USBF Online Commentary Guidelines

Goals

These guidelines were prepared to encourage comments that entertain and inform. Commentators have an influential platform for communication to thousands of enthused amateur players. Our goal is to promote the game and encourage listeners to play more often and recruit their friends. Please use your platform carefully!

The BBO Audience

Skill level. The BBO audience range from beginning to expert. The vast majority are advanced beginners to intermediate. Bidding systems used in championship events are typically unfamiliar to them. Their ability to follow complex plays is limited.

Diversity. The audience includes representatives of every country, culture and age group. Many are non-native English speakers.

Audience likes.

• Learning about player backgrounds, especially in bridge, plus anecdotes 
• Learning about conventions and signalling methods. They often don’t know routine expert conventions and signals. 
• Careful explanations of auctions, both what bids meant and why players might have made the choices they did. 
• Humor and stories about great players of the past 

Getting Started

1. Show up to the session on time.

2. Fill out your BBO profile seriously. Spectators want to know they are listening to an authority or at least a strong, experienced player.

3. Be prepared to answer questions. Read the FAQ.

4. Be prepared to explain aspects of the BBO software. The audience thinks you know how to see the result/play at the other table, where to see the score, where to access Vugraph archives, etc.

5. Introduce yourself to the spectators. They probably don’t know who you are.

6. If your room has many commenters (4 text or 3 voice), move to a different room.

7. If you have a problem with a commentator or operator, send a private message to vugraphzfb (Jan) or agumperz (Andrew).

Commentary Do’s

 1. Keep the discussion about bridge. Avoid long, off-topic digressions.

 2. Report, clarify, and elucidate players’ actions without judging them.

 3. Minimize outright criticism. The player may have had information you don't that affected their choices. Further, the play of spotcards is difficult for operators to always capture correctly. The player may have seen different cards played than you as the commentator.

 4. Be sensitive to the feelings of the competitors. Point out errors, but keep criticism respectful.

 5. Analyze the bids made by the players. Feel free to disagree with the player's valuation, ("I would have forced to game..."). Avoid digressions into how some other system would bid the hand unless that system is in use at the other table.

 6. Explain conventions used.

 7. Explain spot card signals used and how the signalling method works.

 8. Read the operator’s explanations of alerted calls and the results; be skeptical if operator explanations appear unlikely; operators do make errors.

 9. Send a private message to the operator if you need to ask for a correction not to the entire table.

10. Pay attention to what colleagues say; try not repeat or talk at cross purposes.

11. Wait your turn to contribute. Commentary is confusing when multiple themes are discussed simultaneously.

12. Be polite to operators and colleagues. Mistakes happen, but everyone is doing their best.

13. Invite your colleagues into the conversation. "I would have raised hearts. What about you Larry?"

14. Be considerate of listener sensitivities. Non-native English speakers can miss subtleties like irony and sarcasm. Be especially careful to avoid the appearance of racism or sexism.

15. Make single dummy analysis. Seeing 52 cards there is a temptation to work backward from the optimal outcome: 7NT is cold, ergo there must be a bidding sequence ending in that contract. The players are constrained to work forward so try to do the same as an analyst.

Commentary Don’t’s

 1. Make statements like, “I would lead a club” or “I would bid 6NT” without explanation.

 2. State definitively what a bid means unless you know that to be true.

 3. Make, or worse, repeat self-evident comments.

 4. Criticize a bid or play without attempting to understand why the player made that choice.

 5. Offer suggestions for the “correct” play without a convincing rationale.

 6. Announce the double dummy spot unless you think there is a reasonable way for players to achieve that contract/result.

 7. Explain how you would have bid a hand using your own agreements. "We play the Kookaburra club so we would have..." Discussing how you would bid in your system puts attention on you rather than the players.

 8. Make opinionated, universal bridge pronouncements. "Sponsorship is bad for bridge..." "Artificial systems are ruining the game..." "Modern light openings are foolish..." "Wild preempts are not bridge..."

 9. Comment on what has already occurred at other tables before a board is played. That ruins the drama for those focused on one table.

10. Dominate the “microphone” – let the audience feel you are a broadcasting team.

11. As a voice commentator, respond by voice to typed comments from text commentators. Users who have only text (more than half) will find one half of the conversation (in text) baffling.

12. Argue aggressively or raise your voice. Annoyed voices upset listeners.

13. Use excessive abbreviations. Non-native English speakers may not understand them. I.e., "IMO, when u look at a flat 4333 u don't stretch even tho vul is fav. Although YMMV, LOL."

14. Make personal remarks about players. The audience does not need details of a player’s marriages, business dealings, financial situation, etc.

15. Use double dummy solvers.


With thanks and gratitude to Fred Gitelman, Eric Kokish and Roland Wald for their contributions to earlier versions of these guidelines.