Authorized or Unauthorized?

[pescetom]

 

An Announcement is a word or a short phrase that describes the meaning of partner’s call.

Announcements are a form of Alerting, and you must still visually Alert the call.

 

It's interesting to see that these announcements and a visual alert are considered a serious matter with the use of the word must

. I do use the alert card when announcing our 12-14nt as a number of players seem to be unaware of anything other than a 15-17 range for 1nt and often zone out to announcements after 1nt

 

I see it as an arbitrary but legitimate choice, even if mildly bizarre from an organisation that could not enforce the Stop card.

It has to be a serious matter if cards are misused, so it should be either must or must not.

Our announcements are just... announced, without exhibiting any cards.

[mycroft]

It is a serious issue with a serious reason (which should be obvious in a world where the median age is 70ish).

 

The requirement to also do something audible is also serious (viz my partner blind in left eye story).

 

Frankly (and being USA-blinkered for a minute), not having that regulation would be an ADA lawsuit waiting to happen. Now, allowing it to be ignored in practise...well that wouldn't be the first time in ADA cases either, would it?

 

Yes, I do always do something (first of all, those stupid alert Strips are for the birds, all they do is knock over boxes (during an Alert or when bidding.) I try to pull the Alert card and aim it around where my cards go back into the board (again, my partner blind in left eye...), but will sometimes just point at the bid while Alerting or Announcing.

 

or almost always at least. And if it causes a problem, I apologize (although over 1NT, I'm not upset. If you "expect to" not hear anything, don't hear anything, and are okay with it, then you should be okay when what you didn't hear wasn't "15-17". A few more of those rulings and people will start asking; a few more of those asks and people will stop being lazy and follow the -ing rule. Still apologized, though).

 

No, "nobody" does it. And it "never" causes a problem. And when it does, the Director pulls out the regulation and applies the misinformation ruling. And a few more of those hard done by stories might break through the entitled bridge player bubble and get them to JFDI for their opponents' benefit for a change.

 

I absolutely agree with "could not enforce the Stop card". The difference is that they have made a different decision around "we want them to not Alert because it helps them more than us" than they did over "people just use the Stop card to wake up partner". Still amused by the number of people who tell me "we don't have to pause any more, since they took the Stop card away", though - which means they didn't read the decision, or just saw the part they wanted to see.

[barmar]

tl;dr (the whole thread - I did read the first few comments).

 

There's a difference between an alert and an explanation. An expected alert does not convey UI. The explanation may convey UI.

When you say "may", are you including correct explanations, or is it only incorrect explanations that are UI?

 

Including correct explanations leads down a rabbit hole. In f2f bridge without screens we always hear our partner's explanations, and hopefully they're usually accurate. If we had to treat these as UI, we would be unduly constrained whenever the opponents ask for an explanation -- you might be forced to assume partner forgot the system because the UI tells you they remembered it!

 

Incorrect explanations do cause UI, and it can be thorny to work out how to deal with it. But at least there's a reasonable reason for it.

[blackshoe]

I think that if partner's explanation, absent an alert, correctly describes your agreement there's no UI unless you thought the correct explanation was something else.