[mink]

I played my first board at October 13 2001. Some players I met that day are still well-known to me, like Gerardo and Booze.

Karl

[Walddk]

I have been a BBO member for about 2 years now. I was an okb'er when a friend told me about Bridge Base. So I decided to give it a go.

I never looked back!

Roland

[pclayton]

I think a lot of us early birds were Deal of the Week junkies; I checked it regularly Monday mornings and got a little agitiated when Fred didn't post the hand until the afternoon.

He had many postings on BB's site advertising BBO before the site was launched. It took a few months to develop a critical mass of players to form a few tables.

Because it was a good product and free, BBO was able to get over that critical hurdle. Other start up sites haven't been so fortunate.

[hallway]

I remember the day , sadly not the date - that hard drive went up in smoke , middle of 2001 though.

Had completed my first series of bridge lessons, faced the firing squad in the clubrooms, decided - this is not for me !!

Posted my resignation, thought I'd have one last look at bridge, googled it and up came Bridge Base 'educational' , had a look, emailed Fred to ask if it was ok for a beginner.

Next day I was stunned I got a genuine personal reply !! Incredible - this is cyber space and YET this man obviously cared so much about the game that he would take time to nurture 'someone' a world away !

That is the essence that makes BBO the extra special place it is.

I recall the excitement of logging in and finding 5 tables playing, then 20 and THEN 100 !!! Then the day there was a 1000 online - wonderful memories.

Well nowadays my family call me a BBO junkie , still can't play bridge mind you - the title of Aged Void is justly earned

BUT I do like to give the Advanced + community the occassional warning "Watch out the BILlies are coming"

[shoeless]

Hallway - your initial experience with Fred doesn't surprise me in the least - I haven't been around BBO very long but as long time student, trainer and consultant in leadership and organizational development I have been WOWed by what is going on here. If a graduate student came to me and said - I need a subject for my thesis on leadership and OD. Can you point me in the right direction? I would say go take a look at Gitelman - whether he really knows what he is doing or it's just intuitive - there's something magic happening over there. BTW - good on you for BIL - I thought about one of my favorite quotes as I read your signature - "When the student is ready, the master appears"

[fred]

shoeless, on Mar 5 2005, 01:35 AM, said:

Hallway - your initial experience with Fred doesn't surprise me in the least - I haven't been around BBO very long but as long time student, trainer and consultant in leadership and organizational development I have been WOWed by what is going on here. If a graduate student came to me and said - I need a subject for my thesis on leadership and OD. Can you point me in the right direction? I would say go take a look at Gitelman - whether he really knows what he is doing or it's just intuitive - there's something magic happening over there. BTW - good on you for BIL - I thought about one of my favorite quotes as I read your signature - "When the student is ready, the master appears"

I don't know what I am doing.

Making things up as I go along and I am very fortunate that various people who do know what they are doing have taken an interest in BBO and have been willing to offer their help and advice. Special thanks to Uday and Bill Gates

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[slothy]

fred yesterday said:

I dont know what i am doing

Join the club, man.

I been making things up as i go along too: luckily the staff havent cottoned on that i do this and see it as a powerful indescribable intuition.

I basically just embrace the principles of Chaos Theory to the workplace.

On the good side all my staff look up to me. Whether that is because i exclusively employ midgets i dunno...

And who is this William Gates dude?

As for coming onto BBO, I came on very early on after putting in the Search Criteria of Google 'Embroidery Stitching Techniques Used By Neanderthals' and BBO came up third!!!

I was frustrated that the nik alex had been taken so i think you lost points on the personal touch. i also wanted 6toedsloth, my nik on the Zone [i hope i not breaking 'The Code' mentioning La Zona here], but some Young Pretender had taken that too!! (sabotage, man, sabotage)

Also i was so used to Zone i found the interface counter-intuitive (then). SO i left and came back in about late 2003...it was like the rush for Oregon!!
I soon got used to it and have been sucked into this micro-universe ever since.

Fred is it possible to have alex as a nik?? nobody uses it !! [ pleeaaassseee!! some people really have come to believe i am an arboreal vegetarian who prefers to view the world invertedly] (a star wouldnt go amiss either). I check evey once in a while to offer the person $5 BBO for it but he never comes on ( [or she even]. A friend of mine called Alex came on before me and may have picked it but he had a sex change and calls himself Viagrina now and has abandoned his previous identity

Alex

[slothy]

luke warm, on Mar 1 2005, 06:21 PM, said:

does bbo's server database keep track of when a nick was created? this is not my first nick on bbo (or even my 5th)...

Doesnt suprise me Jimmy.....can only imagine you had to change your nik coz of your embarrassment of going off in a 2H+2 par contract or because you had one of your unfortunate bouts of internet-induced Tourette Syndrome episodes...

Your faithful follow-up-poster