[gnasher]

bluejak, on Aug 30 2009, 12:18 PM, said:

Calling the Director is never offensive.  True, some very ignorant people may believe it to be so, but it is far better to educate them, not pander to their unfortunate views.

The first sentence isn't true in all circumstances, although some very stupid people believe it to be so. Being very stupid, they are ineducable.

Does anyone think that added to the quality of this discussion?

[jillybean]

FrancesHinden, on Aug 30 2009, 10:06 AM, said:

This is the problem with discussing things in print.
There's a huge difference with "pardon?", "what did you say?", "sorry, what was that?" being a genuine request to repeat something that genuinely wasn't heard, and a "WHAT did you say" implying, "you moron, don't you even know our system yet?"

The former gets a polite repeat of the answer.
The latter probably needs the TD.

This happened a while ago, I don’t remember exactly how “what did you say” was said,enough to cause some doubt but not enough to call the TD

blackshoe, on Aug 30 2009, 09:42 AM, said:

Actually, I wouldn't call the TD in that case, either. I'd simply attempt to obtain agreement from the opponents that the questioner's manner may have made UI available to his partner. If they disagree, [b]they]/b] are supposed to call the TD. If they don't, I suppose I'll have to call him.

I’m not sure it would work in a club game and could end up with more chaos and the td called anyway, suggesting something could be wrong upsets most players, they think its an accusation of cheating. I’d rather call the TD than say this.

[Cascade]

blackshoe, on Aug 31 2009, 04:42 AM, said:

If they disagree, [b]they]/b] are supposed to call the TD. If they don't, I suppose I'll have to call him.

I disagree.

If the opponents do not call the director then they are implicitly agreeing. That is their problem not yours.

[blackshoe]

Let's not get into calling each other stupid. I don't want to have to start deleting posts again.

[blackshoe]

Cascade, on Aug 30 2009, 02:49 PM, said:

blackshoe, on Aug 31 2009, 04:42 AM, said:

If they disagree, [b]they]/b] are supposed to call the TD. If they don't, I suppose I'll have to call him.

I disagree.

If the opponents do not call the director then they are implicitly agreeing. That is their problem not yours.

I considered that. I agree. The problem is that I'm pretty sure there are at least some, and possibly quite a few, TDs who would not.

[blackshoe]

jillybean, on Aug 30 2009, 02:43 PM, said:

I’m not sure it would work in a club game and could end up with more chaos and the td called anyway, suggesting something could be wrong upsets most players, they think its an accusation of cheating. I’d rather call the TD than say this.

Law 16B2 said:

When a player considers that an opponent has made such information available and that damage could well result, he may announce, unless prohibited by the regulating Authority (which may require that the director be called), that he reserves the right to summon the director later. The opponents should summon the director immediately if they dispute the fact that unauthorized information might have been conveyed.

In previous discussions of this law, the consensus seemed to be that rather than saying "I reserve my right to call the TD later" one should ask the opponents if they agree that unauthorized information may have been made available. The reasoning, iirc, was that the latter was felt to be less confrontational than the former.

Players need to learn not to get upset at the invocation of this law. They will not learn that if no one ever invokes it.

[blackshoe]

gnasher, on Aug 30 2009, 01:53 PM, said:

Please don't put words into my mouth. I don't want anything of the sort.

If the questioner displays surprise or disapproval at his partner's explanation, that conveys UI, and it is appropriate to call the director, or to reserve the right to call him later.

If the questioner merely

jillybean said:

doesn’t hear and says ‘what did you say?’

they have behaved entirely properly. To call the director under those circumstances is, whatever David Stevenson may say, distasteful.

You correctly stated in one post that UI has been made available to the player who asked "what did you say?" Then in your very next post, you asked "what UI?" when Jilly suggested showing incredulity conveyed UI, implying there wasn't any. I read that as wanting it both ways. Apparently I was wrong. Forgive me for that. I certainly did not intend to put words in your mouth.

Let me be more specific. West calls, East alerts. North asks. East explains. The alert and explanation are UI to West. If he didn't hear the explanation clearly, I have no problem (and neither did David) with him asking, and someone telling him, what it was, and no one calling the TD. However, the tone of the question, or other mannerism of West, may also convey UI to East. That situation is, IMO, more serious than the other, and I would think invoking Law 16B2 is appropriate in that case.

