# Rubik's Master



## Carlos (Jul 6, 2008)

What would be considered to determine if someone is a Rubik's Master? Knowing X methods of solution? Being able to solve the cube under Y moves? what?
I just saw somewhere about someone being a Rubik's Master and wondered about what could give him that title.


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## Stefan (Jul 6, 2008)

If you mean something like chess grandmaster, there's no such thing in cubing. So I'd say "Rubik's Master" means someone who can master Rubik's cube, i.e., consistently solve it. Where did you see it?


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## cmv0116 (Jul 6, 2008)

Can you give us a link to that "Rubik's Master" title you saw?


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## Carlos (Jul 6, 2008)

I saw it at the rubiks.com old website, referring to Tyson Mao with something like: Learn to solve the cube with the Rubik's Cube Master Tyson Mao. It was a long time ago, and this question just came im my mind back today. 

Yeah, i meant something like chess grandmaster indeed. That's what i was willing to know. Thanks 

but what if we wished to name some grandmasters? who? how?


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## badmephisto (Jul 7, 2008)

well they have it by ratings, i guess we can have it by averages? I would say a sub15 average would definitely qualify as a master? There really is no official definition


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## Stefan (Jul 7, 2008)

badmephisto said:


> well they have it by ratings, i guess we can have it by averages?



I disagree. In chess, there's no inherent "mastering" of the game. Well, maybe if you know a winning strategy, but I believe that's impossible. So in chess, to emphasize that someone is great, they have to have some arbitrary measure, saying you're a master if you're "this good compared to others". In cubing, it's different. We do have a very natural "mastering" of it, namely being able to solve it (consistently). So I don't see a reason to make a cubing "master" title depend on how fast you are.


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## Johannes91 (Jul 7, 2008)

badmephisto said:


> well they have it by ratings, i guess we can have it by averages? I would say a sub15 average would definitely qualify as a master?


If it's supposed to be comparable to chess, sub-15 average isn't worth anything IMO. Many have achieved it in months. To become a "chess master" ("shakkimestari") in Finland, a rating of at least 2200 is required, and getting there takes _years_. And the other titles (FM,IM,GM) are much more difficult. If we want to have something like GM in cubing, I think it's way too early to decide how good results would be needed.


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## badmephisto (Jul 7, 2008)

StefanPochmann said:


> badmephisto said:
> 
> 
> > well they have it by ratings, i guess we can have it by averages?
> ...



No, to become a chess grandmaster there are several things they have to achieve, but in particular they must have a 2500+ rating at some point in their life. 

Maybe we could have it percent based? That would give a much better measure. Take WCA table of all people sorted by increasing average. Denote Cubing Masters all those people that are in top 5%, or something. Once you get the title, you maintain it forever, just like with chess masters.


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## Stefan (Jul 7, 2008)

badmephisto said:


> No, to become a chess grandmaster there are several things they have to achieve, but in particular they must have a 2500+ rating at some point in their life.


Yadayadayada... so it's a more complicated criterion than I thought, but it's still arbitrary. Because they need arbitrary. Because there's no obvious natural "mastering" of chess. My point is that there is one in cubing. If you want to talk about *grand*master of cubing, that's different.


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## AvGalen (Jul 7, 2008)

I only consider these 6 people grandmasters:
Andrea Santambrogio
Kristian Muggerud
Magdalena Chrostek
Marcos Alberto Gonçalves dos Santos Filho
Mattias Berglund
Pedro Santos Guimarães

[why]
Dynamic list of all (112) masters of cubing: 
Dynamic list of all (6) grandmasters of cubing:
[/why]


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## brunson (Jul 7, 2008)

I'm an average chess player, 1657 ELO, and a below average cuber. The difference I see is that you can get fast at cubing without much study, you may as well try to declare track runners "Masters" based on their 100m times. Just because someone is fast doesn't mean they're master of the sport. Béla Károlyi is a master of gymnastics, but probably can't do a back handspring.

You don't get to be a chess master without study and practice. I don't know of any 2000+ chess player that can't blow my mind with knowledge of openings, pawn structure, combinations, sacrifices and a huge mental database of studied competition games. Sergey Karjakin, the youngest grand master in history, had played and studied chess for over 7 years before he attained his title, and he's a freak. ;-)

A cube master would have to be more than simply a fast 3x3x3 solver. In my mind the title would have to include a respectable time in a broad spectrum of events, including BLD and FMC. A master would need a decent understanding of most common methods of solving and be able to discuss the pros and cons of each. I would include in the requirement some knowledge of the math and theory behind the cube, group theory, commutators, computational algorithms etc.

We could make a nominations thread. I'd start with Chris Hardwick and Stephan Pochmann.


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## AvGalen (Jul 7, 2008)

I would add Jaap Scherphuis to that list


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## fanwuq (Jul 7, 2008)

I agree with brunson. Being fast isn't everything. Knowledge is necessary.


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## AvGalen (Jul 7, 2008)

And Ryan Heise
And Herbert Kociemba

But I don't know these 2 in person and they are not on the WCA-list of persons


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## Bryan (Jul 7, 2008)

brunson said:


> A master would need a decent understanding of most common methods of solving and be able to discuss the pros and cons of each.



But this would eventually just be restating knowledge that can be learned by reading a bunch of forums without actually understanding anything.

