The Best Of UberMadness & The UberMadness Suggestion Box (1954 hits)
Category: UberMadness!Rating: 1.34 on 48 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Razor <Jeremy_21117.at.hotmail.com> (View user info) at 2004-05-19 12:53:01 EDT
OK, well, UberMadness has had a week to be out of our hair, and looking back I think it went rather well... despite the lack of juice near the end. Overall I think it was a smashing success, and there was a shitload of good writing, which is one of the two purposes of this post..
I have listed what I believe are the best posts from UberMadness, organized by round. I probably missed a few really good ones, to be honest I just didn't have the time to review every last post, these are the ones I remember well. Note, I did not say they were the best, or the winning posts, they just happen to be my favorites.
The other thing I would like is for you to throw me any suggestions you can think of for UberMadness II (coming in September) and/or a regular season post dueling setup. Time between rounds, how the voting works, the overall structure of the whole thing, you name it, I'll read it and take it into consideration.
So, here are my personal favorites...
Preliminaries:
The Devil And The Altar Boy
Author: Loren
http://www.ubersite.com/m/28808
I'm So Lost...
Author: Hamilton
http://www.ubersite.com/m/28686
Round of 64:
Writer's Block
Author: Anansie
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29420
Look At What I Found
Author: JohnGalt41
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29157
Look At What I Found
Author: JMG114
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29096
Mountains and Molehills
Author: smokymtcsw
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29414
The Last Express
Author: Rizzo
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29092
Goodbye
Author: bart
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29531
How Many More?
Author: Razor
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29466
Round of 32:
Curiouser and Curiouser
Author: beer_turtle
http://www.ubersite.com/m/30034
Snake In the Woodshed
Author: method
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29882
This Is My Home
Author:JohnGalt41
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29887
Take Me Away
Author: iddqd
http://www.ubersite.com/m/30010
Take Me Away
Author: quack
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29981
Here They Come
Author: loki
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29878
Take It To The Hole (my personal favorite for all of UberMadness)
Author: Rizzo
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29901
So I'm A Little Strange
Author: BigMike
http://www.ubersite.com/m/29846
Round of 16
Pick One
Author: drink_ddt
http://www.ubersite.com/m/30458
The Last One
Author: Rizzo
http://www.ubersite.com/m/30559
The Last One
Author: Razor
http://www.ubersite.com/m/30802
Round of Eight:
This Town
Author: JohnGalt41
http://www.ubersite.com/m/31443
I Need It
Author: gascs
http://www.ubersite.com/m/31221
Round Of Four
Too Late
Author: Razor
http://www.ubersite.com/m/32030
Finals:
I Could Not Stop For Death
Author: loki
http://www.ubersite.com/m/32677
The Eighth Day Of The Week
Author: BigMike
http://www.ubersite.com/m/32401
For I Have Tasted The Fruit
Author: Razor
http://www.ubersite.com/m/32650
User Reviews
Submitted by Rungler (user info) at 2004-05-30 20:55:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Loren1:
I choose not to write for ubersite. Had I written an Ubermadness post and lost, jealousy might be a factor. I'd rather read what other people have to say. I enjoyed Razor's winning entry and most of his other work. Simply by being Razor he is biased in judging the work of Ubermadness.
Submitted by gain (user info) at 2004-05-30 20:25:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
can i get in on the next ubermadness?
Submitted by slowlyrotting (user info) at 2004-05-24 16:09:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Loren1 (user info) at 2004-05-24 15:54:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Rungler -
It's not just opinion based idiot. There are factors such as the winning margin.
Jealously is a green-eyed monster.
Submitted by Rungler (user info) at 2004-05-24 15:44:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
How can you be so conceited to have yourself as one of your personal favorites.
Submitted by sebcharrot (user info) at 2004-05-24 15:38:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Yay for the next UberMadness!
How do you enlist for it? Do you just ask or is it only the best writers who get chosen by the administrator of UberMadness?
If so...please can I join?
You know, now that I think about it, in school, for my 4th year exams (at 15 years old) we were handed out a sheet with a few suggestions for short stories, ad we had to pick one and write the story in an hour. So UberMadness seems very nice compared to it, although the quality is, of course, a lot better.
In conclusion, please let me in!!
