[Walddk]

uday, on Nov 2 2005, 11:27 PM, said:

Let us not get worked up over this.

Exactly; it's nothing but a storm in a tea cup. mrdct took offence when he was told about the policy of the BBO management. It's his right to be offended, but I honestly think that it's uday's decision and that you either live with it or don't live with it and sign off.

I think it's wrong to have Swan on my BBO screen, but that's just *my* opinion. And it has absolutely nothing to do with cencorship when your hosts ask you to comply with the rules they set. If you don't like the heat, get out of the kitchen.

Roland

[mrdct]

Chamaco, on Nov 3 2005, 04:28 AM, said:

But here we are like guests in someone else's house: somebody who hosts us for free, and sets the rules.

That's a fair point and I certainly wont be mentioning Swan in any commentary until this directive is (hopefully) relaxed. I respect the house rules, even though I strongly disagree with them.

Chamaco, on Nov 3 2005, 04:28 AM, said:

censorship, to me, tends to imply the banning of a legitimate right, that is, the freedom of speech in a public place.

That's also a fair point, although one could take the view that by its nature BBO is somewhat of a public place with stakeholders that go beyond its owners.

The danger is that we start off with simply not being allowed to mention one of BBO's competitors, then we might be encouraged to mention particular parties who serve the commercial interests of BBO, then we might be encouraged to put forward particular views that are aligned with the views of BBO's owners, then we might be prohibited from putting forward alternate views and before you know it journalistic integrity is out the window.

Given the lack of operators in Estoril, over the next three days there will be world championship finals and playoffs receiving no BBO coverage, not to mention a Transnational Teams Event boasting a myriad of international stars. The progress of some or all of these matches will be of interest to many and I hope sensibilities will prevail and the vugraph audience can be directed to the best place to follow those matches whilst continuing to enjoy the feature BBO match, whatever it may be.

[pdmunro]

I was grateful for Walddk mentioning the link to the Swan games scoreboards and leaderboard. I checked it regularly while I was watching the vugraph on BBO.

[fred]

mrdct, on Nov 2 2005, 12:36 PM, said:

We all know that BBO's vugraph is superior in every respect and its spectators outnumber Swan's by at least 20 to 1. So what are Fred & Uday worried about? The reality is that Swan are providing an absolutely outstanding real-time scoring service that is the perfect viewing companion to have on a second screen or a background web-browser while watching BBO.

It's quite simple. BBO are the best in the business for vugraph whilst Swan are the best in the business for real-time scoring.

What you may not know is that BBO was supposed to provide a similar service during the 2005 World Championships.

I won't go into all of the details here, but unfortunately the game was rigged from the start to make it impossible for us to do the necessary work to make this happen. It was also unfortunate that nobody let us in on the joke until we spent a lot of time in a futile effort to get the work done.

The reason for this? "Bridge politics" and the well known America-Europe rivalry that seems to be sadly present in the minds of many Americans and Europeans. In my experience, most bridge players from America and Europe are above this sort of stupidity, but it is unfortunately the case that some of our most powerful "leaders" are not.

Of course it is the case that the primary mission of these people should be to serve the interests of bridge and bridge players. The decisions they have made in this area have done exactly the opposite.

I am not going to name any names here, but I do want to emphasize that WBF President Jose Damiani is most certainly NOT one of the people I am talking about. That is a good thing as I intend to do whatever I can to make sure that bridge scoring data is liberated (ie that anyone who wants access to this data is able to get it in a convenient manner). This may be a difficult battle, but having Jose as an ally (not an ally to BBO so much but an ally to bridge) rates to be critical to our cause.

Those of you who have been around for a while may remember a similar battle when another one of our competitors made efforts to control vugraph data. The issue here is the same: scoring data does not "belong" to everyone and it is in the best interests of all bridge players that this information be made available as widely as possible.

