NASPAWiki - User contributions [en]

Dictionary Committee

2011-02-01T04:21:41Z

Jpate:

The '''Dictionary Committee''' was transferred from the [[NSA]] to [[NASPA]] in 2009.

The mandate of the committee is to maintain the tournament lexicon, currently consisting of
the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] for words of up to nine letters
and their inflections, and [[Long List]] for longer words.

To contact the Dictionary Committee send an email to [mailto:naspa-dictionary@yahoogroups.com naspa-dictionary@yahoogroups.com].

== Members ==

The committee has the following members:

* [[Jim Pate]], chair
* [[James Cherry]]
* [[Bob Gillis]]
* [[Peter Huszagh]]
* [[Bob Lipton]] ([[WESPA]] liaison)
* [[Tim Bottorff]]

Former members:

* [[Sally Ricketts]] (OSPD4 project)
* [[Joe Edley]] – March 2009

== Agenda ==

The committee will have the following items on its agenda:

# Update the [[Long List]]
# Update the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]]
# Consider merging both word references
# Consider including words longer than 15 letters long, for use in [[SuperSCRABBLE]] and [[Anagrams]]
# Liaise with the [[WESPA]] Dictionary Committee to coordinate future updates

== History ==

New York chess club players adopted Funk & Wagnalls College Dictionary as
the first common word reference in the 1960s, leading eventually to its
adoption as the first official [[SCRABBLE]] dictionary by
[[SCRABBLE Crossword Game Players]] (the predecessor of the NSA).

Around 1975, [[Mike Senkiewicz]] proposed addressing the major defects
of Funk & Wagnalls (idiosyncratic vocabulary, large number of affix lists,
and lack of explicit inflection) by compiling an
[[Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary]] (OSPD) from five college dictionaries.

The Dictionary Committee has its unofficial roots in the team
that 1978 [[National SCRABBLE Championship|National Champion]] [[David Prinz]]
led to edit the first edition of the OSPD.
Prinz, along with Jonathan Hatch, Kathy Flaherty and
Bernie Teitelbaum, consulted with [[James Lowe]] of [[Merriam-Webster]] in
compiling and defining
all suitable words found in the following source lexica:

* American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 1969
* Funk & Wagnalls Standard College Dictionary, 1973
* G & C. Merriam's Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 8th edition, 1973
* Random House College Dictionary, 1968
* Webster's New World Dictionary, 2nd College Edition, 1970 (though no words from this source only were included in the first OSPD)

OSPD was officially adopted on October 1, 1978.

During the 1980s, [[Joe Leonard]] updated the word list based on the
ninth edition of Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the third edition of Webster's
New World Dictionary.
His changes took effect in 1990 with the publication of [[OSPD2]],
the second edition of the Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary.

In 1995, Merriam-Webster prepared the third edition
— OSPD3 –
largely in response to pressure to remove offensive words.
Effective February 1st, 1996, the tournament lexicon consisted
of OSPD2, plus a small number of words added in OSPD3, but retaining
the deleted words.

In September 1996, the NSA officially created its Dictionary
Committee and named [[John Chew]] its first chair. The committee
prepared the first edition of the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] (OTCWL1), which corrected some errors, consisted only
of a word list without definitions, and included words of nine
letters (and not just the OSPD's maximum eight). It took effect
as the club and tournament lexicon
on March 2nd, 1998.

[[Jim Pate]] became the committee’s second chair, and
over the following years the committee compiled the first North
American word reference of longer words, the [[Long List]] (LL).
This list
extended the tournament lexicon to the longest playable words of
15 letters, and took effect on June 16, 2003, replacing Merriam-Webster's
Collegiate Dictionary as the reference for longer words. The other members of the Dictionary Committee who completed the work on the Long List were: [[James Cherry]], [[John Chew]], [[Lynn Cushman]], [[Peter Huszagh]], [[Bob Lipton]], [[Joey Mallick]], and [[Loren Mitchell]].

