I'm fine with Am Champ Guideline 18 being the authority for the Novice no-points rule but it would be better to put that in the Handbook.

I guess the point is that you don't need one to play in the Doubles Championship if it doesn't fill up. That is the current rule and the proposed rule.

Is the one full SNQ round requirement supposed to apply to Novice and Doubles events like every other singles division?

Kevin,
The Google Docs handbook comes straight from the handbook that is currently posted on the website. The only changes/additions have been recorded in a thread in the BoD section. I don't believe the sections that you are asking about were changed between the handbooks.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

Thanks for trying Justin but I am still confused. Rather than trying to clarify all my confusion on the applicable rules let me just stick with what is related to Doubles Championship qualification.

2.3 of the Handbook linked on the home page of this site does not contain the "finishing one full round of play" language that is in the Google Docs revised Handbook located here:

[docs.google.com]

I just wanted to make sure that "finishing one full round of play" language is the current BOD approved rule and make sure the BOD intended that to be a Doubles Championship qualification requirement for non-points divisions. If the answer to both those questions is "yes", I believe the Section 3 / G-18 change I have proposed accomplishes my goal.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/16/2011 11:50AM by Discjazz.

I'll have to go back and find the thread with the changes listed.

Unfortunately, the handbook was long overdue for updating. There were many changes that previous BoDs voted on that were never added to the handbook. Most of the changes that I added were issues that previous BoDs voted on. I'm sorry I'm not able to dedicate more to this. I'm currently the site coordinator for a summer school program. It takes up a lot of my time. I'll try to get that info for you.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

Here's the link to the changes that I've made:
[www.sndg.org]

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

That is a very helpful link Justin. Thank you.

It appears the BOD has not actually adopted the revised Handbook, but the BOD did adopt the one full round rule in Board Minutes 9/29/10:

[www.sndg.org]

That just leaves me without any authority that the BOD intended the one full round rule to apply to non-points divisions for Doubles (or Am) Championship purposes.

I suppose that means the Novice who signed up but did not finish a full round can still qualify in the last 2 weeks for the DC this year.

At this point I am not going to assume the BOD would let the Novice without a full SNQ round qualify for the DC. Since the revised Handbook is still in draft mode I imagine that is where my proposed rule belongs as well.

I think I'm done here and can shut up about it, at least for now. Everybody say yeah.

Let me know if I can help further.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/17/2011 11:38AM by Discjazz.

We all follow the changes as they come out or as they are instructed (some are immediate some or "next season").

The hand book is just a culmination of all the changes made over the past 5+ years. Justin has thankfully taken the daunting task of compiling all the changes that are SUPPOSED to be followed and put them in one place. As it has been stated for 3+ years now, we don't have access to the file that is on the front page of this site. We can NOT make changes to it as such. So it was getting very hard and confusing for players when subtle changes were introduced.

As I said, thankfully Justin is resolving this by compiling all the changes into a single book that can be edited by the BOD present and future. This is a step forward in the right direction for sure!

Officially adopting the handbook as written by Justin is more a trivial matter of making sure that Justin isn't leaving anything out or stating a rule incorrectly. Or as is the case here making sure the wording is as lawyer proof as possible (a completely impossible task as I'm sure you know). Justin is basically making sure he isn't over stepping his boundaries by single handedly writing the rules down. I applaud him in his work and his effort to make sure it is done ethically, democratically and by the books.

Great job Justin, keep it up!

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I agree with everything you just wrote Gilly. I especially appreciate Justin's work on the revised Handbook and his responses to my questions.

You could however just admit there is a big difference between writing a rule that is less than perfectly lawyer proof and writing a rule that is completely different than what everyone thought or intended. Both can happen without criticism to the drafters, especially volunteers, but neither is an excuse for not following the writing.

Well, in a series such as ours, I would hope that intention would reign over mis-written versions of said intentions.

Many people often mis-speak and say "I could care less about ..." when in reality they meant "I couldn't care less about ..." Now just because they mis-speak would you go off what they actually said or what you knew they meant by the statement?

