Wait Wait Stats Update: Panelist Appearances (Part 3)

I have finished entering in all of the panelist appearances into the database for the Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! Stats Page. Unfortunately, the panelist scores are still void since that data will have to be collected and entered through other means.

It is also unfortunate that a lot of the earlier show audio is no longer available through the Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! archives, so I will need to figure out other means to procure that information.

Next up? I’m going to try to finish filling in the Not My Job guest appearances.

Wait Wait Stats Update: Panelist Appearances (Part 2)

When the latest version of the Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! Statistics Page gets published later today, you might notice a couple of new additions. The one that that I have finished implementing is displaying the percentage of appearances that each panelist has gotten first, tied for first, second, tied for second and third place. This should be a better indicator on how well a panelist has done based on how often their appeared on the show.

The other additions to the page hint at an upcoming feature that I am currently coding up: statistics for both the show hosts and scorekeepers. At this point, I’m not sure exactly what statistics will be displayed. I don’t have a timeline on when I will have the new feature ready for release.

WWDTM Live Taping

Tonight, Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! came to Portland, Oregon for their third live taping of their show at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. Being slightly obsessed with the show, I had to go and try to meet Peter Sagal, Carl Kasell and the gang. The seat that I got was about 9 rows back and had a great view of the stage. Before the show started, the audience was handed out a sheet of paper that had three questions that people would answer, fill in their name and hand back. More on this later.

wwdtm-asch-20110915

Tonight’s panelists were Peter Grosz, Roxanne Roberts and Roy Blount, Jr. (who has been one of panelists all three times that Wait Wait has been in Portland). Let’s just say that there were many, many hilarious moments and several not-so-PG jokes and comments; of which, only a few will probably make it on air.

For the Not My Job segment, Wait Wait had Colin Meloy of The Decemberists and he was tasked with answering questions about obscure protests. Why? Lookup “Decemberist revolt” on Wikipedia. Let’s just say that the audience helped Colin get his second point.

After the taping of the show, the producers had collected the sheets of paper that the audience members filled in and returned. They randomly selected one of the forms that had all three correct answers and had the audience member come up on stage. The audience member had to properly complete a limerick in order for the audience to get a small prize. Thankfully, the person got the last work of the limerick correct, and we all cheered.Continue reading“WWDTM Live Taping”

Wait Wait Stats Update: Panelist Appearances

One of the features that I had been wanting to add to the Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! Statistics Page was to display when a panelist first appeared on Wait Wait and when was the panelist’s most recent appearance on the show. A fellow Wait Wait (and Paula Poundstone) enthusiast also asked about adding the feature as well.

So, after a little bit of tinkering around with SQL queries, I was able to work out a view that I could query from the page’s PHP code. At first, the query included every show in which the panelist was on, including repeat and best of shows. The problem with that is not all best of shows have panelists associated to them, so the dates would not be as accurate as possible. A compromise was made to exclude appearances on repeats and best of shows.

The first draft was made available to the enthusiast with great appreciation. I have published an updated version of the page that links the first and latest panelist appearance dates to that show’s row on the page (more information about that feature was blogged recently).

I am looking at possibly turning each of the panelist listed for each show into a link that points to the panelist entry towards the end of the page. The only problem that I can foresee is that the panelist’s standing is already color coded and the link would alter that; otherwise, the link would not be evident. Maybe I’ll find a different way to handle that.

Wait Wait Stats Update: Jumping Down to a Specific Show

Up until now, there was no way to create a link that goes to a certain show on the Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me statistics page. Instead, you would have to go the page and scroll down or search for the show’s date. Now, you can create links that refers to a specific show’s entry.

To link to a specific entry, you can use the following URL template:

http://wwdt.me/stats/#s<YYYYMMDD>

Replace “<YYYYMMDD>” with the show’s four digit year, two digit month and two digit day. For example, to create a link that points to the spot for the April 23, 2011 show, the URL you would use is:

http://wwdt.me/stats/#s20110423

I know, it’s a small update, but I hope someone finds it useful. :)

Mo Rocca, The World’s Worst Obstetrician

During the second panelist round of Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! that aired the weekend of 2011-06-18, the discussion lead to Mo Rocca saying that having a Hula dancer in the same room as a mother giving birth would help the mother relax. This led to Luke Burbank asking if this would be blogged on “Mo Rocca, The World’s Worst Obstetrician dot net”.

I didn’t get to listen to that segment until several days later and noticed that the MoRoccaTheWorldsWorstObstetrician.net domain had not been taken… yet. So, I decided to register the domain and set up the site to redirect to my Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! statistics page.

Well, this week’s Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! show was all about listener favorite segments and requests. Many of the listeners wanted a lot of Mo Rocca moments, but Peter and Carl included Mo Rocca’s Hula dancer moment. Peter then added:

A note to that story. You may know that a listener named Linh Pham keeps a detailed archive of past Wait Wait episodes. Shortly after that question aired back in June, Linh registered “Mo Rocca, the world’s worst obstetrician dot net” as a website and it takes you to the Wait Wait archive.

Yep, got another mention on Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!; and as a fan of Wait Wait, that’s pretty darn awesome.