[mgoetze]

I don't believe in individual ratings in bridge, I think you must rate partnerships if you want to use anything similar to ELO. However, I think the current system of setting your own "Skill Level" is even more worthless. Therefore, I recommend it be abolished, and replaced by the following optional (opt-in) reputation system:

1. Each player may rate any other player he plays with along the scale "Novice" ... "World Class", keeping in mind the definitions set out in "Rules of this Site" currently.

2. However, these ratings are capped at the player's own reputation + 0.5, so e.g. a beginner would not be able to push someone else's reputation to expert.

3. Star players are an exception to rule 2: they can always contribute as high a rating as they wish, regardless of their own current reputation.

4. A player's reputation is iteratively calculated as the average of other player's ratings of him, weighted by number of boards played together (and optionally how long ago they were played), discarding any capped ratings (as per 2.) which would lower the average.

Since I expect that noone will understand these rules, I'll give an example.

Novice = 0, Beginner = 1, Intermediate = 2, Advanced = 3, Expert = 4, World Class = 5

Alice has recently played with Bob (8 boards), Cindy (12 boards) and Daniel (4 boards). She also played with Eve some time ago (8 boards), and with Bob a long time ago (12 boards).

Bob has a reputation as a good Intermediate (2.2), and rates Alice intermediate. The weight of his rating is 8 * 1 (for recent boards) + 12 * 0.5 (for boards long ago) = 14.

Cindy is a novice (0.3) and rates Alice advanced. However, this rating is capped at 0.8. The weight of Cindy's rating would be 12.

Daniel has somewhat of an expert reputation (3.8). He rates Alice advanced. The weight of his rating is 4.

Eve is a snobby advanced-expert (3.5) who rates Alice as a beginner. The weight of her opinion is 8 * 0.75 = 6.

So Alice's preliminary reputation is ( 2*14 [Bob] + 0.8*12 [Cindy] + 3*4 [Daniel] + 1*6 [Eve] ) / 38 = 1.46. As we can see, Cindy is pulling down the average, and since her rating was capped, we drop it from the equation.

Therefore Alice's reputation is ( 2*14 [Bob] + 3*4 [Daniel] + 1*6 [Eve] ) / 24 = 1.92, about intermediate.

This needs to be calculated iteratively, because Alice's ratings of other people might be capped, and her contribution different now that we have just calculated her reputation, etc.

I welcome comments on this system, and otherwise all I can say is: please, Fred and Uday, pretty please!

[paulg]

Personally I think it would just be a waste of the programming team's time implementing this.

Self-rating may not be perfect, but it is the people who abuse it that are the problem. This system does nothing to address the problem of people over-rating the ability of some and denigrating others. Additionally, it is very difficult to rate the performance of others with any certainty.

But most importantly I cannot see sufficient people caring enough to spend the extra time rating everyone.

I use a much simpler reputation system. If I believe that people are deliberately overstating their ability, they are marked as enemies. Seems to work fine.

Paul

[Mike_P]

I assume you're suggesting that one would only be given the opportunity to rate one's partner, not either or both of the opponents.....

[helene_t]

Mike_P, on May 16 2007, 03:28 PM, said:

I assume you're suggesting that one would only be given the opportunity to rate one's partner, not either or both of the opponents.....

Why assume that? It will take a long time to achieve 'advanced' status if you play mainly with beginners. Especially if many of those beginners are self-perceived experts who are convinced that all bidding disasters are partner's fault. And much easier to achieve 'advanced' status if you play with people who know you (and like you) in person.

When you're getting rated by your opps and kibitzers, you don't have those biases, or at least much less of them.

Somewhat off-topic: If you really want a rating system, let it be based on indy's and/or play with GIB only. There could be a pair-rating system based on pair tourneys and/or pairs playing against two GIBs as well. And there could be a peer-rating system for social skills rather than social skills, allthough I don't think that would be a good idea either.

Then again, most people, including me and (much more importantly) including Fred, don't want a rating system at all, other than what is allready available (stars, self-rating, the amount of money won in pay tourneys).

[Gerben42]

This won't work. Most players will either rate their ex-partner as stupid or they won't rate them at all. In addition certain groups will push eachother up in the rankings.

[mgoetze]

Gerben42, on May 16 2007, 02:55 PM, said:

This won't work. Most players will either rate their ex-partner as stupid or they won't rate them at all. In addition certain groups will push eachother up in the rankings.

If that is found to be a problem, you just have to change Rule 2, so that ratings are capped not at reputation + 0.5, but at reputation + 0.0.

That way, of course, you'll have to have played with someone who played with someone who played with a star for it to work. But if you do it for a while the trickle-down effect will set in.

