I became a chess.com greeter yesterday and I have 3 games going on right now. I think one should generally be typical with such situations doing the least possible and expecting occasional bad behaviour. After all you open yourself to the world ...

I feel I am very friendly and helpful to those people that:

a.  play the game.  After all... we are here to play chess.  If they'er not making their moves I assume they're not interested in talking to me either.

b.  engage in dialogue.  My other games all began with my saying "welcome to chess.com" or some such greeting, followed by "let me know if you have any questions.  I'm new to the site but I can answer most questions you may have."  I have mostly gotten no reply.

What does my gender have to do with anything?  On top of that, if he looked at my profile he'd clearly get his answer.

Despite all of this, I think it's a great program and I will keep doing it for the odd person that takes advantage of it and has a good welcoming experience with me.

I had a wonderful experience as a "greetee" last January. I was paired with Kacparov, who was over 2200 at the time. I managed to force a draw and was delighted, but also pleased at how polite and helpful he was in introducing me to the bells and whistles of this website. The greet program surely is worth the effort some members are willing to put into it. 

@ nxaver,

You say: "I just thought that as a greeter one should be friendlier." therefore, i challenge you: become a greeter for two months and then return and tell us what your opinion is - of the types of folks you encountered.

(my personal opinion, not site management opinion.)

I just thought that as a greeter one should be friendlier. Not that one should generally be that polite with everyone.

second that point.  why folks ask A/S/L  or what is your gender on the internet indicates something about their own maturity level - given that there really is little one can do to verify or validate the response to such a question.

   when asked that, I generally respond with:  why would it matter and how could you tell whether my answer is the truth or not ??

@nxavar: I'm here to play chess and try and explain the site if someone has any questions. The guy cut directly to personal questions. He may have well as said "A/S/L?" I'm not going to deal with that. Other than cyber, what could have been the reason for asking that? That's what I wanted to know. That's why I asked why my gender was important. Its not a matter of courage. Also, I don't need a chess.com guide telling me how to speak to internet jerks (trolls) in order to avoid inappropriate dialogue.

I'm not a greeter but I think the newcomers would appreciate a more discrete approach than "What importance is my gender". Just have the courage to answare all questions that are not per se offensive and politely avoid answering the offensive ones. Maybe chess.com should publish a guide on that.

I have played 812 welcome games so far and I'd say more than 90% of them have ended with my opponent's timeout or the game has been aborted, which means that they just didn't make their move. Out of those that have ended with timeout most have ended after 1 to 3 moves.

However, I have also played against number (maybe 20-30) of very strong players and even some quite nice people in welcome games and a couple of latter are on my friends list now.

So, majority of those welcome games are pointless and a big waste of time etc. but not all of them, so I guess the system has a chance to become a success in the future if it gets improved a lot...

and now you know why many who have been 'greeters' have stopped.  it is a nice concept (as far as a concept goes) but the theory is at such complete variance with the practice that it leaves extreme frustration for both.

many will post:  move move move move at you, as if you were there, when in reality they could have read the information and learned it is 'move in 3 days' or less.

ahh well, you cannot always fix things, and likely it is good that way.  (not sure how anyone could fix the problem with this concept anyway.)

above are my personal opinions, not reflective of site management.

regards,

I went through a dozen or so as a greeter.  Maybe one actually finished a game.

Most just made one, maybe two moves and then nuthin.  They would time out but I don't want points that way.  Seems like a lack of courtesy on their part since I / we take the time to be welcoming and as a member I am paying for this?  I really like this site and would be glad to greet but no more nice guy.

pahatop bujang has a nice ring to it.  wonder what it means?

Maybe he is not allowed to play with girls...........