arti

Originally posted by GEOFFREY H
I have read your replies to those complaining about arti, defending him.
Your arguments all follow the same logic - he is not breaking any rules so let him continue. Exactly the same defence has been used by Members of Parliament in the UK who were caught extracting large unjustified sums in expenses.
Who was it said "For evil to flourish it is on ...[text shortened]... e administrators are sitting on their hands, afraid to act.
Arti should be banned forthwith.

I don't think Atri should be banned. You may be able to argue that the site rules should be altered, but I am not even convinced about that. I have been a member of many different sites and CC organisations over the years and people have always found ways to infuriate opponents. In the old postal days certain opponents would always seem to need a disproportionate number of repeat cards to be sent yet if one of yours went astray your death would be reported to the controller!

On another site I play at there are players with game loads of 3000 yet on another the tournament entry limit is fifty. Some allow computer engine use, others don't but don't enforce it. Some opponents drag their games, others won't resign. Some disconnect, play the time lags etc etc. The means by which someone can annoy and frustrate an opponent are legion. On each site/organisation mass resigners, time outers have existed, those that devalue your tournament wins by resigning the rest of their games in that section because they can no longer win and so on. Some sites sanction this type of behaviour with six month bans and so on. This one doesn't it just hits your rating if you do it. Nothing says that my twenty odd games on here are not backed up by a thousand games on other sites. Same as Atri could have games elsewhere.

Different servers appeal to a different types of player - some develop a brand identity and there has to be a certain amount of buyer be aware. I think RHP brand well defined, appealing most to the casual chess player and with it's free ranging forums. I have said elsewhere what I think about that and whether I would recommend it to parents of juniors in my OTB club or not - but if you are the type of person who is upset by the eccentric behaviour of some opponents believe me you will find that everywhere.

If you join a tournament with Atri in it at least that could easily be two games less to worry about when planning your appearance on the winners rostrum!

Originally posted by TerrierJack
...I don't want to affect how most people use the site because it appears that most people here act with courtesy and consideration for their fellow players. I just want us all protected from someone who has no consideration for others.

How not to affect others on the site is the real question? There are users who handle 700+ games simultaneously with no real problems. I'm not sure of the upper limit possible, but I'm sure its well above that. Any limit could arbitrarily affect other players, but might still be a good idea. i'm sure there are other ways to solve the problem, too.

If it gets to be a problem, I'm pretty sure the administrators of the site will act. My general experience is that they do things that makes sense, but it sometimes takes longer than you think it should. If you're really concerned, send Feedback, located at the bottom of the page. I've always gotten a response, eventually.

Originally posted by GEOFFREY H
I have not used abusive language, and who exactly am I "bullying"?
Atri is entering tournaments all the time while claiming to be on vacation. Clearly he is abusing the system and causing great inconvenience to many people. The question that needs addressing is why no-one in authority has done anything about this deplorable state of affairs.
I am beco ...[text shortened]... er and had zero response.
Come to think of it, are there actually any administrators at all??

I didnt say you were using abusive language, however, you compared Atri to an evil person, which is bullying behavior. How would you like to be called evil in a public forum? Evidence his evil nature...... go on try........

He is playing within the rules set down by the site, if you dont like the rules then send a message to the site admins, who Adram has pointed you towards and stop this vindictive and petty attack on somebody breaking no rules.

What do you define as a great inconveience? He is slightly slowing down a few games. Whats the most he can slow down the tourni's by his 'abuse' of the system? The most is the length of the vacation days. Otherwise he could just play to the extremes of his timebanks (or is that abuse too? - if so I am guilty too, as I am playing in a 21 day move tourni and taking a couple of weeks to move in each game).

Get a grip on reality, what Atri is doing is a minor inconveience at the vary worst, and I have games against him too, Im not bothered, when he moves I will respond, if he doesnt I will time him out - simple!

If you are a subscriber then you can have as many games going as you like, so can I, so can Atri - get over it!

flagging has begun, flagged atri 4 times today

Excellent!

for anyone who might be interested.atri is no longer on vacation(you may allready know this.) anyway,i just skulled him,and so can you.😀😀😀

lol same here

and everyone else on the site did too.......

Originally posted by chessisagame
and everyone else on the site did too.......

Not me. Most of the games timed-out are similar to game 6247456. What was the point in expending the energy to reach that position when your opponent never had any intention of completing the game? Still over 1900 games (most of which will never be completed) and he enters more tournaments.

To summarize the arguments above, no he is not abusing any rule, calling for bans is therefore simply unfair. How can one be punished for not breaking rules (for lawyers and really old Romans under us: nullum crimen, nulla poena sine praevia lege poenali).

