I'm still not sure/don't remember if or what the consensus was about the validity of a ring attack-speedrun for a goal in a TAS for this game. I know the Sonic 2 "perfect bonus" run was rejected, even though it was well received, and I understand why, but S3&K doesn't even have a tangible in-game reward for collecting all the rings. I think it's questionable whether you guys would allow it, but if it was done right, and well, I don't see why not. And I believe it's a nice solution to the aspect of S3K runs zipping through much of the core content of the game, which some people don't always like, while still being less arbitrary and difficult to define than something like a glitchless run.
These are the guidelines for it that I'd propose:
-First and foremost, aims to obtain the maximum number of rings (normal + monitor) possible as Knuckles (or whatever character is selected)
-Secondly, aims to do so in the least amount of time required
-Thus, the only way the movie could be obsoleted is if somebody did another recording with either more rings regardless of time, or equal rings in less time
-Since it's a full, single segment playthrough and the only thing that ultimately matters is total rings collected by the end of the game, progress should be measured in terms of rings per zone; rings per act is an irrelevant figure, and it's also ambiguous because there are some levels (AIZ, ICZ) where certain rings overlap and can be collected in either act
-Ignores special and bonus stages, except for rare instances when it's necessary to enter and immediately exit one in order to reset a boundry, and excludes from the eligible ring count for the run any rings that can be obtained through them (RA's including giant rings and/or transformations should be a separate category for everyone, due to drastic ramifications on the overall nature of the gameplay; except maybe Sonic, since he can still use shield jumps without transforming)
-Uses glitches to get more rings, faster
-Uses in-game timing, if possible