The time-of-day issue

[wcc2]

It would be nice if Webman could address the issue of time of day and high scores in daily contests. Some people seem to be convinced that "they" have a way of "turning off" high scores after a certain point. I'm equally convinced that the game is fair (but I suspect a lot more people play early in the day). A summary of % of highish scores by hour of day (that is, what % of games played each hour are, say, >150% of target) would be good evidence, although I don't think it would convince the "there MUST be something going on" group.

[Webman]

It's a common perception, since early in the day there tend to be scores that look tough to beat (and like you say, a lot of people do play early).  But let's look at reality rather than perception. Here are the times that each of the recent daily contest winner's got their winning score.1/19 wogger 8:37 am1/18 TXGinger 1:34 pm1/17 jjad 8:21 pm1/16 Splkg 10:25 pm1/15 poo 7:05 pm1/14 Top Paul 11:39 pm1/13 whiteydw 9:02 am1/12 shesback 11:25 am1/11 Donald Mays 4:14 pm1/10 starlasperch 5:19 pm1/9 Linnylee 9:29 am1/8 jimewins 10:53 amDo you think this supports the theory?

[Tedlark]

  Yeah but what time zone were those scores achieved in? Huh? Huh? Huh? ?????????

[Webman]

I'm not going to spend a ton of time on this running data, but looking at your original request of 150% scores, here is the data from yesterday in 6 hour blocks (all times pacific)6am-noon<150% 10,611 sessions150%+ 919 sessionsNoon-6pm<150% 10,225150%+ 871 sessions6pm-midnight <150% 6,554 sessions150%+ 545 sessionsSummary: Fewer people play in the evening hours, but the percentage of 150%+ sessions (7.9%, 7.8%, 7.7%) is almost identical in each of these time ranges.

[wcc2]

Webman: Your figures show just exactly what I'd expect. I can't imagine any reason why VP would have the games playing anything other than fairly--it could only hurt VP and make the software a LOT more complicated--and the other factors make great external sense. And it's become clear in the chat that those who Believe it's rigged won't accept evidence anyway. Thanks for the figures supporting a reality-based viewpoint: Not worth spending more time on!