I am a sports fan. My husband’s not. He puts up with me graciously. He is happy for me when my team wins, and graciously will leave me alone when they lose. I was thinking today about some of the common misconceptions and “myths” so to speak about sports fandom that many non-fans might hold. Consider this my own little version of Mythbusters: Sports Fan edition.

Myth: Nothing’s more fun then your team in a close game.

No. No. No. This is probably the biggest misconception non-sports fans have about sports fans. There are a lot of emotions going through me during a close game: stress, frustration, homicidal rage, and bursts of joy mixed with bursts of agony. The exact proportion depends on the type of game. Is my (favored) team choking agains a rival, or underperforming against a team they should dominate? Or alternatively, are they coming back and surging late, which actually can be pretty fun? Usually, though, close games are tense affairs, and are “fun” the way eating a hot pepper (and I like jalepeños) tastes “good” – the pain is an essential part of the process of pleasure.

Corollary: If you don’t care about either team, a close game is awesome.
Especially in the last few minutes, these contests are a joy to watch, especially if an upset is in the making.

Addendum: After its over, a great close win has more “juice” then a blowout
The immense feelings of satisfaction, relief, and euphoria after a close, hard fought win are amazing. I call these “hugging strangers” moments, and they make up for all the stress during a game, and even months or years after the games are over, you can pause, and remember the emotions you felt, and get a bit of that warm fuzzy feeling all over again.
For me, this was the final Kansas-Missouri basketball game, where Kansas came back from being down 19 in the second half to win in overtime (and of course Mario’s Miracle in 2008). For Auburn fans, it was Cam Newton’s comeback against Alabama in the Iron Bowl a couple years ago. Giants fans, remember Super Bowl XLII?

Truth: Genghis Khan said it best: “The greatest happiness is to vanquish your enemies, to chase them before you, to rob them of their wealth, to see those dear to them bathed in tears, to clasp to your bosom their wives and daughters.” The most fun you can have during the game is when your team is winning big, especially against a rival. If you a fan of the dominant team, it is a pleasure cruise. You can relax, enjoy the conversation with your friends, down a few beers, and take in the show without any stress.

Addendum: Schadenfreude is real, and essential. As Cartman said, “Ohhh, the tears of unfathomable sadness, mmm, yummy yummy you guys!” A great rivalry, with true bitterness, is a lot of fun, and cheering on any misfortune of your rival, even when they are not playing against your team, is a key part of that. How can you tell if it is a real rivalry? If seeing their colors and logo fills you with the same feeling of disgust as, say seeing a stranger’s turd floating in a public toilet, then that’s a real rival. For me as a Kansas fan, the turd is Mizzou. If you are a Yankees fan, it’s probably the Red Sox. Ohio State? Michigan. Every Batman needs his Joker.

Myth: Losing a close game is easier to take then being blown out

“Oh, your guys played well, they almost won!” Ugh. No. A close loss is just a series of agonizing “what ifs” that you replay in your mind ad nauseum. A blowout loss is easier to get over, the difference between pulling that band-aid off one hair at a time and just ripping the thing up. This is even worse in “series” playoffs. 2003 will agonize Cubs fans til the end of time. If they had lost 4 games to 0, would anyone remember?

Corollary: On rare occasions, there really are “moral victories”

It happens. Sometimes the team you root for gets so much further then it had any right to that even after the loss, you are just amazed at the ride. This has only happened a couple times in my life as a sports fan, most recently this year, when a Kansas basketball team that had no business getting so far played its heart out all the way to the national championship game where it lost narrowly to a dominant Kentucky team filled with NBA draft picks. Unlike every other Kansas tournament loss in their history, I was not angry after the final game, just thrilled they made it so far and I got to enjoy the ride.

Addendum: Gallows humor helps deal with the pain of losing.
That is, among your own fans. The difference between an asshole and a comedian might be the animal team logo printed on their shirt. The pain is real too; a really agonizing loss can have me in a funk for days.

Myth: Sports fans are dumb

Somehow, enjoying watching skillful athletes do amazing things with their bodies is considered highly cultured if the athletes are performing a ballet but not if they are performing with a basketball. Human beings who enjoy watching sports cross the spectrum of the human experience just like any other activity, and there is nothing any more or less noble about athletic competition compared with any other type of “non-essential” (i.e. “cultural”) activity humans do. I will happily discuss the Jayhawk basketball team’s rotation next season or football clock-management strategies, but if you get bored we can talk about the socio-political situation in the Roman Empire as it transitioned from the Principate to the Dominate, or statistical models of crowd behavior in panic situations. Or NFL officiating, your choice.

