[mr1303]

I've just spent the weekend operating the vugraph for the English Premier League.

Unfortunately, due to a lack of volunteers, the last match couldn't be broadcast. It was a shame, but it appears that a lack of investment in vugraph operators was the cause.

Operating the vugraph can be a very stressful job. Trying to keep up with the play, particularly close to when a player claims, or if there's a particularly fast bit of play is difficult.

Add in the issues regarding connection outages etc, and the whole job can be quite difficult.

Given that TDs, caddies and other ancillary staff get paid, shouldn't vugraph operators?

[DJNeill]

Put in a different way, is vugraph a valuable thing to bridge tournament organizers?

[mike777]

DJNeill, on 2013-October-13, 14:40, said:

Put in a different way, is vugraph a valuable thing to bridge tournament organizers?

Put in a different way, is vugraph a valuable thing to bridge tournament owners?
As always lets put the onus ultimately on the players who own the tournament and as well as those who are delegated authority as leaders. It can help at times if the owners give their delegated leader a bit of a push and viceversa.

[FrancesHinden]

mr1303, on 2013-October-13, 14:20, said:

I've just spent the weekend operating the vugraph for the English Premier League.

Unfortunately, due to a lack of volunteers, the last match couldn't be broadcast. It was a shame, but it appears that a lack of investment in vugraph operators was the cause.

Operating the vugraph can be a very stressful job. Trying to keep up with the play, particularly close to when a player claims, or if there's a particularly fast bit of play is difficult.

Add in the issues regarding connection outages etc, and the whole job can be quite difficult.

Given that TDs, caddies and other ancillary staff get paid, shouldn't vugraph operators?

I wasn't aware that the EBU run tournaments with 'caddies and other ancillary staff' at all? The last time I saw a caddy was when I was one, a long long time ago, and I got a small amount of money. It seemed a lot to a schoolgirl but wouldn't to an adult.
'Ancillary' staff such as tournament host, appeals chairman etc get half price entry to the event
On site Referees get travel expenses (they used to get a payment as well but I'm not sure if that is still true)

However it's a horrible enough job that I agree it's not surprising that insufficient people volunteer.

But you do raise a fundamental question: for whose benefit is the premier league being broadcast on bbo? Until we know the answer to that, I don't think we can say who should be paying.

[gnasher]

First of all, as both a participant in the event and a member of the Selection Committee (which organises the Premier League), I'm very grateful to people like mr1303, who donate their time to do a difficult job, in order to improve the event for everyone else. I suspect that this doesn't get said as often as it should.

The Selection Committee doesn't have an unopened pot of cash labelled "support staff". The Premier League is funded by the entry fees. If we were to pay the Vugraph operators, the funds would have to come from the players in the form of increased entry fees. Vugraph coverage does benefit the players, but obviously those benefits would have to justify the additional cost to the players.

Suppose that we paid two Vugraph operators the UK minimum wage of £6.31/hour, and there were no other costs. Allowing half an hour for setting up, they would have to be paid from 10.15am-7.35pm for seven days, so the cost would be 2 * 6.31 * 9.33 * 7 ~= £824. With 16 teams in the event, that adds around £50 per team. Note that this is the lowest posible cost, whereas in practice it would probably be rather higher. Also note that half of the teams never appear on Vugraph anyway.

I'm not sure whether the players would regard such an increase in cost as reasonable, but we should should probably ask them.

[MickyB]

gnasher, on 2013-October-15, 03:50, said:

With 16 teams in the event, that adds around £50 per team. Note that this is the lowest posible cost, whereas in practice it would probably be rather higher. Also note that half of the teams never appear on Vugraph anyway.

Given that it is known in advance that division 2 won't be on vugraph, it would seem more reasonable to only pass the cost onto the division 1 teams, i.e. £100+ per team.

[paulg]

gnasher, on 2013-October-15, 03:50, said:

Vugraph coverage does benefit the players ...

Generally I think the major beneficiaries from vugraph coverage are the organisers, BBO and the BBO audience. I wouldn't have said the players but perhaps they are a distant fourth.

In terms of the English Premier League, the value to BBO and the BBO audience is quite small as the event does not have many star names. As long as any vugraph is on BBO is happy and the audiences for the league drop significantly when run alongside the Polish or Swedish equivalent.

