Episode 308: IFPA back open for business

Pinball Profile·podcast_episode·32m 52s·analyzed·Jun 8, 2021

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.029

TL;DR

IFPA reopens for sanctioned tournaments August 1, 2021 after COVID closure; championships canceled.

Summary

Josh Sharp, IFPA president, announces the reopening of IFPA-sanctioned tournaments effective August 1, 2021, after a 16-month closure due to COVID-19. The decision was based on reaching 60% of the global player base in areas deemed safe to sanction. All 2021 championship series are canceled with collected fees rolled into 2022. Hosts and tournament directors retain flexibility to implement safety measures.

Key Claims

IFPA will reopen sanctioned tournaments on August 1, 2021
high confidence · Josh Sharp, IFPA President, making official announcement
Decision to reopen based on reaching 60% of global player base in safe areas
high confidence · Josh Sharp explains decision-making threshold and analysis process
All 2021 championship series finals (NACS, European Championship Series, etc.) are canceled
high confidence · Josh Sharp confirms cancellation of championship finals that would have occurred in 2022
All money collected for 2021 season will be rolled into 2022 pot
high confidence · Josh Sharp confirms funds from Jan-Mar 2020 plus April 2020-end of year being added to 2022
IFPA 17 World Championships originally scheduled for November at Pinball Asylum have been postponed
high confidence · Josh Sharp confirms less than a month ago decision to postpone World Championships to 2023 (IFPA 18)
COVID exposure occurred at last major IFPA event (Denver Women's World Championship); participants notified
high confidence · Josh Sharp acknowledges having to send notification email to participants post-event
Ontario Canada currently restricted to 10-person outdoor gatherings as of June 7, 2021
high confidence · Jeff Teolis reports learning this information during the recorded interview
U.S. North America approximately 62% with one vaccine dose, 40% fully vaccinated as of early June 2021
medium confidence · Jeff Teolis citing vaccine rollout numbers

Notable Quotes

“I was focused on Illinois, and I really looked to our volunteers to help guide our decision... somehow I feel like it's like buying a house. Both groups are unhappy with the date we picked. And I feel like that's the best way to get a deal done.”
Josh Sharp @ early in interview — Explains the compromise nature of August 1 reopening date between state/provincial and international reps
“before we hit 50 i honestly had not given too many thoughts about like when are things going to happen... let's just focus on continuing to like kill as few people as possible for all this and we'll figure out the logistics of this competitive pinball thing which is far less important in life later”
Josh Sharp @ mid-interview — Demonstrates prioritization of public health over competitive concerns during pandemic
“I don't want to put people in that position where they feel like they have to go or they're going to miss out, and they're having an inner dialogue with themselves about pushing them into an uncomfortable zone.”
Josh Sharp @ mid-interview — Explains cancellation of championship series cut-lines to reduce pressure on hesitant players
“I think you've done really well here. I think it's a great idea... You have no idea how much I have to admit that.”
Jeff Teolis @ late interview — Host's acknowledgment of Josh Sharp's pandemic management decisions
“That would be the biggest nightmare that, oh, my goodness, X amount of people got sick from this pinball event. And it is public knowledge.”
Jeff Teolis @ late interview — References undisclosed COVID exposure incident at IFPA event, suggesting community awareness

Entities

Josh SharppersonJeff Teolisperson IFPAorganizationRaw ThrillscompanyDistrict 82organizationWomen's World ChampionshipeventNACSeventEuropean Championship SerieseventIFPA 17eventPinball Asylumvenue

Signals

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business_signal: IFPA championship cancellations consolidate significant prize pool into 2022, creating unusually high-stakes tournaments in second half of 2021
high · Jeff Teolis notes concern about explosive August-October tournament activity; Josh Sharp acknowledges 'big pot' being built for 2022
?
community_signal: Undisclosed COVID exposure incident at major IFPA event (Denver Women's World Championship) triggered participant notification requirement
high · Josh Sharp references having to write notification email; Jeff Teolis references this as potential driver of subsequent closure decisions
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sentiment_shift: Tournament directors and players expressing vaccine hesitancy and uncomfortable with mass gatherings; some explicitly stating readiness to defer participation
high · Josh Sharp references emails from people saying 'I don't want to play but will because I don't want to miss out' and directors saying 'I'm not ready yet'
?
competitive_signal: WPPR decay during pandemic has compressed rankings; top players dropped from ~1,000 points to ~60-80% of previous levels, creating bunched field and opportunities for qualification
high · Jeff Teolis raises concern about ranking compression increasing number of players who could qualify for Stern Rewards Program through fall tournaments
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event_signal: Pinball Expo hotel fully booked immediately following IFPA reopening announcement
high · Facebook group chat question noted by Josh Sharp; indicates strong pent-up demand for in-person gatherings

