There has been a suggestion to integrate the contents of the SBB with those of the Blue and White Books, avoiding the need for a separate document for online bridge. This may well be discussed at the forthcoming L&E meeting.
We may update the Sky-Blue Book with some minor issues but it will be replaced in August.
The Sky-Blue Book material will go into the Blue Book and White Book. The material in the Blue Book will try to unify alerting/announcing/explanations for face-to-face and online. The EBU will continue with self-alerts (written self-explanations) on RealBridge, but other bodies (clubs/counties) can make their own regulations, so may continue to run RealBridge event with face-to-face alerts/announcements/explanations by partner.
@patricks said:
Is there a plan for updating the Sky Blue book sometime? The initial arrangements felt very much about making as little change from face-to-face regulations as possible, and we can see some of the same attitude in the way RealBridge has developed. But there are serious opportunities for a better game of bridge (one with less UI) by making it normal practice to use self-announcement and removing the confusing concept of alerting altogether. Is it time to do that?
Patrick
Gloucestershire CTD
I'm not sure I agree that it leads to a better game of bridge. Less UI, yes, but the fiddly process of having to type the meaning of the bid. From the point of view of the enjoyment of the game, I would far rather have partner alerting (so spoken announcements and explanations) than having to type these out, whether or not the opposition want to know.
Moreover, with partner alerting, it's generally clear what UI (if any) exists. If I can see (or even suspect) that partner is typing before bidding , I have UI but it would be impossible to say what it was, or if I had taken advantage of it.
Some of the aggro regarding typing can be removed with a little efficiency. For example having your basic system announcement ready so you just paste it. That's easy but it is surprising how many waste time and effort each round doing it. If there are common things to type then having a word document open and cutting and pasting is also easy. I would get bored with typing for a 1C opening "May be 2, can include 5D in a weak NT hand"
I think the reduction of UI is a big improvement but short of us all playing behind screens it won't be possible to have it in F2F bridge.
Comments
There has been a suggestion to integrate the contents of the SBB with those of the Blue and White Books, avoiding the need for a separate document for online bridge. This may well be discussed at the forthcoming L&E meeting.
We may update the Sky-Blue Book with some minor issues but it will be replaced in August.
The Sky-Blue Book material will go into the Blue Book and White Book. The material in the Blue Book will try to unify alerting/announcing/explanations for face-to-face and online. The EBU will continue with self-alerts (written self-explanations) on RealBridge, but other bodies (clubs/counties) can make their own regulations, so may continue to run RealBridge event with face-to-face alerts/announcements/explanations by partner.
I'm not sure I agree that it leads to a better game of bridge. Less UI, yes, but the fiddly process of having to type the meaning of the bid. From the point of view of the enjoyment of the game, I would far rather have partner alerting (so spoken announcements and explanations) than having to type these out, whether or not the opposition want to know.
Moreover, with partner alerting, it's generally clear what UI (if any) exists. If I can see (or even suspect) that partner is typing before bidding , I have UI but it would be impossible to say what it was, or if I had taken advantage of it.
Some of the aggro regarding typing can be removed with a little efficiency. For example having your basic system announcement ready so you just paste it. That's easy but it is surprising how many waste time and effort each round doing it. If there are common things to type then having a word document open and cutting and pasting is also easy. I would get bored with typing for a 1C opening "May be 2, can include 5D in a weak NT hand"
I think the reduction of UI is a big improvement but short of us all playing behind screens it won't be possible to have it in F2F bridge.