Card counting
Dec. 20th, 2008 08:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rickvsAs expected, I did not win the $10,000 shopping spree.
This did not prevent me from calling my mother-in-law and breathlessly chirping, "You won't believe what I'm doing *right now*! I'm ... going home empty-handed!"
The single person whose name got drawn from the walk-ups and dropped in with us semi-finalists was also drawn as one of the final five ...so I was rooting for her, just out of a general desire to see the underdog win out. A different one of the five finalists got it, however, so we went away... after using up one of my corollary semi-finalist prizes buying frozen yogurt on the way out. (The last corollary prize -- tickets to look at the model train display which Northpark sets up every year -- will be used sometime in the next week or two. Probably).
And, because I've had a few people ask me about it, here's my list of suggestions on how to play radio contests. Hopefully, many of these are blindingly obvious, but several wouldn't have occurred to me before I bumped my nose learning them.
Guidelines for playing radio contests:
GREASE THE SLIDE
Put your favorite stations in your speed dial. Your mother will understand if her number gets bumped.
Be sitting in front of a web browser before you call. Writing utensils wouldn't hurt, either. If the DJ drops a hint that you'll be guessing the song titles from a mashup of Grateful Dead xylophone covers, a short google session can prevent a self-inflicted aneurysm. Even if you can mentally summon the Dead's entire discography, can you do it before the DJ hangs up on you?
If your motor skills are up to it, use more than one phone, but not while driving. Earpieces are your friend, in any case.
Land lines are preferable to cell lines -- they'll ring longer before "helpfully" hanging up on you, which I must assume has something to do with how much bandwidth the cell companies are willing to devote to a (presumably) dead-end call. I used to have a cell phone that'd ring till the battery died, if the other end of the call wasn't picked up, but I'm becoming uncomfortably certain that's an option that can't be had for love nor money these days.
If the contest involves some obscure piece of trivia about which you have no clue -- the funniest answer you can come up with may wind up being the correct one. DJs don't generally cherry-pick trivia questions with boring answers.
Give a one-syllable version of your name. It'll be helpful if you're playing a contest in which you use your name to buzz in. It'll also delay the time when the staff starts recognizing you by your name/voice/caller ID. ("Hey, isn't this the same Bartholomew that called us yesterday? Give someone else a chance, fella!")
If they're giving away bunches of the same prize pack every ninety minutes all weekend, fewer people are going to be clogging the station's phone lines at 9am Saturday morning than at 3pm Sunday afternoon.
For contests that occur at predictable times, dial in just *before* they give the cue to call -- this can provide useful information about when they flush/reopen the phone lines, among other things. It may also, in rare cases, plant you on a phone line that the call screener isn't quite hanging up as they count off the callers. I've had it happen that just by not hanging up, I've heard: *click* "You're-caller-one-thank-you" *click* ... *click* "You're-caller-five-thank-you" *click* ... *click* "Congratulations, you're caller nine!"
Don't piss off the call screeners. You'll spend more time talking to them than to the DJs -- and they can, to a limited extent, stack the deck either in your favor or against it. I don't think this is cheating on their part; I'm certain they have instructions to feed people to the DJs that'll make for good radio, and if you sound like Eeyore and cop an attitude with them, that probably won't be you.
DO THE RESEARCH
Know the rules of whatever contest you're calling. If the game you're playing allows you to choose which DJ you're teaming up with, have an idea which ones suck at the game.
If the station plays some game at the same time all week -- but they've got a specific "Monday" game, a specific "Tuesday" game, et cetera ... figure out which game you have the best chance at winning, and bide your time till that day. Also take into account whether a specific game consistently yields larger prizes, compared to other games on the same station.
Find out how long the prize timeout period is for each station (probably 30-60 days), and whether winning the $15 DVD they're giving away right now would disqualify you from making an attempt at the hundred-dollar Eagles tickets next week.
Consider calling a few contests you're not particularly interested in, just to gather data. How many phone lines does the station have available? How quickly does this team of call screeners start answering the phone -- and about how long does it take them to get to the twenty-fifth caller, so you can get back to your breakfast?
FIND THE SWEET SPOT
Figure out how much time you want to reasonably spend playing radio games. You could kill twenty-four hours a day chasing these things, but I don't recommend it. Are you doing it to maximize your enjoyment, or to put the most expensive prizes in your pocket? Do you really have a use for that Bugaloos DVD, or are you just playing for the thrill of the hunt? I'll generally avoid the big-dollar contests, especially on stations with the largest audiences in town ...because I don't like my chances of getting through against an army of fourteen-year-olds with thumb muscles overdeveloped from texting all day. I've found I do better with contests that have a smaller response -- because the prizes are worth less, or the station has a smaller audience, or the contest has some skill component that many listeners don't want to go up against.
I have anecdotes behind many of the above points. Some of them are amusing -- perhaps more to you, Gentle Reader, than they were as they were happening to me ...and some of them I won't post to a public forum, but feel free to ask me about them anyway.
In the meanwhile, does anybody wish to watch the Bugaloos with me?