I wasn't around to see any of the alleged "censorship" that took place, but I can imagine what happened. Uday is too polite to write posts like this one, but hopefully this post will help you to better understand his actions. We felt that BBO (not just our company but also our members) were screwed by some of the powers that be and I suspect that Uday did not want to do anything help publicize the efforts of the people who did the screwing.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[FrancesHinden]

Quote

The reason for this? "Bridge politics" and the well known America-Europe rivalry that seems to be sadly present in the minds of many Americans and Europeans. In my experience, most bridge players from America and Europe are above this sort of stupidity, but it is unfortunately the case that some of our most powerful "leaders" are not.

This is sad and a bit strange.

I subscribe to the American-Europe rivalry in the sense that I was supporting Italy against the USA in the final.

But a rivalry for broadcasting? Perhaps it should be pointed out the extent to which the BBO Estorial Vugraph was a European affair: organised by a Dane off-site and a Frenchman on site, with a commentary team that seemed to me to be more European than North American (with a few South Americans and Australasians to improve the international quotient).

[Walddk]

Let me say this once and for all, so that no misunderstanding is possible:

BBO does not censor and will never impose censorship upon our commentators. They are all adults and therefore capable of knowing what's right and wrong. We have had examples of commentators who overstepped the line, but our remedy is very simple:

They will not be invited again. We have very few rules the commentators must abide by, but we have no intention of interfering with their comments as long as they are put forward in a civilised manner.

Roland

[fred]

FrancesHinden, on Nov 7 2005, 02:29 PM, said:

Quote

The reason for this? "Bridge politics" and the well known America-Europe rivalry that seems to be sadly present in the minds of many Americans and Europeans. In my experience, most bridge players from America and Europe are above this sort of stupidity, but it is unfortunately the case that some of our most powerful "leaders" are not.

This is sad and a bit strange.

I subscribe to the American-Europe rivalry in the sense that I was supporting Italy against the USA in the final.

But a rivalry for broadcasting? Perhaps it should be pointed out the extent to which the BBO Estorial Vugraph was a European affair: organised by a Dane off-site and a Frenchman on site, with a commentary team that seemed to me to be more European than North American (with a few South Americans and Australasians to improve the international quotient).

I will try to clarify.

As far as I can tell there are some bridge politicians who are concerned that BBO is getting to be "too big and powerful". This in itself may not be the problem, but the fact that BBO happens to be an American company makes some Europeans feel threatened by our success.

In my mind this is totally absurd. For one thing, anyone who knows us personally will tell you that BBO is first and foremost about bridge. Business is a secondary but necessary concern. Where we happen to live does not enter into the equation. Besides that, Sheri and I are Canadian citizens whose grandparents were born in Russia, Poland, England and Austria. Uday and his family come from India.

The world would be a much better place in my view if everyone understood that we are all really Africans. I have little hope that the Bush and Chirac types will ever figure this out, but I would have expected more from the supposed leaders of the bridge world.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[Walddk]

fred, on Nov 7 2005, 05:15 PM, said:

As far as I can tell there are some bridge politicians who are concerned that BBO is getting to be "too big and powerful".

If it hadn't been so sad, it would be hilarious. So they think we should be punished because we are big? Could it be that we are big because we deliver quality and promote bridge in the best possible way?

At the end of the day it's our fault anyway I suppose. We elect the politicians we get, do we not? I wish there were more bridge players among them. Politicians who have both feet solidly planted in thin air are useless. Fred used the word "stupidity". I dare say that this is stupid beyond belief!

Roland

[42]

Stupidity, envy and greediness often rule Look what happens in the name of God (our, theirs,....), look how people deal with nature, many more examples can easily be found. Whoever thinks it could be different in bridge is perhaps a dreamer (me included) although the ability to draw conclusions and making reflections is there (at least at a higher level ...ehemm..). We can just do it better by putting things on the table and discuss them - even controversal but always with respect. Then there is hope that people understand where the quality is and where they feel good; and the crowd grows (I know what I am talking of, look at my member number ). I feel that my bridgehome is BBO, thanks to you who made it to such a place!!♥♥♥
Caren

[mike777]

Chamaco, on Nov 3 2005, 04:28 AM, said:

This issue is, IMO, very delicate.