I think the principal values of the broadcast are that it promotes the EBU (particularly at a time when it is starting BBO tournaments), helps the selectors see more of the event and provides valuable experience for some players of playing on vugraph.

So you might hope that the EBU funds this from its marketing and international budgets.

[hrothgar]

Personally, I think that it would be a mistake to pass Vugraph costs onto the teams who are competing.

Vugraph is for the spectators, not the competitors.
It doesn't seem fair to ask the competing teams to pay. Moreover, I'd expect significant push back if you were to do so.

If I were trying to arrange for Vugraph funding, I'd pursue two different strategies

1. See whether the National organization is willing to pay for a comprehensive Vugraph program.

Organizations like the ACBL and the EBU are chartered to promote bridge.
Vugraph is one of the best ways to do so.

2. Use a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds directly from the spectators.

In an ideal world, you might be able to get some bridge luminaries to volunteer playing in an online tournament or some such to folks who fork over enough filthy lucre...

[TMorris]

The value to the BBO audience as a group may not be that large but for EBU members who watch on BBO it will be more significant. Personally I would rather watch players I know in an event that has some significance to English bridge than a foreign event such as a Polish event where I have no idea what the systems are and hence what the bidding means. It surely has some benefit in educating this audience regarding standards and requirements for the top level of bridge in England. To some albeit limited extent it may help in raising standards through such education.

[gnasher]

paulg, on 2013-October-15, 05:06, said:

Generally I think the major beneficiaries from vugraph coverage are the organisers, BBO and the BBO audience.

Sometimes it appears that the main beneficiaries are the commentators.

Quote

I wouldn't have said the players but perhaps they are a distant fourth.

The players benefit by having a more authentic "big event" experience, by seeing how future opponents play, by comparing their own actions with those of the pairs on Vugraph, and by being entertained when sitting out. Some of these are benefits of the vugraph archive rather than the live coverage, but you can't have the former without the latter.

[paulg]

gnasher, on 2013-October-15, 06:53, said:

The players benefit by having a more authentic "big event" experience, by seeing how future opponents play, by comparing their own actions with those of the pairs on Vugraph, and by being entertained when sitting out. Some of these are benefits of the vugraph archive rather than the live coverage, but you can't have the former without the latter.

I think the 'big event' experience is important, but would argue that it benefits the Selection Committee more than the players.

Aside perhaps from Phil King, Burn, you and I, does anyone else consider looking at the archives?

[paulg]

TMorris, on 2013-October-15, 06:33, said:

The value to the BBO audience as a group may not be that large but for EBU members who watch on BBO it will be more significant. Personally I would rather watch players I know in an event that has some significance to English bridge than a foreign event such as a Polish event where I have no idea what the systems are and hence what the bidding means. It surely has some benefit in educating this audience regarding standards and requirements for the top level of bridge in England. To some albeit limited extent it may help in raising standards through such education.

I agree but I think the EBU audience is small and would be surprised if more than 50 members were watching.

[GreenMan]

Some players also benefit from raising their professional profile, which helps them find clients. I certainly would not recognize the name Bathurst, for instance, without the U.S. trials and BB on vugraph. And as gnasher suggested, the same may go for some commentators.

But I don't want the job of putting a number to this benefit, and in general it will accrue only to a small number of the top players who aren't already well known.

My hunch is that there's simply no economic model for non-volunteer vugraph operation. In today's media environment we get accustomed to having any competition available to watch, e.g. every game in major American pro sports and most college games are viewable somewhere, often without paying more than we already do for our TV service. But it doesn't extend to niche endeavors such as bridge, sad to say.

[hrothgar]

GreenMan, on 2013-October-15, 08:02, said:

My hunch is that there's simply no economic model for non-volunteer vugraph operation. In today's media environment we get accustomed to having any competition available to watch, e.g. every game in major American pro sports and most college games are viewable somewhere, often without paying more than we already do for our TV service. But it doesn't extend to niche endeavors such as bridge, sad to say.

As I said before, I think that Kickstarter provides a very good economic model for these sorts of activities.