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.099

0:00

It's time now for another Pinball Profile. I'm your host, Jeff Teels. You can find everything on pinballprofile.com, all past episodes, subscriptions, and more. Check us out on Twitter and Instagram at pinballprofile and email us pinballprofile at gmail.com. The things this guy will do to stay relevant. My goodness. No one's been talking about him for months. He hasn't been on Pinball Profile in a long time. He used to be on it for like two, three months. No one remembers his name. I do. It was Josh Sharp, and apparently he's the IFPA president. I don't know how he's taken a paycheck for what's been done the last few months, but apparently, cha-ching, the money is coming in, and so is our next guest. Hello, Josh. How are you? See, now I'm going back to work while we talk. You disrespect me like that, then I'm going to disrespect you by typing. Here, that's me typing. You hear all that, Jeff? I do. You ready to continue this interview? Yeah, you're like a movie typer. You know when you see people type on movies and they're like a million miles, and they're not doing actually anything? I'm not doing anything. I actually did not even hit a key for real. You are right. I have been busted. How's it going, man? How's it going? Everything is good and some big, big news for sure with the IFPA. Congratulations. Does this mean the pandemic is over, first of all? It means it's over. It's all good. It's over. Coast is clear. It means that everything is fine in Texas. So, therefore, the rest of the world needs to follow suit. Haven't they been fine for quite some time? I know when I watched the Blue Jays opener in April, it was like full capacity. I'm like, what world is this? Yeah, man, I think. And it's so funny that you're coming out with this announcement because it was this weekend I saw that Chicago White Sox, Chicago Cubs are allowed full capacity. And then next, I'm like, okay, something's going to happen with the IFPA. Yeah, I think, you know, I've felt really, really good about our process this whole time, which is I was focused on Illinois, and I really looked to our volunteers to – help guide our decision. And when our decision was going to be made about reopening, you know, between the state reps, the provincial reps and the country reps, it's just been, it's been a pleasure to try to find a way to thread that needle. And as I joked, when I sent a message earlier to both, we have two separate groups, you know, like forums, one for the state and provincial reps, and then a separate one for the country reps. And, you know, somehow I feel like it's like buying a house. Both groups are unhappy with the date we picked. And I feel like that's the best way to get a deal done. You know, if one person's happy and one person's not, you didn't do a good job. I want to bring this up now because we're opening things up, I guess. I say we like I'm part of the IFPA. Oh, yeah. I feel like I am. Some way, somehow you got to change out the board of directors, like people's president, if you wouldn't mind. The ginger, the ginger representative. Thank you. But I can say this now because you and I have been talking for quite some time about, you know, where are we at? What's going on? And I'm reading a text from us May 7th. We were at 44% and about 50% was North America. So obviously things in Canada, well, not even Canada, things in Europe and Australia, although I can't imagine there, but other parts of the world were not doing as well as North America. And of that 50%, I think zero was Canada because we were just... You guys are still zero. Yeah. Are we still zero? Still zero. So that means for people listening, our provincial reps are basically looking at the guidelines like everybody else in state reps and country reps. Are we able to open up? And I can say this as we record this on the 7th of June. It is 430 in the afternoon, my time. We just found out today that as of this Friday in Ontario, we're allowed to have gatherings of 10 people as long as it's outside. So we're still nowhere near. Oh, dude, you didn't even tell me that off air. It has to be outside for 10 people? Yep, yep. So that's a lot of outdoor pinball machines. No kidding, man. Dory Hill Campground Tournament, they could run that up there 10 at a time. Every machine's going to look like the paint job of old No Fear games, you know, where fish tails the fades. That's right. Replogle's fine playing his fish tails in the river. It's funny. I'm trying to think what's safer, him having power in a river in rubber boots. Oh, that's too funny. But OK, so