I think that short runners shouldn't have to play when they are on e.g. their 11th show, lots of contestants enjoy their time there and it isn't fair on them to have to play so early.

and it tends to be people who aren't very built up or someone who wee don't really know about too,

IN MY OPINION!!!

I like a bit of variety, I don't like seeing everyone do 22 shows, so I'm not against short runners at all! However, I prefer it when they're not really big characters on the wings, as I always feel their time's been cut short (such as Cocky Bill and Howard). Ken's another one, but that was understandable as they wanted him to play before the 4 month break!

do you mean because of his age?

I think it was due to the fact that he'd recently been in hospital (just recovered from cancer?).

In which case, why didnt joseph play after his 9th/10th show? Or Patrick[£75k/£250k patrick], or even Doug?

My personal opinion on the thing is that there should be a limit on just how little amount of shows people can do - you pay £30+Train/coach/petrol fees to get on the shiow in the first place, so you would not want to do just, say,9 shows.That is too little.

15 is fine. 22 is fine. 30 would be great, as would 35/40/45/50.

People on most game shows turn up to do one show, and one show only... OK there are those where champions can come back, but even on Countdown you can do a maximum of 8 + three knockout finals games, and I can't think of any others that would match that. (Not since Channel 5's 100% where someone could win an unlimited number of times and return every day.)

DOND is different of course, and it's a great feature of the show that we get to "know" contestants over a few weeks before they play. It makes the format what it is, you care so much more about how they do compared to someone you've never seen before. But some contestants now seem more devastated to be called early than they would be to win 1p, and if that's the situation then something's not right. The game and the chance to win money should be the main reason for being there, the rest of the "experience" is a bonus.

I disagree, I think the contestant's experience is what makes the show so different to other shows. If I were to go on Deal or No Deal, I'd be going for the experience and meeting new people rather than the game it's self.

"Money may run out but friends are for Life"

Well maybe they should forget about the game part completely, and just keep them in a hotel for a few weeks and film that... they could call it "Big Brother" or something like that

No, don't compare Deal or No Deal to that trash please!

Of course the game is important too but the show comes in two parts, the "experience" and the "game" itself, and I just think that the experience is more important than the game - that doesn't mean I want to see the contestants being filmed in the hotel, and let's forget about the game! That's not my point at all. What I'm saying is that...oh forget it, it's too confusing to explain...

All I'm saying is that I want to see contestants on screen who care about the game (whatever their financial targets and attitude to gambling may be) and who don't look like it's the worst thing that has ever happened to them when they get called up to play.

As the game is the part of it that the viewers get to see, it takes something away from it as a viewer if it becomes secondary in importance to the two-week party beforehand.

Yes, I agree, as a viewer the game is more important but if I was a contestant, the experience would be more important to me. That's what I was trying to say, but obviously I didn't explain it very well. I'll just shut up now.

I like short runners. If everyone played after 22 shows it would be boring and you'd always know who is going to play. I like guessing who is going to play and being surprised if someone plays who hasn't been there all that long.

It's good to have a surprise now and then, although I do think it may be unfair to cut a player's time short with new friends, etc.

They should make one person stay there until the very last show ever, so they do about 300 shows

I don't really mind...

I would have thought most of the players would have been glad to get an early game.

If each show takes 2hrs to shoot and there are 3 shows filmed per day thats 6hrs standing behind those boxes every day. Few days of that and I'd be desperate to play lol.

There should be short-runners, but they should all be *beep*/boring people. It's crap when cool people like Colin and Cocky Bill play really early...especially when there doesn't seem to be any reason for it.

I agree that the boring ones should be kicked off after short time. I guess the reason is that the cool ones like those you mentioned have a bit of a short shelf life. They tend to get boring/irritating quite quickly. There was a short runner called Wendy (stood in E11, got the red card at a game) towards the end of last year. She was great when she started, but after about a week I thought she began to get pretty annoying.