I have contributed to a number of different projects including movies, albums, a 1/2 inch thick steel insert for my oven...
None of this is rocket science and the infrastructure is already in place to collect the $$$.

It's possible that folks won't be willing to contribute the necessary funds, however, you won't know until you try.

[gnasher]

paulg, on 2013-October-15, 07:57, said:

Aside perhaps from Phil King, Burn, you and I, does anyone else consider looking at the archives?

My partner does.

[GreenMan]

hrothgar, on 2013-October-15, 08:50, said:

As I said before, I think that Kickstarter provides a very good economic model for these sorts of activities.

I don't think Kickstarter is the right tool. It's for startup capital, not ongoing operating costs.

[barmar]

FYI, ACBL pays Vugraph operators $20 per session at NABCs. Which is the same rate they pay caddies. A caddy friend said he prefers caddying, since it's not as hard, and probably also because he's friends with the other caddies.

Myself, I'd do it for free because I enjoy it. But I don't refuse the cash.

[hrothgar]

GreenMan, on 2013-October-15, 08:55, said:

I don't think Kickstarter is the right tool. It's for startup capital, not ongoing operating costs.

Kickstarter is to fund projects

Define your project as "Providing VuGraph for the following set of events"...

[GreenMan]

hrothgar, on 2013-October-15, 09:23, said:

Kickstarter is to fund projects

Define your project as "Providing VuGraph for the following set of events"...

Kickstarter is explicitly for creative projects. ("A project is something with a clear end, like making an album, a film, or a new game. A project will eventually be completed, and something will be produced as a result.") What is the creative element of vugraph, given that it's been in existence for decades?

What benefits might contributors receive?

[JanM]

I certainly agree that Vugraph operators should be paid. I wish we could afford to pay more than we (USBF & ACBL) now do, but I can also sympathize with Andy's numbers. ACBL & USBF pay Vugraph operators the modest amount of $40 a session (with 2 sessions a day; Barry thinks of a session as a quarter, so his $20 a session is for 4 sessions a day). I suppose that's somewhere close to minimum wage (the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour for about 5 hours a session would be just under $40; some US states have higher minimum wages). It was actually determined based on what ACBL pays caddies at NABCs, although a session of caddying is shorter than a session of Vugraph. Certainly no one is choosing to be a Vugraph operator because of the money, but I hope that it makes the job more attractive. When I collect the money to pay NABC operators and put the amounts into budgets for USBF tournaments I am always amazed at how large the total is.

The question of where the money should come from is difficult. I'm pretty sure ACBL allocates Vugraph to marketing. USBF puts it in the tournament budget, but since USBF usually loses money on its tournaments, that really means it's coming out of general funds. When I first made a push to increase USBF Vugraph, I raised money from donors to pay for it, but that isn't something you can do over and over. It did allow me to go to the USBF Board and say "I have the money, let's see whether people like having more coverage." This year, when I wanted to improve the quality of USBF Vugraph by paying expenses for a few experienced operators, the Board voted to spend the extra money out of general funds.

I think Vugraph benefits many groups. I hope it's good for bridge in general, because it shows people who aren't yet "hooked" bridge at its best. Players like it because they can watch their teammates when they're sitting out (I always tell them they're supposed to be resting, but as an operator I see people who log in invisibly, so I know they're watching) and they can go over the boards after a session or event. People "back home" like it because they can see what's happening in real time. Journalists like it because they have a ready source of information about how hands were bid and played. Coaches and NPCs like it because they can "scout" future opponents easily.

I think that bridge organizations are the obvious place to get monetary support, not because they benefit more than anyone else, but because they, at least to some extent, represent all of the different groups and can pass money through from those who benefit. I don't want to charge spectators, because I think it's good for bridge to have spectators watching and in some ways it's more important for bridge to have the "marginal" ones (those who wouldn't be willing to pay) than to have the "addicts." More and more, it has become something that a top level tournament "needs" to offer as part of the package, but whether that means it should come out of entry fees or advertising budget or private sponsor donations I don't really know. I do know that opinions change over time. When I first proposed showing all of the tables in the USBC from the Round of 8 on, people thought I was nuts. Now I get complaints when I can't show every single table, even if some matches are very one-sided.