9.3.13 Mastermind Mess

I will set out to demonstrate that Mastermind is a flawed programme and that there are inherent issues with fairness.

Unfortunately the approach adopted by the BBC in the format of Mastermind has devalued its worth, and made it little more than a general knowledge quiz. There was nothing much wrong with the old format where contestants (or 'contenders' as is preferred for some reason) answered questions on their subjects for a whole 2 minutes, followed by 2 minutes of general knowledge. Now the split is one-and-a-half plus two-and-a-half.  So the 50:50 ration is now 90:150, or put another way 37.5% specialised questions and 62.5% general knowledge.

After eroding the uniqueness of Mastermind, the people in charge have failed to take into account the further problems of:

a) The number of questions asked
b) The length of some, which is totally silly and unnecessary
c) The 'no interrupting' rule

There can be no mistake that John Humphrys likes the sound of his own voice, and likes us all to know who he is, considering he tells us in the opening to the programme.  When it comes to the questions, he rabbits on like hell, and wastes so much time asking the overly long questions.  There has been a marked shift in the average length of time to ask any question.  This causes frustrations on two counts - reducing the number of questions asked, and forcing contenders to wait for the pillock to finish each monologue before being allowed to answer.  If this has anything to do with making sure each person in the black chair gets the same time for thinking and answering, then that is simply shite.

Last night, there were two contenders (out of the five now invited to participate) whose score after the first round was 11 points.  One was a bloke who was a company director, and one was a blind woman who was a student.  The end result of yesterday's programme was the correct one, with the bloke going through to the final.  However, this was not through fairness or good planning by the BBC.  No, it was simply fortunate that there was no travesty in the result.  My reasoning for this comment is as follows.

Both contestants in their specialised subject round answered all questions immediately, and neither opted to pass on any question.  The man was asked 11 questions, answered all immediately and correctly, and so scored 11 points.  The woman was asked 13 questions, again answering immediately but got 2 wrong, to score 11 points.  This is of course totally unfair, because the only reason she was given extra opportunities to score was that Humphrys was rambling for less time in asking questions.  So whilst the half-time scores [or perhaps I should say after 37.5% of the contest] showed a tie for first place, the man's performance was 100% and the woman's was 84.6%.  That suggests to me that he was in the lead, what with a 15% higher score.  This would have demoted an 'A' level result from an A* to a C.  The only possible way in which the two could potentially be viewed as even is if the woman had answered the first 11 of her 13 questions correctly and it was questions 12 and 13 which proved too challenging.  Only on this basis could there be any claim (still weak) of them being equal, as the man never got his 12th and 13th questions, so we'll ever know if he too would have got them wrong - highly doubtful, considering his perfect performance.  Anyway, this is not relevant because she did not get the last two wrong.

In the general knowledge round, the questions were either prepared more carefully or delivered better by Humphrys, because both the contenders were asked 16 questions.  Again, there were no passes, and all answers were given immediately by both.  This consistent quick answering and lack of passes means we had a chance to witness possibly the best opportunity for analysis of Mastermind and its level of fairness.  The man scored 10 points and the woman 9 points.

So all ended well; he went on to the final with 21 points (from 27 questions) and she came second with 20 points (from 29 questions).  However, if she had got just one more correct in the second round, then they would have tied.  With no passes at all, then there would have been no way of separating them - despite the fact that he would have scored 21/27 and she would have scored 21/29.  So his 77.8% overall would have been judged the same as her 72.4%.

What is worse, and thankfully it did not happen, is that if she'd scored two more points in the second round, so 11/16 against the man's 9/16, then she would have been declared the winner.  So, with immediate answers to all questions by both, and not a pass all night (and so in all other respects the most even and fair contest one could envisage) she would have won with 22/29. But her percentage success would have been 75.86%.  She'd have won despite the man getting 77.8%.

So, Mastermind / BBC, get it sorted.  Allow interruptions, because if the contender knows the answer, he/she should not be penalised by time being wasted for them by Humphrys.  If the contender gets it wrong, then it's a gamble that perhaps didn't pay off.  Make questions shorter anyway.  Change the format back to the original.  With these long questions, no interrupting allowed and only 90 seconds for the first section, the maximum score possible is 11, 12 or 13 for anyone.  Even if you're think, being on the programme means you're likely to get seven anyway.  So the scores are basically bunched around the 9-11 mark.  Well, that's really capitalising on the one thing that makes the show special!  [That is sarcasm, in case you think I am being complimentary].

Q.E.D.

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