I do think it's a bit bloody minded to invoke Law 16B2 at every possible opportunity, though I've seen players do it. at least until they got tired of it.

[Cascade]

blackshoe, on Aug 31 2009, 08:45 AM, said:

Cascade, on Aug 30 2009, 02:49 PM, said:

blackshoe, on Aug 31 2009, 04:42 AM, said:

If they disagree, [b]they]/b] are supposed to call the TD. If they don't, I suppose I'll have to call him.

I disagree.

If the opponents do not call the director then they are implicitly agreeing. That is their problem not yours.

I considered that. I agree. The problem is that I'm pretty sure there are at least some, and possibly quite a few, TDs who would not.

At the very least the opponents' inaction when confronted with the suggestion of conveying UI is evidence that at the time they did not dispute the suggestion.

"When a player considers that an opponent has made such information
available and that damage could well result he may announce, unless
prohibited by the Regulating Authority (which may require that the Director
be called), that he reserves the right to summon the Director later (the
opponents should summon the Director immediately if they dispute the fact
that unauthorized information might have been conveyed)."

There is nothing in here that suggests that I should summon the director if the opponents dispute the transmission of UI.

Note the use of the word "should" which has the defined meaning:

"“should” do (failure to do it is an infraction jeopardizing the infractor’s rights but not often penalized)"

Therefore it seems reasonable to conclude if they do not summon the director as they "should" do then they jeopardize their rights. In particular they jeopardize their rights to dispute the UI.

[NickRW]

jillybean, on Aug 30 2009, 04:32 PM, said:

jillybean, on Aug 29 2009, 08:25 AM, said:

1N (P) P 2♦*  alert
P   (2♥) ?

My partner opens 1nt - pass - pass
LHO bids 2♦, RHO alerts. Partner passes, RHO bids 2♥
I ask RHO what 2♦ was, he tells me ‘majors’

LHO doesn’t hear and says ‘what did you say?’

What should happen here?

This is how it continued

RHO told LHO 'majors'.

I had little values but length in ♠'s and ♣'s so bid 3♣, this is where we played.

By the end of the hand I realized 2♦ 'majors' was an incorrect explanation and called the director. He looked at my hand and told me I should know 2♦'s can't be majors and could have called earlier, result stands.

I don't think this is a good ruling at all and wondered if, despite the social repulsion of doing so, I should have called the director back at the start.

If I had been certain 'what did you say' was an exclamation rather than a question would it be acceptable to call the director?

IMO the ruling may or may not be a good one (don't know without more information), but the reason given for it seems wrong - just because you have, say, 5 spades, does not mean that the overcall could not legitimately have meant majors.

In what way were you claiming damage from the MI - that you would have bid 2♠ instead?

Nick

[aguahombre]

by length in spades, I assume you mean 4.

[gnasher]

blackshoe, on Aug 30 2009, 10:10 PM, said:

You correctly stated in one post that UI has been made available to the player who asked "what did you say?"

No I didn't. I said

me said:

If LHO's explanation was incorrect, it makes UI "available" to RHO. That UI is "available" regardless of whether RHO heard it. This UI constrains RHO's actions, even if he didn't receive it. If you are in a position where UI may have been made available to you, but you don't know whether it was or not, it seems to me that you're obliged to find out.

My point was that you have a general responsibility to listen to your partner's explanations, in order to determine whether UI was made available to you, in order to enable you to comply with Law 16B1. I didn't say, or intend to say, that UI had been made available on this particular deal. Sorry if that was unclear.

blackshoe said:

Let me be more specific. West calls, East alerts. North asks. East explains. The alert and explanation are UI to West. If he didn't hear the explanation clearly, I have no problem (and neither did David) with him asking, and someone telling him, what it was, and no one calling the TD.

Not having a problem with it doesn't go far enough. West should ask for the explanation to be repeated, for the reason I gave above.

Quote

However, the tone of the question, or other mannerism of West, may also convey UI to East.

Yes, obviously.

This post has been edited by gnasher: 2009-August-30, 17:16

[gnasher]

blackshoe, on Aug 30 2009, 09:41 PM, said:

Let's not get into calling each other stupid. I don't want to have to start deleting posts again.