Submitted by Spooner (user info) at 2004-05-23 23:57:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I didn't like how little comedy there actually was. Everywhere you turned there was a mediocre drama story about someone dieing or having an incurable disease. I WAS PROMISED HUMOR!
Next time I think you should have people decide which division they'd like to be a part of, drama or humor, and then we'd get both. Or, make each round acertain genre. first round would be humor, second round would be drama, third would be humor, and so on. The writer would have to be able to write drama and humor to win.
Submitted by smokymtcsw (user info) at 2004-05-21 18:15:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thanks for the mention Razor. I would say the word limit would be fine. I would also say that a genre breakdown would be sweet. Like first round fiction serious, second fiction humor etc. That would really stretch the writers but that is fine.
Submitted by beer-turtle (user info) at 2004-05-21 03:39:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
To be honest I got burnt out with the rapid time-table.
I think we should have had a hiatus or mid madness break.
10,000 word limit cap maybe even 5000 or so.
I really lament the fact that I can no longer access uber from work. I will try to keep around as much as I can from home, but I try not to sit here too much unless I am doing something creative.
Writing hasn't been it lately. I still love it but I need a break. Right now I am designing a Massively Multi player online roleplaying game to pitch to a few games development firms. That is taking up alot of my time, as is my work and my personal life now that I am off probation.
I will make a full disclosure post soon.
-Turtle
Submitted by NotApologizing (user info) at 2004-05-20 09:44:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Well, it seems like we're all in agreement (my suggestion I might add) that a photo tournament would be a good time.
And actually, it might lend itself to this type of competition a little better because the time to view/rate would be cut down by a lot. I really to think it would be a lot of fun, and we'd probably see a completely different seeding order than the writing competition.
viva la photÜberMAdness
Submitted by JohnGalt (user info) at 2004-05-20 06:02:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Wow! I'm on Razor's "Best Of" list 3 times. Thanks, Razor.
Bart, I definitely like the option of getting more than 1 title to choose from (although 20 might be a bit much). I was OK with most of mine for UberMadness, with 1 obvious exception. However, the last 2 seemed a bit too restrictive. Having more than 1 choice would allow for some of them to be restrictive or leading, since you don't have to use the ones you don't like. It makes the title selection process a lot easier as well. Some titles would suck for one person and sound great to another. For example, "The Eight Day Of The Week" didn't do anything for me. I didn't get any good ideas for it. Then I ran into about 8 million problems and other things that had to be done. I ended up writing my post in about 10-15 minutes (starting at 11:40pm) and barely getting it submitted on time. Big Mike came up with an idea very quickly and wrote a great post with days to spare.
Submitted by Lucifer_Industries (user info) at 2004-05-20 05:33:06 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
The best thing about Ubermadness, was the lack of any posts by me.
Malone
Lucifer Industries LLC
Submitted by bart (user info) at 2004-05-20 04:19:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
While not exactly perfect, UberMadness! turned out to be a much larger success than I would have guessed.
As a change, what if people could pick their own title? The matchups would still be preset, but you could pick one of say twenty titles and use that for your entry. Your title may not end up being the same as your opponent's, but it would still be one from a controlled set.
Also, I think we'd need to work the bracket into the site, although that will add a decent amount of work to the whole thing.
Submitted by iddqd (user info) at 2004-05-20 01:26:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
i dunno, i thought my first round post worked out as my best one...
Submitted by mystiamoon (user info) at 2004-05-20 00:58:37 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
"i agree the 'firefly cup' has a better ring to it
Thats it Mr. Prickles is getting renamed.
bastard.
Submitted by MrPrickle (user info) at 2004-05-20 00:36:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
i just thought i should let you know that the revolting fraud shandythedog has been putting forward stolen ideas for a 'quick and easy' writing contest: http://www.ubersite.com/m/33486
the swine even mentions you:
"I doubt Razor will be reading this, but if he was I would try and tempt him into support of this idea by raising the tantalising possibility of pulling off a sensational double: imagine the glory of winning BOTH the Inaugural 2004 Ubermadness and the Inaugural 2004 Mistiamoon Cup."
he seems to have garnered a handful of gullible supporters, and there have been calls to name the contest 'The Firefly Cup'. Shandy's poisonous mindset shines through in his response:
"i agree the 'firefly cup' has a better ring to it
also, if that cunt razor won, we could all sully his victory with claims his wife has set it up, fitting in well with the ubermadness sullying."
anyway, just thought you should know.
