Weighing In On Tournament Standings

As the SLTA begins its 15th year, it will be closing this conversation thread begun last year on evaluating MGA’s tournament posting site, and thanking the respondents for their feedback.

(See HERALD article 'SLTA Looks To The Future')

To recap, the MGA site was discovered in development last August posting a carbon copy of the SLTA's published posts for June & July and mirroring the same organization, classifications and points system for tournament rankings resident on the SLTA site.  MGA’s continued postings have resulted from the acquisition of SLTA’s reporting network, as well as the realms it served.

The policy of the SLTA is clear on process, and not all SLTA stewards were informed of MGA’s plans, nor were they announced in the SLTA public group or shared with its website administrator.  No answers came from the MGA to SLTA's request for clarification, so questions remained over the need for redundant postings, the accuracy of MGA’s information and its rebranding of SLTA’s time slotted signature events and awards.

The SLTA has a long history of shared tournament responsibilities and cooperation with the MGA since 2014 and supports any tournament service wishing to follow its template in service to the tournament community. 

Had the MGA been forthright and forthcoming, the SLTA could have assisted those efforts, and welcomed their taking on month-to-month tournament posting duties.  SLTA's current plans are to maintain its annual tournament archives as a continuing public service and will complete it's archive by following the example set by the MGA for sharing SLTA resources.

It will also encourage all to attend any in-world awards celebration hosted by the MGA to honor SL's tournament competitors, as any event the SLTA hosts will be on-line only as first inaugurated last season.

- SLTournament

6/2025

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I would like to weigh in on the issue of MGA’s Tournament Standings database.

As to the question raised why we would need two in the “SLTA Looks To The Future” can’t see how this is a service to the tournament community when it basically duplicates the functions of the SLTA Database used successfully for the past 14 years.  No offense to the effort expended, but the site looks amateurish by comparison.

If it were a significant upgrade of design, functionality or accessibility, I could understand it being proposed, but it fails on all counts and is more a downgrade from what the tournament community is use to.

If this decision resulted from a meeting of SLTA/MGA folks, then you would think a change of this magnitude would have been proposed, announced, vetted with all other SLTA members, by IM or email.  It wasn’t, and this was the first I have heard of its existence.  It bypasses the spirit of cooperation and inclusiveness the group was founded on.

This is meant as no offense to my good friends in the MGA who have worked hard on this in secret, but if upgrades were needed, why not ask for those as has been the case in the past.  Kali, the sites chief postings coordinator, has done so with Headmaster Forester in the past, and all has been accommodated. No other issues have been voiced.

I was scheduled to take over the officiating of the DDA WEDNESDAY KNIGHT FIGHTS, and would not wish to enter the results using another Standings than the one SLTA has served the community for 14 years.

In looking at the sites side by side, it’s a thumbs down from me.  Why fix what ain’t broken?

- Commander Bella Denver

8-11-2024

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I wanted to add a few comments on the MGA site after observing it over some months.

Although I might share the criticism for MGA site’s design, I can’t fault the quick access to data on one page as a benefit for the end user.  I also like the job the newsletter is doing to highlight tournament and non-tournament hosts alike and commend their early nod to the DDA Headmaster for his contributions to their success.

The only disconnect I see in their cheery newsletters is the absence of any credit to the SLTA after the MGA's long association and adoption of its template for their site. Given the SLTA years of pioneering community service and annual awards ceremonies honoring the benchmarks of others, that omission belies the inclusive nature the newsletters would hope to project.

As far as the posting of DDA past or future tournaments are concerned, it has no preference on where those results reside or who awards its participant; and gratified to see the same DDA tournament posts on both the SLTA and MGA sites.  The DDA would only take issue if a realm or group claimed exclusive rights to those results as the UJ did long ago.

Realms or groups like the DDA and SLTA can't claim rights to information they do not originate.  They might claim it for a sim, tournament equipment or the design elements of a website beyond SL’s borders, but not the final tournament scores generated by individual competitors in events open to the public, heralded in public groups, and reposted on public forums all have access to. It's no different in RL where fair use to game facts can be reposted on multiple print, broadcast and online sites, even when the reporting agency is not at the event.  

I will add it is incumbent on those sites to be accurate in the reposting of those facts.  The SLTA article that prompted this note cited several discrepancies in MGA’s reposting of events, some now corrected, others not, that raise that question.

As long as tournament services sites like the MGA, SLTA, UL, etc. provide an accurate accounting of SL’s public record, with equal access to all without bias, they will have DDA support.

Fafnir Fang, Director Of Administration

Double Dragon Academy

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SLTA JOUST STANDINGS

MGA JOUST STANDINGS

*Please observe constructive criticism and civil discourse to avoid editing for offensive remarks.