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Meta-badminton
Aug. 2nd, 2012 07:32 pmI kind of felt a bit of sympathy for the eight Asian badminton players who were disqualified for not trying their best (well, actually, for downright trying to lose).
I was reminded of some of the younger poker players who don't care who they upset in live games -- in deed, they seem to WANT to upset people. As Neil Channing has observed, these kids don't really understand the poker economy, and the way that they play live will eventually destroy the games. But, hey, these guys will move on anyway, so why should they care?
The badminton players looked at the rules and worked out that they would have easier games in the next round if they lost their final games in the first round. Now, look at it from their point of view. They are playing for medals. In this sense, an individual game is no more nor less important than an individual point. If losing a point, or losing a game, or losing a match, can serve to increase your chance of winning a medal, then it is the right thing to do.
But, you might cry, don't they have a duty to the audience, who have paid a lot of money to see these games. Don't they have a duty to entertain?
And here the poker analogy comes in again. These kids are youngsters. All that they want is a medal. if the audience gets bored watching them try for a medal, well, unlucky. And, let's remember, none of that money which the audience has paid has gone into the pockets of the players. It's gone into Locog's pockets, and they've kept it.
But the badminton kids forgot two things. The first is that there is a metagame beyond their own metagame. And it was that bigger metagame that got them disqualified. Sure, the system was badly set up, but to exploit that loophole in a way that got a lot of media attention and which backed the organizers into a corner -- well, didn't it cross any of their minds that there might be consequences?
Apparently not. And it's here that my sympathy for the badminton kidsters fades away. because they SHOULD have thought of that, especially the top Chinese pairing. There's been considerable grumbling that "what the Chinese want in badminton these days, they get". So I assume that the Chinese kidsters thought that arranging things so that it would be another Chinese gold and silver would be ok. But, this time round, it wasn't. They (or, I suspect, their coaches) miscalculated.
And for that, they can't complain. They thought that they could exploit a loophole in the rules and that those rules were set in stone. But the IOC doesn't work like that. They can effectively change the rules retrospectively (or, as it were, enforce another rule). And that's it. Good bye Columbus.
One of the kidsters has said she is quitting the game. I'm reminded of the snivelling tosser who played in the women's WSOP event because the law forbids the barring of men from a tournament because they are men. When Vicky Coren started pressing him on the matter, he immediately shouted "floor!" and claimed harrassment. Vicky promptly named and shamed him in her online blog, and said little tosser became a laughing stock.
Once again, there's nearly always a bigger metagame than the metagame you think you are playing.
++++++++++
Draghi made himself look a bit of a dick today. The chairman of the ECB said last week that it would do "whatever it takes" and that this "would be enough" to save the euro.
In today's speech it wad rapid backtracking time, as he qualified the "whatever it takes" phrase by, well, quite a lot, actually, as he listed all of the things that the ECB couldn't do.
The euro plummeted by more than 1.5 cents in about half an hour. Tis was more of the same old same old. The markets are getting fed up with everyone involved saying what they will do, and are waiting for them to do so. In the meantime, each crisis gets slightly worse than it was. The Greek "crisis" of two years ago now looks like what it was -- a penny-ante mishap. What we have now is Spain -- the one that some of us warned about a couple of years ago.
What we also have (and this was mentioned by Peston this morning) is a structural problem that is unsolvable unless debts are mutualized (and Germany won't allow that until there is full federation, so it won't happen). That problem is that the French banks are pulling out of Italy. If French banks stop buying Italian bonds, that begins to make Italian debt renewal look rather dodgy.
What's saved Italy in recent years has been the observation that a large proportion of its debt is domestically held. Well, mebbe so, but fair chunk of it is held by French banks and assurers. If you lose even 20% of the market for your debt, then you are in a bit of a pickle.
And that is what seems to be happening to Italy.
I still think that when Germany finds itself looking at euro apocalypse, it will buckle. But one definitely can't be certain. And the recent rating actions to put Germany's AAA-rating under review will hardly make them keen to keep on bailing out the weaker states. And now it's being questioned whether it can even afford so to do.
