McBruce

That post deserves a Robert Novak reply. :) Instead, I shall simply point out that there are over 1300 players that have finished above average at least once in my 51 tournaments. Of these, over 25 tables are frequent players, finishing over average at least 5 times (which would indicate that they have played at least 10 times). Supply and demand may get people to try them, but getting people to return is a sign of a well-run series.

An analogy: Wherever you happen to be in the world, open your wallet and have a look at some paper money. You will find fine lines, great detail, intricate watermarks, and even holographic patches. Technology today is sufficient that people who want to counterfeit it will do so. So no, it will not help to take these silly countermeasures. Credit cards? Debit cards? Coins? Have a look. All have anti-counterfeit measures that technology can easily overcome if you are serious enough. If your honest conclusion from this is to boycott money, I support you in your boycott of BBO tournaments that bar kibitzers. ;)

My tournaments, which keep kibitzers out until everyone has played the first ten of fifteen boards, are averaging over 27 tables after 51 events. Not only that, they have other limitations that some on these forums have said were not even bridge--they are individuals, unclocked, and everyone is limited to SAYC. Yet we average over 27 tables! If the majority, or even a great number of BBO players prefer no kibitzers and will not play in tournaments without them, how could this be? Could it be that you perhaps are not a majority? Could it be that maybe there are some things more important than whether kibitzers are allowed or not, like running a series of tournaments where the rules are clear, the rulings are consistent and the rating system and results web site is an attraction? C'mon folks. BBO people read these forums; occasionally they make changes based on the opinions we give. I haven't seen them changing their rules to make sure kibitzers are allowed. They're not convinced by your arguments. Organize a boycott; go ahead, make my day. If you think a successful boycott will convince me (or anyone) to change my rules, you are mistaken. You might, if you are successful, get me (and others) to quit running tournaments entirely. Is that what you want? I doubt that's what BBO wants.

While I agree that this is a pretty bad rule, contrary to the Laws of Duplicate, one example hardly meets the requirement of "constant" new rules in tourneys. Do you have others?

As I stated earlier, there has to be some indication that the non-offending side knew there was an infraction. We should never be denying a non-offender an adjustment if he made a bad bid because he was not informed of a conventional agreement. A TD's job is to determine what would have happened if the Laws were followed, not to determine whether the non-offenders played perfectly under misinformation they did not even know about. I fail to understand why so many TDs go overboard in looking for infractions by the non-offenders. A bad bid is not an infraction, especially when it is based on misinformation.

This is an important point missed by many experienced Directors. The general case is: 1. Offending side fails to explain their agreements, by not alerting, or misexplaining. 2. Non-offending side takes some unusual action that goes for a big number. The instinct of most TDs is to apply the prinicple that most NCBOs follow: after an infraction, the non-offending side must continue to play normal bridge, they must not try for a "double shot." Citing that principle, the TD rules no adjustment. What the TD fails to understand is that to the non-offending side, there is no indication that there even HAS been an infraction. Without it being obvious that there has been an infraction, the "anti-double shot" prinicple cannot possibly apply. Example: ♠ T 9 6 ♥ J 9 7 ♦ A K 9 7 2 ♣ K 4 Nobody is vul and RHO opens 2NT, alerted as 0-11, both minors. You pass and LHO bids 3♠. Partner doubles this and it is passed to you. What is your call? I chose 3NT, which was doubled by LHO. Partner now bid 4♦ and RHO now mentioned that he had forgotten to alert the 3♠ call. The Director was called and told us to continue. RHO passed, I asked about 3♠ and was told that it was artificial and showed a strong hand. I passed 4♦ and it got doubled. Partner, with a diamond void, retreated to 4♥, also doubled and down 500. The Director ruled A- to the offending side, but made us keep our -500! His reasoning was that 3NT was an insane bid. My response that of course 3NT was insane, I had no idea whose hand it was because I was not given the information I was entitled to, fell on deaf ears. Keep an eye out for this when you are about to rule that the non-offending side is trying for a double shot. Quite often they don't even know there is an infraction.