The Dictionary Committee continued working on OSPD4 and OTCWL2,
which returned to earlier OSPD traditions by including newly added words
from multiple source dictionaries:

* American Heritage College Dictionary (4th edition),
* Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th edition, 2003 printing)
* Random House Webster’s College Dictionary (2nd revised and updated edition, 2000)
* Webster's New World College Dictionary (4th edition)

OSPD4 was published in 2005, and
OTCWL2 took effect on March 1st,
2006, and is the current word reference for club and tournament
play in North America.
The complete list of two-letter to eight-letter words added in OTCWL2 was published in the [[SCRABBLE News]] newsletter. It is not available in electronic form, for copyright and other reasons. The [[Official_SCRABBLE_Players_Dictionary#Changes_between_OSPD3_and_OSPD4|list of changes to OSPD4]] is freely available and may be of some use to tournament players.

== External links ==
* [http://www.scrabbleassociation.com/boards/dictionary/ NSA Dictionary Committee home page]

[[Category:Committees]]

Dictionary Committee

2011-02-01T04:16:15Z

Jpate:

The '''Dictionary Committee''' was transferred from the [[NSA]] to [[NASPA]] in 2009.

The mandate of the committee is to maintain the tournament lexicon, currently consisting of
the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] for words of up to nine letters
and their inflections, and [[Long List]] for longer words.

To contact the Dictionary Committee send an email to [mailto:naspa-dictionary@yahoogroups.com naspa-dictionary@yahoogroups.com].

== Members ==

The committee has the following members:

* [[Jim Pate]], chair
* [[James Cherry]]
* [[Bob Gillis]]
* [[Peter Huszagh]]
* [[Bob Lipton]] ([[WESPA]] liaison)
* [[Tim Bottorff]]

Former members:

* [[Sally Ricketts]] (OSPD4 project)
* [[Joe Edley]] – March 2009

== Agenda ==

The committee will have the following items on its agenda:

# Update the [[Long List]]
# Update the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]]
# Consider merging both word references
# Consider including words longer than 15 letters long, for use in [[SuperSCRABBLE]] and [[Anagrams]]
# Liaise with the [[WESPA]] Dictionary Committee to coordinate future updates

== History ==

New York chess club players adopted Funk & Wagnalls College Dictionary as
the first common word reference in the 1960s, leading eventually to its
adoption as the first official [[SCRABBLE]] dictionary by
[[SCRABBLE Crossword Game Players]] (the predecessor of the NSA).

Around 1975, [[Mike Senkiewicz]] proposed addressing the major defects
of Funk & Wagnalls (idiosyncratic vocabulary, large number of affix lists,
and lack of explicit inflection) by compiling an
[[Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary]] (OSPD) from five college dictionaries.

The Dictionary Committee has its unofficial roots in the team
that 1978 [[National SCRABBLE Championship|National Champion]] [[David Prinz]]
led to edit the first edition of the OSPD.
Prinz, along with Jonathan Hatch, Kathy Flaherty and
Bernie Teitelbaum, consulted with [[James Lowe]] of [[Merriam-Webster]] in
compiling and defining
all suitable words found in the following source lexica:

* American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 1969
* Funk & Wagnalls Standard College Dictionary, 1973
* G & C. Merriam's Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 8th edition, 1973
* Random House College Dictionary, 1968
* Webster's New World Dictionary, 2nd College Edition, 1970 (though no words from this source only were included in the first OSPD)

OSPD was officially adopted on October 1, 1978.

During the 1980s, [[Joe Leonard]] updated the word list based on the
ninth edition of Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the third edition of Webster's
New World Dictionary.
His changes took effect in 1990 with the publication of [[OSPD2]],
the second edition of the Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary.

In 1995, Merriam-Webster prepared the third edition
— OSPD3 –
largely in response to pressure to remove offensive words.
Effective February 1st, 1996, the tournament lexicon consisted
of OSPD2, plus a small number of words added in OSPD3, but retaining
the deleted words.

In September 1996, the NSA officially created its Dictionary
Committee and named [[John Chew]] its first chair. The committee
prepared the first edition of the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] (OTCWL1), which corrected some errors, consisted only
of a word list without definitions, and included words of nine
letters (and not just the OSPD's maximum eight). It took effect
as the club and tournament lexicon
on March 2nd, 1998.