____________________
I was reminded of some of the younger poker players who don't care who they upset in live games -- in deed, they seem to WANT to upset people. As Neil Channing has observed, these kids don't really understand the poker economy, and the way that they play live will eventually destroy the games. But, hey, these guys will move on anyway, so why should they care?
The badminton players looked at the rules and worked out that they would have easier games in the next round if they lost their final games in the first round. Now, look at it from their point of view. They are playing for medals. In this sense, an individual game is no more nor less important than an individual point. If losing a point, or losing a game, or losing a match, can serve to increase your chance of winning a medal, then it is the right thing to do.
But, you might cry, don't they have a duty to the audience, who have paid a lot of money to see these games. Don't they have a duty to entertain?
And here the poker analogy comes in again. These kids are youngsters. All that they want is a medal. if the audience gets bored watching them try for a medal, well, unlucky. And, let's remember, none of that money which the audience has paid has gone into the pockets of the players. It's gone into Locog's pockets, and they've kept it.
But the badminton kids forgot two things. The first is that there is a metagame beyond their own metagame. And it was that bigger metagame that got them disqualified. Sure, the system was badly set up, but to exploit that loophole in a way that got a lot of media attention and which backed the organizers into a corner -- well, didn't it cross any of their minds that there might be consequences?
Apparently not. And it's here that my sympathy for the badminton kidsters fades away. because they SHOULD have thought of that, especially the top Chinese pairing. There's been considerable grumbling that "what the Chinese want in badminton these days, they get". So I assume that the Chinese kidsters thought that arranging things so that it would be another Chinese gold and silver would be ok. But, this time round, it wasn't. They (or, I suspect, their coaches) miscalculated.
And for that, they can't complain. They thought that they could exploit a loophole in the rules and that those rules were set in stone. But the IOC doesn't work like that. They can effectively change the rules retrospectively (or, as it were, enforce another rule). And that's it. Good bye Columbus.
One of the kidsters has said she is quitting the game. I'm reminded of the snivelling tosser who played in the women's WSOP event because the law forbids the barring of men from a tournament because they are men. When Vicky Coren started pressing him on the matter, he immediately shouted "floor!" and claimed harrassment. Vicky promptly named and shamed him in her online blog, and said little tosser became a laughing stock.
Once again, there's nearly always a bigger metagame than the metagame you think you are playing.
++++++++++
Draghi made himself look a bit of a dick today. The chairman of the ECB said last week that it would do "whatever it takes" and that this "would be enough" to save the euro.
In today's speech it wad rapid backtracking time, as he qualified the "whatever it takes" phrase by, well, quite a lot, actually, as he listed all of the things that the ECB couldn't do.
The euro plummeted by more than 1.5 cents in about half an hour. Tis was more of the same old same old. The markets are getting fed up with everyone involved saying what they will do, and are waiting for them to do so. In the meantime, each crisis gets slightly worse than it was. The Greek "crisis" of two years ago now looks like what it was -- a penny-ante mishap. What we have now is Spain -- the one that some of us warned about a couple of years ago.
What we also have (and this was mentioned by Peston this morning) is a structural problem that is unsolvable unless debts are mutualized (and Germany won't allow that until there is full federation, so it won't happen). That problem is that the French banks are pulling out of Italy. If French banks stop buying Italian bonds, that begins to make Italian debt renewal look rather dodgy.
What's saved Italy in recent years has been the observation that a large proportion of its debt is domestically held. Well, mebbe so, but fair chunk of it is held by French banks and assurers. If you lose even 20% of the market for your debt, then you are in a bit of a pickle.
And that is what seems to be happening to Italy.
I still think that when Germany finds itself looking at euro apocalypse, it will buckle. But one definitely can't be certain. And the recent rating actions to put Germany's AAA-rating under review will hardly make them keen to keep on bailing out the weaker states. And now it's being questioned whether it can even afford so to do.
____________________
