Paul Mitchell - Head of Recruitment and Analysis

[Bedfordspurs]

I thought the technology was a gift from Aliens

 

[Baleforce]

I think that we should. I could save a lot of time with subjects that come up a lot

can we get a bot?

as soon as someone mentions something that's been dealt with the thread gets a final post to the previous impasse and gets locked?

 

[billyiddo]

can we get a bot?

as soon as someone mentions something that's been dealt with the thread gets a final post to the previous impasse and gets locked?

We had a bot but the person who wrote the algorithyms has moved to another site and none of us have the rights to use it

 

[Baleforce]

We had a bot but the person who wrote the algorithyms has moved to another site and none of us have the rights to use it

 

[Gutter Boy]

GB and this Algorithym nonsense.

The Black Box is the fudgeing name of a room with an interactive TV screen they use to present their findings to the powers that be - pull up tables and charts and link to video clips and so on, it's a glorified fudgeing presentation room - not footballs answer to HAL for Christ sakes

Do you really think a £1/2b+ business operates without using modern approaches? Everything is using big data and algorithms now - from how they allocate resources for healthcare, to the timing on traffic lights, to the adverts on the side of your screen.

 

[Millsy_Yiddo]

I think they buy the data, which probably has some analysis tools (sabermetrics/the stuff like the Comolli video).

But Mitchells' particular talent is supposed to be writing algorithms to use that data to predict future trends/trajectories. The Billy Beane stuff

He was a footballer up until Jan 2009 with MK Dons, then he retired and was hired as head of recruitment at the same club in 2010.

So in a year he was able to gain the necessary knowledge and skills to write algorithms, then come up with one that not only has the ability to monitor and predict trends for the entire footballing population, but is novel, unique and useful enough to be patentable?

 

[Finney Is Back]

He was a footballer up until Jan 2009 with MK Dons, then he retired and was hired as head of recruitment at the same club in 2010.

So in a year he was able to gain the necessary knowledge and skills to write algorithms, then come up with one that not only has the ability to monitor and predict trends for the entire footballing population, but is novel, unique and useful enough to be patentable?

Open University?

 

[Millsy_Yiddo]

Open University?

haha must have been.

@Gutter Boy I had a quick search on Espacenet and the UK Patent Office website (patents once approved become public) for both 'Mitchell' and 'Southampton' as both applicant and inventor. There are 0 patents for either and Southampton Football Club don't have a single patent granted to them.

Not sure where you got it from mate, but it's absolute nonsense.

 

[Gutter Boy]

haha must have been.

@Gutter Boy I had a quick search on Espacenet and the UK Patent Office website (patents once approved become public) for both 'Mitchell' and 'Southampton' as both applicant and inventor. There are 0 patents for either and Southampton Football Club don't have a single patent granted to them.

Not sure where you got it from mate, but it's absolute nonsense.

It's IP, not patents.

 

[Finney Is Back]

It's IP, not patents.

As I keep saying. If Mitchell's 'algorithms' had indeed identified certain players at Southampton then I would've expected Mitchell to have brought that knowledge with him in his head. That knowledge should allow us to get through the year or so period it will take him to rewrite the algorithms.... Even though in reality I think you are complicating all of this massively and Mitchell is just a guy that analyses stats from (e.g.) Prozone and makes recommendations based on those.

 

[Millsy_Yiddo]

It's IP, not patents.

You mentioned that 'Southampton will have owed the IP on his computer systems, so part of why it will take a while for him to get up-to-speed is because he'll have to re-write his algorithms'.

He'd only have to re-write the algorithm if the IP is protected. It can only be protected be through one of 3 things (there are a couple of others but they aren't applicable here);

A patent: I've search and none exist. So it's not that.

Copyright: This gives the person who created the work exclusive rights. If Mitchell created the algorithm like you say, he owns the copyright so would just take it with him.

Trademark: More of a logo/sign type thing so not applicable here.

This was just me trying to show you that whoever or wherever you got the information that 'Southampton own the IP' from was talking nonsense.

My main concern is that you believe an ex footballer who moved into recruitement within a year of retirement has somehow found the time to become an expert in writing complex computer algorithms.

I don't know where you got it from, but it's nonsense. Yes, he probably uses data and is pretty good with statistics, has a good eye for a player and builds himself a good network of employees, but somekind of computer genius he is not.

 

[milo]

You mentioned that 'Southampton will have owed the IP on his computer systems, so part of why it will take a while for him to get up-to-speed is because he'll have to re-write his algorithms'.

He'd only have to re-write the algorithm if the IP is protected. It can only be protected be through one of 3 things (there are a couple of others but they aren't applicable here);

A patent: I've search and none exist. So it's not that.

Copyright: This gives the person who created the work exclusive rights. If Mitchell created the algorithm like you say, he owns the copyright so would just take it with him.

Trademark: More of a logo/sign type thing so not applicable here.

This was just me trying to show you that whoever or wherever you got the information that 'Southampton own the IP' from was talking nonsense.

My main concern is that you believe an ex footballer who moved into recruitement within a year of retirement has somehow found the time to become an expert in writing complex computer algorithms.

