Reisinger Fiasco

[pigpenz]

interesting we were worried about cheating on BBO ACBL Online games and here we are talking about cheating by the best of the best where ethics should be the highest :(

[Walddk]

interesting we were worried about cheating on BBO ACBL Online games and here we are talking about cheating by the best of the best where ethics should be the highest :(

For many Ethics is, sadly, a village in Siberia. However, I prefer to treat everyone as innocent until proven guilty. Yes, we may get another Buratti-Lanzarotti issue at some point. It would be foolish to rule it out.

 

Accordingly, I am all for that organisers take precautionary action, but I am still confused regarding the Reisinger semi-finals. More than a month ago, Rick Beye, the ACBL Chief Tournament Director, sent me an e-mail where he specified that the ACBL would be broadcasting from the semi-finals as well.

 

So this was the plan all along. If the organisers were unable to provide 20 sets of boards (not 40 as Fred writes), they must have known in advance. Therefore, it would have been appropriate if they had let Fred or me know, perhaps with short notice, that they had to cancel the broadcast from the semi-finals due to security reasons.

 

They did not, and that was a clear mistake. Everyone was looking forward to that broadcast because we all thought that it would go ahead once it was listed on our vugraph schedule page.

 

As it turned out, all our spectators were disappointed - and with good reason in my view. It is not unreasonable that this comes to the attention of the ACBL so that they can avoid the same mistake next year.

 

That is what I consider constructive criticism, and there is no reason why the ACBL should take offence.

 

Roland

[helene_t]

interesting we were worried about cheating on BBO ACBL Online games and here we are talking about cheating by the best of the best where ethics should be the highest :(

I donno why ethics should be higher at the highest level. You might expect to see less of the ethical slugishness you see at the local club (players who don't know the rules, players who don't call the TD because they don't want to ruin the good atmosphere, players who never thought about the diference between gut feelings and UI). But as for deliberate cheating, I don't see why there should be any correlation with level.

 

The crucial diference is that cheating in a Reisinger semifinal would be much more devasting than would cheating in some only online tourney.

[pclayton]

Bridge cheating is a curious thing.

 

Why would a top professional player even risk such a thing?

No clue... Do you think that Buratti and Lanzarotti would be willing to comment? Maybe we could get a ouija board and summon up Shoeless Joe Jackson... There have been a hell of a lot of point shaving scandals over the years... I'm sure some of the individuals involved had good reason for fixing games. Rumor has it that in some case, they were trying to make more money.

 

If we want to cast our net a bit further and look corporate scandles (Enron, Tyco, Boesky, and the like) there are any number of examples of respectable professionals involved in outright criminal behavior. ***** happens. Its ridiculous to beleive that bridge players are some immune to these types of temptations.

 

Maybe I'm overly sensitive to the possibility of cheating. Then again, Moses Ma and Steve Sion were both regulars at the MIT bridge club. This was before my time, but the stories are pretty well known arround here. In a simialr fashion, the MIT blackjack club was in high gear when I was playing in Boston. I know the time and effort that folks are willing to spend to get an edge.

And I'll bet you the racecars haven't been besieged with pro offers as of late. :(

 

Mind you, the crime they committed was pretty simple. But what I've heard, allegations were floating around for years about them. A pro I know labeled them "The Cheating Italians" (somehow sayng this after the incident doesn't seem derogatory).

 

A pro pair has to be concerned with its image and its reputation. Once they are caught, their career is finished. There is a motivation to stay straight.

 

The Black Sox came about because they hated the Owner, Charles Comiskey. Why would bridge players ever feel disgruntled?

 

I'm not concerned about the players that are already successful (is anyone?). I'm concerned about the new team that wires itself and wins everything.

 

Getting back to the main point; if you wanted to cheat, would using vugraph be the medium? I'd be more concerned with blackberrys. Banning kibs in the CR makes some sense too. Results from the CR could be sent through a director.

 

Wouldn't you just need to isolate one of the rooms; assuming the boards are played sequentially? How could the open room cheat - although communicating info about boards in play could be done. How would you interpret the following; Kib comes to table, speaks in a foreign language to a player, and the player picks up QTx of trump sitting over dummy's J9xx and declarer's AK8xx.