Suppose there are, to simplify things, ten directors running free games on BBO where it is made public that if you misbehave, you will be gone and not invited back. A player named 'goombah' (obviously a name I have made up) misbehaves in TD#1's game. What action would you prefer to be taken? 1. The player is banned from TD#1's games. 2. The player is banned from all free games on BBO. My theory is that under #1, 'goombah' will be more careful when he plays in the other nine games. Under #2, there is no chance for 'goombah' to be educated in this way. Therefore, I do not share my banned list with anyone. And, in a very few cases where a player has been put on the banned list and has apologized to me, I have removed the player from the list with the warning that no further misbehavior will be tolerated at all, apology or not.

Assuming a standardish system The 2♥ reverse is quite an overbid. Even if 2♥ is a misclick, 2♠ is odd -- 3♣ would be the expected continuation. But don't N-S pay for this poor bidding. Aren't there ten fairly easy tricks in 4♠?

Some TDs do make it public in their CoCs whether kibitzers are allowed or not. All you need to do is read them. The ones that don't; well, you could always ask. Most of us actually show up before the game starts. Furthermore, as a prospective sub once the tournament starts, can you not see immediately from looking at the tables in play? If it says 'Disallowed;' well, what might that mean? If it says '2 Kibitzers;' hey, that might be a clue as well. If all this sounds sarcastic, well, I'm sorry, but you cross the decency line when you urge a boycott in a public forum. Don't play in a tournament if it doesn't suit you, but writing about boycotting one type of tourney "until TDs change their minds" because you don't agree with the TD's decision is just plain wrong. Those of us who do considerable work in organizing these events will not change our minds in the unlikely event that such a boycott works. We will quit; for who knows what decision we'll be forced into next. I do agree that it is incomprehensible why a TD would suddenly bar kibitzers. A player is getting huge scores every hand and has the same kibitzer? There is no way a TD could even verify that during the event.

