barterer2002 wrote:I understand what you're saying here Lindax but have to disagree in general. There are a couple of comments you've made here that I want to disagree with for discussion.
1).
Obviously mass-pms are a no-no.
Tell me why? Do you think that HA got his 2000 in the 200th tournament without using some mass PMs? I've used them in filling 500+ tournaments in the past. I personally have two parts to mass PMs. The first is previous player lists which you seem to indicate are OK within limits, the second are the unsoliticiated ones that you indicate are not. I would guess that many TOs who have used larger tournament formats have used them in the past and would contend that in some cases they've been instrumental in building the tournament section of CC by bringing new players into the fold. Part of the responsibility of a good TO is to get the tournament to begin in a timely fashion and sometimes, especially for larger formats. Now, I haven't done it for a few years as I tend to have enough players who have participated in previous tournaments that if needed, I can send a PM to those players and fill almost any sized tournament. That doesn't mean that I agree that its a No-no. Especially for a new organizer I'd support the idea of building the tournament area by bringing in new players and sometimes that's with a mass PM.
I was responding to the question of a new TO who doesn't have a mailing list (yet). I did not want to encourage him to send mass PMs to whomever he can think of.
I could have worded it better: Indiscriminate mass PMs are a no-no (or something like that). I'll actually edit that first post.
Good that you bring HAs 200th tournament up. There were several issues related to that tournament and mass PMs. Several people abused mass PMing and were warned. Besides that, you are implying that one can do whatever one can to fill a tournament as long as it's big enough. That is something I definitely would not want to encourage in public.
barterer2002 wrote:2.
As a general observation for everybody: Be careful with things like this because you could be found to violate the "50% open to the public rule". In this particular example: If more than half of the spaces are filled up by your clan mates, that rule could come into play.
I say could because as long as the organizer waits long enough (several days, a week or so) before specifically PMing his clan mates, that should allow enough time for them to either sign up naturally or get enough public players to not have to worry about the 50% rule.
I disagree again. Our clan forum specifically has a thread where we can post new tournaments so our clan mates can see what we're doing. Now, being G1, we tend to have a lot of tournaments running at any one time of course so not everyone joins everything but its there for all clan mates to see. I've also in the past, filled tournaments in less than an hour by sending to my previous players list. Now, I stopped sending to them because I didn't want to fill quite that quickly but I'm not sure how that's different in theory.
Yes I understand that it could be abused and that you're not saying that it has been here but I worry about the idea that there are limits being placed on the abilities of TOs to market their tournaments. One of the things a good marketer will do is put their product out there in front of as many people as possible, particularly those who are more pre qualified. In some ways it seems like what's happening is that TOs are being somewhat limited to having their tournament posted and having to sit back and wait for people to find it and I do have an issue with that idea. If a TO wants to sit back and take the Retail approach where they just wait for players to come into their door and buy the product that's OK but if the TO wants to get out there and market they should be able to, within reason, and the things being discouraged here seem to me to be within reason.
I worded my statement very carefully and I stand by it.
I know most clans have some "join tournaments" thread and I can assure you that if we notice that a tournament fills up quick, with all members of the same clan, we will certainly have a look into that.
Same with a tournament filling up within an hour with players that were all PM'd by the TO.
Those 2 examples you give
could mean a violation of the 50% rule. Now, in most cases that will be hard to prove and it also doesn't mean that the TO systematically abuses the system. So, those 2 examples are practices that I would not encourage and I feel it's not incorrect to warn a new TO about the potential consequences.
Why not have your tournament open for sign-up for a few days and then send PMs to your mailing list and/or post in the clan forum? Then you make sure that the public has ample chance to sign up as well.
You know as well as I do that we're in a kind of gray area here and sometimes TOs walk a very fine line. I'm simply trying to keep them on the right side of that line.
Finally, I agree totally with this:
....if the TO wants to get out there and market they should be able to, within reason.
Lx