FIDE WCC thread question

[michiguel]

Several issues touched in this thread will be answered in one place.

Ruxy is not on trial here, so we are not going to debate this individual decision. We like Ruxy, his pictures, and I truly hope he keeps posting.

We can make some general statements about related issues.

On topic vs. off topic
The membership should know that in a thread that is "on-topic" you can sometimes digress and the discussion diverge into something off-topic. If is difficult to cut this off cleanly, and it is not our intention to disrupt communication. Normally, this fades away quickly and no action is required. Humor, pictures etc has been known to cause this and we always allowed it within limits. If it starts to grow too much, we tried to PM, suggests, and other attemtpts to avoid an off-topic branch to drown everything else. Generally it goes away, but if the original thread was hijacked, then we split it or another action is taken.

A complete different story is if a member initiates a clearly off-topic thread with not even a tangential relationship to the forum picked. Do not be surprised to be invited to relocate the post. If this starts to annoy the membership, do not be surprised if the post is removed. Almost all the time we notify our reasons.

This is not exact science, cannot be, and should not be. It requires judgment calls and that is the reason we have elected moderators. We have tried to be as consistent as possible in making those distinctions.

Moderation stats
Let’s see actual numbers of the posts removed that we have in the archives. In the last three months, there were some posts removed because they were duplicates or the OP suggested to remove them. Let’s not count those. From the rest, the majority (16) were personal attacks or insults. We had 10 trolling/spamming posts, which was an anomaly because most came from one offender that is currently banned. 4 posts were under the category of questionable legality. We had one that was a sort of a “customer service” for a commercial brand, and I count only TWO (2) that I can consider them to be in the off-topic category. So, the biggest customer are personal attacks, one every four days. We rarely remove other things but some are relocated for better organization (most of the time with consent from the OP). The problem is, a very small number of members cannot accept to be “suggested” to do something, but it is a very minor problem. Loud, but minor.

This has improved tremendously since we started 21 months ago and the overwhelming majority of the membership behaves like model citizens.

Chess posts
Regarding the “chess” posts, those fall under the category of “borderline”, in the same way that the few posts that are “pure” hardware with no connection to chess. We had an extensive debate about it a while ago, and we listened to the people. Technically and pedantically they are off-topic, but they cross very easily to the “on-topic” territory. So, here what it has to be consider is volume. When they grow too much (World Championship Matches, for instance), they could easily drown the forum and generate valid complaints. Locating those in CTF did not work, so this time, after a lot of debate, we believe that constraining that discussion to one thread will satisfy most people. We will see what happens, we may need to adjust this policy, but start complaining about those hypothetical posts before even the match started is an over reaction.

Public statements
We have made a policy of not discussing conversation with members because their privacy should be respected as much as possible. So, when moderation calls are evaluated, an individual member will not know what type of communication we had with other members, what posts have been removed, what post have been relocated with consent etc. We cannot do much about it, but just ask to consider that you may be seeing just one piece of the puzzle. However, we have seen a number of public complaints full of hyperbole and plain falsehood in which we are accused of some silly things. In those cases, we may start setting some records straight. There is limited amount of this we can take.

Reverse engineering
No idea why this topic came up now, but the policy, which has been very consistent is: Publishing findings of reverse engineered software without consent is not ok. The law may vary but it is illegal in many places. In fact, according to the charter, even if it is questionable we can consider to moderate it. We apply this to more than one engine. It is even worse if it is done in the technical forum, and the findings were completely irrelevant to the post itself.

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Independence day, Bastille day, and any other greetings we have seen I cannot remember now
We are not going to moderate those posts, which are very few, are contained in one thread, and expire in days. We are not biased by religion, we are biased by culture, tradition, and good will. Whenever those become a volume problem, we will deal with them.

Royalty
There are no nobility titles in Talkchess. If someone is trying to impress us with their pedigree, it will not work because 1) we know who he/she is already, 2) it is irrelevant, 3) it is inappropriate 4) he/she is not the only one. So, please, avoid it.

Again, this is not to debate individual decisions, because we are not going to do that publicly, as we stated in our policies <see sticky thread>, but just to explain and clear misconceptions. Our policies have been as consistent as possible for almost two years, but not inflexible. They have been maturing and hopefully being polished. You can continue expressing your opinions here. We will just listen. Do not expect us to debate.

Miguel

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

Several issues touched in this thread will be answered in one place.


Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Independence day, Bastille day, and any other greetings we have seen I cannot remember now
We are not going to moderate those posts, which are very few, are contained in one thread, and expire in days. We are not biased by religion, we are biased by culture, tradition, and good will. Whenever those become a volume problem, we will deal with them.