(In football/soccer, the referee shows a yellow card to a player who commits a serious infraction. The league keeps track of yellow cards and accumulating too many will get you a suspension. Two in a game, or an extreme infraction, and a player is shown a red card, which is an immediate expulsion.) Friday night's event seemed to be Misbehavior Night. After a recent epidemic of suspicious "please replace me, I have to go" (like seven in the last tournament), I made sure to announce a new rule at the outset: NEW RULE: I will replace players who need to leave. But by signing up you promised to play all 15 boards, good or bad. If you ask for a replacement or leave, the results you got while in WILL be checked and if it seems likely that you are leaving based on bad results, you will get a one-month ban from Alphabet Point tournaments, longer for repeat offenders. One or two disasters will not make it impossible to break average and win some Alphabet Points. The attitude "if I can't win, I'll quit" is not welcome here. Within three rounds I had issued two "yellow cards". Survivor tournaments seem to have the effect of leading people to believe that it's OK to quit when you're having a bad game, instead of trying to break average and get something for it. It appeared that a third yellow card was about to be issued when a player in a bad contract asked to be subbed. I convinced the quitter to play it out and message me when finished, as I had a TD call at another table. Five minutes later I got a message from the quitter "sub me now please." I did so without going to the table, and got an immediate TD call: the quitter had played only seven tricks and the sub had no idea what to do. I had to go over the play to the first seven tricks with the sub, which took several minutes. Forget the yellow card--this is a red card. People who agree to follow the TD's instructions and then don't can go play elsewhere. Here is another one of my opening round announcements: Be courteous to partner and opponents. The player you insult now may be your partner next round! ADVICE: If you insist on "educating" the opponents (or partner), you may find that you lose more points for your sins than they for theirs. I encourage all players to call me when unquestionably unacceptable comments or behavior occur. DO NOT tolerate, call the Director...and educate! ...and, from the Alphabet Point website: There is no greater bridge crime than being a jerk at the table, but the second worst bridge crime is responding in kind and the third worst bridge crime is to let it happen. And yet, about an hour in, I got a report that a player had watched his partner go down in a slam, and felt the need to say (among other things, apparently) "if I am paired with you again, I will ask to be replaced." I confirmed the rudeness with the other two players at the table. Then I asked the player whether the comment was made. Five minutes and a round change went by with no answer. Would anyone do this at a f2f tournament? Ignore a TD completely when asked a question? Why does online bridge give people the impression that this is reasonable behavior? That was red card number 2 (after the end of the hand). Director call--off I go. A hand is finished, and a player from Turkey, the player who called the TD, is responding to partner's comments: TurkishPlayer: i from turkey TurkishPlayer: i not turkey This seems a pretty good indication of what has happened. Unfortunately, it continued this way: McBruce: problem here? TurkishPlayer: stupid When I told the Turkish player that 'stupid' was not an acceptable way to respond and that some might DQ him but I was only giving him a warning, he hit me with CAPSLOCK for the next few minutes, protesting angrily that his partner had called him a turkey. TurkishPlayer: YES I SAY STUPID TurkishPlayer: WHAT I SAY??????????? TurkishPlayer: AND HE SAY LAST HAND HE SAYS ME I M VERY PLAYED AND I MAKE IT 4!C X I SAY WHO IS BAD PLAYER? TurkishPlayer: WHY NOT DISCARD HIM HE IS MY COUNTRY TURKEY IS LAUGHING, McBruce > TurkishPlayer: stop this please, I cannot sort it out if you continue to SHOUT IN CAPS TurkishPlayer: u dnt eork TD? TurkishPlayer: work? he is realy rude? McBruce > TurkishPlayer: I don't see the chat unless I am at the table so I have to confirm with the others at the table. If you continue protesting I will not be able to do this. TurkishPlayer: i report u and him BBO borders TurkishPlayer: chat log on bbo In this storm I was unable to do what I had done in the first instance, which was to confirm the comment with the opponents. It seemed unneccessary from the comments I had seen when I arrived. So I sent a private message to the partner -- and it's only fair since we are referring to the one player as Turkish to say that the player who called him a turkey was flying the American flag -- asking if rude comments about his partner were made. Again, no response for several minutes. I subbed him. Red card #3. From the lobby came this answer: "only after he told me twice that if was very bad and he then played with me and misbid and misplayed a hand" And then: "i think you should get the whole story before you do that" and "when someone tell me twice, I play bad and then misbids and misplays a hand with me, where is the justice" McBruce: you admitted that you made fun of his country, what do you expect? Name-caller: "no i just called him a turkey" The Turkish player continued to rant, and at one point in the middle of my discussion with the other player, I saw this: TurkishPlayer: he is racism and may be u same side? Well, that's enough--Red card #4. TurkishPlayer actually had finished the tourney by now and was yapping from the lobby. TurkishPlayer broke average and won Alphabet Points, or would have--I calculated them without including TurkishPlayer. And it didn't end there! While responding to a player's question about a score on a previous board, I was at a table when a dummy said 'pathetic' while a hand was in play. McBruce > dummy: comments like that are NOT welcome here, this is your last warning dummy: are lunatic bids acceptable ? McBruce > dummy: you signed up for an indy, that does not give you the right to belittle others dummy: i didnt be little anyone i was saying alas why me My remarks were made in private. Dummy's were not. Red card #5. Mercifully, the tournament ended without any more incidents... Is there no decency at all? Can't people just say they're sorry when they make an outburst, or is it now common ground in indy tourneys that when your partner goofs you get to tear them a new one? Ah well, perhaps it's my fault for taking such a long sabbatical from TDing: had I been around I would have purged these goons from my tournaments one by one instead of getting all five in the same night....

My solution to this issue in my tournament series (being a confirmed fence-sitter :P ) has been to keep kibitzers out until all players have played ten of the 15 boards. Because my tourneys are unclocked, this has the effect of allowing the fastest to come back and kibitz as they wait for the results. In checking the results of the winners for unusual actions, as I do every time, I have not noticed a significant difference between the first ten boards and the last five. In the first few tournaments of the series I allowed kibitzers all the time and there were usually some strange actions that accompanied scores of 90%+ on any board. Now most extreme results are simple errors in bidding or play. Not a scientific finding, more just an impression.

I think our opinions are closer than it seems. I too am uncomfortable with calling them habitual cheaters, because the only evidence is the grapevine. But in the Tenerife case, I agree with the Committee's decision to DQ them, which doesn't use the word cheating, but convicts them of passing signals and acting on them. Cheating pretty strongly implies prearranged methods. It seems possible that the importance of the match and the situation made Lanzarotti decide to cook up a way to let Buratti know the vital information needed: that Bareket had three trumps to an honour. After the A♥ lead it would be clear to Lanzarotti that this was the crucial information needed. But there is no evidence to suggest that the signalling method was prearranged; if anything, it feels like it was ad libbed.

