SEASON 11
| Standings | Entries | Rules | Progress Chart |
Nathan Sanders's Survivor Certainty Contest has inspired similar contests on the newsgroups of other popular elimination shows, such as American Idol. You pick the singers who you think will go the farthest. The longest they last, the more points you score. At the end of the season, the player with the highest score wins.
1. This contest is open to all subscribers of the alt.tv.american-idol and rec.arts.tv.x-factor newsgroup (ATAI and RATXF, for short), regardless whether they are regulars, semi-regulars, or lurkers. Registration is absolutely free, and there is no limit on the size of the field. The more, the merrier. Visitors of my website, the Game Show Warehouse, or members of any other newsgroup, message board, or discussion forum of which the commissioner is a member may also enter if they so choose.
2. On the night of Thursday, March 15, 2012, two weeks after the thirteen American Idol finalists are announced--and shortly after the third elimination has aired in the Eastern and Central time zones--I will post a call for entries on ATAI and any other message boards where the contest may be of interest. Players wishing to participate may either reply directly to this post or e-mail me at tjwuthrich[at]frontier[dot]com. (Remember to replace the words in brackets with the punctuation they describe.)
1. Each player wishing to participate will be given 100 Certainty Points (CPs) to distribute among the nine remaining finalists however he/she wishes, based on how certain he/she is that each will be named the American Idol.
2. The following restricitions apply on dividing your CPs:
Other than that, you have complete flexibilty. You can give CPs to all twelve performers, or to just four of them, or anything in between, as long as you comply with the restrictions above.
3. If an entry is determined to be invalid, the player will be notified of what he/she did wrong and will be asked to try again.
4. If I receive multiple entries from a single participant, I will accept his/her latest valid entry. In other words, I will assume that subsequent entries are updates to old entries.
Let's use the finalists from Season 8, the first season with a Top 13, as an example. If you are 40% certain that Adam Lambert will win the competition, 30% certain that Allison Iraheta will win, 25% certain that Matt Giraud will win, 3% sure of Jasmine Murray, and 2% certain of Kris Allen, your entry would look like this:
Adam Lambert - 40 Allison Iraheta - 30 Matt Giraud - 25 Jasmine Murray - 3 Kris Allen - 2
Last names or nicknames are optional, but just make sure I know where the CPs are going. They do not have to be in any order, although I would advise arranging the names alphabetically to make the "record-keeping" a little easier. Just don't try to give points to people like Hallie Day or Reed Grimm (eliminated in the semifinals), David Leathers, Jr. (eliminated in the Hollywood rounds), Kelly Clarkson (wrong season), or Gladys Knight (wrong show). Theoretically, you are allowed to give CPs to the first three finalists eliminated, but I wouldn't recommend it. J
5. Entries must be timestamped before Wednesday, March 21, 2012, 5:00 pm Eastern Time (4pm CT/2pm PT)--three hours before the Top 10 performance show airs in the Eastern and Central time zones. Be sure to include the name you wish to go by in the standings. If you do not sign a name, I will take the name in the "From" header of the entry.
1. Each Thursday, the singer with the fewest votes from viewers is eliminated from the competition, and that singer is assigned a placement based on how long he/she lasted. Since three contestants have already been eliminated, the finalist cut in the first week after the contest begins is given a placement of 4, the second 5, the third 6, and so on up to 13 for the winner. This placement is multiplied by the number of CPs you have placed on that singer, and your total score is determined by adding up the multiplied points. The player with the highest score at the end of the season is the winner.
Going back to the Season 8 example above, you may recall that Kris won, Adam was the runner-up, Allison was eliminated in the tenth week, Matt was our the week prior after being saved by the judges, and Jasmine was one of the two who were cut in the first week. Here's how your final score is calculated:
| NAME | CPs | PLACEMENT | SCORE |
|---|---|---|---|
| Adam | 40 | 12 | 40 x 12 = 480 |
| Allison | 30 | 10 | 30 x 10 = 210 |
| Matt | 25 | 9 | 25 x 9 = 225 |
| Jasmine | 3 | 2 | 3 x 2 = 6 |
| Kris | 2 | 13 | 2 x 13 = 26 |
| GRAND TOTAL | 947 | ||
2. (The Corey Clark Exception) In the event that a performer is released from the competition during the finals for reasons not involving the viewer vote and is not replaced by another performer, that performer will be given a placement of zero, meaning all CPs placed on him/her are lost.