Submitted by Bigmike (user info) at 2004-05-20 00:28:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thanks Razor. I'm glad you enjoyed those two. I enjoyed many of these as well.
I surprised myself in Ubermadness. I didn't think I would go past round one.
Congrats to all who participated.
Submitted by shandythedog (user info) at 2004-05-19 23:49:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
ARE YOU STARK RAVING MAD??? You've left out Fooshie!
Submitted by polyamorousaj (user info) at 2004-05-19 22:40:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Uber regular season would be too much. I do, however think that there could be a place to have Uber duels. Just let Razor or Bart know ahead of time who is going to duel, but keep it quiet. There would just be a matchup, and no one would know who it was. It would still give the quality post matchup, without flooding the whole site.
Submitted by maiorano84 (user info) at 2004-05-19 22:35:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Maybe I should enter next....
Submitted by ugaly (user info) at 2004-05-19 22:33:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
If you are going to be worrying about post titles again, what I suggest is a "Submit a title for reg-season and Ubermadness II" link. or split the two.
Submitted by hamilton (user info) at 2004-05-19 22:19:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Submitted by antluvdog (user info) at 2004-05-19 18:31:28 (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by hamilton (user info) at 2004-05-19 17:08:41 (#)
Ranking: 1
and thanks for the match, rizzo. I deserved to lose that one.
***************************************************
Actually, I really enjoyed your entry, hamilton. I love those conspiracy theory type stories, and I love anything to do with the government. I'll admit, I put a lot of fire behind my entry. You just caught me on one of my best days - like the Braves did last night against the Big Unit!
---------------------------
one of your best days? it wouldn't have mattered
Submitted by DraconianKing (user info) at 2004-05-19 22:11:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
and PolyAJ, eat me! *gives the finger* Just kidding! Yes I know I suck at posting, but if I cared enough, I'd improve.
Submitted by DraconianKing (user info) at 2004-05-19 22:07:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
There should be two categories for a Picture UberMadness. A Photoshop one (for high quality ones) and Paint (for crappy ones done on Paint). And maybe put the Best Paint vs. the Best Photoshop because the Paint might not look as good but be funnier. Or something.
Submitted by polyamorousaj (user info) at 2004-05-19 22:06:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
"Seed the initial round randomly. There's no way to determine who's a higher/lower seed accurately so let fate decide."
You've got to be kidding me. Look at the Sweet 16. With the exception of JohnGalt, there are really no glaring contradictions to the validity of the seeding. What would happen if we had Rizzo, Razor, iddy, and loki all against each other in the first round, with the winners facing off in the second? That would be a big fucking waste of talent. We could end up w/ iddy v. DraconianKing. The seeding was fine.
I think that we should try and keep the field trimmed down, giving first dibs to people who were in the contest the first time around. I think 128 is a good number.
Submitted by Herpes (user info) at 2004-05-19 21:07:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You're just lucky I got Al Gored by gascs. I had some killer shit waiting, but didn't want to throw in my best shit for the first round. Damn me for underestimating gascs.
I like the picture tournament idea. I think someone should co-ordinate one of those. Look how awesome the unofficial Phinch photoshop competition was.
Submitted by R.P.McMurphy (user info) at 2004-05-19 19:47:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
one day to post. 24 hours. this is the internet man two minutes ago is history.
plus that is the way to seperate the wheat from the chaff.
if you cant think on your feet, go work in a cubicle.
oh....sorry...
Submitted by chipolatte (user info) at 2004-05-19 19:29:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't wait for the next one, because I foolishly did not enter this one. Was it stupid teenage pride?
Since I wasn't in, I can't really relate the stamina buzz...but I think that if you have any longer than a week between posts it might get a little stale. What about a week between posts until Sweet Sixteen or Elite Eight, and then stretch it out by a few more days or a week.
I think it would cool if every post, you also said which bracket it came from, at least in the first couple. That way it stays anonymous, but you still have some idea who's writing it. It personalizes it. Personally, I was a little turned off to voting because there were just so many posts (at least in the beginning stages), and they felt impersonal. Just a thought.