When I read that I think that I am in a nightmare, or in an Inquisition trial (which is the same). The assertion about the diamonds break can be a joke, or a natural provocative reaction of someone very irritated by what he judges a silly accusation. Please stop whacking the Committee for a job done well. People who are accused of cheating in a Committee should know better than to joke or to react angrily to testimony, because this is not going to help their cause. I prefer to believe that this very experienced Committee made sure that no such thing happened, that in their report they cited reasons given by Buratti that they understood were meant seriously, and that they ensured (as all Committees are supposed to) that decorum and order was kept, and none of the people giving evidence were allowed to react provocatively to any statements made by the other side. To assume otherwise is to accuse the Committee of bias and incompetence. If that were the case, don't you think we'd have heard some sort of protest from the Italian gentlemen by now?

No such precedent has been. The 'flair' player would simply say to the Committee that table presence made him play the way he did. Buratti tried to make this type of claim to the Committee by saying the questions led him to believe that the opening leader lacked the Q♦, a claim which has drawn some criticism online. But under normal ciurcumstances the Committee might have believed him, had this been the only defense he put up. But when he followed this up with "diamonds are always breaking badly at this tournament" and Lanzarotti pulled a Raphael Palmeiro: "I did NOT look at his cards...okay, maybe I tilted my head a little but I'm blind in that eye....uh....at least to red suit honours," well, let's just say that the Committee was not comprised of people who were born yesterday...

Gee Dwingo, thanks for that lucidity. It's quite clear that you oppose the suggestion but completely unclear exactly why. Care to elaborate?

Point One: I am uncomfortable with rules that allow players to imply something from the absence of an alert. It seems to me that most jurisdictions will bite the non-offending side for making such assumptions. Observe: If the opponent's auction goes 1NT - 2♦ and there is no alert, non-offenders are expected to protect themselves by looking at a convention card or asking. If a non-offender here psyches a 2♥ call with ♥Jxx and goes for 800, the side that failed to alert may get a procedural penalty levied against their 800 but the non-offenders are going to have to eat their bad score. If a non-offender here decides to bid 3♣ and goes for 200 against a partscore, he doesn't get to claim that he assumed 2♦ was weak because of the absense of an alert if there was a visible convention card on the table, or if it was common knowledge that transfers were being used. Now let's argue the other way... Auction goes 1NT - 2♦, alerted and explained as a transfer. If the partnership agreement is that 2♦ is a signoff, the non-offending side will virtually always get an adjusted score. Online, there is virtually no reason at all not to protect yourself when a commonly alerted call is not alerted. You can ask one or both opponents what their agreements are privately, and no UI will be passed. Assuming a bid means something is never a good idea online, because you can always find out. Point Two: There is no constant definition of 'natural,' at least, not a simple one that players are aware of. Some Polish players, as pointed out elsewhere, think 1♣ in WJ is natural. The problem with the artificial-natural approach is defining what is natural and making that definition common knowledge among players. Still, I think it is better than your alternative of "standard-non-standard." I routinely tell players to ignore the ACBL alert rules, try to use common sense, and pay any penalty imposed when you cause damage and move on. This, to me, is far better than studying the GCC and becoming a bridge lawyer instead of a bridge player.