[[Jim Pate]] became the committee’s second chair, and
over the following years the committee compiled the first North
American word reference of longer words, the [[Long List]] (LL).
This list
extended the tournament lexicon to the longest playable words of
15 letters, and took effect on June 16, 2003, replacing Merriam-Webster's
Collegiate Dictionary as the reference for longer words. The other members of the Dictionary Committee who completed the work on the Long List were: James Cherry, John Chew, Lynn Cushman, Peter Huszagh, Bob Lipton, Joey Mallick, and Loren Mitchell.

The Dictionary Committee continued working on OSPD4 and OTCWL2,
which returned to earlier OSPD traditions by including newly added words
from multiple source dictionaries:

* American Heritage College Dictionary (4th edition),
* Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th edition, 2003 printing)
* Random House Webster’s College Dictionary (2nd revised and updated edition, 2000)
* Webster's New World College Dictionary (4th edition)

OSPD4 was published in 2005, and
OTCWL2 took effect on March 1st,
2006, and is the current word reference for club and tournament
play in North America.
The complete list of two-letter to eight-letter words added in OTCWL2 was published in the [[SCRABBLE News]] newsletter. It is not available in electronic form, for copyright and other reasons. The [[Official_SCRABBLE_Players_Dictionary#Changes_between_OSPD3_and_OSPD4|list of changes to OSPD4]] is freely available and may be of some use to tournament players.

== External links ==
* [http://www.scrabbleassociation.com/boards/dictionary/ NSA Dictionary Committee home page]

[[Category:Committees]]

2010 NSC Town Hall Meeting

2010-08-09T15:49:48Z

Jpate: /* Jim Pate, Chair, Dictionary Committee */

The '''2010 NSC Town Hall Meeting'''
will take
place on [[2010 NSC Schedule|Monday, August 9, 2010]]
from 8:30–10:30 P.M.
Although we welcome [[Contact|inquiries]]
throughout the year, this is a good opportunity
to talk about NASPA in a public forum.

As stated, our time is limited and we want to ensure that
everyone is heard from, please note that we will have a maximum three-minute microphone time. If you have a complicated question to ask, please come prepared to phrase it as concisely as you can.

== Panel Members ==

NASPA’s business is conducted by the 73 members of
its 22 committees. All of our key committees are represented
by at least one panel member, and we will begin the meeting
by asking each member to report briefly on their
committee’s activities since the last NSC.
After these initial statements, we will welcome questions
from the audience.

* [[Chris Cree]]: [[Executive Committee]], [[Championship Committee]], [[Advisory Board]]
* [[Dallas Johnson]]: [[Advisory Board]], [[Tournament Committee]]
* [[Jan Dixon]]: [[Rules Committee]]
* [[John Chew]]: [[Executive Committee]], [[Championship Committee]], [[Web Committee]], [[Advisory Board]], [[Dictionary Committee]] and [[Technology Committee]]
* [[John Robertson]]: [[Canadian Committee]], [[Club/Director Committee]], [[Membership Committee]]
* [[Mary Rhoades]]: [[Championship Committee]], [[Club/Director Committee]], [[Technology Committee]]
* [[Siri Tillekeratne]]: [[Canadian Committee]], [[Tournament Committee]]
* [[Tony Leah]]: [[Canadian Committee]], [[Membership Committee]], [[NASPA-WESPA Liaison Committee]]

== Meeting Minutes ==

Minutes for the Town Hall Meeting will be posted here
after the event. In the meantime, here are opening remarks
from our panel members about some of the committees in
which they are active.

=== Chris Cree, Executive Committee ===

Our committee:
*has overseen substantially greater membership and tournament activity than foreseen
*manages an advertising campaign on Facebook
*meets regularly with [[Hasbro]] face-to-face and by conference call
**Hasbro now includes NASPA flyers in SCRABBLE sets
**Hasbro now has a NASPA link on their website
**are discussing relationships with Hasbro partner corporations
*researched venues for the [[2012 National SCRABBLE Championship]]