What constitutes censorship and what constitutes freedom of speech ?
In which context ?

A friend of mine used to have political statements in his profile. The statements in themselves were not offensive, but they were definitely "taking a view" about specific issues.

Yet he was asked to remove them or be banned.
Talking with me, he complained to me that it was censorship.

Was it ?
If this was a republic, yes.
But here we are like guests in someone else's house: somebody who hosts us for free, and legitimately sets the rules.
We might disagree with some or most of the rules (personally, I do believe that BBO has nothing to fear from Swan, at least right now, given the extra lousy interface of Swan).

Indeed,  I definitely disagree with Uday's position on the point you raised, but the comparison to censorship seems improper to me: censorship, to me, tends to imply the banning of a legitimate right, that is, the freedom of speech in a public place.

But if you are invited at dinner at my place and I ask you not to mention some specific topic, it's not censorship: you are my guest in my house, you are free to leave if you dislike the house's rule.

Well we have had this discussion before. If you invite me to your house and say I cannot discuss something, yes that is censorship. If I yell in your front yard at 2 am in the morning that you are a lousy politician and you call the cops on me, that is censorship.

Censorship is not just by governments and is very often legal and ethical.
BTW in an other post they mentioned highlights with other networks logos shown. In fact as technology improves these logos are being edited out! In fact people are being edited out!

[hrothgar]

fred, on Nov 7 2005, 06:15 PM, said:

As far as I can tell there are some bridge politicians who are concerned that BBO is getting to be "too big and powerful". This in itself may not be the problem, but the fact that BBO happens to be an American company makes some Europeans feel threatened by our success.

While I find this attitude regretful, I don't think that it is particularly surprising. BBO's management team has had enormous success promoting this little corner of the bridge world. Let me pose a couple questions (I'm not particularly interested in the answer, however, I think that the questions themselves have some value to them)

1. Assume that we treated BBO as a national or even a zonal authority. I'm quite sure that BBO's membership is significantly larger than most countries. I suspect that BBO membership will be larger than most zonal authorities in the near future.

2. Assume that we treated BBO as an “event”. If we compare the numbers of tables played during the course of an average week on BBO with other large events like the ACBL Nationals, who comes up on top? Here once, I suspect that BBO has surpassed to competition.

For better or worse, you're focal to one of the biggest forces in organized bridge. You don't have the same budget or the number of director reports as the ACBL in Memphis. At the same time, BBO is still undergoing rapid growth while the ACBL and the WBF are struggling.

BBO's size makes it a player. The unique nature of the online environment makes it a threat. Online bridge is a classic example of a disruptive technology innovation. As always, the big incumbents like the ACBL and the WBF are having enormous trouble adapting to a rapidly changing environment. As I've noted in the past, I think that “Platform Leadership” is the critical dynamic that will shape online bridge. Successful entities will own one or more platforms which they can use to provide services to their customer base. The BBO client can be viewed as one platform. The Full Disclosure file format is a second. Sadly, the established players don't seem to even recognize the battlefield on which these issues are being decided.

[inquiry]

mike777, on Nov 7 2005, 01:46 PM, said:

Well we have had this discussion before. If you invite me to your house and say I cannot discuss something then yes that is censorship. If I yell in your front yard at 2 am in the morning that you are a lousy politician and you call the cops on me, that is censorship.

Censorship is not just by governments and is very often legal and ethical.

BTW in an other post they mentioned highlights with other networks logos shown. In fact as technology improves these logos are being edited out! In fact people are being edited out!

I think you confuse a couple of issues. Censorship (we will not go all the way back to roman censors), is technically (as far as I am concerned).. the act of forbidding or preventing publication or distribution of media products, or parts of those products, by those with the power, either economic or legislative, to do so (this one is taken from freespace.virgin.net).

