Originally posted by scandiumYou're pretty defensive, my friend. Can you not disagree with me without the rancor? Contrary to your claim, I didn't insist on anything. I merely posed a question: "Is banishment reasonable." Then I gave three reasons that I think it might not be. So far only one solid arguement has come back in favor of banning, and that was from the guy who pointed out that conditions here were worse before the banning policy. That's good. That constitutes evidence. Now we're getting somewhere
Or maybe you'd be a whole lot happier if you simply found one of the many sites that don't care if you use engines or not.
Really, how self-important you must be to show up out of the blue, play one whole game, and then begin insisting that RHP change a fundamental part of the TOS that the thousands who played here agreed to just to suit you and your opinions.
You also sneered something about no one else supporting my position, but you haven't considered the possibility that attacks like the one I'm currently enduring would discourage most people from taking the risk of posing challenging questions here. That's not a heallthy environment in which to exchange ideas.
It also seems that several people have misinterpreted my original post. I have no desire to play on a site that permits the use of engines during games. What I am questioning is the policy of banning alleged cheaters. I'm still not convinced that it's enforceable, certainly not without a lot of false positives. I'm glad so many of you have faith in the site's moderators, but how do you really know they haven't banned a lot of innocent people?
Oh yeah, one more thing. By show of hands now, how many of you feel confident that the site benefits from the banning of alleged cheaters. Okay, now keep your hand in the air if you also are strongly suspicious that I'm a banned player who's returning under a different screen name? (Be honest now.)
Those of you whose hands are still up have some serious 'splaining to do. Why do you support banning players when you also believe that those same people can come right back in and start playing again? Isn't that like spending a lot of time and money to send criminals to prisons and then not bothering to lock them in?
"Ban Yuri Sumnoffabich!" t-shirts and bumper stickers will be on sale in lobby after the show.
Originally posted by Yuri SumnoffabichAnd yet, the whole tenor of your argument, from your first post to the most recent one (quoted above) seems calculated not to discuss the abstract issues involved, but to undermine the anti-engine use policy incorporated in the TOS.
You're pretty defensive, my friend. Can you not disagree with me without the rancor? Contrary to your claim, I didn't insist on anything. I merely posed a question: "Is banishment reasonable." Then I gave three reasons that I think it might not be. So far only one solid arguement has come back in favor of banning, and that was from the guy wh bich!" t-shirts and bumper stickers will be on sale in lobby after the show.
Your entire premise lies on a presumption -- and it clearly is used by you as a working premise despite your characterization of it in terms of "skepticism" -- that the process used to detect engine use is highly unreliable and that therefore banning is unjustified.
You then claim, in response to suspicious criticism, that you wouldn't want to play at a site where cheating was allowed. Yet, what use is an anti-cheating policy which has no enforcement mechanism? And why would you want to play at a site which -- you claim -- makes judgments about cheating which are unreliable (whether or not banning is a consequence)?
The thrust of your position is that you do not support banning because the detection process is unreliable, but that you do support the existence of the putatively unreliable detection process. Thus, your position is incomprehensible except as a gratuitous attempt to undermine the integrity of the system by sowing doubt and dissension.
All this is taking place in the context of a rather prominent banning. You now show up, using what you pointedly admit is an alias, attempting to cast aspersions on the process. It is scarcely surprising that others accuse you of being a banned player. If you are not a banned player, then you are a mischievious individual deliberately employing provocative arguments, which you then retreat from and attempt to retroactively recast when you are confronted about them.
I presume the remarks about McCarthyism were a form of irony, in which case they proceed from a highly cynical and manipulative individual. If they were intended seriously, you would have to be adjudged a fool.
Originally posted by ivan2908Of course ivan2908 is joking, as anyone checking the games history of the player in question would see. For the benefit of any who might not have, Golden King began with a rating of 3050 and after 25 games had a rating of 3002 at the point of banning. Not the most subtle example of engine use, apparently.
Golden King is good example, find it in "Find player". Poor fellow played extremly well, it was not his fault, his talent did that to him, and unsensible admins decided to ban him. But he didn't cheat to achieve this rating.
Originally posted by Yuri SumnoffabichMaybe because I find your posts to be pompous, contradictory, and full of under-handed innuendo. You sow seeds of distrust in the site admins offering as our savior from their allegedly (and only by you) despotic regime your enlightened alternative, which isn't even coherent, that's built upon such a grand foundation of experience here at RHP that it constitutes one whole game.
You're pretty defensive, my friend. Can you not disagree with me without the rancor? Contrary to your claim, I didn't insist on anything. I merely posed a question: "Is banishment reasonable." Then I gave three reasons that I think it might not be. So far only one solid arguement has come back in favor of banning, and that was from the guy wh ...[text shortened]... bich!" t-shirts and bumper stickers will be on sale in lobby after the show.
