Page "International Obfuscated C Code Contest" Paragraph 6

The rules are often deliberately written with subtle loopholes that contestants are somewhat encouraged to find and abuse.

This is the result of the contest being a " parody of the software development process ".

Entries that take advantage of some loophole in the rules ( whether or not they pass a final round of judging ) can cause the rules for the following year's contest to be adjusted accordingly ( although often other subtle loopholes are deliberately introduced in the process ).