[mycroft]

The other issue is that the ACBL has found that most new ACBL members are:

• retired people (or working people whose kids are grown), who
  
• learned to play bridge earlier (like in high school or college), and
  
• see lessons available and say "I used to play that, maybe I should try again"

That's not going to lower the average age much, but it will *replace* the members in the "in Memoriam" page.
It also means that if we want this to continue to happen, we still need to push the "bridge in schools/universities", knowing that we're going to only get a 10-20% uptake from those classes. It's an investment for 20, 30 years down the road.

[kenrexford]

campboy, on 2010-December-22, 17:26, said:

I think you are wrong here. That would be "any-purpose". A swiss-army knife is an all-purpose tool but a pair of grape scissors isn't, even if all you happen to want to eat is grapes.

Sure, that interpretation makes sense. (Sarcastic.) The next time someone opens a Precision 1♦, I will call the director if the person syas that Opener cannot have a 28-count with seven spades. If he cannot, then 1♦ is not "all"-purpose but rather limited purpose.

[campboy]

kenrexford, on 2010-December-23, 12:28, said:

Sure, that interpretation makes sense. (Sarcastic.) The next time someone opens a Precision 1♦, I will call the director if the person syas that Opener cannot have a 28-count with seven spades. If he cannot, then 1♦ is not "all"-purpose but rather limited purpose.

People use language in a rather sloppy manner, it is true. I personally would not use the phrase "all-purpose" at all. But, when it is used, what does it mean? From my dictionary: "Fulfilling many different functions; capable of being used in various ways." A quick google search gives similar stuff: "Having many purposes or uses"; "not limited in use or function"; "for every pertinent purpose; useful in many ways"; "suited for many purposes or uses". None of these definitions fit the bid in question, which has the very specific single purpose of showing spades, yet most of them would seem to fit a bid which covers several hand types even if there are other types it does not cover.

[Phil]

Richard, what do you think the average age of the membership will be in five years?

I'm willing to bet its less than 73.91.

[Phil]

kenrexford, on 2010-December-23, 12:28, said:

Sure, that interpretation makes sense. (Sarcastic.) The next time someone opens a Precision 1♦, I will call the director if the person syas that Opener cannot have a 28-count with seven spades. If he cannot, then 1♦ is not "all"-purpose but rather limited purpose.

And to think I was going to run to the pantry and use our all-purpose flour as fertilizer.

[hrothgar]

Phil, on 2010-December-23, 14:21, said:

Richard, what do you think the average age of the membership will be in five years?

I'm willing to bet its less than 73.91.

Off the top of my head, I'd guess that it would be ~72

However, if you're tracking membership numbers, the mode is probably a lot more important than the mean

[Siegmund]

Interestingly I have experimented with a very similar system (only in mine 1D promises 4 hearts). I avoided hrothgar's first problem by not asking Memphis, just reading the regulations for myself, and following the path that 1M=5-card major is allowed, and a Polish-eque 1C that handles all hands with 4-card spade suits is allowed, and a 1NT denying a 4-card major is allowed, so my catchall needs to catch hands with 4 hearts. Yes, I freely admit I deliberately did not ask Memphis because I had a feeling they'd do to me what they did to hrothgar.

Given that they have allowed a variety of artificial diamond systems (as long as they dont use illegal responses to 1D) I have a hard time believing the regulation-as-written bars constructive but unexpected meanings of 1D.

Re average age, it has taken it over 10 years to rise from 67 to almost-69. It might reach 70 in 5 years but almost surely will not reach 71, let alone 72. And we ARE doing a better job of bringing in young players now that we were 20 years ago, just not quite good enough yet.

[Phil]

Siegmund, on 2010-December-23, 15:50, said:

Re average age, it has taken it over 10 years to rise from 67 to almost-69. It might reach 70 in 5 years but almost surely will not reach 71, let alone 72. And we ARE doing a better job of bringing in young players now that we were 20 years ago, just not quite good enough yet.

I was hoping someone had these stats. Whats more encouraging is that the league has appeared, at least for the time being, to finally hold the line on a 35 year decline in membership.

I'll get ripped for this, but you have to honestly ask the question where the acbl's marketing dollars should go - junior bridge, or trying to attract recently retired baby boomers who are already familiar with the game?

/threadjack

[pooltuna]

Bbradley62, on 2010-December-21, 19:23, said:

You should forward this response to the supervisor of whoever sent you the response and ask whether it's correct.
Does your partner know about your (presumably undisclosed) restriction? If so, you are guilty of having undisclosed agreements.
Clearly, punish someone who has undisclosed agreements. Then also see my first answer.

Don't you just have to alert that it shows 0+ ♦ and promises 4+♠?

[bluejak]

I do not like suggesting meanings which logic means cannot be the intention of those who wrote the regulations. If 1♦ is allowed as an all-purpose bid, no-one believes that means a bid that shows four spades, so anyone who plays it under that umbrella knows it is illegal but is trying to get around the regulations because they are carelessly worded.

[Bbradley62]

pooltuna, on 2010-December-23, 16:56, said:

Don't you just have to alert that it shows 0+ ♦ and promises 4+♠?

No. The original post clearly says that ACBL said this is not allowed.

[Bbradley62]

Phil, on 2010-December-23, 14:21, said:

Richard, what do you think the average age of the membership will be in five years?

I'm willing to bet its less than 73.91.

If no current members die (or otherwise terminate membership), the age would be 73.91. If the oldest 20% of members leave and no new members join, we'd expect the average age to increase from about 69 to about 71.