This did not prevent me from calling my mother-in-law and breathlessly chirping, "You won't believe what I'm doing *right now*! I'm ... going home empty-handed!"
The single person whose name got drawn from the walk-ups and dropped in with us semi-finalists was also drawn as one of the final five ...so I was rooting for her, just out of a general desire to see the underdog win out. A different one of the five finalists got it, however, so we went away... after using up one of my corollary semi-finalist prizes buying frozen yogurt on the way out. (The last corollary prize -- tickets to look at the model train display which Northpark sets up every year -- will be used sometime in the next week or two. Probably).
And, because I've had a few people ask me about it, here's my list of suggestions on how to play radio contests. Hopefully, many of these are blindingly obvious, but several wouldn't have occurred to me before I bumped my nose learning them.
Guidelines for playing radio contests:
GREASE THE SLIDE
Put your favorite stations in your speed dial. Your mother will understand if her number gets bumped.
Be sitting in front of a web browser before you call. Writing utensils wouldn't hurt, either. If the DJ drops a hint that you'll be guessing the song titles from a mashup of Grateful Dead xylophone covers, a short google session can prevent a self-inflicted aneurysm. Even if you can mentally summon the Dead's entire discography, can you do it before the DJ hangs up on you?
If your motor skills are up to it, use more than one phone, but not while driving. Earpieces are your friend, in any case.
Land lines are preferable to cell lines -- they'll ring longer before "helpfully" hanging up on you, which I must assume has something to do with how much bandwidth the cell companies are willing to devote to a (presumably) dead-end call. I used to have a cell phone that'd ring till the battery died, if the other end of the call wasn't picked up, but I'm becoming uncomfortably certain that's an option that can't be had for love nor money these days.
If the contest involves some obscure piece of trivia about which you have no clue -- the funniest answer you can come up with may wind up being the correct one. DJs don't generally cherry-pick trivia questions with boring answers.
Give a one-syllable version of your name. It'll be helpful if you're playing a contest in which you use your name to buzz in. It'll also delay the time when the staff starts recognizing you by your name/voice/caller ID. ("Hey, isn't this the same Bartholomew that called us yesterday? Give someone else a chance, fella!")
If they're giving away bunches of the same prize pack every ninety minutes all weekend, fewer people are going to be clogging the station's phone lines at 9am Saturday morning than at 3pm Sunday afternoon.
For contests that occur at predictable times, dial in just *before* they give the cue to call -- this can provide useful information about when they flush/reopen the phone lines, among other things. It may also, in rare cases, plant you on a phone line that the call screener isn't quite hanging up as they count off the callers. I've had it happen that just by not hanging up, I've heard: *click* "You're-caller-one-thank-you" *click* ... *click* "You're-caller-five-thank-you" *click* ... *click* "Congratulations, you're caller nine!"
Don't piss off the call screeners. You'll spend more time talking to them than to the DJs -- and they can, to a limited extent, stack the deck either in your favor or against it. I don't think this is cheating on their part; I'm certain they have instructions to feed people to the DJs that'll make for good radio, and if you sound like Eeyore and cop an attitude with them, that probably won't be you.
DO THE RESEARCH
Know the rules of whatever contest you're calling. If the game you're playing allows you to choose which DJ you're teaming up with, have an idea which ones suck at the game.
If the station plays some game at the same time all week -- but they've got a specific "Monday" game, a specific "Tuesday" game, et cetera ... figure out which game you have the best chance at winning, and bide your time till that day. Also take into account whether a specific game consistently yields larger prizes, compared to other games on the same station.
Find out how long the prize timeout period is for each station (probably 30-60 days), and whether winning the $15 DVD they're giving away right now would disqualify you from making an attempt at the hundred-dollar Eagles tickets next week.
Consider calling a few contests you're not particularly interested in, just to gather data. How many phone lines does the station have available? How quickly does this team of call screeners start answering the phone -- and about how long does it take them to get to the twenty-fifth caller, so you can get back to your breakfast?
FIND THE SWEET SPOT
Figure out how much time you want to reasonably spend playing radio games. You could kill twenty-four hours a day chasing these things, but I don't recommend it. Are you doing it to maximize your enjoyment, or to put the most expensive prizes in your pocket? Do you really have a use for that Bugaloos DVD, or are you just playing for the thrill of the hunt? I'll generally avoid the big-dollar contests, especially on stations with the largest audiences in town ...because I don't like my chances of getting through against an army of fourteen-year-olds with thumb muscles overdeveloped from texting all day. I've found I do better with contests that have a smaller response -- because the prizes are worth less, or the station has a smaller audience, or the contest has some skill component that many listeners don't want to go up against.
I have anecdotes behind many of the above points. Some of them are amusing -- perhaps more to you, Gentle Reader, than they were as they were happening to me ...and some of them I won't post to a public forum, but feel free to ask me about them anyway.
In the meanwhile, does anybody wish to watch the Bugaloos with me?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-12-27 08:19 am (UTC):)
Truth be told, I always had a crush on "Joy"... :)
no subject
Date: 2008-12-27 10:19 am (UTC)