The arbiting team is currently considering a potential rule change in the Random Words discipline. Specifically, we are exploring a shift from the current one-word rule to a proposed one-concept rule.
Background:
Under the one-word rule, compound words such as “vacuum cleaner” are excluded in English, while their direct equivalents in other languages (e.g., German “Staubsauger”) are permitted.
This has created challenges for translations in many languages, where certain concepts are naturally expressed with multiple words (e.g., Vietnamese “máy hút bụi”, Mongolian *“*Тооссорогч” ).
The proposed one-concept rule would allow any entry that represents a single, easily imaginable concept—regardless of word count. For example, “snowman” would be valid in all its linguistic forms (Schneemann, bonhomme de neige, người tuyết, bałwan śniegowy, цасанхүн ).
We believe this adjustment could improve fairness and inclusivity across languages, particularly in international competitions.
Next Step – Test Phase
Before making a final decision, we would like to test this change with a first set of words.
We are therefore calling for volunteers to participate in the test for 5 minutes words.
If you are interested, please send us your feedback and indicate your preferred language by August 26th.
Your input will be highly valuable in assessing the practicality and impact of this proposal.
Thank you in advance for your support and contribution to the development of fair and inclusive memory sports rules.
Great that we’re changing some convenient things, yesterday I was thinking about something like this for other events, I feel this is a good time to convey this here, I felt that for the Spoken nos, years passing but still it’s the longest standing record in IAM, No one touched it yet, because during the National std. events we can break any record but in most of the National std. Competitions we’re not getting the third trial to push for the record attempt, but for other events we have an fair thing to attempt the WR, also we’re getting only one attempt every year to attempt the WR, and that’s too risky to attempt the record in a single go also another thing, we’re getting 2 trials for Speed nos as well as Speed Cards because it’s the event where mistakes can be done easily also the penalty is so high, same goes here in Spoken, So we get three trials 200,300,550 but the record attempt just once, let’s say there’s an athlete attempting good scores in the first two trials, going for all 200,300 and the athletes will already get exhausted of the repeated images sometimes as there’s no way to review in third trial, So I’d like to propose my idea, 1st bringing the WR trial as the 3rd attempt or 2nd attempt in the National std. Events, then instead of 3 trials in WMC(200,300,550), how about having just two trials with 550 for both, So that people can also go for WR attempt in trial 1 without being exhausted and if they fail they can go for some good safe score in trial 2, same like we get in Speed nos. And Speed Cards, how about this, pls convey your opinion here also I felt we could bring up a change in Random images event, where we have cartoonish images instead of real ones(ML), that brings down the emotional attachment with the images, Thank you! would like to get some opinion about this, Sorry if I said something wrong.
Thank you for waiting for the test.
Here are the words memorization sheets for this test. (You can find them in the following messages.)
First, select a sheet based on your own language.
Each sheet is composed of two photos. (100words in the first photo and 80words in the second photo)
Next, test it in the same way as a competition.
To put it precisely, take 1-minute preparation time, memorize the sheet in 5minutes and recall the words in 15minutes.
If you finish the recall, mark the sheet on your own , then tell us the score and your feelings.
I did a 100-word attempt (usually I try 120, but here, with the difficulty created by the new words, I preferred to try 100).
91 correct, final score of 50.
My mistakes were the following:
“Caractère de texte” instead of “Police de caractère”
“Stylo à bille” instead of “Stylo bille”
I forgot the words “Bouton - feuille”
“Superviser” instead of “commander”
And two inversions at the end.
Overall, entries containing multiple words are really unpleasant to memorize in French… In this set, two words are not or barely used in French (“bâtiment scolaire” and “navire à passagers”), and two have multiple spellings depending on where you are in France (“stylo à bille” and “police de caractère”).
Finally, the words “feu de signalisation”, “table basse” and “arrêt de bus” are correct and therefore cause few problems, even though they add complexity for us. Typically, “table basse” = table + low, and indeed two words.
TLDR : Not a great french set. I would be unhappy to face it in competition.
This is nonsense to see words that we dont even use in our language. I almost never heard someone using “feu de signalisation”. Even its a very common thing.. “bâtiment scolaire” I dont get what we are exactly talking about here. Same for “navire à passager”, that’s just a broad thing that doesn’t represent something specific. As if we were translating a french word like “flâner” → “stroll aimlessly” in english.
It would work for snowman = bonhomme de neige. Cause we use it commonly, but some words don’t have a direct translation and bringing 2 or 3 words together doesn’t resolve it (Except maybe in German).
The issue is not literal translation.
Some English words are one single idea, but in French they turn into a description.
That means you must remember two or three words instead of one. Like for “bâtiment scolaire” “navire à passagers”.
Here is chatgpt explanations for “schoolhouse” and “passenger boat”
And also, with words like “stylo-bille”, “motocyclette”, or “feu de signalisation”, the problem isn’t that we can’t say them, it’s that nobody uses them anymore. Everyone just says “stylo”, “moto”, or “feu”.
Thanks Florent. The topic is quite a challenge. Maybe a different solution is rather to show people with different native languages a picture and ask them to say what they see. I still believe that a one-concept rule might work but maybe we should think about how to adapt the approach.
Also it seems difficult to compare how easy or hard words appear to people. I.e. “Schulgebäude” is a word I would barely use I also would use “School” and it’s definetely a good chance that I would get it wrong. Anyway I wouldn’t mind seeing it in a set because its a regular German word.
