugene Maleska's puzzles
were genuinely hard to solve (harder on the average than Shortz's) but for
all the wrong reasons: They relied on obscure vocabulary, literary
esoterica, and pop-culture references no longer current (Asta, Abie,
e.g.). We find the Shortz-edited puzzles to be much fresher, breezier,
funnier, and varied--and only a LITTLE easier to solve, on average. For
every new pop-culture reference that stumps us, we get several new
chuckles as compensation--something we could never count on with Maleska's
daunting but pedantic puzzles. As long as the commercial references don't
get too out of hand (and you can be sure that Shortz is very receptive to
criticism about this), the NYT puzzle's new direction is entirely
positive, in our opinion.
--E Cox and H Rathvon
Al Sanders
crossword puzzles, to use a phrase coined by Stanley Newman awhile back.
Will is certainly not unique in promoting this style of crossword.
Games magazine, Stanley's Tough Puzzles magazine (which I really miss),
CROSSW RD magazine, Merl Reagle's SF Examiner puzzles and others have
had puzzles of this sort for years. Stan has written some very good
explanations of the style. Two current places to look for these are a
couple of Stan's new books he's edited for Random House, Masterpiece
Crosswords and Ultrahard Crosswords. I really enjoyed them both.
I imagine a lot of the controversy is due to the fact that Will now has
a much broader audience for presenting this style of crossword.
Anyway, I'm strongly in favor of the new style of crossword. I would
have nothing to do with Maleska's puzzles which I found pretty boring.
In my opinion, Will's puzzles in the Times are the best newspaper
puzzles around today (although I don't have access to the Newsday
puzzles which I hear are quite good as well).
Emily and Henry, your contributions to the Boston Globe's Sunday Puzzle,
along with Henry Hook's, are topnotch. However, the Globe daily puzzle
is really uninspiring. Now that the Globe is owned by the NY Times, is
there any possibility that they could run the NY Times puzzles in addition
to yours? Do you know who I would talk to at the Globe to make this
suggestion?
Just adding my two cents,
Al Sanders
san...@ch.hp.com
Daniel Asimov
I like the freshness of NYTimes crosword clues since
Will Shortz took over as Crossword Editor.
I'm not so enthusiastic about the inclusion of lowbrow pop
culture, or brand names, in the puzzles -- but this is a small
deal to me.
I especially like the puzzles toward the end of the week --
Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, which I relish spending a good while
solving.
Often these puzzles are not as hard as I would like them to be,
but then again, often they are.
(There seem to be two kinds of puzzles: the kind where my answers
keep growing until the whole thing is filled in -- and the harder kind where my
first pass is full of holes, sometimes huge ones.
The latter is my fave. It feels like rock-climbing -- with the constant search
for finger-holds and toe-holds -- but without the peril.)
I wish there were more of these very tough puzzles at the Stamford tournament.
(Though I'd bet that it would be a nightmare for the people who have to grade
them!)
--Dan Asimov
Ellen Ripstein
>I wish there were more of these very tough puzzles at the Stamford
tournament.
>(Though I'd bet that it would be a nightmare for the people who have to
grade
>them!)
>
It would also be a nightmare for the people who have to solve them! On
the other hand, harder puzzles would keep the tournaments from being a
speed race.
The first Long Island tournament had unusually hard puzzles. I think I
ended up 5th, but it was a real struggle.
To get back to the topic heading, this Will Shortz subject has generated
more interesting posts here than I've seen in ages (I'm not a cryptics
fan). It's nice to see people defending Will and the "new" NY Times
puzzles.
Stephen Hait
>all these years. I think you are both right.
>
>Becky
Hi there, Becky :), Stephen here. PMJI but I LIKE Will Shortz and find
his clues a welcome change from Meleska's (whose clues I also enjoyed but
found getting tiresome towards the end. Will Weng was really fabulous!
Haven't read Games for ages, though, so no comment there.
M. Huret
>
>I like the freshness of NYTimes crosword clues since Will Shortz took over
as
>Crossword Editor.
>Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, which I relish spending a good while
solving.
>
>Often these puzzles are not as hard as I would like them to be, but then
again,
>often they are.
>
>(There seem to be two kinds of puzzles: the kind where my answers keep
growing
>until the whole thing is filled in -- and the harder kind where my first
pass
>is full of holes, sometimes huge ones.
>I wish there were more of these very tough puzzles at the Stamford
tournament.
>(Though I'd bet that it would be a nightmare for the people who have to
grade
>them!)
I agree with you as to the flavor of the current puzzles...but more
*difficult* at Stamford????
maybe there should be 2 comps running concurrently...hard clues and then
clues for those who finish in the bottom third<G>
-=asobi(holder of last place-ain't nobody gonna take that away from me)=-
never let the truth stand in the way of a good story
Becky Swann
> Hi there, Becky :), Stephen here. PMJI but I LIKE Will Shortz and find
> his clues a welcome change from Meleska's (whose clues I also enjoyed but
> found getting tiresome towards the end. Will Weng was really fabulous!