 

Maybe it doesn't make sense to have duplicated boards for these events either.

[mike777]

Please take a look at the latest info on Shoeless Joe Jackson. Some interesting stats have been run showing he played up to his full potential in the series.

 

Having grown up a few miles from Sox Park let's keep an open mind please. ;)

 

BTW great thread and points made by many here on this issue. I hope the ACBL read these forum posts.

[glen]

Any delay more than a few minutes is completely weird. You'd be watching and suddenly the winner is announced.

How would a winner be suddenly announced? The commentators would not reveal the ending, if they happened to know it, until the end (or were spoil-sports). The ACBL tends to have a lag between end of event and result appear on their web site. So if the time-delay was 3 1/2 or so hours, then there should be no sudden announcements to ruin the drama.

 

Anyway for me I would rather have 27 boards knowing the result, or with a chance of finding out the result before the end, than 12 boards only and the "drama" of waiting a very long time between the scheduled start and seeing 6 of those boards, and then waiting a very long time to see another 6.

 

Loved the final yesterday, and much thanks to the ACBL, BBO, commentators, and everybody else that made it a successful Sunday.

 

Of course, for me it is a tired Monday since our alarm clock did not adapt to the early morning result.

[pigpenz]

interesting we were worried about cheating on BBO ACBL Online games and here we are talking about cheating by the best of the best where ethics should be the highest ;)

For many Ethics is, sadly, a village in Siberia. However, I prefer to treat everyone as innocent until proven guilty. Yes, we may get another Buratti-Lanzarotti issue at some point. It would be foolish to rule it out.

 

Accordingly, I am all for that organisers take precautionary action, but I am still confused regarding the Reisinger semi-finals. More than a month ago, Rick Beye, the ACBL Chief Tournament Director, sent me an e-mail where he specified that the ACBL would be broadcasting from the semi-finals as well.

 

So this was the plan all along. If the organisers were unable to provide 20 sets of boards (not 40 as Fred writes), they must have known in advance. Therefore, it would have been appropriate if they had let Fred or me know, perhaps with short notice, that they had to cancel the broadcast from the semi-finals due to security reasons.

 

They did not, and that was a clear mistake. Everyone was looking forward to that broadcast because we all thought that it would go ahead once it was listed on our vugraph schedule page.

 

As it turned out, all our spectators were disappointed - and with good reason in my view. It is not unreasonable that this comes to the attention of the ACBL so that they can avoid the same mistake next year.

 

That is what I consider constructive criticism, and there is no reason why the ACBL should take offence.

 

Roland

yes the ACBL had promoted the event on their web site that it would be available on BBO VuGraph. So someone dropped the ball somewhere :( I know myself I sat around for about an hour waiting for something to get going on saturday first semifinal session finally came back the next day.

[fred]

How would duplicate boards help solve the problems described by Richard? There would still be people on the internet watching the full deals while they were played. Now I give one of my friends who plays in the semi-final GSM receivers in both his shoes and we agree of the following simple protocol: a sting in his left foot means "finese left".

When the boards are not duplicated, the players do not play the same boards at the same time. Here is a possible cheating scenario that could arise:

 

Suppose that during the first round table 1 is on vugraph playing boards 1, 2, and 3. Someone watches these boards on BBO vugraph from his hotel room and then goes to the playing site and tells his friend "on board 1 EW can make 6D but only if they play N for the Queen of trump".

 

His friend plays board 1 later in the session and knows what he has to do in order to get a good result.

 

If all tables play the same boards at the same time this cannot happen.

 

There is still a danger that a player could receive information about a board via some kind of electronic signal, but the player receiving the signal would have to have some kind of hidden device (using a Blackberry, for example, would not work because other people at the table would see this). Passing meaningful information via a hidden electronic device might not be trivial to begin with, but ACBL will likely be scanning players for such devices before too long.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[mycroft]

Hrothgar's "buzzer in the shoe" would be all it takes (two way guess for the queen, finesse LHO vs. squeeze RHO, aggressive vs. passive) - and Vegas cheats have been using those for decades.

