Regarding timing in Portal:

Recently, some people in the Portal community have been attempting to use a different timing method for speedrunning. Since 2007, Portal speedrunning has started timing when crosshairs appear, and ends when crosshairs disappear. The new method would have timing start around around 52.3 seconds, which is a few seconds before the starting portal opens. If you do not know much about Portal, the beginning consists of you in this small chamber, able to interact with objects, and manipulate physics of the objects. This will be important later. People want to skip the majority of the chamber with a predetermined save because it's annoying to wait a minute doing absolutely nothing. I would argue that the current timing method, which has been in place for the last 8 years, is fine. If we change the timing, it sets a precedent that we can skip cutscenes THAT WE CAN PROBABLY SKIP VIA A GLITCH ANYWAYS whenever we want just because it's an inconvenience. Perhaps I'm being abrasive, but that is literally the only reason to change the timing method. Here are some of the arguments of the people that want to change the method:

BUT HALF-LIFE DOES IT! WHY CAN'T WE?
1. We are not the Half-Life/GoldSrc community. 2. To my knowledge, the Half-Life community uses a map command to start their timing, not some arbitrary save that someone made up. 3. I actually don't agree with their timing method considering the beginning is skippable via a low FPS glitch, but I'm not gonna tell their community what to do/change a timing method that has been in place for years.

BUT WHAT ABOUT SUPER METROID?
1. We are not the Super Metroid community. 2. You cannot move at all during the opening Super Metroid cutscene, it is just advancing text for minutes. 3. I actually agree with the save here, but once again, the text is not skippable by any stretch of the imagination.

IT INCONVIENCES ME
1. You know what you were getting into (or you should have) when you starting running the game. It's a LITERAL minute, deal with it or don't run the game anymore.

Some arguments in favor of keeping the current timing method:

We believe that skipping the relaxation vault (the first minute) is possible using objects and certain boosts via bad physics with the clipboard/radio/cup. I don't want to reveal any info other than that. If someone finds a consistent way of skipping it in the future, then what? We could potentially skip 40-50 seconds off the current timing, which would not be possible anymore if this new timing was used.

Apparently the rules would also entail not doing any inputs until the save is made. But what if I want to clip a clipboard out of the vault and do a stucklaunch off it? This we know is possible, as seen in Portal Done Inbounds. I was told that if I want to do this, I need to actually play through the entire relaxation vault instead of using this predetermined save. This gives an advantage to the people who just use the predetermined save who can now do more attempts quickly, not having to worry much about consistency in the early game. This to me, is completely ridiculous. This also makes timing confusing for new runners, in an already confusing game.

I don't believe you are actually beating the game if you use a save 50 seconds in, especially when you are free to move during that time. It's more like "I beat the game, except for the first 50 seconds".

Whats stopping me from skipping elevators too? I have to wait 8-10 seconds every chamber? What the fuck? It's inconviences me (even know we KNOW they're skippable), so let me just skip those too. Once again, back to the precedent thing.

That's all I can think of for now. Sorry if grammar is bad, it's 5 AM and I'm tired.