*has overseen the work of the [[Advisory Board]] and other committees
*has organized face-to-face meetings and conference calls for NASPA committees
*fielded hundreds (thousands?) of general inquiries about NASPA
*renegotiated liability insurance coverage
*filed a first tax return
*kept the association’s financial books
*sought and received legal advice concerning the association’s affairs
*recruited committee members
*held smaller Town Hall meetings monthly (?) across the continent
*attended the 2010 NSSC to recruit School players
*commissioned the new big board and signage
*set up office functions: P.O. Box, storage, letterhead
(more to follow)

=== Dallas Johnson, Cochair, Tournament Committee ===

Our committee:
*Sanctioned over 500 events.
*Reviewed in excess of 1,300 emails to the committee.
*Reviewed and acted on 7 incident reports.
*Reviewed and acted on a complaint stemming from a director’s decision to bar a player from an event.
*Discussed changes to 200 mile driving distance requirement, and developed new guideline for calculating driving distance using Google maps.
*Considered reducing distance restriction in highly populated regions (no action to date).
*Discussed circumstances warranting an exception to 8-week sanctioning lead time requirement.
*Modified sanctioning requirement for ORT events to 6-weeks, with no exceptions to notice requirement.
*Initiated sanctioning of Local Club Tournament (LCT )events (beginning September 1, 2010), with 10 day advance notice required without exception, and established the following criteria for sanctioning: 1. Must be sponsored by a sanctioned NASPA club; 2. No more than 1 event per club, per month; 3. Open to all NASPA members in good standing (subject to size limitations of venue).
*Initiated sanctioning of Team Challenge or Championship (TCC) events (beginning September 1, 2010, with transitional exceptions), with 6-week advance notice required without exception, using the same criteria as for Open Rated Tournaments (ORTs), except that entries may be restricted based on rating or geography.
*Discussed confidentiality guidelines regarding incident reports and witness statements.
*Discussed creating an online tournament sanctioning tool for directors to use.
*Drafted guidelines for sponsorship of tournaments.
*Drafted a statement on accommodation of disabilities at Scrabble tournaments.
*Received and acted on requests for accommodation.
*Coordinated with the Director’s Manual committee to update the sanctioning guidelines for 1-day tournaments.
*Coordinated with the Club and Directors Committee to review guidelines for minors serving as directors and to discuss responsibilities of directors for keeping order at tournaments.
*Fielded various questions from directors, including:
*#Rating all local club games during a month as a single LCT (not permitted)
*#Barring or placing special requirements on “no show” players (permitted within reason)
*#Americans with Disabilities Act requirements as they apply to disabled Scrabble players (must provide reasonable accommodations)
*#NASPA policy on non-discrimination and prohibition on gender-exclusive events (may not discriminate based on gender)
*#The ability to forbid changes to tally slips once submitted (contrary to tournament rules)
*#Allowing a player who has been inactive for a long time to return to play in a lower division (not permitted)
*#Allowing a player who has improved significantly since last rated event to leapfrog other players into a higher division (not permitted)
*#Standards for advertising of Scrabble tournaments (ads should comply with community standards of decency)
*#Dealing with a “no show” player on the second day of play (remove from event pairings)
*#Holding rated invitational tournaments (only Team Challenge or Championship events may restrict entries, and restriction must be on approved standards of rating or geography)
*#Whether or not a NASPA-rated event can also be rated by WGPO (events can be rated by any outside organization the director wishes, if that organization’s requirements are met)

=== Jan Dixon, Chair, Rules Committee ===

Our committee:
* rewrote the entire rule book
* added an index

There were several rules changes, most notably the rule regarding blank declaration. Many others were simplified and/or clarified.

=== Jim Pate, Chair, Dictionary Committee ===

Jim is unable to attend, and his
report will be made by John Chew, who can also answer
any questions about committee business.

