How Windows FreeCell Gave Rise To Online Crowdsourcing 93
TPIRman writes "In 1994, a physics doctoral student named Dave Ring assembled more than 100 math and puzzle enthusiasts on Usenet for what became one of the earliest online 'crowdsourcing' projects. Their goal: to determine if every hand in Windows' FreeCell solitaire game was in fact winnable, as the program's help file implied. Their efforts soon focused in on one incredibly stubborn hand: #11,982. They couldn't beat it, but in the process of trying, they proved the viability of an idea that would later be refined with crowdsourcing models like Amazon's Mechanical Turk."
Finally! (Score:4, Funny)
I can figure out how to solve Free Cell...
(scrambles back to Spider Solitaire)
I tried to crowdsource minesweeper (Score:4, Funny)
In real life, with real mines. Terrible results. While we did find most of the mines, it turns out that people are terrible at safely locating them. Lots of dead bodies, limbs, etc, everywhere.
Re:Not solved != proof (Score:4, Funny)
Based on my own results, I'd have to say that thirty-one thousand, nine hundred, and ninety-nine hands are not winnable, and one is.
As a corollary result, I seem to have proven that I really suck at FreeCell.