Of course we are not in a court of law... this is real life. ;)

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I remember playing in a lot of events back when there were no SN written rules as far as I know, just what the TD said & PDGA playing rules. I think I could have just as much fun now if there weren't any SN written rules. I could get by with fewer rules anyway but since we have them I thought it would be good to read them to determine qualification. Thanks to you guys I was able to read them but it turns out that is not a good way to learn the SN rules, yet. Maybe it shouldn't be I guess is what you are saying.

Just saying we aren't all technical writers and sometimes it shows.

Hopefully, with the help of guys like you and Justin we can get this hammered out and put the original intent into the letter of the handbook better so that when someone wants to sit down and read up on the rules they can do so with the least confusion.

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Take me to the window and understand
I got a rocking chair in my skin.
And every time the wind blows
It brings me down to meet the mood I'm in.
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Thanks for the input Kevin.

It's a continued work in progress. I've e-mailed Brian over a month ago to get the GoogleDocs handbook link added to the front page of our website. It has yet to be done. Our situation now in regards to the handbook is much better than what it was before, yet it's still not perfect.

When I've added something to the handbook, I typically add verbatim to what the previous BoD voted on. However, if they did not write out what the change was/is, then I consult the rest of the current BoD in wording. Like Gilly said, it would take someone with legal knowledge or technical writing experience. I only took 1 technical writing class in college, and it wasn't very helpful.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

If you guys need help you should ask for it from the players. You are not supposed to have to do everything, except the decision making. You asked me for a re-write so I did. There are plenty who post in these threads that could prolly write a clean code section or shore up the overall. I'm off mission fixing rules but it never hurts to ask.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/22/2011 09:58PM by Discjazz.

Well, therein lies another problem. Typically, when we (I) ask for help, people get quiet. There is a ton of criticism and complaining about the way things are, but they all get quiet when we ask for suggestions or input to fix it.

You can go back and see plenty of threads where I've asked for help with the handbook, by-laws, and forum guidelines wording.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

Your point is well taken Justin. To clarify, my suggestion is to ask a specific person to help with a specific issue. If you just ask for help generally, many like me will assume someone else will take care of it. Many like me are not trying to be volunteers or bigger volunteers, but also don't like to say "no" when asked for help. Also I just don't go around minding other peoples business. So I'm not trying to call anybody out, but these are players off the top of my head I imagine would be good at re-writes; Robert Williams, Bryan Griffin, Don Perkins, Mike Kernan.
I will go ahead and offer some general suggestions:

Step 1: I think Gilligan has made a point that should not be dismissed summarily. Do we really want to follow written rules? If we are going to give priority to widespread beliefs of intentions stop with the writing now. Don't write rules unless we intend to live by the words we use. It is a waste of time. OTOH, if we are going to make a commitment to following the words of written rules, then move to Step 2.

Step 2: Do we have the capacity? Are we able to fairly publish written rules? We have to find a way to fairly publish or we should not bother. I do applaud Brian for not putting a link to the revised Handbook on this site as requested because the BOD has not officially adopted it. I also applaud the BOD for not adopting it yet because it is not ready and would just add to the confusion. I think the answer is yes, and if you agree move to step 3.

Step 3: Ask one of the guys mentioned to write up a review of what rules in the Handbook / Guidelines need fixing just so they make sense - no rule making decisions involved, just language clarification.

Again for clarification, those are steps (decisions) the BOD should take/make, not one member of the BOD.

Kevin... for the record that isn't a point *I* was making... that is a bit of twisting there.

Obviously we need something written so people can reference it. Now, since we don't have paid employees and holy cow if we actually paid someone their worth to do a job that is needed in the SN. It is hard to write down the EXACT wording that is needed to make it rock solid. Hell, the group that does have over paid employees keep revising because it's almost impossible to make it that rock solid.

