Questioning The Randomness Of The Randomizer

[Brit Canuck]

If the $25,000 is jumped over in two consecutive games, that's unlucky coincidence.

With today's (12-12-2012) episode, it has now been jumped in three consecutive games.

No offence to the folks who work in the control room, but is there something Disney/ABC's trying to tell us?

On a hunch, I think that if someone took the time to go back through all the transcripts from the previous two seasons, and those from so far this current season, I think they'll find that $25,000 is the most jumped over dollar amount in each season of ShuffleBAM to date.

That doesn't sound all that Randomized to me. Opinions?

[SportsFan68]

You'll probably get the same opinions that came up when the randomness of the 50/50 was discussed. Why always were the two mostly likely answers left? And now, why is the $25K jumped so often? It does seem to me that this is a recent phenomenon -- until the past few days, I noticed that it was almost always $3,000 or $500 or similar lower amount.

[earendel]

If the $25,000 is jumped over in two consecutive games, that's unlucky coincidence.

With today's (12-12-2012) episode, it has now been jumped in three consecutive games.

No offence to the folks who work in the control room, but is there something Disney/ABC's trying to tell us?

On a hunch, I think that if someone took the time to go back through all the transcripts from the previous two seasons, and those from so far this current season, I think they'll find that $25,000 is the most jumped over dollar amount in each season of ShuffleBAM to date.

That doesn't sound all that Randomized to me. Opinions?

Anything truly random may have occasions when there is a run of occurrences that are identical - i.e., flipping a coin may result in T H T T H T T T T T. Just because they come in a cluster doesn't mean that the process isn't random.

[earendel]

You'll probably get the same opinions that came up when the randomness of the 50/50 was discussed. Why always were the two mostly likely answers left? And now, why is the $25K jumped so often? It does seem to me that this is a recent phenomenon -- until the past few days, I noticed that it was almost always $3,000 or $500 or similar lower amount.

When I was on the show, our group was told that the 50/50 wasn't totally random - the intent was to leave the correct answer and the one most likely to be mistaken for the correct answer.

[Bob78164]

How many contestants were on yesterday's show? I'd like to add placeholders before today's transcripts go up. --Bob

[smilergrogan]

Here's my investigation of the 50/50 I posted years ago for the first two seasons of the syndicated show. At one time, I also posted an investigation of the same thing for the prime time show (using incomplete transcript info), and it showed that the primetime 50/50 behaved more like it was generated randomly than the syndicated one did. Interesting that it very likely wasn't random when Meredith said it was, and behaved more like it was random when the show told contestants it wasn't. (Just because it behaved as if it was random doesn't prove that it actually was random, though).

If the Bored wasn't so screwed up and slow, I might take a look through the transcripts to see if the JTQ behaves as if random.


"50/50 Random? Stats Suggest Otherwise", Nov. 21, 2004

It seems whenever I see the syndicated BAM show, Meredith is always
insisting to skeptical contestants that the 50/50 randomly removes
two of the three wrong answers. I know the conventional wisdom is
that it's not random, but this is actually a testable proposition,
making use of the thorough transcripts compiled by dedicated fans
(and available in the links section here).

In particular, every time a contestant uses the ATA followed by the
50/50 on the same question, we get numerical data on the popularity
of the three wrong answers which can be compared to the one wrong
answer which the 50/50 actually leaves. If the 50/50 is truly
random, then the most popular wrong answer should be left 1/3 of the
time.

Looking back through the three seasons of syndicated show
transcripts, I identified 56 instances where a contestant used ATA
followed by 50/50 on the same question. Here are the results:

50/50 leaves most popular wrong answer: 25 times
50/50 leaves 2nd most popular wrong answer: 15 times
50/50 leaves least popular wrong answer: 16 times

(for this season's shows, I averaged the studio audience and AOL
results for ATA)

It is straightforward to calculate the chance that a random selection
would choose the most popular of three answers 25 or more times in 56
chances; this works out to be 5.1 %. So, if the 50/50 really is
random, there is only about a 1 in 20 chance that the results would
be skewed so much in favor of the most popular wrong answer.

The above probably overstates the chance that the 50/50 is random.
Consider that on many questions there is not a clear "best" wrong
answer, so the audience response is unpredictable. If we focus in on
only those questions where the audience clearly favored one wrong
answer over the other two, we might get a better idea of whether the
50/50 is random.

I looked at questions where the ATA resulted in one wrong answer that
got at least 25% of the total vote AND at least 15 percentage points
more than either of the other two wrong answers. These are likely to
be questions where the most popular wrong answer is easiest to
predict.

