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8th International Mathtrade

ECplus3

By ECplus3
in Trackables

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ECplus3

+ECplus3

Posted
Posted (edited)

Hi everyone,

 

It is that time of year again!

 

I have created a new gmail account for this year's mathtrade to handle all the communications. If you are interested in joining, please send your info to:

 

mathtrade8@gmail.com.

 

I will need your:

 

- Caching Name

- Real Name

- FULL Mailing Address

- Email Address

 

For now I am just gathering names. Once I create the Google spreadsheet I will give you access to it and you can start adding coins! (but don't expect this til after Christmas!)

 

The trade will be divided into four phases:

 

1. Coin submission - entering your trade offers into the spreadsheet (ends Jan 14th, 9pm EST)

 

2. Regroup - reorganize your coin submissions to create groups (ends Jan 21st, 9pm EST or earlier)

 

3. Want list submission - create your wish lists! (ends Jan 28th, 9pm EST or earlier)

 

4. Trading! - trade list generated and emailed to you (starts Jan 31st if all goes well!)

 

Please respect the following rules:

 

1. This is an international trade - only take part in it if you are willing to pay for a possible overseas shipment of your coins! Remember that in theory each coin that you trade away may have to be sent to a different destination, within or outside of your own country.

 

2. You can list both trackable and non-trackable coins. If nothing is mentioned in the Remarks column, the coin will be assumed to be trackable and unactivated. In all other cases the status of the coin needs to be specified in the Remarks column. Activated coins are only allowed if they will be offered up for adoption (with the exception of Lackey and Moun10bike coins, obviously :D).

 

3. Participants may only submit one coin of any one edition (same coin with same finish/colour/etc) to trade. Duplicates are not allowed.

 

4. Please make sure you adhere to the deadlines shown above! Any edit after a deadline will be ignored!

 

5. Please keep your list to 50 coins or less!

 

 

Keep an eye on this thread - I will use it to post additional information/clarifications whenever needed!

 

Of course you can also use it to post any questions or remarks.

 

 

 

A More Detailed Explanation:

 

Q. What is a geocoin math trade? What makes it different from a 'normal' trade?

 

A. In a ' normal' trade, person A gives coin X to person B and person B give coin Y to person A. Sometimes person A wants a coin that person B has, but has nothing that interests person B to give in return. In that case person A could go looking for a person C to arrange a trade to get a coin from person's B want list. In a math trade you don't have to hunt for a 'person C' -- the software will do this for you! The math trade software will find optimal 'trade chains', some of which may involve just the regular 2 coins, while other 'trade chains' that are part of the same math trade may involve 3, 4, 5 or even more coins.

 

Q. I feel uncomfortable listing coin offers without knowing what I'll receive in return for them. Why would I do this?

 

A. You will be the one to decide what you'll get in return. After everyone has listed their coin offers, you can go through the total list of offers and make a want list for every coin you have offered. If you are not interested in trading one of your coins for any of the listed offers, you will simply use an empty want list for it, so that your coin won't be traded at all.

 

Q. What if someone offers a coin that I REALLY want? Is there a way that I can maybe offer 2 of my coins in exchange for this coveted coin?

 

A. Yes, there is. After Phase 1 (entering coin offers), we will enter Phase 2 (regrouping). During this phase you have a chance to look closely at the coins that are being offered, and if there are coins you would really want to get, you could try and create a more interesting offer by grouping two or more of your coins into one offer. If you group coin X and Y together, then these will not be traded separately, but as one single unit, for which you can decide (during the want list submission phase) what you want to trade them for.

 

(Detailed instructions for this regrouping will follow once we hit that phase (but don't worry, it's actually quite simple).

 

Q. Two or more people have listed one specific coin that I like. But if I include both in my want lists for, say, two of my coins, I risk ending up with 2 copies of the same coin. Is there a way to prevent this?

 

A. Yes, there is (a more verbose answer will follow at the appropriate time).

Edited by Flying Spaghetti Monster
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ECplus3

+ECplus3

Posted
  • Author
Posted

I have sent an invite to the spreadsheet to everyone I have received an email from.

 

Since it is a Google doc, you will be required to have a Google account. This is not the same as a gmail account so you will not be required to create a new email address -- just an account to log into Google.

