S, P, S

[webofevil]

In all the kerfuffle of the last couple of days, this story appears inexplicably to have been overshadowed:

The [Tokyo-based] Maspro Denkoh electronics corporation was selling its $20 million collection of Picassos and Van Goghs, but the director could not decide whether Sotheby's or Christie's should have the privilege of auctioning them. So he announced that the deal would go to the winner of a single round of scissors, paper, stone.

Sotheby's reluctantly accepted this as a 50/50 game of chance, but Christie's asked the experts, Flora and Alice, 11-year-old daughters of the company's director of Impressionist and modern art, and aficionados of the game.

They explained their strategy:

1. Stone is the one that "feels" the strongest
2. Therefore a novice will expect their opponent to go for stone, and will go for paper to beat stone
3. Therefore go for scissors first

Sure enough, the novices at Sotheby's went for paper, and Christie's scissors got them an enormously lucrative cut. [BBC]

Comments

[femme-letale.livejournal.com]

That strategy is just brilliant! You couldn't just filter neil_scott out, could you?

[webofevil.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid that even if I knew how to do this, my strict objective principles would not allow me to do such a thing. Unless perhaps ready cash is involved.

[femme-letale.livejournal.com]

My bank strict objective principles would not allow me to do the ready cash thing... (in public). I guess I'll keep losing at it and doing the washing up...

[internetsdairy.livejournal.com]

I've never really understood why paper beats stone. I've heard the explanation is that it 'wraps' it, but a gift-wrapped rock to the head will only do marginally less damage than an unwrapped rock. It might even do more damage if the bow goes in your eye.