 

It's clear that the solution, if we wish to continue to broadcast highend pairs games, is to play with duplicated boards, everybody playing them at the same time. Barometer would be an interesting, but definately not necessary, addition to the program (and of course it would change the nature of the event!) This is an expense and needs to be planned beforehand (yes, I know the europeans are laughing themselves sick right now, but in the ACBL duplicated boards tends not to happen).

 

And we may have to have a 30 minute delay in the system, to stop the buzzer-in-the-shoe. On the other hand, the live Vugraph would have to have that as well (remember, all the signaller needs, besides enough bridge knowledge to know what one piece of information would be best to give the player, is a switch in each of *his* shoes - one can almost inconspicuously "tap" the foot without the shoe moving).

 

I think that, provided it is a consistent delay - so the tempo that is so revealing remains to comment on/in - there wouldn't be too much of a problem with this. If this means that the reporting of the final results is also delayed to ensure that the VuGraph audience isn't "spoiled" on the last round - why anyone would do that I don't know, but I've been a Canadian too long, and seen too many calls to Ontario to get election coverage while the polls are still open in Alberta, to know that somebody, somewhere, will do it - then oh well. Stick it in the Conditions of Contest, so that the players know about it *in advance*, and they can look at the one-to-go when they're done, go to the bar, have a drink, and come back for the results. If they gripe, well, they knew when they entered.

 

Michael.

[pclayton]

In a semi final match of a major KO, all four tables are playing the same boards in sequence. When I played with screens in Long Beach, we received 16 boards in a pile that we played; they werent sent to the next table, since the other table had their own set.

 

Vugraphs are more interesting when there is a lag between boards. This opens up the possibility for cheating however, because the extra time gives the crooks more time to transmit info.

 

My main point about duplicated boards is that I don't think its sacrosanct that each match play the same boards. The more times they are played, the more opportunities there are to send illegal information. I know it makes the Daily Bulletin and the Bridge World articles more readable, but its more problematic from a security standpoint.

 

Pairs events - even the big ones - have no control over players transmitting data about boards, especially since the hands aren't played at the same time (or am I wrong about this in a National Final like the 3 session LM's?). I seem to remember the need to have bathroom monitors for instance.

[mrdct]

Here is a possible cheating scenario that could arise:

 

Suppose that during the first round table 1 is on vugraph playing boards 1, 2, and 3. Someone watches these boards on BBO vugraph from his hotel room and then goes to the playing site and tells his friend "on board 1 EW can make 6D but only if they play N for the Queen of trump".

This cheating scenario has little to do with vugraph as exactly the same thing can easily occur if a kibitzer sits down at the table and watches board 1, 2 and 3 and then wanders around the playing room, toilet area or whereever players mingle between rounds and tells his friend "on board 1 EW can make 6D but only if they play N for the Queen of trump".

 

As I keep saying, proper security measures deal with both the vugraph environment and the non-vugraph environment.

 

If the ACBL were indeed worried about cheating the Reisinger semi-final due to boards not being played simulatanteously, kibitzers would need to be banned and player movements in between rounds would need to be very tightly controlled. If they didn't do that, they are just acting in fear and ignorance by blocking the vugraph.

[Walddk]

When the boards are not duplicated, the players do not play the same boards at the same time. Here is a possible cheating scenario that could arise....

 

<snip>

 

If all tables play the same boards at the same time this cannot happen.

While all this is true, I find it perfectly legitimate to point out that the ACBL erred for more reasons than one:

 

1. 5 weeks before, the ACBL announced that they would be broadcasting from the semi-finals. I think we all agree that this gave the organizers plenty of time to plan.

 

2. A couple of days before, and even on the same day, they promoted the event on their web site, again telling everyone that there would be a broadcast from the semi-finals.

 

3. When the broadcast was due, the table was opened.

 

4. We had an operator (Sue Grue) ready at the table. Nothing happened, and our operator wasn't even able to tell the audience what had gone wrong.

 

1 hour later it was finally confirmed that no play would take place at the BBO table due to security risks. The boards were not duplicated. Is it really unreasonable to expect that the organizers knew that well in advance?