Our committee:
* is in the early stages of revising the long word list to include words from original sources not yet included
* welcomes volunteers to assist with this effort
* will likely be adding some new members to the committee after communication with persons who have expressed interest in joining in the past (will include some testing to be sure that prospective members fully appreciate the painstaking work needed to produce as accurate and complete a list of valid words as possible)
* is waiting for information regarding the next edition of MWCD before revising the shorter words

=== John Chew, Cochair, Advisory Board ===

The board:
* has convened in person, by conference call and group email several times
* debated and passed 18 motions
** six addressed individual disciplinary cases
** four honoured members of the NASPA community
** three created new regulations to deal with delinquent members
** two created new regulations affecting tournament activity (new SOWPODS rating system, rules on spacing cruises and tours)
* (Motion 13 TBA at this meeting)

=== John Chew, Chair, Web Committee ===

Our committee:
* Maintained NASPAWiki, including
** pages for all committees
** pages for all committee members
** Breaking News
** Press Releases
* Developed an online membership payment system
* Developed an online membership renewal system
* Developed an online electoral system
* Ported the rating system from John’s laptop to our main server
* Implemented substantial turnaround improvements in rating events
* Implemented a database for tracking upcoming rated events
* Began moving the NASPA website to a higher-performance dedicated host
* Developed a large number of member, director and committee services
** print your own membership card
** submit account payments
** submit profile photos
** edit profile photo
** view current Bulletin
** add new members
** list current members
** submit rating data
** edit director, member or calendar databases
** list accounting records
** view championship registrations
** etc.
* Developed a new, streamlined NSC registration system
* Developed in-house accounting tools
* Developed and supported better data exchange with cross-tables.com
* Began documenting all committee maintenance procedures
* Continued to develop graphics related to NASPA’s corporate identity and events
* Provided technical support for our website users
* Maintained the NASPA Records page

=== John Robertson, Membership Committee ===

Our committee:
* has helped process 3200 memberships since NASPA was founded
* provides membership-related customer service
* (several announcements TBA at meeting)

=== Mary Rhoades, Chair, Club/Director Committee ===

Our committee has:
* Received fees for sanctioning two clubs in Hawaii but have not certified the clubs yet since they don’t have certified directors.
* Administered 27 director tests to new directors and assigned mentors.
* Retested two who failed the first time and they passed the second time.
* Fully certified 7 directors whose mentors approved their readiness.
* Administered 3 director tests to already-certified directors for purposes of critiquing the test
* Certified 15 new or formerly NSA clubs.
* Counseled numerous club directors wanting advice or regarding conflicts.
* Committee investigated incident report between player and club director and upheld club director. Although player kept complaining, when I told him he could take it to the AB, he stopped.

=== Rebecca Slivka/Scott Smith, Cochairs, Technology Committee ===

Rebecca and Scott are unable to attend, and their
report will be made by John Chew, who can also answer
any questions about committee business.

Our committee:
* has been evaluating SSL and game clock phone apps; our preliminary conclusion is that it’s too hard to guarantee that a particular SSL app is correctly configured to authorize their official use by players, and that the clock apps they’ve looked at so far interact poorly with use of a device as a phone
* would welcome volunteer testers for such apps

=== Siri Tillekeratne, Canadian Committee ===

Our committee:
* set the size of the CC at six members with provisions for minimum and maximum regional representation
* established the length of terms for CC members at three years, with two members' terms expiring on December 31 of each year
* established annual CC elections (and their regulations) in which all Canadian NASPA members can participate
* organized the 2009 CC election (which was unnecessary because the candidates won by acclamation)
* established the qualification rules for the next Canadian Championship tournament, and for the Canadian team at the next World Championship tournament and Causeway Challenge tournament
* established John Robertson as the financial liaison for Canadian NASPA members who wish to pay their membership fees in Canadian dollars.
* 2010 CanAm news

=== Tony Leah, Cochair, NASPA-WESPA Liaison Committee ===

Our committee:
* was formed in June 2009 to coordinate communication with WESPA on issues of mutual interest and insure the voices of North American players are heard.
* took on an official liaison role in October 2009 when NASPA became a member association of WESPA.
* nominated [[Sam Kantimathi]] and Tony Leah to be members of the 11 person WESPA Main Committee; Sam and Tony were elected to that committee at the WESPA meeting at the WSC in November 2009.
* has had input into WESPA discussions on rules, ratings and dictionary update. WESPA has maintained its policy of rating all NASPA tournaments played to the Collins Scrabble Words (CSW) dictionary.
* has provided North American Scrabble players with information about WESPA events, such as the World Youth Scrabble Championship.
* developed the qualification system for US players for the 2010 Causeway Challenge.
* has also been active in promoting CSW divisions and tournaments in the US and Canada.
* suggest expanding the mandate of the Committee somewhat, to clearly include support and coordination for NASPA members and directors participating in CSW tourneys in North America. This could include formalizing rules for CSW play here, providing support materials for directors of CSW events, and preparation of CSW study materials for NASPA members that are interested.
* could be renamed the International Committee to reflect the broadened mandate.