Amateur porn Ubermadness competition. Yeah? Yeah?
Submitted by antluvdog (user info) at 2004-05-19 18:31:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by hamilton (user info) at 2004-05-19 17:08:41 (#)
Ranking: 1
and thanks for the match, rizzo. I deserved to lose that one.
***************************************************
Actually, I really enjoyed your entry, hamilton. I love those conspiracy theory type stories, and I love anything to do with the government. I'll admit, I put a lot of fire behind my entry. You just caught me on one of my best days - like the Braves did last night against the Big Unit!
Submitted by LadyPlural (user info) at 2004-05-19 17:49:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i doubt that bart has the time/energy/money to do this, but setting up a different site solely for ubermadness-type competition for duels might work. there would be at least two ways to do this-
either
do as somebody suggested earlier (allow participants to pick their own title), and/or the ammount of time given, and/or their adversaries, and just have a constant sort of thing happening,
OR
have uberusers submit titles to some central collector, and have a small group of people who sort through them (i would be willing to volunteer my time to get out the ones that are most obviously shit). the end list could either be posted (with only a set ammount of titles per prospective author), and people could 'claim' the titles with a partner, or they could be randomly distributed some other way.
im sure that there are many flaws in this wild scheme, but... there was my idea. if it deserves any consideration at all, feel free drop, add, distort, change, or in any other way mess with it.
wonderous job on most of your entries, razor. ditto to quite a few other people as well.
uberkicker of all ass.
Submitted by hamilton (user info) at 2004-05-19 17:08:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
and thanks for the match, rizzo. I deserved to lose that one.
Submitted by antluvdog (user info) at 2004-05-19 17:06:12 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Also, thank you for the compliment. Coming from the winner, that is a killer honor :)
Submitted by hamilton (user info) at 2004-05-19 16:57:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
just to add something, here's my theory on the 'depressing' stories.
Titles were given that nobody could relate to, so they were forced to write fiction. With the fiction, came the almost guarenteed(sp) chance that a post would be depressing.
that's my theory
thanks again, i didn't think that mine was all that good.
Submitted by hamilton (user info) at 2004-05-19 16:55:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
by the way, thanks Razor.
but for my point, put some fun titles in. This whole competitions titles, while good, were somewhat boring. put a crazy title in and watch people foam at the mouth trying to figure it out.
Submitted by jillybean (user info) at 2004-05-19 16:43:06 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Did I read that everyone will be able to vote next time? Or will I need to review a lot more posts before then? I'd really like to be able to vote. The posts were great. :)
Submitted by NotApologizing (user info) at 2004-05-19 15:03:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
My suggestion: keep yourself out of it. Short of that, don't cheat this time.
Just kidding. I think the anonymity is difficult to deal with, and I honestly think that given your voting criteria (meaning the qualifications required for one's vote to count), we should be able to reasonably expect sincere voting. I know that the anonymity crippled me in the sense that I do my best writing about real life and my perspective of it. It is hard for me to not be personally specific when I truly am at my best.
Second, I think that ALL functions should be turned off during weekends. My opinion is that you should get your new post subject at Midnight Sunday nite/Monday-AM, submit by Tuesday at Noon, and all voting tallied and closed on Friday...say, 3PM. You're new subject comes out at 12:00AM on Sunday night/Monday morning, and you've got 36 hours to post. It might make for more DQ's, but it seems that the majority of participants are writing during the work week as it is. Or, if you made sure that all those who sign-up would be available, you could even do more than one post per week. That might eliminate some of the lost momentum we saw in the later rounds.
Another few ideas that are a little outside of what has already been done:
1) A photo tournament where competitors are given one photo and must chop it better than their opponent. It should be explicitly stated that pictures of either the EMU or Fluteboy or references therein are grounds for immediate disqualification.
2) It might be interesting with a story or the above photo competition to give everyone the same subject. That would mean 64 people writing a story with the same subject. You post once, then your one post progresses through the rounds until we see who wrote the best post overall with that one subject.
Submitted by firefly (user info) at 2004-05-19 14:26:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by ugaly (user info) at 2004-05-19 14:09:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
you could seed using the regular season. the 4 that have the highest ratings with most votes are the #1, #2 the next for and so on.