Miguel

My Birthday

Did you ignore it on purpose

[michiguel]

Several issues touched in this thread will be answered in one place.


Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Independence day, Bastille day, and any other greetings we have seen I cannot remember now
We are not going to moderate those posts, which are very few, are contained in one thread, and expire in days. We are not biased by religion, we are biased by culture, tradition, and good will. Whenever those become a volume problem, we will deal with them.

Miguel

My Birthday

Did you ignore it on purpose

The problem in that case is the volume, too many messages!

Miguel

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

Several issues touched in this thread will be answered in one place.


Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Independence day, Bastille day, and any other greetings we have seen I cannot remember now
We are not going to moderate those posts, which are very few, are contained in one thread, and expire in days. We are not biased by religion, we are biased by culture, tradition, and good will. Whenever those become a volume problem, we will deal with them.

Miguel

My Birthday

Did you ignore it on purpose

The problem in that case is the volume, too many messages!

Miguel

[pedrox]

Perhaps part of the problem could be solved if the engine origins subforums and the another were open to everyone without making a log in.

I do not read those subforums and the reason is that I simply do not make a log in to read.

If the world championship will be one of those subforums I did not read it. If photos Ruxy going to one of those sub-fórums I do not see.

So we're not talking about a simple change of thread information.

It would also help if you create a subforum for Chess simply unrelated to computer chess and where it might go perfectly hosted the world championship. It's ridiculous a forum for computer chess where you have problems if you talk about chess!

[kgburcham]

Did you read the message. It was SPECIFICALLY about the photo being "off topic."

I - Computer-Chess Club Charter

Important Information - Please Read Carefully

The Computer-Chess Club is a free service that has been set up by a group of individuals who became concerned with the persistent breaches of netiquette occurring on the newsgroup, rec.games.chess.computer, namely a very high level of off-topic posts and a very high level of personal insults and abuse.

It was felt that a group where a full range of computer chess ideas could be discussed, and, if necessary attacked, without also making personal attacks on the deliverer of the ideas, would be productive, and might well encourage various well-known figures who were no longer posting in rec.games.chess.computer to return to the arena of discussion without fear of insult or abuse.

Thus, the Computer-Chess Club is a moderated message board which is open to the general public (known as "members"). Its purpose is to allow the members to disseminate and exchange information as it pertains to computer chess without the distractions of personal attacks and off-topic posts.

Once a member gains access to the message board, he may read all messages and post new or response messages with the proviso that these new or response messages:

1. Are, within reason, on the topic of computer chess
2. Are not abusive in nature
3. Do not contain personal and/or libelous attacks on others
4. Are not flagrant commercial exhortations
5. Are not of questionable legal status.

A panel of moderators has the power to erase specific messages that violate the spirit of the charter of the Computer-Chess Club, and to take, if necessary, suitable sanctions against offenders.

Members of the Computer-Chess Club are solely responsible for their own posts on the CCC Message Board. The only recourse members have against any legally dubious or abusive material is to ask and assist the moderators in identifying any such material so that it may be removed swiftly.

The posts on the Computer-Chess Club message board do not necessarily agree (nor disagree) with the opinions of Your Move Chess & Games, I.C.D. Corporation, or Computer Chess Reports, and these companies do not control, and have no say in, what is posted or how it is posted. Nor do any of these organizations have any say or control over decisions made by the moderators.

By participating here, you are agreeing to abide by all of the conditions set forth above, and you are waiving any and all rights of litigation against those organizations listed above or the moderators of the CCC message board for any messages that may appear within or for taking any sanction against any member.

You are further agreeing to abide by the decision of the moderators should a post of yours be deleted and/or if you should lose your membership privileges after due consideration of the moderators, and also agree not to re-enter the forum under an alias or assumed name in this case. You also will be agreeing that the decision of the moderators is final.

Thank you and we look forward to your contributions

Computer-Chess Club.


Again, what seems to be the primary issue is that Ruxy repeatedly started threads in the wrong sub-forum, despite requests not to do so.
I'm sure that even when you were a moderator, you'd have lost patience with somebody who repeatedly ignored your warnings?

Ruxy has made some valuable contributions to our forum and I hope that he continues to do so, but it is also important for all members to respect the forum guidelines and to not deliberately provoke problems with the elected moderators here.

Of course, some always seem keen to provoke the moderators, whereas others are always happy to join in by bagging them when they respond.
No wonder there are so few volunteers for the job these days.

Fine. Then the WCC thread is NOT related to "computer chess". It should be removed using that draconian logic.

All I asked for was "consistency". This is NOT consistency.

