No more kibitzing at tournaments

[hrothgar]

Interested by the claims that cheating occurs at the money bridge tables. I recall when the money bridge tables were first introduced by BBO that they were advertised as being "cheat proof". I am not familiar with that side of BBO, but just thought it interesting that we now apparently see cheating in a supposedly cheat-proof environment.

I don't recall any claims that people are cheating in BBO's money bridge events. I'd be interested if you could point me at any such threads.

 

For what its worth, the BBO money bridge tables aren't "cheat proof". If BBO wanted to, they could rig the hands so that the North-South pairs were more likely to get good cards than the East-West pairs. With this said and done, my understanding is that BBO's management was careful to design a fee structure such that they don't have any financial incentive to do so. BBO collects the same amount of money regardless of how well any individual player might do. If Fred and Uday were to do something untoward they'd suffer enormous losses with no gain on the upside. I'd be shocked if they were to do anything this silly.

 

In theory, there are other ways that players might be able to cheat at money bridge. For example, players might use some kind of AI running on their own PC to assist their level play. However, I don't tend to get overly worried about this kind of thing. It really doesn't matter much to me if I get hustled by a brilliant bridge player or a somewhat good bridge player using one hell of an AI.

[bassaidai]

How about a couple of 18 board tournaments?

Good idea, I'd like to play in them.

[1eyedjack]

Interested by the claims that cheating occurs at the money bridge tables.  I recall when the money bridge tables were first introduced by BBO that they were advertised as being "cheat proof".  I am not familiar with that side of BBO, but just thought it interesting that we now apparently see cheating in a supposedly cheat-proof environment.

I don't recall any claims that people are cheating in BBO's money bridge events. I'd be interested if you could point me at any such threads.

Possibly my bad. I thought that MBC was TLA for money bridge competitition on BBO. I could well be wrong. But in that context it was in this thread, at

http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?sho...ndpost&p=159725

[jikl]

MBC = Main Bridge Club

 

Sean

[1eyedjack]

MBC = Main Bridge Club

 

Sean

Oh ja - obvious now you mention it.

[barmar]

FYI, the abbreviation you were probably confusing it with is MBT, which is Money Bridge Tournament. The other type of money bridge on BBO is the one-on-one Money Bridge games, but I don't think there's a TLA for this.

[PaulSK]

Since it was largely aggressive lobbying by me that led to our recent change in ACBL policy (which I should note should be seen as an "experiment" and which, as Uday notes, is likely to soon change to allow some people to kibitz), I would like to add some comments.

It's time. Hawaii has been over for 2 weeks now and you can turn your attention back to serious matters, such as Kibitzing at Tournaments. I can offer some suggestions.

 

1. The 10-minute delay might solve some problems. But your programming staff might walk out in a huff over this.

 

2. Perhaps a "Trusted Kibitzer" category could be established.

 

3. Kibitzing a player could be allowed subject to these restrictions:

A. The player kibitzed must give consent.

B. The player and kibitzer must be established as mutual 'friends'.

C. The kibitzer is limited to watching that one player and seeing only what he sees. (That is along the lines of the usual f2f ethic of kibitzing -- you're supposed to watch one hand.)

 

[One little query -- is there a comprehensive dictionary of 'online-bridge-ese'? It took me some time to figure out that f2f was an abbreviation for 'face-to-face' bridge.]

[Posleda]

Incidentally this will be an highly unpopular opinion, but I would not worry about cheaters on BBO at all. If someone is so pathetic a human being that they resort to cheating in order to bolster their ego, then let them. After all as Nick points out, there are no sheep stations at stake here.

 

Unfortunately I suspect that those putting pressure on BBO are just as concerned with their egos and are taking a somewhat self righteous attitude. "I am better than you; if the only way you can beat me is by cheating than I will ensure that that avenue is closed so that I can prove my superiority legitmately."

I am not able to write it better.

[Posleda]

But I guess that banning kibs at some tourneys will hardly decrease the overall amount of cheating, as the cheaters simply play in other tourneys.

 

I am sure that the BBO abuse team does a good job identifying the cheaters simply by their way of play and the fact that some other account was logged in from the same IP address. This is the way the problem should be handled, rather than banning lots of innocent kibs just to keep a few cheaters out.

 

Karl

I am not able to write it better.

[inquiry]

Interested by the claims that cheating occurs at the money bridge tables. I recall when the money bridge tables were first introduced by BBO that they were advertised as being "cheat proof". I am not familiar with that side of BBO, but just thought it interesting that we now apparently see cheating in a supposedly cheat-proof environment.

There are no kibitzers at money bridge tables, as part of making it cheat proof.... That was the point.

