Let's make RHP a safe and better place for everybody

Don't drag me into this mess.

First of all, thank you to radicalcpp for doing the analysis and bringing this topic up. I'd also like to thank King Tiger for his input. My dealing with King a Tiger I have found honest and sincere. About a year ago, King Tiger invited me into his club, The King's Clan, saying the players in this group were all great guys and they did not cheat by using search engines. He obviously was fooled by TheBigKat. My first game with TheBigKat, I won on a book trap, which netted me a minor piece. I was as shocked as anyone that he allowed this to happen. He messages me that he was taking a lot of heat from other clan members (evidently he had never lost in the clan before - I wonder why!) and he vowed to punish me in our other ongoing game. . . And he did.

Here lies the problem. Guys like TheBigKat and Solving In Style probably are good players, but they become great players using a search engine. They don't even have to use the search engine for every move against weaker players. I was the weakest player in the King's Clan, and I think TheBigKat, overlooked me and before he got to a position that required real thinking where he would break out his search engine, he blundered.

For the recorded, radicalcpp has resigned almost all of his games, being distraught over bringing up this topic and redhotpawn not even acknowledging his concern. I have since then filed my complaint to redhotpawn demanding they at least acknowledge the concern and look into it and they are still silent.

Also, about 5 days ago (before seeing this post by King Tiger) I messaged TheBigKat, asking what his take was on Solving In Style and cheating by top players. I appealed to him that he was in The King's Clan, which I was told were all non search engine users). He has yet to message back, although he continues to play. I was just about to call him out by his lack of response, when I heard and saw that King Tiger already did!!

A search engine is something like Google. We just use "engine" to describe someone who cheats by using a computer program.

There's no reason whatsoever to assume that TheBigKat is a strong player without his Plastic Pal to help him out. The number 2 player on here for several years was someone called seadevil who turned out to be just a very average club player. The current #2, carpmaniac71, is even weaker and would struggle to get into my club's third team.

Unfortunately some genuinely strong chess players do resort to cheating. The most notable example (not RHP) is Borislav Ivanov:
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessplayer?pid=138575
I've known two players stronger than me (~2100 FIDE) on RHP who had match-ups with Fritz that seemed to indicate that they were not playing unaided. Either that or they were stronger than Magnus Carlsen when playing online chess. Neither player was banned and one is still active.

It may be that some players don't realise that using computer programs during games is not allowed. They seem to be allowed by most of the official correspondence chess organisations now. I wounder how many of us read the terms and conditions before signing up to this site? I certainly didn't. I can imagine that someone inexperienced at chess and who doesn't read the forums might not know that using a program during play is considered cheating on this site.

Who are you Data Fly? The site shows you have been a member since Feb 2010, but you have yet to make a single move on this site? Very odd that you would be talking about this site without you ever playing on it.
Are you playing under a different name?

Originally posted by cardinalal
Who are you Data Fly? The site shows you have been a member since Feb 2010, but you have yet to make a single move on this site? Very odd that you would be talking about this site without you ever playing on it.
Are you playing under a different name?

It's an anagram. Data Fly is Fat Lady.

Originally posted by cardinalal
Who are you Data Fly? The site shows you have been a member since Feb 2010, but you have yet to make a single move on this site? Very odd that you would be talking about this site without you ever playing on it.
Are you playing under a different name?

I love posts like this. People make such a big stink about past accounts, as if they mattered. I also like the 'shrewd detective' tone that leads to the painfully obvious conclusion.

So how many ways we have to cheat in RHP?? Software, fake member accounts.... etc, etc.... this list will never ends. !!
-
Who is clean in RHP???

Originally posted by Schlecter
So how many ways we have to cheat in RHP?? Software, fake member accounts.... etc, etc.... this list will never ends. !!
-
Who is clean in RHP???

Fake account? How is one account any more "fake" than another? 🙄

Originally posted by SwissGambit
I love posts like this. People make such a big stink about past accounts, as if they mattered. I also like the 'shrewd detective' tone that leads to the painfully obvious conclusion.

Miss Scarlet in the parlor with a candlestick!!

Originally posted by SwissGambit
I love posts like this. People make such a big stink about past accounts, as if they mattered. I also like the 'shrewd detective' tone that leads to the painfully obvious conclusion.

This message gets three thumbs up from me!

Originally posted by ChessPraxis
Miss Scarlet in the parlor with a candlestick!!

She's not as dainty as she looks.

cheating is cheating.Chess or not.It is a trend of someone way of live.How could they explain their actions to their kids and friends.

I am also finishing my games here and no more .My regards and respect to all who respect the game.

Dooma

Dooma, the guys that are on this site using search engines and multiple accounts are of low moral character and the guys that make light of this forum are just ignorant. I've only had one account (why do you need more than 1, unless you are trying to deceive?), and I have not plugged any of my games into a search engine to improve my results. How is that chess?

The sad thing is that honest and talented people like you get fed up and leave the site, while the dishonest players remain. I believe that the vast majority of players are honest (and many like King Tiger are high rated) but we have some problems at the top, how widespread, I don't know. Redhotpawn used to police this problem and for whatever reason is now doing nothing.

I love this site and I have met a lot of good people and have no plans at this time to leave, but I'm going to continue to voice my opinion, in the hopes that the adminstrators of this site will wake up again or the players that have gravitated toward using machines will think twice and mend their ways. I hope you stay and I hope radicalcpp stays too. Redhotpawn needs to keep our good honest players.

Originally posted by cardinalal
Dooma, the guys that are on this site using search engines and multiple accounts are of low moral character and the guys that make light of this forum are just ignorant. I've only had one account (why do you need more than 1, unless you are trying to deceive?)

Maybe I lost my old password. Maybe I'm tired of my old handle.

The only way the site is harmed is if people use multi accounts to play more than 6 games for free.

For you to lump people who have had more than 1 account in with engine users is patently absurd. Engine users harm EVERYONE they play. A guy with two accounts, of which one has 0 moves made, harms no one.

(Hate to spoil your little crusade with facts, but there it is.)

Originally posted by cardinalal
...
The sad thing is that honest and talented people like you get fed up and leave the site, while the dishonest players remain. I believe that the vast majority of players are honest (and many like King Tiger are high rated) but we have some problems at the top, how widespread, I don't know. Redhotpawn used to police this problem and for whatever reason ...[text shortened]... stay and I hope radicalcpp stays too. Redhotpawn needs to keep our good honest players.[/b]

"hope" is not a strategy.

think of it like a chess game.
the high ranked honest players outnumber the engine cheats by a sizeable fraction.
its a free for all, and there is no help coming from outside the playing area.

what are you gonna do?

you need a plan.
group together subscribers and challenge admin more forcefully?
group together players and dictate games on your terms - whitelists / blacklists whatever?

either way you need to organise (and stop waiting for someone else to fix it)