Oh For Crying Out Loud

So, the first thing that happened was, while setting up a Third-Round match for this week, I discovered that Daumier and David had fought to a tie in the Second Round.  This was very exciting, as it meant that there would be a resolution to the Fra Angelico/Anguissola snarl that has been knotting up the top of the first page of the brackets for more than a year now.

I set up the tiebreaker posts!  I wrote a little explanatory essay explaining how the whole cascading logic of the situation would work!  I was very pleased with myself.

Then along comes the Vice Dork of the Southern Region, Chuckdaddy, whose hypervigilance to the details of the Infinite Art Tournament is the sincerest form of flattery even when, as in this case, it is a great big pain in the ass.  Here's what he said.

Hmmm... I kind of want to keep this to myself... But it's looking like Fra won this outright. Wish I'd caught this earlier.

Naturally, I considered my options.  Burying Chuckdaddy and his secret deep, deep in the woods didn't seem practical, as he is a reliable voter.  Making a few troublesome votes go away was certainly tempting, but it turns out I'm kind of a goody-good.  Declaring that votes couldn't be revisited once I've staged follow-up contests seemed pretty reasonable, but after I discussed the matter with my war consigliere, I realized that I would be, absurdly enough, forever haunted by any breach of tournament purity.  Damn it.

The Various Implications

Policy Decision: If a vote-count error is brought to my attention before a subsequent match dependent on that vote begins, the tournament will proceed according to the actual vote tally.  Once subsequent matches have begun, any previous vote-count errors are moot. 

In the matter of Daumier v. David: This tie can't be resolved by matches against Fra Angelico and Anguissola, who were in fact never tied.  Therefore, they (and their subsequent matches) will be on hold until the next tie in the Right Bracket Second Round.

In the matter of Fra Angelico v. Anguissola: The Fra won -- it took a number of careful recounts to be sure -- by a score of 8 votes to 6.  He will advance to meet Arcimboldo today, while Anguissola will fall to the left bracket to take on the winner of the long-suspended Appel/Arp contest.

Tournament Integrity: You, the voter, can remain confident that your tournament is being conducted according to the highest possible standards of ethical standards and participant accountability.  There is perhaps room for improvement, however, in the vote-counting process.