Corollary: Yeah, there are dumb fans too.

There’s dumb people too. They’re the ones that vote for the other guy and root for the other team!

Truth: The social aspect of being a fan is very important

If I were stationed in Antarctica, and was the only Jayhawk fan there, I will still watch games and enjoy the victories, but it wouldn’t be the same. There is an essential social aspect of being a fan, and interacting with other fans is like a catalyst in a chemical reaction. Watching sports socially – with friends at home or in a bar, or at a stadium, is immensely more rewarding then watching by yourself. Sports radio was (and is) driven by this, as is the explosion of Twitter, blogs, and social media among sports fans (and everyone else).

Truth: Nothing is dumber then the tired tropes of how sports fans are portrayed in commercials

There are so many cliches in sports-related commercials, both TV and print. Next time you see a print advertisement featuring a sports theme, check off as many of these cliches as you can.

• (1) multi-racial and multi-sex group of fans (this is a good thing, but it is also cliche)
• (2) impeccably groomed (are we watching football or going to a Parade Magazine photo shoot?)
• (3) in mid-cheer (hey, why not?)
• (4) sitting on a really clean nice couch (only the best furniture for my friends!)
• (5) with a couple artfully-placed foodstuffs (no crumbs or dead soldiers anywhere to be seen!)
• (6) with at least one person holding a ball, representing the sport being watched (I’d forget I was watching a football game if someone didn’t, you know, have an actual football in hand! This is even funnier for baseball…better have that glove on while watching in case Alex Gordon fouls one right through the TV screen into the living room)
• (7) wearing team colors for both teams (mixed company at home viewing party is about as common as a Loch Ness Monster sighting)

The ultimate dumb sports-themed TV ad is that Buffalo Wild Wings series about the football fans so enamored with the awesome environment at their local BWW that they conspire to artificially extend the game they are watching into overtime via various shenanigans. I don’t want the game to go on forever; I want my team to win. As hard as that is to believe, I actually want that more then another order of wings and watered-down American light beer. Ugh.

Do you have any myths related to sports fans that you think I missed? Let me know!

It’s been a while since I really let loose, but some really rude idiot was talking sh*t to my mom (on Facebook) because she posted a pro-Obama story, so I responded with this. I think it was one of my better flames, although I am biased:

“There’s certainly room for good people on both sides to respectfully disagree about the important issues of the day, but your post reads like a verbal enema from the diseased backside of a syphilitic whore. If you could perhaps remove your tongue from Romney’s asshole for 30 seconds to gulp down a breath of fresh air, maybe it would clear your dim-witted brain long enough to realize your own idiocy. Then again, maybe pigs will fly.”

I recently signed up to get a free Obama bumper sticker. All good and well, but after doing so, I started to get daily campaign spam from the Obama campaign. Well, technically not spam; after all, I signed up for that bumper sticker and in the small print, sure, I probably agreed to the emails…and in fairness they were easy to unsubscribe to.

This go me thinking, how do the campaigns compete against each other in the all important Electoral Spam College? So, I created two brand new email addresses, one for Obama, and one for Romney. I then went to the front page of each web site and gave them those respective email addresses.

I am very curious how often each campaign sends email in their “default” setting, and what kind of emails they are (call to action, calls for money, or something else). Finally, I am curious if these email accounts will get any true spam. They are brand new accounts on my own domain and will not be used for anything else so they are very unlikely to ever get spam – unless the source is one of the campaigns.

Anyway, stay tuned and I’ll update things here with an ongoing score.

The system worked…kind of

WWDC sold out in 2 hours, which was completely expected and shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone. You almost certainly got a ticket if you met both of these conditions:

If you didn’t meet these two conditions, you probably didn’t get a ticket. Apple only sells 5000 or so, and they are non-transferrable, which kills scalping. You have scarcity in a non-market environment. The result is a lot of disappointed people.

There are a lot of potential solutions floating around, but they all have problems.

First of all, one non-solution. WWDC can’t be made bigger or split into multiple conferences. WWDC is put on by working Apple engineers, and these folks’ day jobs are writing actual code for Apple, not putting on multiple conferences each year. As for enlarging the conference, you would lose the direct interaction which is an essential part of the event, and on a practical level, there’s no much larger it could get and remain in San Francisco, even if it took over all of Moscone.