Ok, you would drop the "economic or legislative" part and include things like BBO. But, and this is key, BBO has no power to stop commentors or members who post here from going to rec.games.bridge and posting their views, from printing fliers and pass them out, from starting their own webpages and putting the info on those pages, from opening a public chat line and telling members while they are kibitzing they can go there for personilzed messages and then telling them about it. In fact, despite this "censor" many people continued to repeatedly give the link to swan bridge.

What you have here is not censorship in any meaningful way. Censorship exist when you are not allowed access to the material by any means. This requires, in effect, goverment sanctions. Take the movie "Debbie does dallas". You can't rent that from blockbluster, is that censorship by blockbuster? No, because you can get it from other sources (I assume of course, as I have no personal knowledge). Maybe mail order, maybe download from internet, maybe some "sleazy" outlet near or far from you. Now consider a movie with child porn. You can't get that at all. Not from anyway (at least legally). IS that censorship? I guess so (but clearly we all would approve of that type of censorship).

What about books about witches and warlocks? Expect to find them at a christian bookstore? IS that censorship? Business and individuals have a right to pick and choose who they associate with (within reason) and what material they allow. If I was throwing a party and had some friends who were very liberal and some who were very conservative and who have come to blows over political discussions in the past, I might very well "Forbid" political discussions at the party, by anyone. IF you come to that party, I would expect you to follow those rules. Is that censorship? Of course not, because everywhere else, in everyway, you are free to share your political views as you see fit. Just not at my party.

Here the commentators were free to mention the swan site (just not over and over), and did so. When mrdct mentioned the site, he was apparently "yelled" at by the other commentors (lets call this group censor if you like). But no big hammer fell on him. He was not banned from the BBO site, he got no official sanction (as far as I can tell) from the BBO staff. His action of leaving in mid match might mean he will not be invited back again as a commentator (after all, we need people who will be here when they say will), but that is not up to me to decide.

Just as blockbuster decides what to carry, just as christian bookstores decide what to sell, BBO can decide what is and what is not appropriate for their business. Here they made a decision to limit mention of the swansite. What ever else it was, it was not censorship... not in any meaningful interpretation of the word. All you have to do is look at all the mentions that david bird made of that site well after this post was started, or even rolands occaissional mention. And all you have to do is see the lack of force behind the "instruction" to the commentatos and the freedom people had to find this information. For isntacne, click on the world bridge link provided in the news and in links posted by roland and you would EASILY find your way to the swan site due to links on the WBF pages.

After all, like blockbuster, if we don't like pornography, we don't have to carry it or help you find it when you come to us for movies. So we don't want to help people find swan... that is life. I doubt they were sending users BBO's way either.

Ben

[mike777]

As I said we have had this discussion before. But you did get to the heart of the matter what is the definition of censorship. I strongly disagree with your definition. Censorship is not just by governments. Yes in your example Blockbuster chooses to censor itself and that is ok. If we take government out of the definition we can add in self censorship and corporate censorship and many other sources.

As I said I think the vast majority of censorship is welcomed. A lot of free speach is just cheap speach. As in most issues competing rights are involved. One wants knowledge to be free and readily available and one wants to be able to sleep at night without the mob on the front sidewalk all night long. One hates the USA tabloids for hurting many people but we do not want Libel laws as in the UK.

The UN has just published the right to free speech and free press but also says diversity is important so restraints on speech and the press are encouraged. Print what you want but do not be mean to those in power is typical doublespeak

[cherdano]

Maybe we need an off-topic/small-talk board? I don't see what the discussion on the definition of censorship has to do with BBO Vugraph issues.

To be honest, I would also like to have the title of this thread, which seems unnecessarily aggressive to me, go away, and not have it reappearing everytime I go to forums.bridgebase.com due to some new posts...

Arend

[hrothgar]

inquiry, on Nov 7 2005, 09:15 PM, said:

Just as blockbuster decides what to carry, just as christian bookstores decide what to sell, BBO can decide what is and what is not appropriate for their business. Here they made a decision to limit mention of the swansite.

My leftist political leanings are really going to come to the forefront here...