The best we can do is write down with best intentions what we want it to say and count on folks like you to help us along the way by showing us the err in our way err... wording. ;)

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I wouldn't necessarily applaud Brian for not putting up the link to the handbook. I can't even get a response from him. The absence of the link isn't due to his upstanding belief that the handbook isn't correct....
We have 2 different evils when it comes to the handbook right now:
1. The current link is outdated and is missing a ton of amendments that previous BoDs have voted on. If we only link the OLD handbook, it would require players to go through the old threads in the BoD section of the forum to find out rule amendments.
2. The revised handbook isn't perfect. Even though it includes all of the amendments that previous BoDs implemented, the wording isn't crystal clear.

Even if we do adopt the new handbook and have it revised to 100% perfection, would it even be posted on the website?

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

You are correct that I do not know whether Brian will give us a new home page link. If you can't get a response from him then you don't know either. My point is that he has absolutely no reason to do so yet based on my knowledge of what has occurred.

I have laid out the first 3 steps. If the BOD follows them I'll be glad to lay out the rest. Then we will have our answer. Either we are satisfied with a Forums link, have to have another site or Brian will make the home page link. At this time we don't know and will not until we actually give him a good reason to make a new Handbook link. We have not done that.

It's not a matter of the revised Handbook being perfect. We may always have rules that as applied to unanticipated circumstances are subject to more than one interpretation. What we can do is make sure at least one of the possible interpretations is the rule we intended under expected circumstances and makes some sense. The revised Handbook like the home page link Handbook falls far short of that.

Well from my experience, meetings are rushed and lack good organization... Motions are too often rushed and VERY unclear, to the point that I refuse to vote till it is clarified. Often two members will think they are voting on different details until someone clarifies.

I think that is part of the reason the wording gets lost and we assume the "meaning" is understood.

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Take me to the window and understand
I got a rocking chair in my skin.
And every time the wind blows
It brings me down to meet the mood I'm in.
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Agreed

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

I don't pretend to know the struggles of being a BOD member. I imagine you do your best. I respect and appreciate that. It seems to me there should be no rule-making vote except on specific written language and that has the capacity to avoid error better than voting on concepts. Maybe I don't understand the process well enough but I'm still hoping I don't need to.

I just don't think anybody outside the BOD should be willing to put in their time on rules unless the written words approved will control, they will be published fairly, one way or another, and the BOD actually decides they want help fixing them. Otherwise I will just shut up and throw.

Well, if we're implementing something new, we do vote on rule based on what the wording is. If we were to look at the chat logs in which a new rule was voted on, you would see that I type out what the rule will be so that we can all vote on it.

However, as you've brought attention to, this presents a problem. It's easy to see the intent of a rule if you already know what it is supposed to be. Someone reading the rule for the first time without an explanation or preface from someone who already understands it could interpret it to mean something completely different due to ambiguous wording.

It'll always be a work-in-progress. I really appreciate your efforts in helping us with constructive criticism vs. the usual insults.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

"Someone reading the rule for the first time without an explanation or preface"

That is exactly why I think getting outside help would be a good idea. Reading without pre-conception is a developed skill. Not everyone needs that skill in every day life but a rule writer should have it.

I agree.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Justin Tolbert
BHS Disc Golf [www.youtube.com]
Mobile, Alabama

I also agree 100%!

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Take me to the window and understand
I got a rocking chair in my skin.
And every time the wind blows
It brings me down to meet the mood I'm in.
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Just advised 2 more doubles teams today they could not play the 2011 SNDC due to lack of points in the last completed season. I really hated telling them that points in the "current ... season" don't count, even though Handbook 3.2 says they do. Of course I also advised them I am no authority and to ask the TD if they are qualified. Too bad there is no exception for the SN Cup regardless of season.

It really is too bad that your friends didn't play in the 2010-2011 season otherwise they could've played in the 2011 SNDC.

Well it's not too bad. They would have qualified if it had been important enough to them to play tournaments very often. Also, being denied may have saved somebody some money.

So if my friend only played novice for last season and doesn't have any points then he could qualify to play in the doubles tourney if there are still spots open, even if he doesn't have any points??