the point is we are obviously getting better and I check North America vaccine numbers all the time. So I know President Biden has hoped that by the end of the month, you're going to be at 70 percent of people, I think, with one vaccine, but not fully vaccinated. So I think the numbers right now are about 62 America vaccines and about 40 fully vaccinated, whereas we're similar in Canada as of today, about 60, 62 percent with one vaccine. The only thing is we're only about six, seven percent fully vaccinated. You guys are doing the everyone gets the first one and then the delay between shots is longer. Right. And then everyone comes back around for the second one. Is that right? The mindset was better to have one shot than no shots, which I agree. I think they say it's a 70 percent effectiveness. So, yeah, that's great. I think they also there were studies that like because mine was a month apart. And I think there were some studies where if you wait longer, the effectiveness is actually better. Who knows, right? You guys may end up better for it. There's a lot of WebMDs out there. That's all I know. I know, right? I know. I trust the science. And the great thing is, as you probably noticed over the last few months, there have been a lot of tournaments, non-IFPA tournaments, although the UFCP has had a few sanctioned tournaments. I did notice that. We're seeing people do things safely. There was a big event that a lot of people in your area went to in Raymond Davidson, Keith Elwin. Tom Graff was there. Travis Murray flew up for it. Luke the Hornyak, it was in Wisconsin at District 82, a big match play event. Everyone was wearing masks inside. It looks like the games were even spread apart and there was no food inside. And I probably said this before and I'll say it again. I just really commend what they did there because a lot of those people had two vaccines, but they still were practicing the safe social distancing. And I thought that was brilliant. And I thought that's how pinball can work. And I don't know if that was a sign for maybe the country directors, the state directors that, yeah, we could possibly do this. Yeah, I mean, every rep was free to vote their conscience. However, whatever moved them from no to yes was kind of on them or on their player community, you know, getting involved with them, lobbying for a vote one way or the other. But it's clear that events were starting back up and, you know, the numbers here at least continued to decline. So I know my wife just sent me, you know, we sent our kids back to school and that was a very stressful moment. because we were keeping them remote for so long. And we had like positive tests per 100,000 were, for our zip code, were like 300, 400, 500 positive tests. And she actually sent me a text this morning that the rolling seven-day average for positive tests out of 100,000 was eight. And I was like, eight? I'm like, eight? Not 8%, eight people. Eight people. That's great. It's great, man. It's great. I was talking to your brother, in fact, and he was mentioning about Benson and when he can get a vaccine because obviously the vaccines are for certain age groups, and I think in the fall he's eligible? They are testing, I think, 12 and under. Yeah. Yeah, under 12 or 12 and under they're testing right now, and it sounds like they're saying, you know, August, September for that. So all three of my kids fall in that range along with Benson. Okay so I wasn sure if Colin and Charlotte were vaccinated Colin nine and also insanely afraid of getting the vaccine so that be an interesting fight Charlotte wakes up every day asking if she can get it today She ready She's ready to go. My two oldest boys got theirs last week. My youngest gets his this week. So awesome, man. It's great. It's I mean, the 5G. Let me just tell you that the chip, you don't even feel it. I'm proud to say I never even had to take a COVID test, let alone did I catch it. So I feel pretty – it was worth it, worth spending an inordinate amount of time with my family over the last 14 months cooped up in our house. We made the best of it, man. It was cool. I miss them. This is my second week back in the office. Oh, wow. You're at Rothwell's right now. I am, yeah. June 1st, we reopened the office. And you're on a phone on a podcast. Well done. I'm right back where I started, back at work talking about pinball. Oh, hold on. I think that's Eugene knocking on the door. Hold on a second. Right. Just wait, man. Wait for us to be interrupted at any moment in time. Wait a second. What was the dog barking there? What are you testing out at Raw Thrills?