> Haven't read Games for ages, though, so no comment there.
Hi, Stephen. You discovered my favorite newsgroup, I see.
I got word from someone that Games is NOT edited by Shortz, and
I don't ever see the NYT puzzles (since, much as I admired
Maleska, I did not find them of interest in my youth and haven't
developed any desire for American style puzzles since) so I
retract any negative coments I made in my ignorance.
Now I need to take the time to see who is editing the Games that
I rarely open and never finish. I had a charter subscription, so
I will not let my collection die, whether or not I find the current
regime boring.
I would forgive a lot of sins past for a new CalculaTrivia!
Becky
Noam Elkies
>[...] I would forgive a lot of sins past for a new CalculaTrivia!
What is/are "CalculaTrivia"?
--Noam D. Elkies (elk...@ramanujan.harvard.edu)
Dept. of Mathematics, Harvard University
Eric Berlin
>In article <3frluk$a...@news.onramp.net> Becky Swann <be...@onramp.net> writes:
>>[...] I would forgive a lot of sins past for a new CalculaTrivia!
>What is/are "CalculaTrivia"?
Calculatrivia was a contest that ran in GAMES magazine several times over
the years. Basically, you must answer a whole bunch of nasty trivia
questions; each answer will get you a number. Each number is then placed
into a frighteningly enormous mathematical equation. Solving that
equation will give you the answer you need to enter the contest. It's
been an enormously popular contest each time GAMES has run it, and it
would not surprise me at all to learn that they're planning a new one.
--
Eric Berlin * THE SURFBOARD: Read it in * "Only he who does nothing
er...@panix.com * Internet World Magazine * makes a mistake..."
************************************************************************
Freelance Writer, Playwright, Puzzle Enthusiast, & Bad Guitar Player
Becky Swann
> the years. Basically, you must answer a whole bunch of nasty trivia
> questions; each answer will get you a number. Each number is then placed
> into a frighteningly enormous mathematical equation. Solving that
> equation will give you the answer you need to enter the contest. It's
> been an enormously popular contest each time GAMES has run it, and it
> would not surprise me at all to learn that they're planning a new one.
I hope you are right, Eric. It's been years! CalculaTrivia, as Eric says,
is a trivia challenge first, but all the answers (generally 50 or so) yield
numbers. Plenty of research and good resources are necessary, but then your
task has just begun. Each number plugs into a complex (VERY complex)
equations. Solve for X and send in your answer. Pentium users
need not apply. The answer might well extend to the 9th or ever twelfth
decimal place!
It's a great challenge for a group, and ideally suited to the Net.
Becky
Daniel Asimov
Ellen Ripstein <MJT...@prodigy.com> wrote:
>d...@well.sf.ca.us (Daniel Asimov) wrote:
>
>>I wish there were more of these very tough puzzles at the Stamford
>>>tournament. (Though I'd bet that it would be a nightmare for the people who
>>have to grade them!)
>
>It would also be a nightmare for the people who have to solve them! On
>the other hand, harder puzzles would keep the tournaments from being a
>speed race.
>
>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
A nightmare? Really? Of course tastes differ. But I find it far more
satisfying to chip away at a hard puzzle till it's solved than to write down
pencil-jerk answers as fast as my hand and eyes can cooperate.
(I'm exaggerating -- most of the Stamford puzzles fall strictly in between the
very hard and the very easy.)
But since you, Ellen, often end up in the top 3 contestants, you get to solve
competitively the championship playoff puzzle -- which tends to be exactly the
kind of hard puzzle I'm talking about -- almost every tournament.
I suspect that my thirst for hard puzzles would be satisfied if there were
just *one* puzzle of that difficulty level among the 7 puzzles that everyone
is given to solve.
But for me, ending up in the top 3 is *much* too much trouble to go to,
just for the privilege of competing on a hard puzzle! (:-)>
--Dan
Ellen Ripstein
in a competitive situation a really hard puzzle can be nerve-wracking.
Come to think of it, maybe that's why I never win.
M. Huret
you are gonna have your chance...Stamford is just around the corner!
-=asobi=-
>(I'm exaggerating -- most of the Stamford puzzles fall strictly in between
the
>very hard and the very easy.)
>
>But since you, Ellen, often end up in the top 3 contestants, you get to
solve
>competitively the championship playoff puzzle -- which tends to be exactly
the
>kind of hard puzzle I'm talking about -- almost every tournament.
>
>I suspect that my thirst for hard puzzles would be satisfied if there were
just
>*one* puzzle of that difficulty level among the 7 puzzles that everyone is
>given to solve.
>
>But for me, ending up in the top 3 is *much* too much trouble to go to,
just
>for the privilege of competing on a hard puzzle! (:-)>
>
>--Dan
Mark Brader
> equations. Solve for X and send in your answer.
