Introducing Points-O-Matic: News Sprinter!
by andrewjmac
What do you do when you are sitting on a HUGE pile of scanned microfilm images that need names to make them usable? If you are AADL, you turn to the gamers! A while ago, AADL undertook the task of scanning EVERY SINGLE ROLL of Ann Arbor newspaper microfilm. We've been turning those scans into page images that we will use for all sorts of things, including making browsing the microfilm TONS faster and eventually even creating a fully-searchable index of EVERY Ann Arbor newspaper. But first we need to know what all the images are, and YOU can help us make that happen! So welcome to...
NEWS SPRINTER! In this Points-O-Matic mode, you will be shown the top part of a newspaper page. All you need to do is look for some information and enter it. And because this will help us so much, every page you enter info for on News Sprinter is worth 6 Points-O-Matic points AND 6 Summer Game points!
Here's what we are looking for:
Month: Select the correct month from the dropdown (you can type in the first letter after selecting the field to jump to a certain month). If the page image doesn't have a month or if you can't read it, select NOT FOUND.
Day: Select the correct day from the dropdown (you can type it in after selecting the field rather than scroll down). If the page image doesn't have a day or if you can't read it, select NOT FOUND.
Page Number: Enter the correct page number. Sometimes this will be a number (2 or 16), sometimes a letter and a number (A1 or B12). If the number is spelled out, just enter it as a digit anyway. If the page image doesn't have a page number or if you can't read the page number, just enter 0. And if you see "Pages 13-26" on your image, it is the beginning of a new section, so you are looking at page 13.
BUT WHAT ABOUT THE YEAR? Don't worry about the year; the rolls of microfilm are organized by year, so we already know what year every image comes from.
If you hit the Submit button and realize you had a typo NO WORRIES! Every image will be looked at by several players and only after we have matches on the information entered will we take it out of the rotation.
News sprinters to your marks...GO!
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Comments
When I click on the link…
When I click on the link above, I get an error msg that I'm not authorized...
Thanks so much for your…
Thanks so much for your comment! We found and fixed an error. Please try again!
What about when they give a…
What about when they give a range for the page number?
Good point! This is a thing…
Good point! This is a thing they used to do at the start of the second or third section of the newspaper before they had sections labeled with letters, so if you see "Pages 13-26" on your image, you are looking at page 13. Thanks for pointing that out, we added it to the instructions!
Getting a vague error: "The…
Getting a vague error: "The website encountered an unexpected error. Please try again later."
Thanks for your report of…
Thanks for your report of this problem! We've fixed this error, it would have affected any new users.
If it is obviously the front…
If it is obviously the front page but we don't see a page number should we put page 1? Or just page 0?
Good question! If you can…
Good question! If you can tell it is page 1, go ahead and put in 1 for the page number, even if you don't see the number on the page.
Will there be badges for…
Will there be badges for Points-O-Matic like there used to be?
Ho w often do you move on to…
Ho w often do you move on to a new set of pages? I've seen the same page/headline come up during a single session as well as from one session to the next (and the next).
Thanks for the comment,…
Thanks for the comment, Marian! You players blew through that first batch much faster than we'd expected. We've added more--many, MANY more--so hopefully you won't see any more repeats for awhile!
It would be great if the…
It would be great if the month select box were highlighted when a new page loads... I hit tab 4 (or is it 5?) times to get to the month box, which is fine... But even better would be to have that box selected by default in this section of the site.
I got 2 pages on my screen,…
I got 2 pages on my screen, each with different date and page number.