How lexicons are compiled

2010-01-29T22:19:37Z

Jpate:

This article on '''how lexicons are compiled''' was originally
edited from email messages sent by [[Jim Pate]], chair of the
[[Dictionary Committee]].

The reason that words like UQUQ, ZEN, and CUZ are not in the [[Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary]] (OSPD) nor in the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] (OWL) is that they have not appeared as lower
case, non-apostrophized, non-hyphenated, non-foreign, single-word
entries in any of the source dictionaries that were used to create
and to update these official SCRABBLE lists. The four college level
source dictionaries used to create the OSPD4 and the OWL2 were:

* Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th edition
* American Heritage College Dictionary, 4th edition
* Webster's New World College Dictionary, 4th edition
* Random-House Webster's College Dictionary, 2000 2nd revised and updated Random House edition

Also, for the original OSPD one other source dictionary (Funk &
Wagnall's Standard College Dictionary, 1974) was one of five sources
used, and some words from earlier editions of the OSPD have been
grandfathered as explained in the [[Dictionary Committee]] page.
Since these sources are all abridged dictionaries many valid words
that are not as frequently used do not appear in them.

The best way to get words into a future edition of the Official
SCRABBLE Players Dictionary (and the Official Tournament and Club
Word List) is to convince the editors at Merriam-Webster to add
them to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary which has always
been one of the source dictionaries for the OSPD official words.

Jim Lowe, Senior Editor at Merriam-Webster, Inc. suggests sending
a dozen or so documented print usages of the proposed words to them
for their citation files. Google Books is a great way to find citations.
At that point the editors will do additional research to determine
the advisability of inclusion of the new terms into Merriam-Webster's
Collegiate Dictionary.

The mailing address is:

Merriam-Webster, Inc.
47 Federal Street
P.O. Box 281
Springfield, MA 01102

When the next edition of the Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary
is done the new words that have made their way into Merriam-Webster's
Collegiate Dictionary should then be incorporated into the OSPD and
thus become legal words for tournament and club play.

In international play, a similar process is followed by HarperCollins
Publishing to prepare the larger [[SOWPODS|Official Scrabble Words]]
lexicon. Comments concerning that list should be directed to the
[[NASPA-WESPA Liaison Committee]] for forwarding to the [[WESPA]]
Dictionary Committee.

As for your group using these words as you play, that's the great
thing about SCRABBLE Brand Crossword Game — if you and your opponents
agree on the dictionary or word list you want to use then you are
by all means free to do so. Of course, if you play at a NASPA club
or sanctioned tournament then the word list used for adjudication
there would be the OWL2. (If you cannot get all of the people in
your group to allow these words in all the games you play, you might
want to suggest including them as acceptable in a certain percentage
of designated games. It could be a fun variation for your group
from time to time.)

We hope that you and your friends continue
to enjoy playing SCRABBLE Brand Crossword Game whatever word source you
choose to use.

Dictionary Committee

2009-08-29T08:07:38Z

Jpate:

The '''Dictionary Committee''' was transferred from the [[NSA]] to [[NASPA]] in 2009.

The mandate of the committee is to maintain the tournament lexicon, currently consisting of
the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] for words of up to nine letters
and their inflections, and [[Long List]] for longer words.

To contact the Dictionary Committee send an email to [mailto:naspa-dc@yahoogroups.com naspa-dc@yahoogroups.com].