Well, this is true in the sense that X = 4 * 5 / 2 is an equation that
must be solved for X; no algebra is required, just a lot of arithmetic.
> .... The answer might well extend to the 9th or ever twelfth
> decimal place!
If it does, it's a tip-off that you got one of the numbers wrong.
At least, the above describes how the *past* Calculatrivias have worked.
I have no information about how they might set one in the future!
> It's a great challenge for a group, and ideally suited to the Net.
The Net? Sounds like cheating to me.
ObCrossword:
Games's companion magazine Games World of Puzzles recently ran a
chained series of 10 word puzzles. You had to get the answers to
puzzle N to complete the (partially given) questions for puzzle N+1,
through 10 puzzles of different types, some of which were crosswords
or similar. Interesting idea.
--
Mark Brader, m...@sq.com | "Where is down special?" ... "Good."
SoftQuad Inc., Toronto | "Do you refuse to answer my question?" "Don't know."
This article is in the public domain.
Becky Swann
> Encyclopedia Brittanica won't do you much good in a CalculaTrivia...you need the
Sorry, I really can spell Britannica!
Becky
Becky Swann
> The Net? Sounds like cheating to me.
>
In what way? Team solving is certainly not cheating, and I use every reference
at my disposal to solve. The first time I was shocked to find that many solvers
had made calls to assorted experts, etc., but that is a part of the game. A 1975
Encyclopedia Brittanica won't do you much good in a CalculaTrivia...you need the
most current information available at the date of publication. What better source
than the net?
> Games's companion magazine Games World of Puzzles recently ran a
> chained series of 10 word puzzles. You had to get the answers to
> puzzle N to complete the (partially given) questions for puzzle N+1,
> through 10 puzzles of different types, some of which were crosswords
> or similar. Interesting idea.
That particular chain of puzzles in World Of Puzzles was one of the most
interesting innovations in a Games pub. in years. It was tough, but fair.
Another classical favorite of mine from Games is the Scavenger Hunt, which
may be even more rare than CalculaTrivia. I like my challenges hard. Working
against the clock is not my idea of fun. Creative thought is.
Mark, you are so right about knowing you have a mistake somewhatre if you
find a complex result, but that too is part of the fun. I have always wound up
with two or three variables, and was never in the running for a Games T-shirt,
but I love the research, and as a non-mathmatical person, I love the challenge
of taking the apparently "impossible" equation, and solving it. It's much like
diagramming a very complex sentence. I am in awe of the constructors.
Becky
Matthew Merzbacher
+ Games's companion magazine Games World of Puzzles recently ran a
+ chained series of 10 word puzzles. You had to get the answers to
+ puzzle N to complete the (partially given) questions for puzzle N+1,
+ through 10 puzzles of different types, some of which were crosswords
+ or similar. Interesting idea.
I liked that set a great deal. I ended up working some of it backwards,
though! That is, using the gaps in puzzle N+1 to finish off puzzle N. In
particular, I'm not a big Word Search fan, so I just skipped to the
Cryptolists, figured 'em out, and then went back to the word search.
It made the cryptolists harder, not knowing the subjects in advance...
--
Matthew Merzbacher mat...@cs.wellesley.edu
Assistant Professor (617) 283-3152
Computer Science Department
Wellesley College Yo ho ho!
Mark Brader
>
> In what way? Team solving is certainly not cheating, and I use every
> reference at my disposal to solve. The first time I was shocked to
> find that many solvers had made calls to assorted experts, etc., but
> that is a part of the game.
Yes it is; I shouldn't have said "cheating", which would imply a
violation of contest rules. What really concerns me is violation of
netiquette. In past Games contests, we have seen things like:
From: x...@abc.def.ghi.edu (Xavier Y. Ziggurat)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: dodecahedron
Lines: 1
How many vertices does a dodecahedron have? Thanks.
From: x...@abc.def.ghi.edu (Xavier Y. Ziggurat)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies
Subject: Jimmy Stewart
Lines: 1
What was the year of Jimmy Stewart's first feature film? Thanks.
From: x...@abc.def.ghi.edu (Xavier Y. Ziggurat)
Newsgroups: sci.astro,alt.science.planetary
Subject: Saturn's moons
Lines: 1
How many moons does Saturn have? Thanks.
I'd like to think that solving a Calculatrivia should require a bit more
work than identifying 40 newsgroups to post to, and that was why my first
reaction was to call this sort of thing cheating. With messages of the
sort illustrated above -- and they truly are representation of some that
we've seen -- I think it's reasonable to call them abuse of Usenet, since
they conceal the poster's intent to profit monetarily by the answer.
If people are honest about what they're doing, that's different. And if
the intent was not to refer to Usenet postings, *that's* different.
May I suggest that further discussion migrate (with sufficient context)
to rec.puzzles?
ObCrossword:
Unwieldy prize using electric power (7)
AWKWARD (AWARD + KW)
