i will he helping to run a tournament over Labor Day weekend, oregonchessfed.org/wp-conte … -flyer.pdf, in which all of the sections will be using the FIDE rule that any electronic device a player has with them must be stored in their bag and completely turned off during play.
I see CCA does this for all of their regular rated tournaments. What does CCA do if a round is about to start and someone says they don’t have a bag to put their electronic device in?
How does this event define ‘electronic device’?
By common Sense.
Let’s not get off on a tangent here.
If TDs were to use common sense, the rulebook could probably be shorted by tens of thousands of words.
I don’t know what CCA does, but some local tournaments with this sort of policy have had little trays (about a foot square and several inches deep) placed near each board, and what you do at the beginning of each round is turn your device off and place it in the tray. When your game is over, you retrieve your device. This has worked well at the tournaments where I’ve seen it done.
I already requested that this thread not get sidetracked.
I have played multiple CCA events where I turned my phone completely off, then placed it face down on the table and didn’t touch it again until after the game. I figure placing my phone in direct view of the opponent can’t be bad.
National Open provided clear plastic bags on the table for a similar purpose, even if merely symbolic.
Michael Aigner
In some events, they want you to turn your phone completely off, then place it face up on the table (and then don’t touch it during the game), presumably so the TDs can walk by and see that it is not operating.
Bill Smythe
Having the phone face up isn’t proof that it is completely off, though.
Isn’t this against FIDE and CCA rules?
I know some schools and concerts use the Yondr device to secure phones, but I have no idea how much they cost and the Yondr site doesn’t seem to have pricing information readily available, which probably means it’s too expensive for a small organizer.
Google says they’re between $15 and $30 each.
Neither does having it face down.
Some organizers have policies that directly contradict the policies of other organizers. In one tournament recently, I think the TD wanted all phones to be “out of sight”. My opponent obeyed a policy he had learned in another tournament, where phones were to be kept face up on the table. I was deathly afraid that the TD, a known (somewhat) hothead and not exactly the brightest star in the heavens – and probably not aware that, under current FIDE rules, a cell phone violation no longer results in an automatic forfeit, but rather a discretionary penalty or warning – might immediately forfeit my opponent, and all hall would break loose.
Fortunately, that did not happen.
Bill Smythe
Nobody has ever asked me or others players doing the same to comply with rules. Not even the local NTDs/IAs who generally follow CCA policies.
By the way, CCA rules on electronic devices do not explicitly follow the much stricter FIDE rules. If you don’t have a nearby car or hotel room, where do you keep your phone? European tournaments sometimes have small lockers with a key you can keep, but I haven’t seen those in USA.
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