Jim Karpen Tips

July 2001

The hot game when I was in fifth grade was tetherball. Allen was the best, and he knew the rules. Sometimes it seemed like the rules always worked to his advantage. He insisted he had a rulebook at home, and we all believed him. But thinking back on it now, I realize that the exceedingly elaborate set of rules, even though consistently applied, was in his mind.

When I first came across Rules Central.Com, the first game I looked up was tetherball. But the rules weren't there. Sigh. I may never know the truth for sure. Maybe they'll add the tetherball rules when they implement their promised Kid Games section, but I suspect that no one plays tetherball anymore.

The site has rules for card games, board games, casino games, and sports. Poker gets its own category. There are also separate categories for hunting and fishing that list the regulations state by state. The sports rules include Women's Sports, Youth Sports, Sports for the Disabled, Intramural sports, and even Sports Betting.

The site promises to soon make available rules for Computer Games, Video Games, Fantasy Games, Parlor Games, Party Games, and the aforementioned Kid Games.

I checked out the Card Games section and was impressed: there must be hundreds of sets of rules available, from Agurk to Zwickern. I was surprised that it even includes a few with scatological names that wouldn't be appropriate to list here. The Board Games section seems equally comprehensive, from Acey Deucey to Zooquest.

Just for an experiment I checked out the rules for NBA basketball (the finals being fresh in my mind). I had a choice between a PDF file and a text version. PDF means that it appears on the screen in a nicely formatted version just as it would appear in print. (It uses a PDF reader such as Acrobat rather than your Internet browser.) I couldn't quite imagine all the rules of basketball in one place, but there they were.

The first rule had to do with all the technical details in regard to the court dimensions. The next rule described the officials and their duties--a very important rule. I then scrolled down to the rules on fouls. What causes more arguments in a basketball game than fouls? Here it is, in all its glory: "A personal foul is illegal physical contact which occurs with an opponent. . . ." That's it. I didn't see any discussion of what might constitute "illegal physical contact." I'm thinking of Allen, the tetherball player, here. I guess the referees keep it in mind the way he did. Which works, I suppose, as long as they're consistent. (But of course they never are, especially when the other team wins.)

© 2001 by Jim Karpen, Ph.D. (#272)