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This was the YouTube video where I think the person makes the same design as the one I remember: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=t2sozrof3HY
> I think I've found the design! But it took a blurry YouTube video and some trial and error. That isn't at all blurry.
One of the finest paper airplanes is the origami design of Prof. James M. Sakoda of Brown University "winner of the origami award in the First Inernational Paper Airplane Contest" in 1967 and published in "The Great International Paper Airplane Book" (Jerry Mander, George Dippel, Howard Gossage) https://i.imgur.com/Kv94Glf.png
My interest in science started when a friend and I folded a few paper planes, tested them over a small downhill section outside my house, made notes about what worked, tweaked and experimented with new designs, and so on. It blew my little mind that with structured experimentation you could design things that actually got better with each generation. Where would the improvements stop? With hindsight, I realise that m…
Microsoft Publisher 97 had (and still has in the 365 version) templates for different papercraft, including a couple of paper airplane designs. I honed my standard paper airplane design on this, and likely wasted gallons of ink in the process. Living in an apartment with a balcony also upped the incentive to make paper airplanes.
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I was at a math camp where one of the activities was that each team had to design a paper plane and get it to a castle on top of a hill by throwing it the fewest times possible (like in golf). Several teams converged on a design of a crumbled ball of paper as that was what offered the best combination of accuracy and distance. Since there was no rule against it, we've allowed it. Some of the teams who played with con…
I'll bite. What's the most controversial activity you have held at maths camp?
Played outdoor, between two teams who face each other on the opposite sides of a small playing field. In the middle there is a stick stuck into the ground.
The players are assigned various numbers. In each round a moderator announces a predicate such as "even numbers" or "factors of three primes" or "sum of digits is a power of two" etc.
The players who satisfy the predicate are allowed onto the field and their goal is to get the stick and bring it to their side. If a player mistakenly steps into the field they are out of the game. Grabbing and pulling other players while battling for the stick is fine.
The last time this was played it rained a bit and the terrain was muddy and slippery and also the game was probably needlessly violent. Too many people didn't enjoy it and we've decided to retire it.
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While I'm at it, the third most controversial game was a game where teams had to complete various tasks in and around the village after the sunset, find some objects, etc. We always have at least one such game and it is usually one of a kind, played just that one time.
This time there was a special twist. Unknown to the rest of the players, each team had a traitor whose goal was to hinder the progress of their team as much as possible. The traitor whose team finished in the last place was the actual winner of the game.
The activity was not scored, but the players were led to believe it is going to be scored.
When we played it some teams had conflicts and it sowed a lot of distrust and paranoia that spilled into the next day's games as well. Also the players who gave the game a lot of effort were angry that it is not scored in the end. It was the opposite of a team building activity so we never explored it further.
Although I have to say, I'm still intrigued by the concept and would like to try it in some other form one day again.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'll bite. What's the most controversial activity you have held at maths camp?
Haha. It wasn't my game and it was called "The Stick". Played outdoor, between two teams who face each other on the opposite sides of a small playing field. In the middle there is a stick stuck into the ground. The players are assigned various numbers. In each round a moderator announces a predicate such as "even numbers" or "factors of three primes" or "sum of digits is a power of two" etc. The players who satisfy t…
In fourth grade we had a paper airplane contest, but they had a restriction on the design: a circle about the size of a quarter was on the page, and no fold or crease could go through the circle. The circle was located a few inches above the exact center of the paper. Anyway I made a "dart", and just offset the angle a little to avoid the circle. It was good, and most of the competition was incredibly bad. And a few…
The inventor, when it was a new things years ago, submitted it to a Paper Airplane contest. The contests disqualified him because it was not an "Airplane".
He argued A) It s made of paper (Cardboard from a Pizza Box), B) it flew (for very long distances), therefore it is a Paper Airplane. QED
From experience I can tell you that A) They are attracted to trees, B) They swim like bricks (lost my first one in the first half hour to the local creek), C) They are very sensitive to thermal gradients. You can watch it ride up and over the finger tips of whomever you are playing with so it is just out of their reach. D) You need football size field, at a minimum, to paly with these.