Skill level description

[matmat]

A possible idea is that if you rate yourself as World Class

or Expert, you have another compulsory field to fill in:

Year I Learnt Bridge.

 

This would minimise realities that happen, such as 8 year old kids

finding BBO*, unaware that a world of intense bridge-playing exists,

and describing themselves as Expert because they are good at games.

because a kid that is smart enough to figure out how to get on bbo will not be smart enough to put 1950 in that field?

geeee

[Trinidad]

A possible idea is that if you rate yourself as World Class

or Expert, you have another compulsory field to fill in:

Year I Learnt Bridge.

 

This would minimise realities that happen, such as 8 year old kids

finding BBO*, unaware that a world of intense bridge-playing exists,

and describing themselves as Expert because they are good at games.

because a kid that is smart enough to figure out how to get on bbo will not be smart enough to put 1950 in that field?

geeee

Most mistakes, in particular those made by kids, are made out of ignorance and in good faith.

 

It is entirely possible that a kid searches the www for online bridge after his first three bridge lessons. He finds BBO, sees that he needs to put in a skill level and enters 'expert' because he is good at games. (Who knows, maybe he is the best player in the bridge class of 8.) In that case, he will make the mistake in good faith. Under 'the year that you learnt to play bridge' he will obviously enter '2008', also in good faith.

 

My estimate is that Peter's suggestion will take care of more than 99% of the cases where children enter a skill level that is too high. So, Peter's suggestion will work a whole lot better than you think. Your thinking is based on the implicit assumption that people (children) lie consciously and are aiming at disrupting the system. Fortunately, this assumption is entirely wrong (otherwise this world would be a truely horrible place to live in).

 

Whether Peter's suggestion is worth the trouble is an entirely different question. I don't think that there are so many children playing on BBO. If I am right about that then Peter's suggestion is obviously not going to have much effect, but I may easily be wrong. There may actually be many children playing on BBO.

 

Rik

[helene_t]

A possible idea is that if you rate yourself as World Class

or Expert, you have another compulsory field to fill in:

Year I Learnt Bridge.

I know plenty of players who have played more than ten times as long as KFay and QuantumCat combined and still don't have a clue. Dunno if they would label themselves as "Experts", though.

 

I see three ways of dealing with this "problem":

- Introduce some kind of objective rating (this has been proposed many times and most of us agree it would be a terrible development)

- Get rid of the rating

- Ignore the "problem"

[RichMor]

I see three ways of dealing with this "problem":

- Introduce some kind of objective rating (this has been proposed many times and most of us agree it would be a terrible development)

- Get rid of the rating

- Ignore the "problem"

Helene,

 

Could you explain the first part - 'objective rating'. I have not seen previous proposals.

 

Thanks,

RichM

[barmar]

Objective ratings would be something like the Lehman ratings that OKbridge uses.

 

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/okrating.html

[mikeh]

I have often wondered how many players believe they are in the top 100 players in the world.  Well not often, but I have wondered it before.  Any guesses?

A comparable issue: say we asked the top 300 players in WBF rankings, plus (to the extent not already duplicated in this) the top 1% (by masterpoints or equivalent) of players in all countries with a significant bridge playing population (I am not going to state how we determine the cut-off) who the top 100 players are.

 

How many names would appear on the list?

[JLOL]

It's about time the forums had an ill-informed post complaining about the self-rating system. I have long been waiting for the day it would finally happen.

LOL

[JLOL]

Your thinking is based on the implicit assumption that people (children) lie consciously and are aiming at disrupting the system. Fortunately, this assumption is entirely wrong (otherwise this world would be a truely horrible place to live in).

LOL

[dcvetkov]

There is one good reason I think for people clicking that expert level, even they are aware they are not there. It goes something along these lines

 

("If I put my self as an expert, chances getting a seat in Main Club or wherever are much higher" and with Advanced and Int, much slimmer).

Everyone likes to play with or against better players. And if most Forumers are honest, they will admit they have rejected seata requests from Adv/ Int

 

You have all seen how many tables announce (Experts only please;), so this argument may hold some water.

 

There is time maybe BBO to revisit Lehman rating policy, or at least give it a try. If members dont welcome it, its easy to go back to old.