Is it really the case that the average age wasn't over 65 thirty years ago? It doesn't seem to me that the current demographics are any different than when I joined in 1982.

[Trinidad]

When I was in the ACBL 15 years ago, the average was 66.

So, the average age seems to increase by 1 year, every 5 years.

Whether this is worrying or not depends on the demographics of the USA (and Canada and Mexico), but I can't get it out of my head that 15 years ago I found that ACBL did very little for young players. (My partner and I were in our 30's and treated like children! I guess I already need to be happy that ACBL didn't organize a little league for us. )

I could understand that a bridge club doesn't do much to attract young players. After all, they tend to go to college, move away and will be lost for the club. The investment is not really worth it for the club. But the number of kids that will emigrate must be negligible. Yes, some might give up the game when they start to get a family and life is too busy. But a significant fraction of those will come back when the kids have grown up. (As an example: I used to play with my wife. When the kids were born, I started playing with another partner. My wife stopped and is highly likely to start playing with me again when the kids have grown up.)

Rik

[mycroft]

Phil, on 2010-December-23, 16:23, said:

I'll get ripped for this, but you have to honestly ask the question where the acbl's marketing dollars should go - junior bridge, or trying to attract recently retired baby boomers who are already familiar with the game?

And where do you think the "retired Noughties who are already familiar with the game" are going to come from when it's their time? Not putting money into school and college bridge is signing one's own death warrant - 30 years down the line, true, but dead just the same.

Putting money into recovering the "bridge players, before I started a career and kids" is, of course, also useful.

[kenrexford]

I have played, with approval, the following definitions for a 1♦ "all purpose" opening bid:

1. 3+ diamonds with 5+ major, or EITHER minor, with 0+ diamonds
2. balanced or 5+ in either minor, with 0+ diamonds
3. 5+ in either minor, or both minors, or a major-diamond canape (longer major), or a major-club canape (longer major), or balanced, with 0+ diamonds

If all of these were allowed as "all-purpose," then how is a specific 4+ spades not "all purpose?"

Don't get me started, then, on all of the weird meanings for "all-purpose" and a 1♣ opening that have been approved.

[campboy]

kenrexford, on 2010-December-28, 19:38, said:

If all of these were allowed as "all-purpose," then how is a specific 4+ spades not "all purpose?"

Because it is specific. Specific and all-purpose are opposites.

[awm]

Recently I had an email discussion with a number of top-flight players in my area of the USA (Los Angeles). Most of us (including two national-level directors and a world senior champion) believed that "all purpose" means that a 1m opening may be assigned any meaning whatsoever (subject to the further restriction of 10+ HCP), certainly including showing four spades. Only one believed that "all-purpose" was more restrictive than this, but even he could not clearly delineate which meanings were or were not "all-purpose." Note that in practice 1♦ guaranteeing a four card major (matchpoint precision) is allowed, and it's not particularly clear why this "multi" meaning (one of two possible four-card majors) should be allowed whereas a more specific meaning (four spades in particular) would be banned. Anyway, the statement by bluejak that "no-one believes..." is very far from the case.

My view about this kind of behavior is rather fuzzy. Giving ACBL a description which is purposely misleading in the hopes that they will make a "wrong" ruling does seem like an attempt to cheat. However, I think there are often different ways to describe a call without either of them being particularly misleading. For example, a 1♦ opening could be described as "unbalanced without a four-card major" or could be described as showing "either 6+♣ or 6+♦ or at least 5/4 in the minors; no four-card major" It's not clear to me that one of these descriptions is really "better" than the other... however I suppose the first looks a lot more like what some people call "all-purpose" whereas the second looks more like a multi-meaning bid showing at least one of two possible suits. Describing a 1♦ opening as "showing 0+♦" is rather nonsensical of course.

As far as ACBL "customer satisfaction" is concerned, I'm not sure I understand how having vague and erratically enforced convention regulations benefits anyone. I understand that the vast majority of ACBL customers play very "standard" methods and don't particularly care about the convention charts. I understand that there is a sizable group of players who don't like to play against "unusual" methods and that the interests of this group may (or may not) outweigh the interests of those who want to play "unusual" methods. However, the argument here is not really about whether ACBL should enact more permissive policies, but rather about whether they should produce a clearer set of rules governing legal methods. Having a clearer set of rules will not greatly upset any of the people playing standard methods (assuming the clearer rules don't ban anything currently popular or allow anything "really weird" that isn't currently permitted). However, it will make anyone (player or director) needing to deal with the convention regulations a lot happier. Even if this is only 1% of the bridge playing population, it is potentially an important set (i.e. tends to include younger players who are potential long-term members, tends to include better or at least "up-and-coming" players, tends to include internationalists ACBL wants to encourage to play in their NABCs). And I don't see who loses from a clear and fairly applied set of rules.

[TimG]

awm, on 2010-December-28, 23:53, said:

tends to include internationalists ACBL wants to encourage to play in their NABCs

Are you sure ACBL wants to encourage this?

[hrothgar]

awm, on 2010-December-28, 23:53, said:

Recently I had an email discussion with a number of top-flight players in my area of the USA (Los Angeles). Most of us (including two national-level directors and a world senior champion) believed that "all purpose" means that a 1m opening may be assigned any meaning whatsoever (subject to the further restriction of 10+ HCP), certainly including showing four spades.

Thanks for investing the time / effort to conduct this survey.

FWIW, I very much agree with your posting (in particular, the sentiments that you express in paragraph three)