You remind me of the tourist who visits, for a day, a large populous city with little crime and a community and its officials who generally get along quite well with one another and seem content with their day-to-day lives. Rather than adept to the adage that when in Rome, one must live as the Romans, you see only that their way of life doesn't conform to your narrow expectation of what it should be. So rather than adapt, or move on to a place more suiting your expectations, you take it upon yourself to preach that the locals are blind, their system corrupt, their way of life flawed. You attempt to sow discord and disharmony where none exists because you refuse to adapt and you're more interested in starting trouble than finding a place more conforming with your preferences.
Its been said before: RHP is not a democracy. You can rant and rave all you like about how flawed you think the current system is, but you're just farting into the wind. But I gather you enjoy the stench of your own putrid hot air.
Originally posted by Mark Adkins
And yet, the whole tenor of your argument, from your first post to the most recent one (quoted above) seems calculated not to discuss the abstract issues involved, but to undermine the anti-engine use policy incorporated in the TOS.Again, no. As so many others have done, you've misrepresented my position. I'm not questioning the anti-engine policy. I'm questioning the banning. There's a difference.
Your entire premise lies on a presumption... that the process used to detect engine use is highly unreliable and that therefore banning is unjustified.Yes, that is my presumption. So far, a number of people have asserted that I'm wrong, but no one has offered evidence. I assure you that I can be swayed by evidence.
You then claim, in response to suspicious criticism, that you wouldn't want to play at a site where cheating was allowed. Yet, what use is an anti-cheating policy which has no enforcement mechanism?And what use is an anti-cheating policy PLUS the enforcement mechanism if the mechanism is dubious?
And why would you want to play at a site which -- you claim -- makes judgments about cheating which are unreliable (whether or not banning is a consequence)?I suppose it's because I think it's likely to be a very long time before someone accuses me of playing like a computer.
The thrust of your position is that you do not support banning because the detection process is unreliable, but that you do support the existence of the putatively unreliable detection process. Thus, your position is incomprehensibleIt only seems incomprehensible because you keep misrepresenting it. (See above.)
All this is taking place in the context of a rather prominent banning.Of course it is. I hadn't given banning or cheating a second thought until ih8sens got banned. I had come across several of his posts shortly after I joined, and I had intended to take him up on his standing offer to play unrated games with lower-rated players to help them improve. I was planning to do that as soon as I finished at least one of my games-in-progress, and by the time that happened, he was gone.
I sat thinking for a long time about why someone like that would cheat. And I couldn't come up with a motive. (See my first post in this thread about motive.) And that's when I thought I should ask foks in the forum to consider whether or not banning is reasonable.
If you are not a banned player, then you are a mischievious individual deliberately employing provocative arguments, which you then retreat from and attempt to retroactively recast when you are confronted about them.I'm hardly a mischievous person. I'm just a guy who's keenly interested in issues of justice and who thinks it's good to have open and courageous discussions from time to time about how we arrive at it. And by the way, I have not retreated from my argument yet and can't think where you got such an idea. I'm always prepared to do so, of course, but only in the face of new evidence or sound reason. But there hasn't been much of that here.
Originally posted by scandium
Maybe because I find your posts to be pompous, contradictory, and full of under-handed innuendo.Then you're reading a lot into them that isn't there. I can't help that.
You can rant and rave all you like...When you're done foaming at the mouth, brother, feel free to point out where I have been anything other than a gentleman.
The post that was quoted here has been removedOriginally posted by Sicilian Smaug
You sound like the sort that believes fiends at the bus station saying they lost their money and need 2.50 to get home or else they're stranded! How could anyone be lying in Yuri world? Take the blinkers off. The guy at the bus station is asking for money. Can chess cheaters spend their rating points?
Originally posted by Yuri SumnoffabichYou did, very obviously, retreat from your position (which, incidentally, you have since resumed, rather inconsistently). You originally began the thread with the presumption that the process used to detect engine use is highly unreliable and that therefore banning is unjustified. Then, in a recent reply to scandium's criticism, you wrote: "Contrary to your claim, I didn't insist on anything. I merely posed a question: 'Is banishment reasonable.'" That is a retreat, since clearly you did insist on a working premise (without any evidence, I might add). Now, in the message quoted above, you explicitly admit that this is, and in fact has been, your presumption. You can't seem to keep your story straight. Either you are an open-minded skeptic investigating abstract issues of justice on a whim, or you are an agenda-driven individual attacking the process of banning as being without justification: and it's clear that you are the latter.
Yes, that is my presumption. . . . I sat thinking for a long time about why someone like that would cheat. And I couldn't come up with a motive. (See my first post in this thread about motive.) And that's when I thought I should ask foks in the forum to consider whether or not banning is reasonable.