So "stupid" is unacceptable, but "ignorant" is OK?

To be clear, I don't believe that David is stupid, and I don't suppose that he thinks me ignorant either. The purpose of my post was to suggest that such epithets are best avoided on a forum such as this.

[aguahombre]

I don't think a player's "right" to hear his partner's explanation of a call really exists. If it did, something different would have been done when screens are in use.

[bluejak]

Certainly: that is UI.

But not giving you redress because you did not call the TD earlier is against the Laws of bridge.

[barmar]

aguahombre, on Aug 30 2009, 07:21 PM, said:

I don't think a player's "right" to hear his partner's explanation of a call really exists. If it did, something different would have been done when screens are in use.

Indeed, regulations regarding alerting are generally different when screens are in use, and there are sometimes thorny issues when mistaken explanations are made. Not only does partner not get a chance to correct the misexplanation, because he doesn't know that it happened, but there's also the problem that the MI only goes to one of the opponents. There was a very controversial appeal a few years ago that decided a national or international event due to one of these.

[kevperk]

I don't think that West should ask for what was said to be repeated, and don't think that the laws support him being answered. He can find out at the appropriate time(after the auction if declaring side, or after play if defending side). Once the opponents have been given the answer, repeating it only passes UI.

Kevin

[bluejak]

Passing UI is no infraction, of course.

I do not see the problem with asking for something to be repeated. After all, it was available for him to hear: he is not asking for something that was kept from him by choice or Law.

As for the Law supporting him being answered, they do not support him not being answered either. It seems petty to me for an opponent not to answer him.

[VixTD]

I've been directing at national events in England for some time, and when I read the original post I thought it was quite a good problem, because the answer was not immediately obvious to me, so I find the comments that calling the TD might be offensive, distasteful, "beyond the limit" and such like very surprising.

If my partner explains one of my calls and I don't hear the answer, what right have I to ask for it to be repeated? Alerts, announcements and explanations are for the benefit of opponents only. Of course, I may wish to know what has been said so that I can take steps to comply with the requirements of law 16 regarding unauthorized information, but if I really have no clue as to what was said, there is no danger of my using UI. Then again, under "normal" circumstances (no screens, and not online bridge) I would have heard the explanation, so perhaps "normal" circumstances should be restored by repeating the explanation. On the other hand, if it is repeated by one of my opponents, might it not be argued that this is no longer unauthorized information because I didn't have the explanation before, and it has now been supplied by one of my opponents rather than by my partner?

I don't agree with all of the points I have made in the paragraph above, but they are all questions which may be worrying the players, and what do we want players to do when faced with a legal or ethical problem? Call the director, of course, and let them deal with it.

If I had been called to the table I would probably ask for the explanation to be repeated, partly to restore "normal" circumstances, and partly because there may well be some doubt as to whether partner had really not received any clue as to what the explanation was or might have been. I would then make sure the players were aware of their obligations under law 16, and let them carry on.

But I would not consider it at all strange that I had been called.

[Vampyr]

VixTD, on Sep 9 2009, 09:11 AM, said:

Of course, I may wish to know what has been said so that I can take steps to comply with the requirements of law 16 regarding unauthorized information, but if I really have no clue as to what was said, there is no danger of my using UI.

Perhaps there is no danger of your "using" UI, but people who take action suggested by UI rarely do it on purpose; that is cheating.

If UI has become available it does not matter whether you have actually received it. Your obligations under L16 are the same whether you have heard partner's explanation or not.

[VixTD]

Vampyr, on Sep 15 2009, 11:24 PM, said:

Perhaps there is no danger of your "using" UI, but people who take action suggested by UI rarely do it on purpose; that is cheating.

When I said "using UI" I did not mean necessarily deliberately using UI.

Quote

If UI has become available it does not matter whether you have actually received it. Your obligations under L16 are the same whether you have heard partner's explanation or not.

I don't really understand what you mean by this. If UI was available and there was any chance that I might have received any of it (even just a clue from e.g. the length of the answer) I would expect the benefit of the doubt to be given against me. But if I definitely couldn't have received it (e.g. I was called to the phone as an opponent asked, and the explanation given when I was out of the room) then the UI wasn't really made available, and I wonder how I could be expected to follow L16.