Announcing again

[nige1]

Not this time. Making this unalertable was a terrible mistake. Another thing that no longer requires an alert is a non-forcing change of suit after a weak two. Disclosure of methods seems to be an issue the EBU struggles with.

Regulators and Players are perennially confused about what is conventional, what is artificial, and what is alertable. IMO, the ACBL base their regulations on a flawed principle: you alert the "unexpected". That might work for local players sharing similar methods. It's useless for strangers and foreigners, who, arguably, are in most need of explanations, and most confused about what to disclose. Appeals to so-called "General Bridge Knowledge" just make a bad situation worse. Anyway, currently, each NBO produces its own idiosyncratic tome of alerting regulations, subject to constant change.

 

Much simpler would be:

 

1. You announce the meaning of all partner's calls
2. To facilitate such announcements and to reduce disturbance to neighbouring tables, each table would have matrix of common meanings (e.g. T/O, F/G, etc). This could be on a card or a tablet.
3. On-line this can be automated, with appropriate "Full Disclosure" software. Brilliant examples: Kungsgeten's mark-up language and StanMaz's BBOAlert

These rules should be included in the WBF law-book.