[pigpenz]

Interested by the claims that cheating occurs at the money bridge tables.  I recall when the money bridge tables were first introduced by BBO that they were advertised as being "cheat proof".  I am not familiar with that side of BBO, but just thought it interesting that we now apparently see cheating in a supposedly cheat-proof environment.

There are no kibitzers at money bridge tables, as part of making it cheat proof.... That was the point.

then lets leave the tourneys that way.

If you really want to go over the hands then just go to myhands and look at them there :D

[geller]

[One little query -- is there a comprehensive dictionary of 'online-bridge-ese'? It took me some time to figure out that f2f was an abbreviation for 'face-to-face' bridge.

Try this glossary.

[mike777]

KIbitzers now on all ACBL hands now? Had one at our table in round 2 last night?

[uday]

I'm experimenting; deployment still under way. When complete (probably sometime today) any user with an award symbol of 3 or higher will be able to spec ACBL tourneys.

 

I might raise/lower the requirement, or revert to 'no specs' depending on how things go.

[mrdct]

I haven't seen it first hand, but I understand Yellows have an option to view a player's IP address by right-clicking on their name. So given that BBO is tracking people's IP addresses, perhaps just barring kibitzers with the same IP address as a player at the table or in the same tournament would be the way to go.

[inquiry]

I haven't seen it first hand, but I understand Yellows have an option to view a player's IP address by right-clicking on their name. So given that BBO is tracking people's IP addresses, perhaps just barring kibitzers with the same IP address as a player at the table or in the same tournament would be the way to go.

Rather yellows or the BBO itself can track IP addresses is hardly the answer to the kibitzer issue. With telephone, voice-over-internet, MSN-messenger, et al, UI from "friendly" kibitzer does not require the same IP. On the otherhand, a lot of users share the same IP's quite innocently. I would prefer and "honest" no kibitzers to the solution you propose, even if it was possible and feasible.

 

BTW, many same IP partnerships play together all the time, most often husband/wife, mother/daughter, etc.

[mrdct]

I've got nothing against people from the same IP address playing together. I just find kibitzers from the IP address as a player a bit sus.

[Al_U_Card]

I suppose you could have "serious" playing areas (no kibbitzers allowed, no dummy seeing all 4 hands etc.) and "relaxed" areas where the "social" norm would be allowed. At least then, players could choose their poison...;-)

[1eyedjack]

I've got nothing against people from the same IP address playing together. I just find kibitzers from the IP address as a player a bit sus.

Sorry to learn that. My wife frequently kibitzes me, on her machine. It never occurred to me that we should not be doing this for fear of suspicion. Of course there are some who are inclined to suspicion for all sorts of reasons, and I don't lose any sleep over that.

[inquiry]

Someone more computer savvy than me might know for sure, but I think all AOL customers log in from the same IP address. So if one (or more) AOL members are playing, all other AOL members would be banned by your suggestion.

 

I happen to find the banning of kibitzers personally distasteful (see my old post on the subject), but it seems to me that the response to banning the kibitzers has been generally favorable, both in number of talbles in play and in comments from various users.

 

I am not sure how well uday's workaround for "good customers" to allow kibitzing will work. To have "3" in your profile requires only 5 BBO masterpoints. Not exactly a huge hurdle. However, even under such a requirement, many of the people protesting the lack of kibitzing in this thread would be BLOCKED, as they have none or less than 1 BBO masterpoint.

[matmat]

I'm curious -- has banning kibitzers in ACBL tourneys in any way affect the tournament statistics?

[matmat]

I haven't seen it first hand, but I understand Yellows have an option to view a player's IP address by right-clicking on their name. So given that BBO is tracking people's IP addresses, perhaps just barring kibitzers with the same IP address as a player at the table or in the same tournament would be the way to go.

I am not sure I understand the reasoning for this. What about the people that play ACBL tournaments quite a bit, but don't really win enough points to go up to 3?

[mike777]

I'm curious -- has banning kibitzers in ACBL tourneys in any way affect the tournament statistics?

I cannot comment on stats but it did change my perception of the game and some of the players in a good way.

 

As for stats...it seems my scores have gotten better and there have been less crazy hands...but that is only my perception.....the facts may not back me up...

[mike777]

If Ben has the time perhaps he can run the stats on my ACBL games and see if there really is any change?

[inquiry]

If Ben has the time perhaps he can run the stats on my ACBL games and see if there really is any change?

If i could, i wouldn't. For one thing, there is a winner, a second place, a third place, just like before. So the "stats" will not change. I suspect what you mean is did someone who won say 50% of the time they played before now never win, or something similiar. Even if that happened it could be partially a coincidence. And if it wasn't, a study might prove it and get someone banned. But then again, we would not discuss it here. You know the policy about not posting stuff about bbo members...