[RichMor]

Objective ratings would be something like the Lehman ratings that OKbridge uses.

 

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/okrating.html

OK, got it. I used to be an OKB member. Thanks.

[han]

There is time maybe BBO to revisit Lehman rating policy, or at least give it a try. If members dont welcome it, its easy to go back to old.

I think there is no time for any kind of rating, it is a bad idea.

[CSGibson]

There is one good reason I think for people clicking that expert level, even they are aware they are not there. It goes something along these lines

 

("If I put my self as an expert, chances getting a seat in Main Club or wherever are much higher" and with Advanced and Int, much slimmer).

Everyone likes to play with or against better players. And if most Forumers are honest, they will admit they have rejected seata requests from Adv/ Int

 

You have all seen how many tables announce  (Experts only please;), so this argument may hold some water.

 

There is time maybe BBO to revisit Lehman rating policy, or at least give it a try. If members dont welcome it, its easy to go back to old.

This does happen, but frankly, I'd rather be a good advanced player than a bad expert, and those are my two ratings choices.

 

If you are really advanced/intermediate and you lie about your skill level, it's going to take, what, 5 hands at most for your partner to figure out either that you lied or that you're drunk & distracted? Your skill level can increase with time, but the handwritten "Not a real expert" label in the notes field lasts until the server gets wiped. [edit: I suppose if it was really handwritten, it would last until the computer screen got wiped]

[matmat]

I think there is no time for any kind of rating, it is a bad idea.

Yup.

[HeavyDluxe]

I think there is no time for any kind of rating, it is a bad idea.

Being a compulsive organizer, I'd sure like more than simply Friend/Enemy flags... But, that's still an ample rating system. Play with someone, assess their game, and play with them (or not) in the future.

 

Granted, I don't doubt I'm on a lot of ppl's enemy lists... But, any other rating system seems like it would come with a lot of baggage.

[mtvesuvius]

There is time maybe BBO to revisit Lehman rating policy, or at least give it a try. If members dont welcome it, its easy to go back to old.

I think there is no time for any kind of rating, it is a bad idea.

Have BBO Ratings would be just another thing that would be meaningless, and not very helpful... The effort put into creating ratings would be in vain. I doubt anyone would really value and use these ratings. Also, what do you suggest they be based on?? The main bridge club results are as wild as ever, so that is not a very accurate way of measuring... What did you have in mind?

[jillybean]

I think there is no time for any kind of rating, it is a bad idea.

Being a compulsive organizer, I'd sure like more than simply Friend/Enemy flags... But, that's still an ample rating system. Play with someone, assess their game, and play with them (or not) in the future.

 

Granted, I don't doubt I'm on a lot of ppl's enemy lists... But, any other rating system seems like it would come with a lot of baggage.

 

This imo what HeavyDluxe said is the best and only solution.

 

Replace skill level with something fun. 'Favorite ice-cream flavor', 'color of socks you’re wearing today' or something that could put a smile on someone’s face rather than have them storm off in a huff after enduring 12 boards with a self-rated expert.

 

Or just do away with it all together.

[awm]

What if we replaced "skill level" with "best result"? We might get some interesting answers. Of course people could lie but I think the current situation is more a result of inaccurate self evaluation than outright lying.

[HeavyDluxe]

Replace skill level with something fun.  'Favorite ice-cream flavor', 'color of socks you’re wearing today' or something that could put a smile on someone’s face rather than have them storm off in a huff after enduring 12 boards with a self-rated expert.

 

Or just do away with it all together.

FWIW, I think that there's a good reason to have self-ratings. After all, they don't hurt anyone unless you agree to play a friend for money with a pickup 'expert' pard.

 

The only thing that gets hurt with self-rated lies are people's pride. Look, I'm not claiming that it isn't frustrating to sit down with someone who drives you batty... But, it's still just an online game.

 

To Adam's point - I think people do often see themselves in *cough* the best possible light. I think there are probably polite way to let folks know they're a little optimistic re: their skillz.