As for your argument that ih8sens could not have cheated, because he offered to play unrated tutorial games with lower rated players to assist them, and you can't imagine a motive for cheating which fits "anyone like that", presumably you can't imagine Columbian drug lords, or Victorian robber barons, having innocent persons murdered or ground into poverty, because they lavishly endow charitable institutions (medical clinics, libraries)?
As a solipsist, my comments on the motive of "others" would be pro forma conveniences, but even I can come up with hypothetical motives, ranging from egotism to cover. Presumably, if one wants so badly to be regarded as an advanced chess player, that one is willing to cheat, one also wishes to bask in the glory of the ill-gotten reputation, and acting as "the shoulders of giants" for all the little people to stand on, might be a powerful inducement.
The post that was quoted here has been removedOriginally posted by Sicilian Smaug
Their reward for their cheating is the equivalent of a money return - The respect of a group of people on a chess site for what appears genuine ability at chess. I had considered that, too, but then dismissed it because it doesn't seem reasonable for someone to cheat in a virtual environment where they are only identified by an alias. The only way to translate virtual respect into actual respect would be to meet -- and presumably play against -- some of your online buddies in real-world chess, and at that point, one's cover would be blown.
However, I mentioned this thread to my wife over dinner this evening and she reminded me of this startling event: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4072704.stm
I will have to rethink my assumptions about virtual respect.
Originally posted by Mark Adkins
You originally began the thread with the presumption that the process used to detect engine use is highly unreliable and that therefore banning is unjustified. Then, in a recent reply to scandium's criticism, you wrote: "Contrary to your claim, I didn't insist on anything. I merely posed a question: 'Is banishment reasonable.'" That is a retreat, If you'll go back and read my previous posts you will find no assertions that banning should be banned. I raised a lot of questions about it, and I gave voice to my skepticism of the process, but I never insisted on anything except a discussion. If I'm wrong about that, by all means quote me.
As for your argument that ih8sens could not have cheated... I made no such argument. Correct me (with a quote, please) if I am wrong.
Originally posted by Yuri SumnoffabichLet's revisit your original post, point by point:
I ask this for three reasons.
First, I can't imagine why anyone (aside from a few smart-ass teenagers who just want to feel they've gotten away with something) would cheat on a chess-playing website. There's no prize money at stake, and one can't even gain status here because any status gained would go to a member's screen name, not to the memb ...[text shortened]... nts to a fairly trivial violation, one which can only be alleged but not proven?
First, I can't imagine why anyone (aside from a few smart-ass teenagers who just want to feel they've gotten away with something) would cheat on a chess-playing website.
Did you just discover the internet last week my friend? People cheat on chess sites for the same reason idiots troll forums: the anonymity. You don't need to be a genius to figure out that people are a lot more inclined to behave in a manner on the internet that they never would in real life because nobody knows who they are, thus they believe there are no consequences.
More accurately, that would be the reason they cheat online but would not, or could not, cheat in OTB chess where this isn't a problem. As to their motives, I'd imagine their pretty diverse. But you're a fool if you assume that because there's no money involved that there's no motive. People do things other than for money. I've played chess for over 2 decades and my net "career" winnings were $25 for a shared first place in a small unrated rapid tournament. So obviously I don't play for the money, and never have. Likewise I'm not being paid to respond to your posts, but here I am typing this anyway.
Second, I'm skeptical that cheaters can be caught with any degree of certainty.
The big 3 chess sites I've played regularly at over the years all employ anti-cheating systems, as do some of the online chess leagues. Its neither new nor unique to RHP. Further two of those sites are commercial operations that make money on the subscriptions people pay to play there; thus they have no financial incentive to ban players (who are occasionally money paying subscribers. ICC, in fact, will refund the remainder of your paid subscription if you're banned for cheating. Thus with money on the line, the very money that funds these operations and makes them financially viable, they have a very strong financial incentive to ensure their anti-cheating systems are accurate and detect only those who cheat. Otherwise they throw away money.
Third, what difference does it make, really, if a few people cheat?
1. It corrupts the rating system. If this corruption is significant enough the entire rating system becomes meaningless. Are you also in favour of doing away with that?
2. It deprives honest players of hard earned tournament victories that would have otherwise gone to them, which, again, if significant enough, makes tournaments meaningless. Where is the incentive to bother if the winner is simply the player with the latest engine on the fastest PC? Just what do you think chess is about?
3. It skewers clan challenges in favour of the clan with the cheater. The consequence of that is that the losing clan feels cheated (surprise) out of a victory that might otherwise have been theirs while the winning clan gets the victory but its cheapened by the cheater. This also makes such challenges meaningless.
What's left then of RHP that makes it RHP? Strip away or ruin the above and this place just becomes another crap site where you never know who or what you're playing against.