== Members ==

The committee has the following members:

* [[Jim Pate]], chair
* [[James Cherry]]
* [[John Chew]]
* [[Bob Gillis]]
* [[Peter Huszagh]]
* [[Bob Lipton]] ([[WESPA]] liaison)

Former members:

* [[Sally Ricketts]] (OSPD4 project)
* [[Joe Edley]] – March 2009

== Agenda ==

The committee will have the following items on its agenda:

# Update the [[Long List]]
# Update the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]]
# Consider merging both word references
# Consider including words longer than 15 letters long, for use in [[SuperSCRABBLE]] and [[Anagrams]]
# Liaise with the [[WESPA]] Dictionary Committee to coordinate future updates

== History ==

New York chess club players adopted Funk & Wagnalls College Dictionary as
the first common word reference in the 1960s, leading eventually to its
adoption as the first official [[SCRABBLE]] dictionary by
[[SCRABBLE Crossword Game Players]] (the predecessor of the NSA).

Around 1975, [[Mike Senkiewicz]] proposed addressing the major defects
of Funk & Wagnalls (idiosyncratic vocabulary, large number of affix lists,
and lack of explicit inflection) by compiling an
[[Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary]] (OSPD) from five college dictionaries.

The Dictionary Committee has its unofficial roots in the team
that 1978 [[National SCRABBLE Championship|National Champion]] [[David Prinz]]
led to edit the first edition of the OSPD.
Prinz, along with Jonathan Hatch, Kathy Flaherty and
Bernie Teitelbaum, consulted with [[James Lowe]] of [[Merriam-Webster]] in
compiling and defining
all suitable words found in the following source lexica:

* American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 1969
* Funk & Wagnalls Standard College Dictionary, 1973
* G & C. Merriam's Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 8th edition, 1973
* Random House College Dictionary, 1968
* Webster's New World Dictionary, 2nd College Edition, 1970 (though no words from this source only were included in the first OSPD)

OSPD was officially adopted on October 1, 1978.

During the 1980s, [[Joe Leonard]] updated the word list based on the
ninth edition of Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the third edition of Webster's
New World Dictionary.
His changes took effect in 1990 with the publication of OSPD2,
the second edition of the Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary.

In 1995, Merriam-Webster prepared the third edition
— OSPD3 –
largely in response to pressure to remove offensive words.
Effective February 1st, 1996, the tournament lexicon consisted
of OSPD2, plus a small number of words added in OSPD3, but retaining
the deleted words.

In September 1996, the NSA officially created its Dictionary
Committee and named [[John Chew]] its first chair. The committee
prepared the first edition of the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] (OTCWL1), which corrected some errors, consisted only
of a word list without definitions, and included words of nine
letters (and not just the OSPD's maximum eight). It took effect
as the club and tournament lexicon
on March 2nd, 1998.

[[Jim Pate]] became the committee’s second chair, and
over the following years the committee compiled the first North
American word reference of longer words, the [[Long List]] (LL).
This list
extended the tournament lexicon to the longest playable words of
15 letters, and took effect on June 16, 2003, replacing Merriam-Webster's
Collegiate Dictionary as the reference for longer words.

The Dictionary Committee continued working on OSPD4 and OTCWL2,
which returned to earlier OSPD traditions by including newly added words
from multiple source dictionaries:

* American Heritage College Dictionary (4th edition),
* Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th edition, 2003 printing)
* Random House Webster’s College Dictionary (2nd revised and updated edition, 2000)
* Webster's New World College Dictionary (4th edition)

OSPD4 was published in 2005, and
OTCWL2 took effect on March 1st,
2006, and is the current word reference for club and tournament
play in North America.
The complete list of two-letter to eight-letter words added in OTCWL2 was published in the [[SCRABBLE News]] newsletter. It is not available in electronic form, for copyright and other reasons. The [[Official_SCRABBLE_Players_Dictionary#Changes_between_OSPD3_and_OSPD4|list of changes to OSPD4]] is freely available and may be of some use to tournament players.

== External links ==
* [http://www.scrabbleassociation.com/boards/dictionary/ NSA Dictionary Committee home page]
* [http://www2.scrabble-assoc.com/subitems.asp?id=36&sid=72&ssid=31 NSA Dictionary Committee members]

[[Category:Committees]]

Dictionary Committee

2009-03-09T07:36:00Z

Jpate:

The [[NSA]] [http://www.scrabbleassociation.com/boards/dictionary/ Dictionary Committee] has not yet been transferred to [[NASPA]].
Its mandate is to update the tournament lexicon, currently consisting of
the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] for words of up to nine letters
and their inflections, and [[Long List]] for longer words.