I found 21 such instances; results were:

50/50 leaves most popular wrong answer: 13 times
50/50 leaves 2nd most popular wrong answer: 4 times
50/50 leaves least popular wrong answer: 4 times

If the 50/50 is random, the chance that it would select the most
popular wrong answer 13 or more times out of 21 works out to be 0.7 %.

So, I feel pretty safe in saying that the 50/50 is not random. I
guess the question is, why do they insist that it is? Why not just
say that it is intended to leave the most plausible wrong answer and
let contestants deal with it that way (it still would be a valuable
lifeline)? Isn't it unethical to intentionally deceive contestants?


"50/50 Random? No Way", Nov. 23, 2004

I followed through on a trend I spotted in my previous 50/50 survey.
I'm a little surprised no dedicated viewers of the syndicated show
noticed it. Here is the key statistic:

In the first two seasons of syndicated BAM, the 50/50 was used 562
times (according to the transcripts) and the wrong answer it left was
letter D exactly 1 time (June 27, 2004). D was one of the two
remaining answers a total of 120 times, and was the correct answer
119 out of 120 times. Starting from the beginning of the first
syndicated season, when the 50/50 left D as one of the two possible
answers, D was the correct answer 111 times in a row. If you don't
believe me, check the transcripts yourself.

In addition, the two answers left by the 50/50 were C and D exactly 1
time out of the 562 (also June 27, 2004).

Now, if that's random, I'm a Hottentot!

Here are the complete numbers for the first two seasons:

Answers Left By 50/50
A&B: 103 times
A&C: 158 times
A&D: 35 times
B&C: 181 times
B&D: 84 times
C&D: 1 time

Correct Answer
A: 151 times
B: 138 times
C: 154 times
D: 119 times

*The bad news for those who may want to use this information to
improve their chances of success in the hotseat:

Starting with this season, there has been a dramatic change. The
show clearly became aware of the problem and has corrected it (and
maybe even overcompensated). In 62 50/50 usages this season, D has
been the wrong answer left 24 times, and the correct answer 12. C
and D have been the two answers left a total of 12 times.

So it's possible the 50/50 is now random, but it surely wasn't for
the first two seasons.

[jaybee]

Nothing in TV production is random. Whatever can be controlled will be to give whatever is perceived to be the best show.

I've made a game about predicting what name Jeff will pull out in Survivor. Once the first name is out, it is easy to predict the order of all the rest. There is way too much at stake for TV production to rely on 'random'. That word does not exist in the TV producers vocabulary.

[Bob Juch]

Nothing in TV production is random. Whatever can be controlled will be to give whatever is perceived to be the best show.

I've made a game about predicting what name Jeff will pull out in Survivor. Once the first name is out, it is easy to predict the order of all the rest. There is way too much at stake for TV production to rely on 'random'. That word does not exist in the TV producers vocabulary.

But they don't pretend the names are random on "Survivor".

[MarleysGh0st]

Nothing in TV production is random. Whatever can be controlled will be to give whatever is perceived to be the best show.

I've made a game about predicting what name Jeff will pull out in Survivor. Once the first name is out, it is easy to predict the order of all the rest. There is way too much at stake for TV production to rely on 'random'. That word does not exist in the TV producers vocabulary.

But they don't pretend the names are random on "Survivor".

Whereas they specifically do say it's random in the official rules of SyndieBAM.

http://dadt.com/millionaire/auditions/rules.html

Round 1

Dollar Values

In Round 1, the Contestant will face up to ten (10) questions of varying degrees of difficulty, as determined in the sole discretion of the Producer. The order of the dollar values for each of the first ten (10) questions in Round 1 will be randomly shuffled by the game computer prior to game play. These dollar values shall include the following amounts: $100, $500, $1,000, $2,000, $3,000, $5,000, $7,000, $10,000, $15,000, $25,000. The total prize money available in Round 1 is $68,600 if all ten (10) questions are answered correctly . The Contestant will not be told the dollar value for any question in Round 1 until they answer the question, jump the question (see below), or walk away. The prize chart in Section 5, below, illustrates the potential outcomes during game play.

Questions

Prior to actual game play, the Round 1 questions will be randomly shuffled by the game computer. The Contestant, therefore, will face these ten questions in a randomized order of difficulty. The order of the questions will be randomized independently of the order of the dollar values. The questions will not be identified by level of difficulty during game play.

If TPTB have confused the definition of "random" with "arbitrary", they're in violation of the official rules. I presume there are federal laws that have effect, in such cases.

[Brit Canuck]

Just for the record, $25K was jumped over again today (Friday), and so was the $15K in the same game.
That also happened earlier this week, in David's game on Tuesday/Wednesday.