3. (The Mario Vasquez Exception) If a performer drops out of the competition voluntarily and is replaced in the Top 13 by a new performer, the alternate will automatically assume all CPs originally placed on the departing finalist. If the departure occurs during the entry period, like it did in Season 4, players may still change their entries. If the alternate is a previously eliminated Top 13 finalist, some singers' placements may be changed.
3a. If a contestant leaves the competition either voluntarily or for medical reasons over the course of this contest and is replaced by a previously eliminated finalist, the placements will be determined as if the departing act was eliminated that week.
4. (The Judges' Save Rule) Starting in Season 8, the judges are granted a one-time-only chance to save the lowest vote-getter from elimination. If that happens, no contestant is eliminated that week. By defintion, the winner's placement is the total number of finalists while each other singer's placement is the number of finalists no longer in the competition at the conclusion of the result show he/she was eliminated, including him/herself.
5. In case any event not outlined above takes place, the commissioner (which am I) reserves the right to make an executive decision.
The Certainty Contest is a game of strategy. To win, you want to place the most CPs on the singers you think will last the longest. Using the rules above, the best possible entry is 50 CPs on the winner, 48 on the runner-up, and 1 on each of the third- and fourth-place finishers, which would result in a score (50 x 13) + (48 x 12) + (1 x 11) + (1 x 10) = 650 + 576 + 11 + 10 = 1,247 points. However, if your 50-CP singer goes out first, followed by your 48-CP singer in Week 2, and your other two picks go the next two weeks in either order, you'd have the lowest possible score of (50 x 1) + (48 x 2) + (1 x 3) + (1 x 4) = 153 points. However, since this year the CC starts after three contestants are eliminated, you get these eliminations for free! Therefore, your final score will fall somewhere in between 453 and 1,247, with the average score being 850.
The safest strategy is to assign CPs evenly to all ten available finalists. This works out to 10 CPs per singer, but this assures you will finish with the average score of 10 x (4 + 5 + 6 + ... + 12 + 13) = 850 points. Since this method offers no deviation at all, the better strategy is to take risks, but watch out. If Jennifer Lopez doesn't like your 50-CP performer's Week 3 performance (and that's really bad), your risk could backfire.
1. Once your final entry is submitted, all you have to do from then on is root (and vote) for your favorite singers. After the East Coast airing of the results show--usually within 24 hours--I will post the weekly leaderboard showing the current scores and remaining CPs for all participants. If you live in the Mountain or Pacific time zone, however, please be advised that the standings may be posted before the show airs on your Fox station (if I do it Thursday, it's one less thing I have to do on Friday). You might also be an irrepressible fan of The Big Bang Theory or The Vampire Diaries and watch AI on tape or DVR later. Either way, this post may be considered a spoiler.
2. If the CPs on an otherwise valid entry do not total exactly 100, the individual CPs will be proportionally calculated. For example, a split of 50-20-11-9, which adds up to 90, would become 50-25-14-11.
3. Like on the Survivor contest, I will calculate the average number CPs for all performers and use this to create a false entry. You can use this entry to gauge how you are doing against the field as a whole.
4. Because I, commissioner of the ATAI Certainty Contest, have no advance knowledge of how the votes will go (how can I, since AI is live on the East Coast from here on out?), I have the option to participate as well.
5. On the weekly leaderboard, players will be ranked based on their "expected score", which is defined as the average of the highest and lowest possible scores they can achieve. According to Nathan, this gives a more accurate picture of who has the best chance of winning the contest than ranking by best-case or worst-case score. All three of these scores will match the current score after the final week.
6. If two or more players are tied for first place at the end of the season, the player who has given the most CPs to the eventual Idol will win. If the players are still tied, the player who has given the most CPs to the runner-up will win, and so on. If the tying entries turn out to be identical, the player who submitted his/her entry first will be ruled the winner.
7. The winner won't receive a trophy, a recording contract, or any other kind of tangible reward, but you can't put a value on the bragging rights over the rest of the group.
Remember, contest entries are due Wednesday, March 21, 2012, at 5:00 pm Eastern Time.
If you have any questions, e-mail me at tjwuthrich[at]frontier[dot]com. (Again, substitute the proper punctuation for the words in brackets.) Enjoy!
-- Jason Wuthrich
This contest does not now nor will it ever challenge 19 Entertainment or FremantleMedia North America for ownership for American Idol.
For more Certainty Contest action, visit Nathan Sanders's Survivor Contest or Peca Fan's Amazing Race Contest.
Return to the results page or visit the Game Show Warehouse.