I believe that industrial concentration creates implicit and explicit social responsibility. To use your own examples, there is a few big difference between a local Christian bookstore and Walmart. Local Christian bookstores don't have a dominant position in distribution channels. A decision by a local bookseller to stock or not stock a particular item does not have a significant impact on product availability.

Walmart is a VERY different beast. Walmart has enormous channel power. There are large numbers of towns where box store distributors are (essentially) the only game in town. Back in 1999, Walmart decided that the company would not fill prescriptions for emergency-contraception. The company was forced to back down under the threat of legal action. I certainly don't want to start a debate about Walmart (or worse yet abortion)- I simply want to point that there are some strong arguments that run counter to your line of reasoning.

From my own perspective, BBO is approaching monopoly status. Associated with this, I believe that the management has an obligation to ensure that they are behaving in a socially responsible manner. Unlike the case of people versus Walmart, bridge players really don't have any external course of remedy. With this said and done, I do believe that its in BBO own best interest to avoid conflict (or the perception of conflict) with the user base.

[mike777]

hrothgar, on Nov 7 2005, 01:54 PM, said:

[there is a few big difference between a local Christian bookstore and Walmart. Local Christian bookstores don't have a dominant position in distribution channels. A decision by a local bookseller to stock or not stock a particular item does not have a significant impact on product availability.

Walmart is a VERY different beast. Walmart has enormous channel power. There are large numbers o towns where box store distributors are (essentially) the only game in town. Back in 1999, Walmart decided that the company would not fill prescriptions for emergency-contraception. The company was forced to back down under the threat of legal action. I certainly don't want to start a debate about Walmart (or worse yet abortion)- I simply want to point that there are some strong arguments that run counter to your line of reasoning.

From my own perspective, BBO is approaching monopoly status. Associated with this, I believe that the management has an obligation to ensure that they are behaving in a socially responsible manner. Unlike the case of people versus Walmart, bridge players really don't have any external course of remedy. With this said and done, I do believe that its in BBO own best interest to avoid conflict (or the perception of conflict) with the user base.

Interesting post.

As I just finished a book that postulates that the entire world body of knowledge doubles every 3-4 years, I post this. This means knowledge increases at an exponential rate.

A few points. Keep in mind Sears used to be the giant. Walmart is huge but it can be beaten and go broke. Think of shopping in a virtual world, with touch, smell, etc?

Uday pointed out in another post that BBO cannot be used on PDA and many other portable units.
I can certainly envision BBO beng supplemented as technology drastically increases. BBO may stay on top or some bright 16 year old from India Tech school may have Killer app the we all move to.

Wireless bridge?
Holographic Virtual bridge?
Team match leagues?
Chip in our heads bridge? ok I think my partners say I got this one now .

[Clinch]

hrothgar, on Nov 7 2005, 01:54 PM, said:

From my own perspective, BBO is approaching monopoly status.  Associated with this, I believe that the management has an obligation to ensure that they are behaving in a socially responsible manner. 

I tend to agree. What is unclear to me is what the long term business plan or vision is for BBO.

Uday refers to Swan as a "competitor" in an earlier post. In what way? Why is it not a good thing to have more bridge, wherever you can get it? Are local clubs competitors? Is the vugraph available in Estoril a competitor?

I get confused when I read some of these threads. I'm sure I can't be alone. This whole thing about being invited into someone's home (presumably because the service is free) just doesn't reconcile itself with a description of swan as competition (presumably because BBO wants to make money).

There are also a lot of statements in "management" responses that I feel are designed to curtail discussion, rather than to encourage it, along the lines of:

- That's a pretty low priority for us right now.
- It doesn't feel right to me, so we are not doing it.
- I'm not particularly interested in whether anyone agrees or not.

These are not direct quotes, but they are typical of several littered across threads. Maybe they are ok when the enterprise is a couple of guys in a room seeing if they can build a good product that will fly. When the enterprise gets bigger, questions of civic responsibility do arise.

Like just about everyone, I think the majority of the time, BBO gets it right. That is why it is so popular.

I still don't see the end-game, though. When I see threads that say the World Championships were a triumph for BBO, then I really don't see the end-game. What good thing does world domination give us?