So let’s assume it will be one conference with 5000 or so attendees. The three most popular ideas for improving the ticketing process all have problems:

So what might an semi-realistic alternative distribution system for WWDC tickets look like?

There probably isn’t a good one…just keeping things as they have been is probably the way things will muddle through. But, perhaps if we combine aspects of the three alternatives somewhat of a better process could be developed.

I am thinking of something that combines the lottery and application process.
Developers would apply in advance for the chance to buy tickets (one application per developer). An application would require membership in one of the paid developer programs, and would cost additional money to apply (which would go towards the ticket cost if you got in and refunded if you didn’t). As part of the process, Apple would see what company you were from and what apps you’ve developed, but this is not a merit-based” application.

For 4000 or so of the 5000 tickets, Apple would distribute tickets randomly among all applicants. If you “won” you would have a chance to buy a ticket, good for a certain period. You could not resell or transfer a winning ticket; if you can’t go, then you would decline and the ticket would go back into the pool.

The remaining 1000 or so tickets would be for Apple to use for a “second chance” distribution. These would be for hardship cases – I am thinking of situations where say a large company has 10 applications and doesn’t win a single ticket, they could appeal and perhaps be granted a second chance ticket so at least one of their developers could attend. These second chance tickets would also be available for developers based on merit; you appeal to Apple, “show your work” so to speak and can possibly get a ticket. This wouldn’t be perfect but would give deserving devs who are unlucky a chance to get in. To discourage people skipping the first round, these second chance tickets would be somewhat more expensive.

Finally, a couple rule adjustments to allow to ticket exchanges would help. Apple should consider allowing unlimited transfer of tickets amongst members of the same company, so multiple folks could attend the conference. Of course, only one person could actually have the badge (and be admitted) at any one time. Finally Apple should allow anyone who can’t attend to return their ticket to Apple for a full refund. Apple could then redistribute the ticket into the general pool. As before, outside transfers for pay (i.e. scalping) wouldn’t be allowed.

This is not a perfect solution – for one, it is more complicated, adds an arbitrary element to the process (well, more then there already is), and would require a bit of work by Apple, but maybe it is a starting point if changes are to happen. If nothing else, maybe food for thought or conversation. See you at WWDC!

Pity The Billionaire by Thomas Frank

Thomas Frank spends this book doing what he does best – analyzing why, in spite of historic trends which say otherwise – much of the politically active population of the United States espouses and defends policies and ideas which are contrary to their own best (economic) interests.

This is a restatement of Thomas’s thesis from “What’s the Matter With Kansas” with a focus on the political situation post-Great Recession. Like his earlier book, Thomas is puzzled why so many average Americans are seemingly choosing ideology over what actually benefits them economically. In this case, sympathy for billionaire bankers and their political supporters (couched in the rhetoric of defending capitalism and free enterprise) over policies – such as economic and health care reforms – which might actually benefit middle class folks directly.

I approach politics from a liberal viewpoint, but Thomas seems to fall into the same bit of blindness that affected “Kansas” – namely, he is shocked to see a group of Americans hewing to ideology over their own material self-interest. At least it is shocking and dismaying when these folks are middle-class Americans from the flyover states. This shouldn’t be surprising. Ever since the late 1960s and the rise of the modern political environment, large swaths of Americans focus more on ideology over their own self-interest – liberals and conservatives (how many wealthy Manhattanites voted for Obama in 2008 even though his proposed policies might have hit them in the pocketbook?)

Nonetheless, Thomas has written a fairly incisive book, and one which is rather depressing, if only as a catalog of the myriad of ways that a more imaginative or energetic Democratic party or President could have responded to the crisis. In the end, the President ceded the ideological battleground to his opponents, and like French generals in World War II, seemed most interested in negotiating his own defeat rather then using imagination (and the significant resources still at hand) to try to actually win.

Thomas’s book is a depressing reminder of the state of American politics today, and a fair look at the Tea Party and other forces (including a great side-trip into the depths of Ayn Rand’s oeuvre) who have been driving the debate in the country the past two years. He tells it like it is, and depressed liberals (as well as triumphant conservatives who aren’t afraid to read a book by someone on the left) will be both enraged and enlightened.

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