And, I dunno, I thought people would be interested in finding a good game around their level. Making proper ratings would help them in this goal.

As for those rude people who will kick you off their table if you make even one bid they disagree with, if one of them rates me as novice after playing 3 boards with me, and then I go and play 100 boards with some people I know who rate me as intermediate, well, the effect on my rating will be small.

[Gerben42]

What I mean is that if partner made no mistakes, most players won't have a reason to give their partner a good rating. On the other hand if partner DID make a mistake (in their opinion), they will give partner a bad rating.

[jtfanclub]

No thanks. I would never sub in a tournament if my new P can punish me. Especially since the person in question may be partnerless due to his lack of manners.

I wouldn't mind a GIB/Indy rating system. I wonder if we did that, if people would pay other people to play their ID, much the way that people buy high-level World Of Warcraft characters.

[mgoetze]

Gerben42, on May 16 2007, 03:42 PM, said:

What I mean is that if partner made no mistakes, most players won't have a reason to give their partner a good rating.

Well, if they don't care about the reputation system, no. But then why would they opt-in? As I said, I would like this to be optional.

And if I ever find a partner who never, ever makes even the slightest mistake, I will surely rate him World Class. But even if he does make a slight mistake, say he fails to find the occasional double guard squeeze, I might still rate him advanced or expert.

[mgoetze]

jtfanclub, on May 16 2007, 03:42 PM, said:

No thanks. I would never sub in a tournament if my new P can punish me. Especially since the person in question may be partnerless due to his lack of manners.

The system can be refined so that players whose ratings are too far from average (e.g. they rate almost everyone Novice, or World Class) don't get counted.

[DrTodd13]

cardsharp, on May 16 2007, 05:25 AM, said:

Personally I think it would just be a waste of the programming team's time implementing this.

Self-rating may not be perfect, but it is the people who abuse it that are the problem. This system does nothing to address the problem of people over-rating the ability of some and denigrating others. Additionally, it is very difficult to rate the performance of others with any certainty.

But most importantly I cannot see sufficient people caring enough to spend the extra time rating everyone.

I use a much simpler reputation system. If I believe that people are deliberately overstating their ability, they are marked as enemies. Seems to work fine.

Paul

Waste of time? I wrote my own bridge system that I tinker with occasionally and I implemented this feature. It took less than a day to implement. I'm even willing to give the core of the ratings code to Fred. So, I don't think this is a huge time sink.

Doesn't deal with people being asses? In my system, you ranked people on two characteristics, bridge ability and "niceness." Assuming one would care about how nice other people view them, this gives them an incentive to actually be nice.

People won't care enough? First, they care enough to do it on Ebay because people know reputations are important. Second, you evidently care enough to set people as enemies so why don't you think people will care enough to rate people?

If your system is just to use the enemy button, how many hundreds of people have you had to mark as enemy due to false self-ratings? Would you have preferred to have a reasonably accurate reputation you could have looked at and avoided wasting all your time playing with people who you ultimately decide were too bad to play with?

[DrTodd13]

helene_t, on May 16 2007, 05:48 AM, said:

Mike_P, on May 16 2007, 03:28 PM, said:

I assume you're suggesting that one would only be given the opportunity to rate one's partner, not either or both of the opponents.....

Why assume that? It will take a long time to achieve 'advanced' status if you play mainly with beginners. Especially if many of those beginners are self-perceived experts who are convinced that all bidding disasters are partner's fault. And much easier to achieve 'advanced' status if you play with people who know you (and like you) in person.

When you're getting rated by your opps and kibitzers, you don't have those biases, or at least much less of them.

Somewhat off-topic: If you really want a rating system, let it be based on indy's and/or play with GIB only. There could be a pair-rating system based on pair tourneys and/or pairs playing against two GIBs as well. And there could be a peer-rating system for social skills rather than social skills, allthough I don't think that would be a good idea either.

Then again, most people, including me and (much more importantly) including Fred, don't want a rating system at all, other than what is allready available (stars, self-rating, the amount of money won in pay tourneys).

Certainly, partner should rate. The opponents should get to rate too but perhaps at a slightly lower weight. The purpose of such a system is not to judge your true ability in an established partnership. The purpose of such a system should be to determine how likely it is that you will enjoy playing with someone else for the first time. I absolutely don't believe a ratings system should be based on play with GIB. You could know the GIB system well but be totally incapable of handling ambiguous situations that may arise with real people. What is the difference between an Indy and the MBC?

[DrTodd13]

Gerben42, on May 16 2007, 05:55 AM, said:

This won't work. Most players will either rate their ex-partner as stupid or they won't rate them at all. In addition certain groups will push eachother up in the rankings.