 

Finally, dcvetkov pointed out that if you want to play with better people, it seems that telling a white lie re: your skills is the only way to get a seat with 'better' players. While that may be true, it's an awful selfish perspective to have aside from whatever ethical implications there are. While I'd love to get a chance to play more often with folks better than I am, I can't imagine how concocting a faux rating accomplishes much.

[Rain]

Ideas from before and whatever:

 

Make everyone take some BM2k deals at registration and assess that way?

 

Make everyone answer randomly chosen bridge questions from a pop up survey and tabulate scores and assign skill level that way?

 

Let everyone assign feedback rating to everyone else if they played enough boards, like ebay.

 

Actually just a simple check of myhands will do, unless that player is completely new. Maybe have myhands average automatically adjust skill level, but let users still overwrite the myhands average.

[peachy]

I think there are probably polite way to let folks know they're a little optimistic re: their skillz.

IMO, there is no polite way to tell someone he is a fake expert. First, you would be essentially accusing the "inflated one" of lying about his skill level [well, he probably did lie...]. Second, you would be criticizing his playing ability [probably for good reason]. If you try to phrase this politely, you will yourself come across as a patronizing jerk. I think better to be silent, leave, and never play with that person again. What is the success rate of trying to cure or to inform or to expose someone who obviously is either

a) clueless,

:) delusional about his own skill, or

c) liar.

 

Let it go :)

[qwery_hi]

There is time maybe BBO to revisit Lehman rating policy, or at least give it a try. If members dont welcome it, its easy to go back to old.

I think there is no time for any kind of rating, it is a bad idea.

It seems to me that some sort of community based collective intelligence approach to ranking players would be our best shot at ranking players.

 

The technical solution would be to let players rank other players - kind of like the google page rank algorithm. Here's how it would work -

 

Every player has an option of 'linking to' (think validating) the other players. How much this validation counts would depend on how many other players, in turn, have 'linked to' (validated) me. Note there are no negatives in this, just like in the internet where there are no negative weights associated with a link.

 

To kick off this recursive validation, perhaps we could have all the stars auto validated.

 

I think that this solution is purely academic, as in the real world, it can be gamed without much difficulty.

[jillybean]

Finally, dcvetkov pointed out that if you want to play with better people, it seems that telling a white lie re: your skills is the only way to get a seat with 'better' players. 

Who's fooling who? Maybe the pyramid is turning upside down and we are now getting a high number of "experts" playing together while best games are among established pairs and those with realistic ratings. ;)

Over stating your skill level may get you a few hands with better players before they either ask you to leave or find another table themselves, putting you on their ban list on the way out.

I think being a great partner, being open to what your partner is telling you and working on your game is your best chance of ‘playing up’.

 

 

And what is the good reason you mention for self ratings?

[HeavyDluxe]

Finally, dcvetkov pointed out that if you want to play with better people, it seems that telling a white lie re: your skills is the only way to get a seat with 'better' players. 

Over stating your skill level may get you a few hands with better players before they either ask you to leave or find another table themselves, putting you on their ban list on the way out.

I think being a great partner, being open to what your partner is telling you and working on your game is your best chance of ‘playing up’.

Hi Jilly. I was trying to say the same thing as you. While sticking "Expert" in my profile might score me a seat at a strong table, it's not going to last long anyway. I just acknowledge that dcvetkov's point is reflective of the way some people think. I think it's an immature and skewed perspective, but a real one nonetheless.

 

And what is the good reason you mention for self ratings?

 

I think the big one is that any other system introduces equal, albeit different, challenges and complications to the existing model. If you want to compete for status, go win a tournament with a known partner of equal or greater skill. Otherwise, have a seat in the MBC and leave politely if your partner is a dunce (like I am).

 

You know... I'm interested to know if we actually have numbers on how the self-ratings are distributed on BBO. What % of people list themselves in each category? Sure, there are admittedly people inflating their status, but how big of an issue is it REALLY?

[vuroth]

I'm always amused by the star novices. :)

[matmat]

The technical solution would be to let players rank other players - kind of like the google page rank algorithm. Here's how it would work -

hmmm...

why wouldn't this work... oh. right.

 

i think Cherdano is an @$$hat. I hate his guts. I don't care that he finished high in the LMP or BRP or whatever. I think he's a RANK BEGINNER.

 

:/