16:08

Less than a month ago, you not canceled but postponed the World Championships, IFPA 17, which was scheduled for November at the Pinball Asylum. Right. I don think the public announcement was included in today announcement but the players knew The players knew Oh I blocked it somewhere Did you I think I did on final Well I wasn told not to say anything No no no it fine It's fine. Did everything. I mean, I'm actually surprised that this August 1st date did. I guess I was surprised that the plans that we had passed along to the reps didn't make it out as publicly as it did. So you had a couple of guidelines. Some you can say, some you can't say. But can you give us kind of the general idea of how this came about? You mentioned that they had to vote on it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I can do that. So my process was looking at the global IFPA player base. Regardless of where they came from on planet Earth, when can we get to a point where 50% of the players that we have in our system are in an area that has been deemed okay to sanction? and before we hit 50 i honestly had not given too many thoughts about like when are things going to happen what are the plans it's like you know what before it's 50 let's just focus on continuing to like kill as few people as possible for all this and we'll figure out the logistics of this competitive pinball thing which is far less important in life later so we passed 50 and my next step was to like analyze like where did that 50 come from and it's like oh look it's the u.s and australia and new zealand so for me you know and bouncing having conversations with with the reps especially the international ones it was important to see like where is everyone is it there are no today but where are their yeses looking and for me you know 50 based on how the 50% looked, 50% was not enough for me to green light it. So the 50% became 60%. And again, there was what does this 60% look like? And where as we pick a date, like where really the most important thing is, where are we going to be by the time August 1st rolls around? And we're in a spot where I feel comfortable enough that enough people around the world can play and events can be held, that whoever is in a place where it can't safely may lose a little bit of time and may fall a little bit behind. But that's where the fact that we canceled all the championships for this season, I didn't want there to be a huge amount of pressure on people to get out there and play like nuts because they had a cut line that they had to make, myself included. If I needed to make a cut line for Germany by the end of this year, I might put myself in a situation where I'm playing in events that I'm not comfortable actually playing in, and that sucks. You want a full year of at least a fair opportunity, and now you've got a full year plus a few months. So this is... You got it. And I didn't want anyone chasing state or provincial cut line. I got emails from people about it that are like, I really don't want to play, but I will because I don't want to miss out. And it's like, damn, I don't want to put people in that position where they feel like they have to go or they're going to miss out, and they're having an inner dialogue with themselves about pushing them into an uncomfortable zone. So that's where all of the, hey, we're bringing Whoppers back, but we're removing all of the tangible benefits of Whoppers right now, besides just the glory of being ranked in the world somewhere. Good point. It felt like a good compromise to me. You know this kills me to say this. I think it's a great idea. I think you've done really well here. You have no idea how much I have to admit that. It was hard. But not just today and not just with this decision with all the state, provincial and country directors, but over the last several months, you made the right decision to do this and really keep people safe. That would be the biggest nightmare that, oh, my goodness, X amount of people got sick from this pinball event. And it is public knowledge. We're not certainly naming any names, but there was a scare at the last major IFPA event where some people, in fact, had COVID. Yeah, we had to put an email out to the participants, you know, whatever, however many days it was after we got back from Denver. So, not, yeah, I mean, that was a horrible email to write. And back then, nobody had any idea, you know, how bad things were going to get. But, man. But that probably solidified why you made the decisions you did that were shutting it down. It certainly, yeah, man.