How often do you play 50 boards with someone and only then decide they are a moron? I think that most of the "my pd is an idiot" is after playing a few hands, getting a terrible result and then they leave. As such, the "idiot" ratings will be mitigated by the small number of boards played with that person.

Likewise, you need to cap someone's contribution to a max number of boards otherwise two people can play with each other all the time and rate each other WC. You'd also need to see the total number of distinct ratings to be able to determine whether the rating was trustworthy. This is just like Ebay's system. You see how many ratings a person has and what the average is.

[DrTodd13]

Gerben42, on May 16 2007, 06:42 AM, said:

What I mean is that if partner made no mistakes, most players won't have a reason to give their partner a good rating. On the other hand if partner DID make a mistake (in their opinion), they will give partner a bad rating.

So you are saying that people on ebay have no reason to give a seller a good rating if the transaction goes smoothly? I find your suggestion totally without proof. All the proof I see says the opposite. People on ebay do rate sellers as good when there is no motivation for them to do so other than having a reputation system that is useful. The peer rating system was one big reason why ebay was successful. People immediately realized its usefulness and appreciated it and use it.

[fred]

It is a lot easier to rate a seller than it is to rate a bridge player.

I mean really - do you care what the average BBO member thinks of your game? Do you think he/she is qualified to judge your skills?

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[DrTodd13]

fred, on May 16 2007, 08:24 AM, said:

It is a lot easier to rate a seller than it is to rate a bridge player.

I mean really - do you care what the average BBO member thinks of your game? Do you think he/she is qualified to judge your skills?

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

I don't care what they think of my game but that is not the purpose of this kind of a ratings system. The purpose is that other people care about what other people think of my game. If I'm looking for experts for a table and a self-rated expert tries to sit down whose "reputation" is intermediate then that person isn't getting a seat.

In broad terms, I think people would do a reasonable job. Are you suggesting to me that you can't play 10 hands with someone and get a general idea of what level they are at?

[fred]

DrTodd13, on May 16 2007, 04:33 PM, said:

fred, on May 16 2007, 08:24 AM, said:

It is a lot easier to rate a seller than it is to rate a bridge player.

I mean really - do you care what the average BBO member thinks of your game? Do you think he/she is qualified to judge your skills?

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

I don't care what they think of my game but that is not the purpose of this kind of a ratings system. The purpose is that other people care about what other people think of my game. If I'm looking for experts for a table and a self-rated expert tries to sit down whose "reputation" is intermediate then that person isn't getting a seat.

In broad terms, I think people would do a reasonable job. Are you suggesting to me that you can't play 10 hands with someone and get a general idea of what level they are at?

No that is not what I am suggesting.

I am not an average BBO member.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[DrTodd13]

fred, on May 16 2007, 08:37 AM, said:

DrTodd13, on May 16 2007, 04:33 PM, said:

fred, on May 16 2007, 08:24 AM, said:

It is a lot easier to rate a seller than it is to rate a bridge player.

I mean really - do you care what the average BBO member thinks of your game? Do you think he/she is qualified to judge your skills?

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

I don't care what they think of my game but that is not the purpose of this kind of a ratings system. The purpose is that other people care about what other people think of my game. If I'm looking for experts for a table and a self-rated expert tries to sit down whose "reputation" is intermediate then that person isn't getting a seat.

In broad terms, I think people would do a reasonable job. Are you suggesting to me that you can't play 10 hands with someone and get a general idea of what level they are at?

No that is not what I am suggesting.

I am not an average BBO member.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

It makes sense to not allow someone who is intermediate to rate someone world class but I think that even intermediates know the difference between beginner and intermediate and "something better than me."

[jtfanclub]

fred, on May 16 2007, 11:37 AM, said:

No that is not what I am suggesting.

I am not an average BBO member.

Oh yeah, how do you know until we have a rating system?

[Echognome]

Personally, I'd much rather see more categories for friends implemented than worry about a rating's system.

Right now I mark as friends those whom I'd never play with, but enjoy kibitzing, friends from various circles, some of whom I wouldn't want to play with, but would like to chat with, and then different categories of partners. Having a customizable color scheme for each group, but would be fantastic.

As far as how others rate the people I play with, it doesn't really effect me in the slightest. (I rarely play with people I don't know.) But certainly if someone had a poor rating say for rudeness, then I wouldn't want to play with or against them. However, I don't see how this rating system is going to work when 1) rudeness (not to mention ability) is highly subjective and 2) those with a bad rating can always create a new account. Finally, I think it just gives people some silly notion of going for high ratings on what is supposed to be a fun site. I can just imagine conversations like "Last board. Thanks all." "Thanks. Can you give me a good rating before you go?" I mean eek!