Even with the grandmaster title in chess, people have complained that it's become so dilluted it's not as prestigious as it once was.

But even so, calling someone a master is like calling someone a professional. It's simply a matter of opinion.


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## brunson (Jul 7, 2008)

And Bruce Norskog. 

Morwen Thistlethwaite and Tom Rokicki, since I don't know of their actual cubing skills, would at least have to get mention as "Honorable and Distinguished Scholars".

@Bryan, I specifically said "a decent understanding".


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## ThePizzaGuy92 (Jul 8, 2008)

Carlos said:


> I saw it at the rubiks.com old website, referring to Tyson Mao



My times are competitive with Tyson's, so I must be a Rubik's Master.

that title will definatly not get me some action. haha nvermind




AvGalen said:


> I only consider these 6 people grandmasters:
> Andrea Santambrogio
> Kristian Muggerud
> Magdalena Chrostek
> ...



what exactly did some of these people do to be grandmasters? Am i missing something?


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## fanwuq (Jul 8, 2008)

ThePizzaGuy92 said:


> Carlos said:
> 
> 
> > I saw it at the rubiks.com old website, referring to Tyson Mao
> ...



LOL.
You are missing the joke. Highlight and see the link.


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## AvGalen (Jul 8, 2008)

Bryan said:


> brunson said:
> 
> 
> > A master would need a decent understanding of most common methods of solving and be able to discuss the pros and cons of each.
> ...


 
Not all cubing knowledge is already available online. People are still discovering new (and sometimes better) ways to do things. I expect to see many new ideas for solving BIG cubes soon because of the V-Cubes. AVG edges for 5x5x5 and SPAVG for centers are just some simple ideas that were not available online 2 years and 2 weeks ago. I also expect someone (me?) to come up with a way to avoid OLL-Parity on 4x4x4 that is suitable for speedsolving. And all this time the WR's will keep improving because people are "mastering" the actual solving techniques


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## Stefan (Jul 8, 2008)

AvGalen said:


> SPAVG


Yes! YES! It worked! Posting a half-baked barely tested method quickly just so it'll (partly) wear my name. Booyaa!


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## Inusagi (Jul 8, 2008)

Carlos said:


> I saw it at the rubiks.com old website, referring to Tyson Mao with something like: Learn to solve the cube with the Rubik's Cube Master Tyson Mao. It was a long time ago, and this question just came im my mind back today.
> 
> Yeah, i meant something like chess grandmaster indeed. That's what i was willing to know. Thanks
> 
> but what if we wished to name some grandmasters? who? how?



We don't have any grandmaster in cubing. I think they just said "cube master Tyson Mao" because they think his good, or they just didn't have any other adjective to use.


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## fanwuq (Jul 8, 2008)

One day, my friend who cannot solve the cube started to make a constitution for the Republic of Cubism with me. Afterward, he signed his name as "THE CUBE MASTER GENERAL." He also types really fast, so I call him the cubemaster general and the typemaster general.

Anyone interested in the constitution document? It's quite funny.


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## CAT13 (Jul 8, 2008)

People at my school used to call me "cube master" when I was averaging over 1 minute lol! None of them have ever seen someone solve a cube before, so they thought it was a suitable name


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## AvGalen (Jul 9, 2008)

StefanPochmann said:


> AvGalen said:
> 
> 
> > SPAVG
> ...


 
It's not _half-baked_. I actually did 1 _full_ solve with it before I posted it. (and it tasted GOOD)

It is indeed barely tested, but that's why we put it out there right? So others could test it for us.

And I am glad you liked the name. It would have been very confusing having AVG edges and AVG centers because then people would start asking questions like "but when will you post AVG 3x3x3?"

And just calling it AVG would have been at least as confusing as all those Pochmann-blind-methods 



fanwuq said:


> One day, my friend who cannot solve the cube started to make a constitution for the Republic of Cubism with me. Afterward, he signed his name as "THE CUBE MASTER GENERAL." He also types really fast, so I call him the cubemaster general and the typemaster general.
> 
> Anyone interested in the constitution document? It's quite funny.


Yes, please just put it in this thread if it is not insanely long


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## fanwuq (Jul 9, 2008)

The CubeMaster General said:


> Article I:
> 9:55 AM There is a quatricameral Parliament, established by the President.
> The upper house is elected by the President by secret ballot, and to qualify to vote, the President must be at least three times the age of himself.
> 9:56 AM The upper middle house is a condominium, elected by the various floors by preferential balloting.
> ...


He printed it out and signed it.


The CubeMaster General said:


> Saul: Why don't we cube a train in the public square?
> Nevermind...
> Let's train a cube!
> me: or square a cubical train in public
> ...



Just had to include another quote. Too long?


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## Swordsman Kirby (Jul 9, 2008)

brunson said:


> and Stephan Pochmann.



Never heard of him.


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## brunson (Jul 9, 2008)

Swordsman Kirby said:


> brunson said:
> 
> 
> > and Stephan Pochmann.
> ...


Dammit, I *seriously* have to stop misspelling his name. 

Stefan Pochmann. Heard of him? 

Just keep calling me Eric *Bronson* from now on until I start getting it right.


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## Stefan (Jul 9, 2008)

Nevermind, I didn't even notice it. Happens so often. Even a serious German TV show recently approached me as "Porchmann" when they asked me for an interview. I didn't correct it, so maybe I'll see that on TV soon.


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