[barmar]

Vampyr, on 2016-February-03, 10:53, said:

Provided the law is there to be read.

It seems to me that the CoC for a private match should say that either a lawbook or Internet connection must be available. Since self-rulings are an inherent part of this format (calling a TD for every irregularity is not practical), you have to have the means to do this.

And in this day and age, what's the chance you can't access the Internet? You have 8 players, and none of them has a smartphone?

[Vampyr]

barmar, on 2016-February-03, 11:01, said:

It seems to me that the CoC for a private match should say that either a lawbook or Internet connection must be available. Since self-rulings are an inherent part of this format (calling a TD for every irregularity is not practical), you have to have the means to do this.

And in this day and age, what's the chance you can't access the Internet? You have 8 players, and none of them has a smartphone?

Well, the smartphones are not charged, have been left home, have no signal, have had all the allotted data used up...

But I agree with you.

[Zelandakh]

barmar, on 2016-February-03, 11:01, said:

And in this day and age, what's the chance you can't access the Internet? You have 8 players, and none of them has a smartphone?

8 players over 70, quite possible. But given that I am a 45 year old working in IT without a smartphone, perhaps I see things from a different viewpoint.

[mycroft]

Heh. What is it about "working in IT" that triggers this for certain people?

My company is definitely divided between "data access only slightly more important than continued heart function" and "I may have a phone, and I can count the number of people who know the number without wearing sandals", with a echoing gulf between the two.

and for me, s/smart//. OTOH, I live in a "keys, phone, wallet" household, so if I need to talk to someone, I can always cheat and use one of theirs.

But, all ha ha only serious jokes about "bridge is the only game where none of the players knows the laws, or cares to" aside, I think that "access to a FLB, you figure out how to do it" seems like a reasonable requirement for a private match of official, duplicate bridge. Now that it's online and available to the players' grandchildren and all.

[barmar]

mycroft, on 2016-February-18, 11:00, said:

Heh. What is it about "working in IT" that triggers this for certain people?

I think many people assume that people who work with computers would naturally be gadget geeks, and the most likely to have devices like smartphones.

I'm a computer programmer and I also only have a simple cellphone. I do have a Kindle Fire tablet; it can go online if there's a WiFi hotspot, but can't use the cellular network. My cellphone plan is pay-as-you-go with a $20/quarter minimum, and I don't do enough phone calling to justify anything more -- I assume a usable smartphone would require signing up for a cellular plan that costs several times more. I also have measured service on my home landline, and spend about $22/mo on local calls and $2/mo on long distance. Life is cheap if you aren't very social.

[mycroft]

I was thinking more "being on call for an IT department means the last thing I want to do in my off time is deal with *people*" and "having the phone ring any time between 2200 and 0600 bringing on *nightmares*" :-). Perhaps with a side order of "I have to sysadmin yet another piece of broken-as-designed tech, and I'm *paying* for the privilege?"

I, too have a tablet that is my world. It does, in fact, have cellular data; I am beginning to believe that if I'm going to stay in Android, I'll have to get a data hotspot and deal with yet another piece of tech when this dies. You (well, certain people who know the email-tied-to-the-tablet) can reach me by email/IM, no problem. But if I don't want to see it, I don't *have* to.

And you've always been at least reasonably social whenever I've seen you. Having said that, there are bridge players who think *I*'m social, because they only ever see me "on".

[barmar]

mycroft, on 2016-February-19, 12:38, said:

And you've always been at least reasonably social whenever I've seen you. Having said that, there are bridge players who think *I*'m social, because they only ever see me "on".

I'm not anti-social -- I'm pleasant when I'm with people. I just don't socialize much -- other than going to dinner with other bridge players between sessions, I rarely hang out with people. And I don't participate in any of the modern social networking sites, like Facebook and Twitter. The closest I get is posting in online forums about particular subject matter I'm interested in (mostly technical stuff, but also bridge and TV).