 

Again I think we can agree that they did know. Would it have been too much to ask that someone had told us about it, and also told the operator not to bother? The organizers decided not to have duplicated boards in the semi-finals, fair enough, but then they also knew that they were not going to broadcast.

 

I agree with you, Fred, that the ACBL does many good things for bridge, but that doesn't mean that one should ignore the obvious errors they make. Did we yet see anyone step forward to tell the world: "Sorry, we could and should have done better than this. We will do all we can to avoid the same mistake next year."

 

No, we did not. I am not so sure as you are regarding the desire to vugraph the ACBL events. We do not get accurate information until very late (sometimes not at all, sometimes even wrong info). As an example, we were also promised two tables; we only got one. And I know for a fact that they even had a spare operator at hand!

 

To be honest, I don't think the ACBL cares much about vugraph presentations, and that is a serious mistake in my opinion. It's obvious nice to get all the top class ACBL tournaments on vugraph and we should all be grateful that we do. However, this works both ways:

 

1. The ACBL gets the opportunity to promote their events in front of thousands of viewers all over the world.

 

2. For that purpose they can use the BBO software free of charge.

 

I think the ACBL (like all organizers worldwide) should be grateful too. I don't call the organizers "pathetic idiots", because I don't think they are, but I do think they make mistakes, and this was clearly a significant one.

 

Roland

[glen]

Believe me, the ACBL does recognize the value of online vugraph in terms of promoting bridge and in terms of serving its members who are not able to attend their big tournaments.

As noted by Fred, there are two more things the ACBL gets when it runs a successful vugraph:

 

- it gets happier customers: that is ACBL members who pay annual ACBL fees are happy that some of their money is being used to showcase bridge, which many of us believe is a legitmate and necessary use of these funds.

- it promotes the NABCs as world class events, attracting new customers to these events and/or preventing drain to other events (not just promoting bridge, but promoting the NABC itself).

 

Thus it is in the best interest of the ACBL to care about their vugraph presentations, and I look forward to seeing some constructive steps by them.

[fred]

It is hard to disagree with Roland about one thing: the ACBL clearly made a mistake.

 

But this does not imply that they do not care about vugraph. I know the people responsible for making vugraph-related decisions and I can assure you that they do care about vugraph (and about security). I am not trying to make excuses for these people or for the ACBL in general, but the fact of the matter is that they have other important things to be concerned about and they are not exactly overwhelmed with resources.

 

These are smart and dedicated people with good intentions. I suspect they will learn from this mistake and that it will not happen again.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[barmar]

Back at the beginning of the thread, Gerben wrote "They say players were concerned with security." Perhaps ACBL intended to show the semi-final, considering the security issues to be minor, and didn't anticipate how strongly the players would feel about it. It probably would have been better for them to survey in advance the experts who were likely to make it to the semis, before promising the Vugraph on the web site, but this is a difficult logistical problem.

 

Another complaint I'm surprised people haven't made is that only one table was shown during the VuGraph of the finals -- last year we had both the open and closed rooms. I was very disappointed when I saw this because I was in Hawaii, spoke to the director who was organizing he Vugraph, and offered to be an operator (I operated during last year's Reisinger), but he told me that he had all he needed. Imagine my surprise when Roland announced at the start of the Vugraph that only one table was being shown due to lack of volunteers!

[Walddk]

Another complaint I'm surprised people haven't made is that only one table was shown during the VuGraph of the finals -- last year we had both the open and closed rooms.  I was very disappointed when I saw this because I was in Hawaii, spoke to the director who was organizing he Vugraph, and offered to be an operator (I operated during last year's Reisinger), but he told me that he had all he needed.  Imagine my surprise when Roland announced at the start of the Vugraph that only one table was being shown due to lack of volunteers!

I actually made that point in my last post. It read:

 

"We do not get accurate information until very late (sometimes not at all, sometimes even wrong info). As an example, we were also promised two tables; we only got one. And I know for a fact that they even had a spare operator at hand!"

 

You are the one I was referring to between the lines, so I was as surprised as you were, Barry.

 

Roland