Graham, if your going to move the picture posts, then you must move the OTB human match to Tournaments and Matches subforum. The low rated 2800 elo blunder filled games are not computer program related.
Lets be consistent. We should not police just based on our own personal self interest.
I agree, move the pictures and move the human match out of computer chess.
kgburcham

[kgburcham]

It is absolutely right that we should be able to discuss the FIDE match here.

No arguments. But it IS off topic for "computer chess". Hence my question. If the mods are going to remove one off-topic post and suggest it be taken to CTF, they should remove ALL off-topic posts and suggest they be taken to CTF. Otherwise it is simply a double standard.

I think that in this particular case, one poster was choosing to consistently post in the wrong sub-forum. Therefore the mods were quite correct in their actions requesting that he comply with forum rules.

But the mods don't have to comply with forum rules? You either enforce them or you don't. Can't be done indiscriminately without causing problems. Hence my always approach to moderation, "very light-handed". Ruxy's pictures don't detract from CCC whatsoever. Neither does the WC discussion. BOTH should still be around. Or, if one wants draconian moderation, BOTH should be removed.

Or you take a path between the two extremes. Given the diverse nature of our members, I believe the third way is best.

Well, that is the problem. Who decides the path between extremes? Based on what criteria? Why we have to trust in you middle path? Its a shame moderators cant understand this.

And the best way to stop complains will be to follow the rules, and enforce the rules. Then the only complain will be: moderators are strict. Witch is good.

Don't censor, just move all out of topic to CTF (as a trash forum)

It is based on self interests of some mods.
I see a pattern.
I got warned by a mod for asking Robert Houdart a question about the number 1 program.
amazing agendas.
kgburcham

This is the PM I sent you July 30 2012 (more than a year ago!)

"Some one complained that the title of this post is not adequate for the forum for several reasons. However, we (mods) believe the thread is fine and it should not be moderated. On the other hand, we think the following suggestion will benefit everybody: If a title is more descriptive ("Activation of Learning in Houdini") it will be better to attract readers to your post in case RH is not available. The title as it is look like a private issue and many readers may skip it. Most importantly, with a descriptive title, the search engine will pick the thread much better if some one is looking for learning in Houdini, for instance. You can always post and at the same time PM Robert if you really want to get his attention. "

You are accusing us of having agendas and self interest in front of the membership. I will let the membership decide whether this is a warning or just a polite message, with a a suggestion, telling you that we were NOT going to remove your post.
Miguel

The title was, "Robert Houdart question".
1. If your agenda is testing 2200 elo programs on small hardware then you have no interest in my thread and might complain.
2. If a person is only interested in OTB play he will have no interest in Houdini or Robert Houdart technical questions and he might complain.
3. If a chess player does not high level game then he would not be interested in my Houdini post and might complain.
4. If a person is in the group that thinks Houdini should not exist because of unclean code then he would be offended by my post and might complain.

I was asking a technical question to, at the time, of the programmer of the number 1 computer chess program at a computer chess forum and I got a warning about something from you, I am sure there is way more to this than anyone would admit because of agendas and attitudes and characters and personalities and levels of knowledge and egos etc... always is.
way more to this then just this post.
I assume this thread will be deleted by you because of this reply, I cannot delete yours.
best to you
kgburcham

[Dan Honeycutt]

This is NOT about whether a WCC thread is appropriate for this forum. It is about consistently enforcing rules. I think the WCC thread is fine. I also think Ruxy's pictures were fine. I've been a moderator probably more than any other person here, and I have YET to see anyone complain about the picture posts or such. There was nothing controversial. Nothing inflammatory. Just a picture.

If anything, BOTH should be allowed. But if one is not, neither should be allowed. Consistency.

Something that is sorely lacking here at times.

I don't have have a problem with inconsistency, at least to a degree. You might say allow both the WCC and Ruxy's pictures. I might say allow the WCC since it is chess related but not Ruxy's pictures since they have nothing to do with chess or computers.

The moderators are trying a solution to the WCC issue. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't but I give them kudos for trying something new.

Best
Dan H.

[Henk]

I would choose a simple solution. Only allow posts which are strongly correlated to computer chess. There should be no doubt about it. In this way readers know what they can expect.

[kgburcham]

No you missed the point Miguel.
Look at the titles for each group.
You have a moderator that is presently posting about OTB human play in a thread titled software and machines.
This doesn't seem fair to Ruxy and others that get posts deleted, moved, or when they get a warning.
Leave Ruxy alone or move the OTB match under the correct title which has to be chess thinkers forum, all others are computer chess topics. Lets be fair.