[Bob78164]

Just for the record, $25K was jumped over again today (Friday), and so was the $15K in the same game.
That also happened earlier this week, in David's game on Tuesday/Wednesday.

But they have no way to know which questions the contestant will choose to jump. --Bob

[omgwheelhouse]

Just for the record, $25K was jumped over again today (Friday), and so was the $15K in the same game.
That also happened earlier this week, in David's game on Tuesday/Wednesday.

But they have no way to know which questions the contestant will choose to jump. --Bob

??? The original poster is wondering if it's rigged, right? So they could change the value on the spot based on whether or not the contestant has jumped. Am I missing something?

[Bob78164]

Just for the record, $25K was jumped over again today (Friday), and so was the $15K in the same game.
That also happened earlier this week, in David's game on Tuesday/Wednesday.

But they have no way to know which questions the contestant will choose to jump. --Bob

??? The original poster is wondering if it's rigged, right? So they could change the value on the spot based on whether or not the contestant has jumped. Am I missing something?

I thought the suggestion was some sort of error in the randomizing program, similar to the problem we discovered a few years ago with the 50-50. What you're describing now would be deliberate fraud and (in my view) can't possibly be cost-effective given the downside if they're ever caught. --Bob

[smilergrogan]

Here's what I get for this season:
Total JTQs: 170
$100: 22 (12.9%)
$500: 19 (11.2%)
$1000: 13 (7.6%)
$2000: 18 (10.6%)
$3000: 17 (10.0%)
$5000: 12 (7.1%)
$7000: 17 (10.0%)
$10000: 17 (10.0%)
$15000: 16 (9.4%)
$25000: 19 (11.2%)

Conclusion: no reason to believe it's not random. There could be a slight effect based on the contestants' relative willingness to use JTQ depending on the size of their bank. If they tend to be more willing to use JTQ with a larger bank, this could explain a bias toward the smallest $ values appearing, since a larger bank means the larger $ values will have been played already.

[thealexdavis]

I've been in the control room repeatedly for shows. It's all random. Some of the producers don't even know the dollar values or answers until they come to that question. Some obviously do, but the rest are playing along with the players. If big money gets Jumped over often it's freak luck.

In the room they get Meredith's monitor, but at the bottom there's an extra small box that displays the cash amount. The cash amount is only displayed when they get to that question. They don't see an entire list of it. They only see the dollar value for that question at that moment.

[MarleysGh0st]

I've been in the control room repeatedly for shows.

How have you gotten into the control room?

Are you permitted in the top secret meeting room where TPTB hand out the Happy/Sad Cards (or, uhhh, Happy/Sad E-mails) too?

[thealexdavis]

I do press (not specifically for the show) and I have some friends higher up. I'm also a TV producer so it's vaguely research. The control room is interesting to be because, again, at least half of them are as in the dark as all of us. They don't know the answers, they don't know the dollar value until the question appears, they play along and root for them like all of us. I've been in rooms where producers have actively rooted against contestants to save cash. Not here. I 100% promise that it's all random and nothing is deceptive about it.

If I had access to the card room I'd be a lot more popular. When they were switching studios it was my joke that I wanted to take a pair of scissors to the set and snip an Ask the Audience console. Didn't fly.

[MarleysGh0st]

The control room is interesting to be because, again, at least half of them are as in the dark as all of us. They don't know the answers, they don't know the dollar value until the question appears, they play along and root for them like all of us. I've been in rooms where producers have actively rooted against contestants to save cash. Not here. I 100% promise that it's all random and nothing is deceptive about it.

Sure, the control room and Meredith can all root for the contestants, because the question writers, hidden away in their secluded lair, have already salted the question stacks with enough WWOQs to ensure that incursions into the upper tier are few and far between.

[Brit Canuck]

Just for the record, $25K was jumped over again today (Friday), and so was the $15K in the same game.
That also happened earlier this week, in David's game on Tuesday/Wednesday.

But they have no way to know which questions the contestant will choose to jump. --Bob

??? The original poster is wondering if it's rigged, right? So they could change the value on the spot based on whether or not the contestant has jumped. Am I missing something?

No, not necessarily rigged, and definitely not changing it on the spot, but rather determining beforehand which questions are more difficult and more likely to be jumped over, perhaps based on what's nearer to the top of the first tier in the unrandomized category tree (UCT). And the fact that not every contestant gets to see his or her category tree prior to it being randomized ("Computer, please randomize the money amounts AND the categories") may also be a factor. If the contestant knows it's a question from near the top of the tier, and the bigger money amounts are still available on the board, he or she might be more likely to go for it rather than jump over it. Without the UCT, there's just no way of knowing one way or the other.