 

You still have until January 14th to get your coins in. I just thought people who are finished their Christmas shopping already might need something to do right now. :)

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AtlantaGal

+AtlantaGal

Posted
Posted (edited)

I have sent an invite to the spreadsheet to everyone I have received an email from.

 

Since it is a Google doc, you will be required to have a Google account. This is not the same as a gmail account so you will not be required to create a new email address -- just an account to log into Google.

 

You still have until January 14th to get your coins in. I just thought people who are finished their Christmas shopping already might need something to do right now. :)

 

I didn't get an email. Did you post this before you actually sent the emails? I FWD my original message from 11/15.

 

Edit Added: The email was sent to Gmail even though I specifically requested all correspondence be sent to Yahoo.

Edited by AtlantaGal
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scificollector

+scificollector

Posted
Posted

Is it also allowed to list (groups of) pathtags, wooden coins and other similar items? And why is there a limit of 50 coins per person (not that I will have that many to list, I'm just curious - I'd think the more coins to chose from the better).

 

I believe that the 50 coins rule was to make sure that there wasn't an overload of coins. The last trade involved 1000+ coins and the previous one before that involved 1300+ coins some people found it difficult to look through them all. Also since the software for the trade has to calculate not only straight trades but also trade chains, the more coins that are in the trade the more variables it has and longer it takes.

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kdv

+kdv

Posted
Posted (edited)

I believe that the 50 coins rule was to make sure that there wasn't an overload of coins. The last trade involved 1000+ coins and the previous one before that involved 1300+ coins some people found it difficult to look through them all. Also since the software for the trade has to calculate not only straight trades but also trade chains, the more coins that are in the trade the more variables it has and longer it takes.

 

Well of course it's up to the math trade organizer, but again, in my opinion, the more the merrier. And people who don't feel like looking through all of the coins can simply look through half of them (or whatever) and base their 'wish lists' on that. I ran one of the earlier math trades a couple of years ago, and maybe it hadn't quite run 'out of hand' then, but I also don't see a problem in the software taking a few minutes (or even hours) longer to run. But again, of course it's up to the organizer to decide the parameters!

Edited by kdv
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scificollector

+scificollector

Posted
Posted

 

Well of course it's up to the math trade organizer, but again, in my opinion, the more the merrier. And people who don't feel like looking through all of the coins can simply look through half of them (or whatever) and base their 'wish lists' on that. I ran one of the earlier math trades a couple of years ago, and maybe it hadn't quite run 'out of hand' then, but I also don't see a problem in the software taking a few minutes (or even hours) longer to run. Bu again, of course it's up to the organizer to decide the paramters!

 

Certainly valid points. :) Personally more coins wouldn't affect me much as I have a system for sorting through the offers pretty quickly and generating my trade lists based off what makes it through the sorting process.

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steben6

+steben6

Posted
Posted

I believe that the 50 coins rule was to make sure that there wasn't an overload of coins. The last trade involved 1000+ coins and the previous one before that involved 1300+ coins some people found it difficult to look through them all. Also since the software for the trade has to calculate not only straight trades but also trade chains, the more coins that are in the trade the more variables it has and longer it takes.

 

Well of course it's up to the math trade organizer, but again, in my opinion, the more the merrier. And people who don't feel like looking through all of the coins can simply look through half of them (or whatever) and base their 'wish lists' on that. I ran one of the earlier math trades a couple of years ago, and maybe it hadn't quite run 'out of hand' then, but I also don't see a problem in the software taking a few minutes (or even hours) longer to run. But again, of course it's up to the organizer to decide the parameters!

All good ideas. Perhaps you can run the next mathtrade and use your own ideas. But, as you said yourself, it is up the the organizer to decide the parameters and he has graciously done so for this one!

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kdv

+kdv

Posted
Posted

 

All good ideas. Perhaps you can run the next mathtrade and use your own ideas. But, as you said yourself, it is up the the organizer to decide the parameters and he has graciously done so for this one!

 

I was (and am) merely wondering about the reasoning behind some of these decisions. they could be such that even if I did run another math trade again mysefl, I might want to use those same parameters too.

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