There are some interesting findings in game theory about cheating, which are discussed in this article by Stanford researcher Robert Sapolsky:
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1134/is_5_111/ai_86684497
"An additional factor that biases toward cooperation [in RHP terms, playing without an engine -LK] in games is 'open book' play--that is, a player facing someone in one round of a game has access to the history of that opponent's gaming behavior. In this scenario, the same individuals needn't play against each other repeatedly in order to produce cooperation. Instead, in what game theorists call sequential altruism, cooperation comes from the introduction of reputation. This becomes a pay-it-forward scenario, in which A is altruistic to B, who is then altruistic to C, and so on."
Of course, we have open-book play here, and reputation is becoming an important factor...
"One more way of facilitating cooperation in game-theory experiments is to have participants play repeated rounds with the same individuals. By introducing this prospect of a future, you introduce the potential for payback, for someone to be retaliated against by the person she cheated in a previous round. This is what deters cheaters."
But it gets better:
"In Fehr and Gachter's game, no good can come to the punisher from being punitive, but people avidly do it anyway. Why? Simply out of the desire for revenge. The authors show that the more flagrant the cheaters are (in terms of how disproportionately they have held back their contributions), the more others will pay to punish them. This is true even of newly recruited players, unsavvy about any of the game's subtleties."
Yep, right on schedule, we chess primates are establishing a police force (which receives no compensation) to create the possibility of retaliation.
"People will pay for the chance to punish, but not to do good. If I were a Vulcan researching social behavior on Earth, this would seem to be an irrational mess. But for a social primate, it makes perfect, if ironic, sense. Social good emerges as the mathematical outcome of a not particularly attractive social trait. I guess you just have to take what you can get."
I know it's not strictly analogous to what's going on here - there are some differences - but the parallels seem very strong to me. It actually makes me feel a little better about how things are progressing at RHP.
But read the whole article, it's good. Especially the part about vampire bats.