Watching the highly subjective Olympic boxing scoring system reminded me once again of a half-baked idea from way back in my notebooks ... Strap an inertia-switch to each wrist of the two boxers so that if a glove stops suddenly a system of some sort registers a point scored ... Fencing has done it for ages ... Other halfbakers will have fun thinking of all the refinements one could develop - like adjustability, and reliability, low-tech and high-tech etc. maybe boxing could become as safe as beach volley-ball - and about as dreary to watch.
-- rayfo, Sep 17 2000

I equate watching boxing with watching paint dry, or grass grow (I was going to add Americas Cup Yachting too, but we won that).
-- Alcin, Sep 19 2000


Beach volleyball is extremely dangerous. What with the exposure to excessive solar radiation and all that sand in your underwear...

The current scoring method in olympic boxing isn't perfect but it's certainly preferable to the previous one whereby the boxer who gave the most presents to the judges won.
-- DrBob, Sep 19 2000


In the media I learn of anger building up about the judging system in use at the Games boxing.

Supposedly improved, it's alleged to be even more open to bribing judges than the last games.

Yet an inertia switch is as simple as a battery-torch which only goes if you bump it.

The principle can be readily refined to indicate [a] a punch [b] the weight behind the punch.

There must be several ways of transmitting the scores to a computer.
-- rayfo, Sep 30 2000


Referee: "I want a good clean fight, touch gloves... but not too hard, I'm on to you"
-- Five_Swords, Apr 24 2006


The inertia switch wouldn't differentiate between blocked hits and ones that connect with a vital spot.
-- 5th Earth, Apr 25 2006


you'd need to team it with a proximity sensor, so that it could measure the distance from the target. points accrue with contact to legitimate areas. Kickboxing would benefit from this, as there are numerous targets that are hard to score... i.e. kidneys. i like this idea, with some refinement.
-- RockCrawler, Apr 27 2006


How about have gloves and outfits coated with conductive material, and use signal generators/detectors to determine hits to targeted areas of the outfits?
-- supercat, Apr 27 2006


not bad [supercat], except you can score with a face hit. so something would have to be done with the helmet, that's why i went with proximity sensors.
-- RockCrawler, Apr 28 2006



random, halfbakery