Topbridge (www.topbridge.com) is an online site from (I think) Norway. Currently most of the players there are Scandanavian. They run a very different game with distinct advantages and disadvantages from the normal type of online bridge game: Topbridge plusses: --the top six players in each daily individual tournament win cash prizes: US$150 for first place, down to US$15 for 4th thru 6th. --players pay an initial fee to receive the right to play a certain number of boards at the rate of 6 for one US dollar. Prizes are paid in boards, so if you win a daily tournament, you would win 900 more boards. --to allow you to become familiar with the setup, anyone who signs up gets 15 free boards (not quite enough to qualify for a tournament prize, but enough to try it out) --if you amass a large number of boards, as some do, you can trade them in for money at the same rate of 6 for $1. --there is virtually no chance of cheating in Topbridge tournaments --no controversies with alerting or explanations: everyone plays the same system (standard with a few gadgets) --the quality of play is fairly good -- few players take the wild chances often seen in online tournaments with their own money on the line -- several well-known players play at the site --participation levels are decent, with about 100 players qualifying (some more than once) daily by playing sets of 16 deals Topbridge minusses: --you cannot play exclusively with one partner --you cannot play a fancy system (to Topbridge enthusiasts these are converted into plusses: you don't have to face 'wired' pairs, and you don't have to contend with fancy systems) --there is no chat and players are completely anonymous--you play only as "North," "South," "East," or "West" without knowing who your partner or opponents are--each new board takes you to a new table with new players --complete information about any deal in the tournament, including the players who played it, is not available until the end of the daily tournament --the Java-based client is okay but definitely not up to the graphical splendour of BBO --since most players (at this point) are Scandanavian, there are times where it is difficult to get enough people at a table--from Western Canada I often have to play in the early morning to ensure getting in 16 boards in a day If you can live with the minuses it is a fun game. Topbridge seems to be based partly on an idea I had during a 1999 discussion on the problems of OKBridge's Lehman rating system. With 100 or so players a day playing 16 boards, they are raking in a little more than they give out in prizes, enough to run occasional large prize tournaments for the highest-ranked players. They've been around since 2001 and I haven't heard of any kind of cheating scandal involved. How can you cheat if you don't know who you are playing with? Even if two players sign on at the same time, chances are that they won't be playing at the same table, and even if they are, they might not be partners. BBO could do this in a flash and make some decent money! The attractions of prize money without the usual possibility of online cheating has got to be a major attraction. Our client looks a lot better, too. I suspect that if BBO were to try a Topbridge-type tourney, it would encourage many, many players to buy BBO bucks and convert them to boards. Our player base is large enough that a successful launch with BB-Basic and BB-Advanced divisions might soon expand to include other systems. It might even be possible to run tournaments lasting only 6 hours instead of running them over a 24 hour period as Topbridge does. Once the tournament ends and details are published about who played what, discussions could begin on special discussion boards here. I don't know a lot about the inner workings of the BBO software but I know that Uday is a smart enough guy that he could make this possible from the existing setup quite easily. Anyone who thinks it is not bridge without real-time chat and prearranged partners and systems can continue playing in tournaments where the spectre of cheating will always be there. I think the tradeoff is worth it for the chance to win money, or even to lose a small amount but learn by playing with some good players.

The problems described in this thread come about for several reasons: 1. BBO still does not provide TDs with enough information in the face of disagreements. We cannot tell for sure when a bid was alerted. We cannot tell for sure how long anyone took to make a call. We cannot see whether a system was pre-alerted in chat. Now, it is true enough that your friendly neighbourhood club director also has to rely on the testimony of players to get these types of facts. But the club director is usually not going to be burdened by language barriers, nor by the fact that conversations are not always the same when typed. Most of us record chat just in case something needs corroboration. It would be a useful option to be able to have players send their tournament chat records to the TD in the case of a dispute. It would be even better if such records included the timing of bids appearing. 2. People do not agree on what constitutes a natural bid. Polish Clubbers feel that their system, including the 1♣ opener, is more natural than SAYC; just as American players feel no need to alert 2 ♣ openers since it is natural to them that this shows great strength. 3. Too many players do not utilize the features of BBO to protect themselves, instead relying on the universal yet flayed concept that if there is no alert, it is whatever I think it is--or else. If two players with names that have few vowels and clashing consonants come to your table and open 1 ♣, you need to have your head in the sand to assume that this is a standard call. Ask for an explanation already! Do so in chat, not by clicking on the bid. 4. If you have a problem that you wish to discuss on this forum, it would really help us to have the deal, the auction, and the story behind it. Blanket statements like 'Polish experts don't alert' are not going to solve anything.

Uday, you and Fred and Sheri, with some help from all of us together are doing a great deal. Players play online and then they look for club or tournament bridge in the area. It takes time, often years, but it does happen. The hardest part for young players is fitting in to the older crowd that plays at clubs these days. But that is not our problem: we who play and promote bridge online are doing our part.