== Members ==

The committee has the following members:

* [[Jim Pate]], chair
* [[John Chew]]
* [[James Cherry]]
* [[Joe Edley]]
* [[Bob Gillis]]
* [[Peter Huszagh]]
* [[Bob Lipton]]

== Agenda ==

The committee will have the following items on its agenda:

# Update the [[Long List]]
# Update the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]]
# Consider merging both word references
# Consider including words longer than 15 letters long, for use in [[SuperSCRABBLE]] and [[Anagrams]]
# Liaise with the [[WESPA]] Dictionary Committee to coordinate future updates

== History ==

New York chess club players adopted Funk & Wagnalls College Dictionary as
the first common word reference in the 1960s, leading eventually to its
adoption as the first official [[SCRABBLE]] dictionary by
[[SCRABBLE Crossword Game Players]] (the predecessor of the NSA).

Around 1975, [[Mike Senkiewicz]] proposed addressing the major defects
of Funk & Wagnalls (idiosyncratic vocabulary, large number of affix lists,
and lack of explicit inflection) by compiling an
[[Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary]] (OSPD) from five college dictionaries.

The Dictionary Committee has its unofficial roots in the team
that 1978 [[National SCRABBLE Championship|National Champion]] [[David Prinz]]
led to edit the first edition of the OSPD.
Prinz, along with Jonathan Hatch, Kathy Flaherty and
Bernie Teitelbaum, consulted with [[James Lowe]] of [[Merriam-Webster]] in
compiling and defining
all suitable words found in the following source lexica:

* American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 1969
* Funk & Wagnalls Standard College Dictionary, 1973
* G & C. Merriam's Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 8th edition, 1973
* Random House College Dictionary, 1968
* Webster's New World Dictionary, 2nd College Edition, 1970 (though no words from this source only were included in the first OSPD)

OSPD was officially adopted on October 1, 1978.

During the 1980s, [[Joe Leonard]] updated the word list based on the
ninth edition of Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the third edition of Webster's
New World Dictionary.
His changes took effect in 1990 with the publication of OSPD2,
the second edition of the Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary.

In 1995, Merriam-Webster prepared the third edition
— OSPD3 –
largely in response to pressure to remove offensive words.
Effective February 1st, 1996, the tournament lexicon consisted
of OSPD2, plus a small number of words added in OSPD3, but retaining
the deleted words.

In September 1996, the NSA officially created its Dictionary
Committee and named [[John Chew]] its first chair. The committee
prepared the first edition of the [[Official Tournament and Club Word List]] (OTCWL1), which corrected some errors, consisted only
of a word list without definitions, and included words of nine
letters (and not just the OSPD's maximum eight). It took effect
as the club and tournament lexicon
on March 2nd, 1998.

[[Jim Pate]] became the committee’s second chair, and
over the following years the committee compiled the first North
American word reference of longer words, the [[Long List]] (LL).
This list
extended the tournament lexicon to the longest playable words of
15 letters, and took effect on June 16, 2003, replacing Merriam-Webster's
Collegiate Dictionary as the reference for longer words.

The Dictionary Committee continued working on OSPD4 and OTCWL2,
which returned to earlier OSPD traditions by including newly added words
from multiple source dictionaries:

* American Heritage College Dictionary (4th edition),
* Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th edition)
* Random House Webster’s College Dictionary (2nd revised and updated edition, 2000)
* Webster's New World College Dictionary (4th edition)

OSPD4 was published in 2005, and
OTCWL2 took effect on March 1st,
2006, and is the current word reference for club and tournament
play in North America.
The complete list of two-letter to eight-letter words added in OTCWL2 was published in the [[SCRABBLE News]] newsletter. It is not available in electronic form, for copyright and other reasons. The [[Official_SCRABBLE_Players_Dictionary#Changes_between_OSPD3_and_OSPD4|list of changes to OSPD4]] is freely available and may be of some use to tournament players.