Has the AHA ever thought about collecting the scores that brewers get in competitions when they provide their AHA number? I recently joined and recently entered my first comps. Don’t see that anywhere.
Has anyone every tried to put together a brewer profile site that includes those scores from across competitions?
Does the information from the brewcomp.com sites go anywhere else like an AHA central database?
If answer is no, I am an IT Product Manager and willing to help out in this space. If AHA powers-that-be read this, please let me know if I can help.
Since most of the Brewing Competition software is individually hosted by each competition, I would imagine aggregating all the data would be near impossible. When provided by competition organizers, the AHA does list overall BOS winners in Zymurgy.
Agreed it is definitely challenging. I would think that brewcomp software could be a big part of it or they could call an API to another entity (maybe the AHA) to at least get the results stored in a central database tied to AHA number.
It could even go lower tech with any comp able to upload their results from a spreadsheet as long as they had some minimal format like: AHA #, category, date, score. optional: comp name, beer name, etc…
We could also give individual brewers the option to upload their own scores. This seems to provide the opp for fudging, but perhaps our lot have such a “code” that it wouldn’t be a problem.
It’s an awful lot of work for, to me, limited value. I have difficulty seeing folks buying into the system as well.
Why would folks want their scores tracked? Why would you want to go - well see I won 3 medals, but I had these 3 beers get 19’s. (must have been crappy judges!)
Then again, I’m not a competition guy so I’m way outside the target demo for this effort, but if you can make it happen and get buyin, then more power to you!
I don’t think scores are a very good indication of the beer’s worth. I enter quite a few competitions and sometimes the same beer on almost the same day will have a 15 point difference in two competitions. I had a best of show winner once that scored in the low 20’s at the previous competition.
I don’t think I want everybody to see that I got a score of anything less than 30. It would hurt whatever reputation I’ve tried to establish.
Why they stopped at just those states? Ha. If you’ve attempted to run a circuit before, you would know that getting results reported from the comp organizers is sometimes an exercise in a near hilarious amount of futility. I don’t wish it on anyone.
Not to mention the constant emails from brewers wondering why their total score is different than what they think it should be (without reading the circuit rules). It’s not glamorous, being a circuit organizer.
The BJCP does not track the results of competitions nor does it collect any scoring data.
Brew Competition Online Entry & Management does have a filed to capture a participant’s AHA number. For non-NHC competitions it’s an optional field in the event there is a Pro-Am associated with the competition.
For the NHC version of the software the field is still there but it might be optional in the BCOE&M screen because AHA membership validation takes place in an earlier screen.
I bet most competitions only have paper copies of scores anyway, so getting them entered online anywhere would require convincing local staff to do a lot of data entry. BJCP is busy enough just getting organizers to enter judging points.
That’s what I’m thinking. Wouldn’t it be so much easier if you could look at the ID and/or beer name on the slip banded to the beer, select it from the list of beers in that category, and then fill in a form that adds up to a score.
I can see that adding in comments will be harder in a digital environment, but we could allow for an audio comment that would make it even easier than writing it out longhand.
I entered my first comp and just got the scores back last week. All I got was a single score for each beer. Not helpful at all to improve my brewing.
The competition you describe would be very expensive because the cost of digital devices for each judge would have to be built into the entry fee. Beer will get spilled on them. You’d need somebody to troubleshoot the 50-100 devices when they don’t work correctly. I’m getting a headache just thinking about it. :o
I can type of a keyboard much faster than I can write, so I see the appeal. But I’m all left thumbs trying to type on a touchscreen.
Was the competition you entered BJCP? If it was, you should get full scoresheets for each beer entered. If you don’t I’d complain to the organizer. Written scoresheets is one of the requirements for being BJCP sanctioned.
Scores are nice to see but in my opinion they really only tell an entrant if the judges thought the entry was on the low, mid range, or high end of the Scoring Guide group (Poor, Fair, Good, Very Good, Excellent, Outstanding) that it finished in. What’s really important about a homebrew competition is the feedback that you’re supposed to receive about the entry. Unfortunately all that was received here was a score and no feedback. Being a first time entrant it’s tough to figure out which comps to enter and which ones don’t meet your needs. I’d suggest checking out the competition sections on the AHA, Brewing Network, and Homebrew Talk forms to see what folks are posting about the different competitions. One thing about the forum world, they seldom hold back any punches. I’d also suggest Googling the competition name to see if folks have blogged about their experience with a particular competition. Finally if you belong to a homebrew club ask around to find out what others think about a particular competition.
Tiny soap box - Introducing electronic devices and voice recognition software to the judging portion of a competition would be a huge challenge. I’m a National judge, coordinated several competitions, and for 5 years implemented electronic medical records systems in clinics. Part of those implementations involved teaching Doctors, Nurse Practitioners, Nurses, and Medical Assistants how to prescribe medications and submit dictations using electronic devices. They were all moving out of the world of paper medical charts and into the world of the electronic one, which is pretty close to what we would be attempting here. One, the learning curve for these professionals was huge and they all have a background of some kind of formal training. Second, the start up and maintenance costs would blow any competition budget. There would have to be some sort of standard device with a standard software image in order to reduce the user learning curve and troubleshooting support. Bring your own device in my mind is not an option because different devices, different operating systems, different operating system versions, anti virus, and keeping software versions up to date would be a maintenance nightmare. Off my soap box. I now return you to the previously discussed topic.