20:49

I think, you know, you fast forward like a month or two back into like the summer of last year, And it's like multiple times I think Zach and I were both, I can't believe we did Denver. What were we thinking? It's like we couldn't believe we did it. Okay, so I went to Australia in January and February of 2020. And people were saying to me, I can't believe you're going to go because of the fires. Well, the fires went out. But then as we were flying into, I think our stop off was in Taiwan, which is 200 miles from the epicenter of COVID. So that was when we got off and we're like, wow, everyone's wearing masks. We should probably get some. And then and we did. And flying back. Now you're just hearing more and more and more. And you're like, holy cow, we really have to get masks in Sydney, which was our last stop. We went to several pharmacies, drugstores to try to get masks, and there were zero. We just finally got lucky and asked somebody, we're trying to buy masks. We're about to fly in a couple days. Oh, we have them behind the counter because they're being gobbled up. Yeah. Can we buy one or two, please? Yeah. We ordered some from one of the vendors that we work with that's out in China. We were able to get a pallet of masks sent to Rothwells that we were able to give all the employees some number of them. It was nuts, man. that and toilet paper. Yeah, toilet paper certainly was key. And yeah, I've been to very few places in the last few months. I'm looking forward to going to many places. Our borders are still closed. And again, that's one thing too about the cancellation of the North American Championships and really the postponement of the IFPA 18, if you will, to 2023, is that there isn't a pressure because I look at some of the things on the calendar, things I want to go to. Cleepin is the first one I can think of. Actually, before that, Pinball at the Zoo in Michigan. So those are two that are really drivable for me. But right now, we don't have the border open. So I'm like, oh, I guess I might not be able to go to that. But things may change. And I think that's one of the reasons why you put things off till August 1st. A couple of reasons. One is you keep seeing the numbers change. So by August 1st, whatever the number is right now, 62% voting yes, will be much higher. Plus also, you still wanted to institute the original IFPA sanctioning of events where you had to submit 30 days in advance, correct? It certainly helps with that because our original announcement was we were going to waive the 30-day rule to start because we didn't know how things were going to line up with the advance notice. And there's plenty of events that are on not on our calendar because our calendar is not available, but it's in the world calendar. Like, I know that Allentown is the end of July, and if we deemed on July 15th that we would be sanctioning immediately, it would be unfair for that event to not be counted because it would be our fault that they missed the 30 days notice. So this allows it to be super clean. It allows everyone, you know, it allows Becker to enjoy his backlog of results and have time to get through all of that. Yeah, man, just start, like, learning how to ride a bike again. I need to know how to log into the admin side of the website. It's been so long. Hey, Coke, there's Pepsi, all right? The UFCP has Allentown covered, so you're okay. That's right. We'll see if they, well, I guess they can't submit that event for sanctioning, but we'll see if those events will pay $2, right? Because I think their sanctioning is also $1 per player. Oh, I don't know. I have no idea. It is. It is, yeah. But the point is. $2 per player now if you want both. Hey, we've seen prices go up on everything else. That's right, man. Gallon of milk isn't what it used to be. Are you staying at for a while or what going on there Yeah nothing changing Okay I know you already working on next year April 1st Oh God No this is exciting I don know what kind of feedback you've had in a short amount of time, but... I don't know. I've been on the phone with you since... Since the announcement? Between your missed phone calls and everything else. I have not even viewed our little Facebook group chat to see. I'm sure there's questions on there that I have not answered yet, but I'll pull it up right now. Here, I'll read some of our little chats here. Well, people who submitted... Did I just hear the hotel at Pinball Expo just fully booked? That's one of them. That's awesome. I live five minutes from there, so that's wonderful. Yeah, I know where you live. I'll be knocking on the door. Well, people who submitted during the IPA closure have to resubmit. Like if Trent submitted... Yeah, I don't even know the answer to that, Ray. I don't. Okay, that's a good example. I help run two leagues and we had set dates and of course, they were all in 2020. So the league nights were, let's say, January through May with our championship was going to be in June. So now I guess we have to resubmit. So I would log into your tournament manager account. Like some people changed their date to like 2027 or something just so the entry was there. Some people deleted their entry altogether. If you log into your tournament manager account, you'll see what's active. And if it's active and you just need a date change, then you can just email us and we'll update the date. If it's not there, then you have to resubmit. Okay, gotcha. I've been getting a bunch of emails too. This is from Derek who helps Gabe with Pintastic. You Canucks need to get vaccinated to get some more Whoppers.