Get titles. Or make it an option to allow the dueling authors to agree on a topic for their own match up. They would agree to write for it, that way they cant argue that it is a piss poor topic and they can crank out something they are proud of.
Submitted by loki (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:48:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I get what Phinch is saying. I'm pretty dry at the moment, but I'd say that over all it was a wonderful experience.
I'd say that we should do away with the loser bracket. Part of the 'charm' if you will in losing is the end of the pressure to come up with something although I did notice that you picked one of my posts from the loser bracket as your favorite (blushes).
Itchy, you are partially correct in that stamina is a large part of it, but consider the pain and suffering of the people having to judge posts that were cranked out through sheer force of will and because the person ultimately finishing #5 had an appreciation for the amount of work that went into it and didn't want to let the team down by forfeiting.
Submitted by itchy (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:18:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I didn't participate, so I suppose you have to keep that in mind when you read these comments. I hear a lot of people complaining about the amount of time between rounds, but to me it seems that the endurance element is part of what should make UberMadness a challenge. It isn't just a competition about literary talent or creativity, but stamina as well. Maybe?
Submitted by antluvdog (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:16:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't wait to do it all over again.
Submitted by conrad (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:15:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Simply leave longer between rounds: I think that this will benefit the reader as well as the contributor, as even I became a bit jaded with it all until the crowd had been whittled down, and I don't consider myself to be one of the dominant ADD group around here. Otherwise, very well conceived and executed. It's also a good opportunity to make people review serious fiction, as that can prove difficult the rest of the time - I certainly have no intention of writing any more for this site.
Submitted by lucid (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:12:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
My comments about ubermadness "rules":
Put the sign up for Ubermadness II on the front page in the ubermadness "corner" so we won't miss it.
If someone "loses" they should be out of the competition for good. That way there are fewer and fewer posts to read each week which will keep the voters involved. The only people that cared who came in 5th, 6th etc, were the authors.
Seed the initial round randomly. There's no way to determine who's a higher/lower seed accurately so let fate decide.
Better titles.
A story a week is sufficient. These are short stories and if someone likes to write they could whip out a few of these a day let alone one a week.
Finally, set up a paypal account and charge an entry fee of $1 USD, winner take all.
Submitted by Loren1 (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:10:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
HEY! Thanks for the honorable mention. I'm flattered! I hated my other story, but that was a huge time-issue problem.
My only suggestions would be to:
A. limit the word count to a couple thou. Some of the "stories" are more like chapters. A LOT of editing could have been done on many of the super-long stories and they would have been just as powerful. It's a challenge to write a short story that's awesome too, sometimes a bigger challenge IMO.
And
B: more time to write and also more time to vote. In the earlier rounds it was impossible for me to get to every story, even though I really did want to.
Submitted by Phinch (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:04:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I was slowly weening myself from uber.. but madness pulled me back in. but it sucked all the juice from me, and now i'm not enjoying uber like i used to.
Submitted by ugaly (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:01:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
For regular season? Are you going to set it up so people can just challenge each other or just make a kind of low profile tournament? If it is people challenging each other you probably wouldn't need to worry about spacing because if the person thinks they can do it they most likely can.
Madness II - wait longer between posts. Give the titles right after the round ends so people have more time to think about it...maybe give them a week or 2 to write instead of 4-5 days. Not so pressured.
Best of this one- glad you put your own stuff in there. You had a lot of really good posts throughout the tournament. GOod Job and congrats on the win.
Submitted by BLITZKREIG_BOB (user info) at 2004-05-19 13:00:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
They're all excellent.
No complaints here.
Submitted by youarsoghey (user info) at 2004-05-19 12:59:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I think the regular season posting duel sounds like an amazing idea. It would be tought to execute and the schedule would need to be planned out ahead of time. Maybe three or four matches per participating user. The ones who have at least a .500 record go into UberMadness. That way we narrow down the field. And maybe six months of regular season so it doesn't get stale.
If ~120 people participate in the regular season and about half of those move on, we've got enough for a preliminary and then a round of 32. Also, with four posts per person there would be something like 250-350 posts spread out over the course of six months of the regular season. That wouldn't be too bad at all and it would narrow down the crunch time stuff.
Furthermore, there is no real need to find out who finished in 8th or 16th place. We should just have the finals and consolation in the end.