Where have all the metas gone

[BarbaraK]

Another week, another Fireball that isn’t a meta. It felt like ages, so I came here to check, and it looks like the last was the June 30 puzzle.

Didn’t Fireball used to do a meta almost every month? I took a year or two off; was there a change then? Did Peter ever say why? Or how we could persuade him to have more of them?

[MikeM000]

I think last year there were about 4; this year there were 2 relatively early on but yes, I have the same letdown feeling getting the email each week where he doesn't say "next week is a contest".

[Cindy]

I too thought it used to be about every month. Maybe we are all crazy.

[markhr]

I started doing these in 2018. There were 10 contests per year, like clockwork. Starting in 2021, the schedule became very erratic; only 4 so far this year. I have not seen any explanation for the change. I like the regular Fireball puzzles, but I do miss the meta contests.

[BarbaraK]

I too thought it used to be about every month. Maybe we are all crazy.

Oh I’m sure we’re all crazy:) But I still miss the metas. Regular Fireballs are good, but just not the same.

[FrankieHeck]

I'm bummed because it's the first year I ever subscribed, and I only did it for the metas. I'm sure the regular fireballs are good, too....I just haven't done any of them

[BarbaraK]

I got an email reply from Peter Gordon and his permission to share it here.

OK. Here's my answer. Feel free to post:

In the past, metas appeared in weeks following themeless puzzles, and themeless puzzles ran whenever the puzzle number was a multiple of four (so 4, 8, 12, 16, 20, etc.). That meant that metas ran on puzzles numbered 5, 9, 13, 17, 21, etc., with the exception being Puzzle #45, the last of the year, which I didn't want to be a meta. With that method, there were 10 metas a year, and that was true every year from 2013 to 2020 except 2014, when there were nine. But for 2021, I wasn't getting as many meta submissions, and rather than run metas I didn't like, I cut back on the number of metas. Just four in 2021. The good news is that I've gotten more meta submissions than last year, so 2022 will have at least six metas, and maybe as many as nine.

Yay! More Fireball metas coming next year!

[oldjudge]

Submissions? Peter is a smart guy. Surely he can come up with some metas on his own.

[Leslie]

I just saw this post as I was trying to decide whether to subscribe to Fireball for next year. This was the first year I subscribed (after seeing many references on this site to the meta contests) and I was very disappointed to get only two of them. I see he says there will be six next year, but I think I’m done. Wish I had signed up in earlier years when it would have been a more worthwhile experience for me!