IAABO Board 666 (Northwest Romania) ...
 

Not everyone. Mark T. DeNucci, Sr., from IAABO (Lake Erie District) Board #55 is a notable exception. If you need any interpretations from the 19th century, he's your man. There are a few other notable "non-hiders" as well.

I, on the other hand, for reasons outlined below, prefer to hide behind my screen persona: BillyMac, an environmental chemical analyst, from a little corner of Connecticut. Seems innocent enough. However, most veteran Forum members know that, in reality, I'm just a sweet transvestite from Transexual, Transylvania.

Reasons for posting anonymously? Here's one example. On November 6, 2006 Chuck Elias, IAABO Board #31 (Hampden County, Massachusetts) rules interpreter, and a highly respected Official Forum member, left the Official Forum. Here's a copy of his post that day:

"After talking about this with some friends from the board and some other officials, I've decided to stop contributing to the forum. As Mick alluded to in the baseball thread, I was hired by a couple of D1 conferences, although I didn't receive any assignments from one of them. Although it's not very likely, I don't want any of my comments to be misconstrued and then passed on to an assignor. Fear not, I will be back to start the annual baseball thread. And I'll keep reading. But I won't be posting very much anymore. If for some unknown reason somebody wants my input on something, you could still email me through the forum. It's been great, guys and gals. Everybody have a great season".

It appears that ChuckElias was a man far ahead of his time. According to one of our local IAABO board officers, who attended last year's IAABO fall meeting, there was a discussion at that meeting regarding legal issues in which it was strongly suggested that officials not participate in "chat rooms". Shortly after ChuckElias went incognito, one of my mentors suggested that I do the same, which I did. According to the legal issues covered at the IAABO fall meeting, I guess it really is a good idea to post incognito.

This is what's known as hyperbole. It may be difficult to tell veteran officials from rules interpreters. It may be difficult to tell veteran high school officials from mid-level college officials. It may be difficult to tell long-time JV officials from mid-level varsity officials.

It may be all of those things, but it's certainly not "difficult to tell the rookies from the highly learned."

Well, bainsey, at NO time in this thread that I can see did I ever ask you to disclose your source. Nor did I disclose the true identity of the IAABO board interpreter that has already posted in this thread that you and your "high ranked interpreter that assists with RefSchool" are both full of sh!t, to put it bluntly but truthfully. My words, not his...before he e-mails me screaming. :D What I did ask you was if you asked your board interpreter the identical question that you posted here, along with the answers and reasons for those answers that you were given here. You know, the question that you say is "yes" but everyone else says is "no". Your failure to respond directly to that certainly speaks volumes to me.

And believe me, I can tell YOU very easily from the highly learned. No matter whether you might happen to have 5 years in, you're still a rookie in knowledge and experience.

+1 on that!