26:16

We're working on it. The only way we can cross the border is apparently if we're with the Montreal Canadiens. I was going to say, it doesn't matter if you're vaccinated or not, man. You can't get in, right? We can't. Well, I think we can fly in. Yes, yes, we can get in. We can fly in. It's just coming back. we have to be in quarantine for, I don't know. Is it the Australia rule where they put you in a hotel for $3,000 a night for seven days or something? The cost is about $3,000 for whatever, how many nights it is. No kidding. Yeah, I know. But, you know, those whoppers are pretty darn attractive, especially after 16 months, I tell you. McCulloch's got the budget. He's coming back. Oh, no, I guess he lives on this side too. Ed Robertson needs to get into it so he can afford that. Come down and get some whoppers. This is exciting. I know it's been a long time coming. Were there any thoughts over the last 16, 17 months of, okay, maybe we have to rethink the wheel? Maybe, you know, what happens if we go back to zero? I know I had asked you that before, but what happens if all these whoppers decay? You had mentioned to me that there was a slight possibility of thinking about, instead of the last three years, the last four years. Sure. I mean, we also could have, I mean, for better or worse, the decision to decay or to freeze the decay or not. Like, I could have probably pushed Shepard harder on, hey, man, we got to freeze this thing, you know, if we're another year from now or whatever. But I assumed that we were going to be back soon enough that it'll all work itself out. And, hey, man, me sitting in whatever, what are we, 47th, 48th? Yeah, I don't know who's who, darn it. I got to get my ass qualified for Germany, man. So I don't mind having the system push me to play, knowing that I have, whatever, four months this year, like 16 months to qualify. You know what's interesting, though? Some of the big, big, big tournaments are going to be just worth so much. There isn't Pinberg anymore. They're likely won't be popping next year. But Indisc, the IFPA Open, the European Championships, those are big, what they call, woppertunities. and my goodness are they going to be huge for a lot of the top players yeah it's uh i mean it's going to be interesting that i might go to my local monthlies because if i win i think it'll be it'll reach my card i get it i'm starting from the uh i haven't plateaued yet i have to re-plateau so there's some there's some fun there to be had and i think that was also a part of you know letting things decay is that for a lot of people they were up against their whatever version of their plateau that they had, that there wasn't the, hey, I played and I went up, I played and I went up. Anyone that hit a wall, this kind of allowed them to drift back down a little bit, and now they can get back out there and play and see success. Let me leave you with one possible nightmare, because that's what I like to do with you. Sure. Between August and, say, October, we're going to have some tournaments. And because the decay has really shrunk the field, The top players had 1,000 Whopper points. Now it's not that. Yeah, it compressed everyone. Everyone's at about maybe 80%, maybe 60% of what they once were. So there's a lot bunched together. So these tournaments in August, September, October might propel several players up and down into the top 1,000, therefore qualifying for the Stern Rewards Program. Yeah, man. So what happens there if somebody who was under? Let's say they're 1,600. They play one tournament. Oh, my goodness, I'm at 995. Do they qualify? Or conversely... Absolutely. Okay, today, as we have the decay, I'm 995. First tournament, holy cow, I dropped down to 1,200. How does it work? So anyone that was in the top 1,000 enjoyed an extra free year anyway during this hiatus. So for anyone that has fallen out, I feel like we've already serviced those people. So get back out there and play yourself back in. Well, this is really good because I know a lot of the arcades are opening up, and we have to save location pinball. And I know that the IFPA and Stern and so many of the other companies have been big in helping that. And, again, it's getting us back to quote-unquote normal. And hopefully we see these arcades flourish once again, not just for pinball, but for you, for Raw Thrills and everything else. Yeah, man. So congratulations. This is a big day. This is exciting. This is the pinball version of that day you got your first vaccine. You're like, all right. You know, there is something to not realizing how much you miss something until it's truly gone. So I'm anxious to, you know, when I was watching the stream of of the District 82 stuff like, man, I wanted to be in those matches so bad. I miss I miss those moments. And I sure as heck won't be taking it for granted when I'm back out there. And as Amanda reminds me, ditching my family again for pinball, which I have not done in quite some time. I'm reading between the lines, Josh. What I'm hearing is you miss me. I do. Where are you going next, Jeff? Where are we going to meet up, man? I think I'm going to go a little crazy, maybe go to Costco. Look out! Party time! Maybe get some more of that toilet paper while we're still in lockdown. I have no idea. Hey, I'm open to come to Expo. That'll be great. New location? Yeah, that's probably my first one. I just have to learn a bunch of Stern games between now and then that I have not touched in over a year. Yeah, there are several. But we shall see, and especially that tournament too, the Expo tournament, where it is all basically all new games, isn't it, pretty much? Yeah, yeah. Thanks, Josh. Congratulations. It's a big day. Thanks, man. This has been your Pinball Profile. You can find everything on pinballprofile.com, all subscriptions, past episodes, and more. We also have a Facebook group. Check us out on Twitter and Instagram at pinballprofile. Pinball profile, email us pinballprofile at gmail.com as Josh types in the background. It wasn't real typing. It was fake typing. I fake typed earlier and I actually stopped the recording, so I don't know how that's going to sound in the edit.