Perhaps you have a point. OKBridge, when I was there, did not have this ability to click on bids: we relied on private chat to the opponents only. This was made easy on OKB by directing messages to LHO with <, RHO with > and both opponents with =. It's a convention BBO should adopt. Maybe the solution is simpler than we realize: --when a bid is clicked on, the explanation only goes to the person who clicked on the bid and kibitzers --if the other opponent later clicks on the bid, he gets the same explanation automatically after a random time interval between 3 and 5 seconds

You are saying that when you are waiting for your partner to make a call and an explanation of LHO's call comes up, you know that partner is interested in that suit because obviously if you didn't ask for the explanation, he did. What's to say that the bidder himself didn't simply add an explanation?

My take on this: Alerts are a response to the problem that players in f2f bridge, when asking questions about calls, pass unauthorized information to their partners by asking. Alert rules are an attempt to minimize (total elimination is impossible) this UI, not to force pairs playing unusual conventions to disclose: disclosure is expected anyhow, through explanations, pre-alerts, convention cards, etc. Complicated rules on when to alert and when not to don't help sell bridge. Players who waste time arguing about what is and is not alertable when they do not have a problem keep people away from bridge who might otherwise come back: the opponents. Online bridge has no need for alerts since either opponent can ask about the bid without passing any UI to partner. You can even ask both opponents separately and find out if they both agree. There is never any trouble with viewing the opponent's convention card-if they have one-online, no coffee cups or bid-boxes in the way. An alert system online would be an unnecessary complication. What might work, especially now that BBO is multilingual, is a dialog box that could pop up whenever someone wants a bid explained: The 2♠ call in this auction is: [__] forcing (partner cannot pass unless his RHO calls) [__] invitational (partner needs extra values to bid on) [__] non-forcing (partner can pass this call) [__] other (explain below) [__] natural (shows willingness to play in the denomination) [__] artificial (says nothing about the denomination) [__] other (explain below) Description of this call: [_____________] (select from a list of common descriptions: transfer, game try, slam try, asking bid, relay, etc.) More information: _____________________________ (user enters text) The bidder would not be able to bid again until the call was explained with a minimum of one box in each of the first two groups checked, and at least some text entered if 'other' was chosen. Such a dialog box could be translated into other languages easily.

The Sound and the Fury? I should remind you that this is a Zero Tolerance tournament... <_< I was kind of hoping for name prospects to highlight the tournament site, a gaming casino and hotel resort. But if you want to highlight the Puget Sound name, maybe something like: The Sounds of Silence Sound Calls or maybe Sound Callings Perhaps an anagram of Puget Sound.... God Tunes Up Dustup Gone Spud Tongue ...or Puget Sound Regional A Sleeping Groundout Engaged Until Porous Sun Delegation Group Gelated Grunion Soup Angered Pouting Soul Pedalers Outgun Gino Dealer Tounging Soup Aged Neurologist Pun Portugal Undies Gone Dropout Ingenue Gals Goats Undergo Lineup Old August Reopening Urge Optional Nudges Plain-Tongued Rogues Gorgeous Nuptial End Piano-Legged Runouts Utopian Goren Sludge Goner: Patios Unglued Lunar Guidepost Gone ...and on and on forever. Maybe I can name each of the issues with an anagram...

OK, so partner had made a call and the double of 2♥ cannot be taken back. My bad. So, instead, I determine that the alerts were late, have the table play it out to a result, and adjust to 2♥ making whatever it might make, unless the non-offending side gets a better result. It's clear to me that the double was not going to happen with timely explanations.

The Puget Sound Regional this August takes place in the Skagit Valley Casino resort, about halfway between Vancouver and Seattle a stone's throw from Interstate 5, August 22-28. I'll be the Daily Bulletin editor, and the move from the previous location near Sea-Tac airport has caused us to look for a new title. Near the airport we were calling the Daily Bulletin "Leading Edge" which is a term that applies to bridge and to aviation. This year we are at a casino resort. I happen to think that calling a Regional Daily Bulletin 'The Hicksville Regional Daily Bulletin' is about as exciting as flavourless Jello. We have rejected these: Thirteen Card Flop Smooth Calls Shoe In Any other ideas? Bridge-poker or bridge-blackjack or bridge-casino; just keep it short and snappy.