That said, the 'no rule is being broken' argument does not prevent that he is obviously frustrating both ratings and tournaments. Some games he makes 4 moves and is timed out, while other games he finishes. Thus in some tournaments (and if he actually takes the time for his games he is a somewhere between 1600-1700 player) people get a free three points while other people in the group lose to him. Moreover, it wasn't exactly thrilling to end a game in a draw against him when he had 1200 points, let alone 700 after a series of timeouts while we started at 1700. This sometimes happens, nothing wrong with that, but in his case it happens all the time due to the large amount of games.

All this would not matter if it was somehow possible to manage 2000 games. If you want to play that many games you should be allowed to do so, no matter whether you make your move every time in the last minute. But in his case, he clearly cannot manage so many games, thus you get a series of timeouts (or early resignations, which I understand even less) and occasional wins and draws.

That is the only thing that I do not like, entering tournaments when you know you cannot finish all games in time is a bit unpleasant for those who do draw or lose when he does finish a game. Nothing more, but certainly nothing less.

So, no he isn't doing anything officially wrong, but yes it is possible to stay within the rules and still make people feel that your behaviour is somehow 'annoying', 'not nice' or even 'wrong'.

However, I think he will at one point have enough of it and will start handling a lower amount of games.

I pointed out all of this when I lodged my original complaint. I am not against the vacation system or in favor of limiting the amount of games because most players use these features responsibly. My suggestion has been and will remain that we just do not allow tournament entry while flying the vacation flag. That change alone would have seriously hampered his ability to mistreat other players. It also would not prevent people who were keeping up with their games from dropping out of vacation and entering a tourney and re-booking vacation to start the next day. I am not a lawyer (and don't even play one on TV) but there is such a thing as reckless behavior - isn't there? You can follow the letter of all the rules and still injure others by disregarding the consequences of your actions. I don't support banning this guy but 10 of him would be more than just an inconvience - they would ruin the site.

Originally posted by Erekose
How not to affect others on the site is the real question? There are users who handle 700+ games simultaneously with no real problems. I'm not sure of the upper limit possible, but I'm sure its well above that. Any limit could arbitrarily affect other players, but might still be a good idea. i'm sure there are other ways to solve the problem, too.

If d Feedback, located at the bottom of the page. I've always gotten a response, eventually.

I wondered about that and it would all depend in time controls.

If you were playing 7/7 games and were making 200 moves per day you could start 1400 games, and move once every 7 days in each game.

This only gives you around 6,000 moves per month which is something averaged by the top 30 movers this month.

Taking longer time controls into account I think a player could easily manage 2,500 to 3,000 games at a time without these being unduly onerous.

However the next thing you would have is a thread about Player A with 3,000 games only moving once per week, fortnight or 3 weeks in the matches.

Originally posted by adramforall
However the next thing you would have is a thread about Player A with 3,000 games only moving once per week, fortnight or 3 weeks in the matches.

I think the key point is that you could never enter enough tourneys to go beyond the limit of reasonableness if you could not enter a tournament while flying the vacation flag. If you tried to do that (by removing the flag) you would just lose the games you had been "sitting on" once you took off the flag so your overall number would not be able to rise to the stratosphere. That change would slow a player from booking more than they could handle without mandating a limit. The secret to the massive number this guy achieved was because he could sit on an already large number of games that he was already timed-out in and continue to add more. That is why this whole issue is not about what any chess player might want to do. Chess players play games of chess. They don't start an indefinite number of games knowing they have no ability or intention of finishing them. I don't mind players using their vacation or promising to play however many games they think they can handle. If you're here to play chess then play chess at whatever pace and load suites you. If you're here to perform disrespectful stunts then I hope the system incorporates some modifications that will help defend the chess players here.

Although I've taken a satirical approach to all this in the other thread, I do think it is desirable to do something about the practice of excessive game loading. It seems to me that the most salient points about the situation are 1. That the kind of game-loading Atri has been indulging in is annoying a good number of paying customers, and with good reason; 2. Atri himself isn't gaining any benefit from his game-loading, unless he takes pleasure in annoying people or attracting attention; 3. Atri has been acting within the rules of the site and shouldn't be punished or sanctioned as, technically, he has done nothing wrong; 4. The fact that Atri is currently operating within the rules is not a reason not to change the rules.

There's a parallel, I think, with the financial practices and lax lending policies that precipitated the current global financial situation. Even if no-one actually broke the law, they indulged in practices that had negative consequences for a great number of people, and this is a good reason to change the rules of the game to try to avoid a repeat. Of course, people will always find new ways to bend the rules out of shape for their own gain or amusement...

As a relative newcomer to the site, I am surprised by the number of games that some players attempt. 3000 is of course ridiculous, but anything over 100 seems overly ambitious. The problem is that there is no deterrent to taking on an unrealistic number of games, and a free resource will always be abused.
Here is a suggestion: amend the annual charge so that the basic level allows say 200 games at any one time; to play another 200 would mean paying say 50% more; and so on for each increment of 200 games.
This would be analogous to broadband where access is limited to a set amount of data transferred in a given period.