I don't know where you got it from, but it's nonsense. Yes, he probably uses data and is pretty good with statistics, has a good eye for a player and builds himself a good network of employees, but somekind of computer genius he is not.

It also would not make any sense to build your own when there are really good systems that are commercially available and supported.

Building a bespoke system would be expensive, time consuming, probably worse than the commercial alternatives and in Southampton's case currently unsupported (because the bloke the GB thinks built it cleared off).

All of this aside, there is nothing, anywhere which says that Mitchell either developed the application at Southampton or is building one for us.

 

[Andyandy]

It also would not make any sense to build your own when there are really good systems that are commercially available and supported.

Building a bespoke system would be expensive, time consuming, probably worse than the commercial alternatives and in Southampton's case currently unsupported (because the bloke the GB thinks built it cleared off).

All of this aside, there is nothing, anywhere which says that Mitchell either developed the application at Southampton or is building one for us.

It's impossible to write an algorithm to identify a player. All an algorithm could do is help support making a long list of candidates for further more subjective analysis by scouts. I.e they will give you a ballpark idea but no more.

 

[milo]

It's impossible to write an algorithm to identify a player. All an algorithm could do is help support making a long list of candidates for further more subjective analysis by scouts. I.e they will give you a ballpark idea but no more.

I know but there is only so much debunking that I can stomach

 

[thfcsteff]

You mentioned that 'Southampton will have owed the IP on his computer systems, so part of why it will take a while for him to get up-to-speed is because he'll have to re-write his algorithms'.

He'd only have to re-write the algorithm if the IP is protected. It can only be protected be through one of 3 things (there are a couple of others but they aren't applicable here);

A patent: I've search and none exist. So it's not that.

Copyright: This gives the person who created the work exclusive rights. If Mitchell created the algorithm like you say, he owns the copyright so would just take it with him.

Trademark: More of a logo/sign type thing so not applicable here.

This was just me trying to show you that whoever or wherever you got the information that 'Southampton own the IP' from was talking nonsense.

My main concern is that you believe an ex footballer who moved into recruitement within a year of retirement has somehow found the time to become an expert in writing complex computer algorithms.

I don't know where you got it from, but it's nonsense. Yes, he probably uses data and is pretty good with statistics, has a good eye for a player and builds himself a good network of employees, but somekind of computer genius he is not.

I have no idea whether GB is right or not. What I wonder is if you are questioning whether a footballer is smart enough to have this knowledge. it is possible that the bloke was doing some sort of Open University course, or some such other sort of supplemental education program, to gain the knowledge. I knew a player in the 90s, played for us actually, good friend...retired from football at 25 and went on to become a hugely successful player in the financial world. he had done Open University courses. Again, not saying anything more than it is possible for footballers to excel in areas of perceived academic reach. If you were not questioning that possibility, apologies.

 

[Millsy_Yiddo]

I have no idea whether GB is right or not. What I wonder is if you are questioning whether a footballer is smart enough to have this knowledge. it is possible that the bloke was doing some sort of Open University course, or some such other sort of supplemental education program, to gain the knowledge. I knew a player in the 90s, played for us actually, good friend...retired from football at 25 and went on to become a hugely successful player in the financial world. he had done Open University courses. Again, not saying anything more than it is possible for footballers to excel in areas of perceived academic reach. If you were not questioning that possibility, apologies.

Not questioning whether he's smart enough. I appreciate there are many intelligent footballers out there. I'm Questioning how someone could train, learn, then create something as complex as a algorithm for predicting trends for an entire footballing population which not only works but is novel enough to have protected IP (which GB is claiming it has) within 2 years.

Protecting the IP itself would likely take the guts of 2 years.

It's nonsense.

 

[JerusalemMan]

I have no idea whether GB is right or not. What I wonder is if you are questioning whether a footballer is smart enough to have this knowledge. it is possible that the bloke was doing some sort of Open University course, or some such other sort of supplemental education program, to gain the knowledge. I knew a player in the 90s, played for us actually, good friend...retired from football at 25 and went on to become a hugely successful player in the financial world. he had done Open University courses. Again, not saying anything more than it is possible for footballers to excel in areas of perceived academic reach. If you were not questioning that possibility, apologies.

Sounds a bit like Espen Baardsen

 

[scaramanga]

Protecting the IP itself would likely take the guts of 2 years.

That depends on his contract.

Back when I didn't mind being someone's IT bitch I signed a few contracts that claimed the rights to anything I created or designed during the period in which I was working for them that related to the customer's
field and/or business interests.

I don't think that's what has happened here but I'd be very surprised of clubs didn't have their data people on similar contracts.

 

[Baleforce]

that's pretty common these days, it's in all the contracts where I work as well

 

[Danishfurniturelover]

I have no idea whether GB is right or not. What I wonder is if you are questioning whether a footballer is smart enough to have this knowledge. it is possible that the bloke was doing some sort of Open University course, or some such other sort of supplemental education program, to gain the knowledge. I knew a player in the 90s, played for us actually, good friend...retired from football at 25 and went on to become a hugely successful player in the financial world. he had done Open University courses. Again, not saying anything more than it is possible for footballers to excel in areas of perceived academic reach. If you were not questioning that possibility, apologies.

Was he a goalkeeper by any chance?