Include_Z_F_R_'s blog

Someting about USACO
By Include_Z_F_R_, history, 2 months ago, In English

Recently, as USACO had announced, your score must be certified if you want to promote from gold to platinum. However, it means that contestants from other countries will have to stay up late (or I've misunderstood the rules). And people who are still in the gold division (like me) will be quite embarrassed! (Not complaining about USACO's problem, they are really high-quality! )

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2 months ago, # |
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From the USACO website: "In order to promote from gold to platinum, your score must be certified."

I find it weird since from my understanding, certified contests are there to get accurate evaluations for the informatics olympiad. Why would they block access to the platinum contest unless you participate in a certified gold contest?

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    2 months ago, # ^ |
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    It is to preserve the integrity of the contests. This way the USACO Staff can monitor everyone and check if there is any cheating, e.g. code-copying. It is needed for gold to, since, if I remember correctly, EGOI finalists can be in gold. Before the EGOI-eligaible thing was in your account settings, they said "if you are eligible and in gold or plat, send us an email".

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      2 months ago, # ^ |
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      I understand that they want to monitor students that could classify for EGOI and IOI. But why do they want to monitor out of competition competitors that want to qualify to platinum?

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        2 months ago, # ^ |
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        Also for the sake of integrity. People do sometimes move into the US for 1 semester and be eligible for IOI/EGOI. Plus, if someone who moved into the US a while later moves yet cheated in the past, they won't want to pick them.

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        2 months ago, # ^ |
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        Country labels are self-assigned and can be updated at any time. If gold->plat was allowed for foreign competitors, then it could be easily circumvented without additional (possibly quite un-intuitive) changes in rules.

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          2 months ago, # ^ |
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          In my opinion, most foreign competitors are not willing to represent USA in IOI.

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2 months ago, # |
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TBH any contest format other than locking the contestants up for 5 hours will have people trying to exploit it. The only variable is the difficulty of doing so.

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    2 months ago, # ^ |
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    Agree, I believe the rule is just avoiding cheaters. maybe I will just let it go :(

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