Peter.
New York, NY.

[reisig]

I can't speak for other commentators - but noone ever even suggested that I NOT mention another site. So - I have no idea where all this started. None of the commentators that I know have ever said anything to me about what can be discussed or not discussed during a vugraph session.

[inquiry]

Well, I will take exception to the suggestion that Bridge Base is a monopoly. Even if there was no competition, there is no large bar to entering the market place. All you need is a a programmer or two and a server and good internet connection to establish competition. This is exactly how BBO overtook the two big dogs in the online bridge kennel (okbridge and MSN) in about two years. But the fact of the matter is that today there are plenty of other bridge sites, TopBridge, Bridge Club LIVE, e-bridge, swan bridge, Funbridge, MSN, Stepbridge, okbridge, to name a few. In addition, some of the commercial bridge software allows you to connect to others and play on the internet. There is also things like floater. And, as noted above, there is nothing to stop a few people from getting together and trying to create a better gaming site. As good as BBO is, it is not yet perfect. I will mention that no other site that I have visited come closes to BBO in quality for me.

And what we are talking about here is simply information. The information that was “censored” was that Swan bridge site had real-time result data. We will ignore for a moment that it took over a week for this “censorship” to start, and that this censorship was really just a restriction on overly promoting the other site. For sake of argument, we will say that it was a total ban that everyone had to follow.

Would this be censorship even by the very large standard of the definition that mike777 wants to use (any restriction whatsoever on “freedom of speech”)—here we will use speech very broadly to include typed words by commentors on a bridge playing website.

No doubt, as well all know, the right to free speech is not unlimited. For example. Limits on free speech - no right is absolute. There are certain kinds of speech which are restricted. For example: Slanderous speech is not allowed, as you cannot destroy a person's reputation by spreading false information. Neither is seditious speech - calling for the overthrow of the government.

Other restrictions on Free Speech are equally well established. But lets examine what “freedom of speech” is based upon legally. In the US, it is called the First amendment to the constitution, which reads.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

There it is, in black or white. Freedom of speech is related to what congress CAN NOT DO. Congress can not ban speech. That is what is guaranteed, no laws against freedom of speech. And I will assure you, in case you where wondering, Congress really, truly had nothing to do with the banning of discussion of the swan bridge site during the vugraph.

Now we all know that expression is a form of speech. Some schools limit what people can wear to class (must wear uniforms, can not wear gang colors, etc). By what authority do the schools (which in these cases I assume are public) exercise such authority? If congress can make no such rules, I think the same would apply to lower ranking government units (state, county, city, etc). Want me to protest against your schools ban on miniskirts, I am there. Ban on gang colors, I support you in theory, but you are on your own with that one. But nowhere is there a prohibition on what private companies can or can not withhold from their “broadcast” or “printed material”.

That is why what happens on BBO forum and BBO game site are not "censorship", nor an abridgement of the freedom of speech. As I said earlier, the commentors had plenty of other means by which to share their information. Let me give but one more example. Imagine the republican party holding a convention. Why don’t we see people up there on the stage telling us why we should vote for the demoncrat? Are the republicans against Freedom of Speech? OF course not. To find the demoncrats, look outside at the protestors, or at the democratic convention, or on TV and newspaper ads. The demoncrats are no more denied their constitutional rights by not being able to speak at the republican national convention than was Swan by not having people sing its praises live during BBO vugraphs.

Too many people take the simplistic, dogmatic view that “freedom of speech” means every thing they want to say, and when they want to say it is constitutionally guaranteed. I assure you, this is simply not the case, and in more ways than you don’t have the right to yell “fire” in a crowed theatre for fun. You have a legal right to express your views, but BBO has no legal obligation to allow you to express those views (whatever they might be) on their gaming site. Type something derogatory in your online profile, and you will be truly censored by the BBO police..... freedom of expression? Yes, you have it. And BBO has freedom of expression too.. freedom to remove you from their site if you behave in an inappropriate manner.

Ben