I am getting really tired of people simply leaving games.  I'm talking about people who do not resign and simply let their time run out. I am currently playing a game where the timer was set to 108 minutes. I pulled ahead in the game, and suddenly my opponent isn't making any moves.

My suggestion is that you create a feature to counter this.  For long games such as this, maybe the site could implement a button to press which causes a user to automatically resign if they do not make a move in say... 10 minutes, which is plenty of time in my opinion.

Although I know what you mean, Im sorry to say It wouldnt work. 

If you study master and grand master games, Or happen to know afew (which I do) you will come to realize that they might take a half hour to make 1 move. So It wouldnt really be fair to these people If they did what you think they should. 

Final verdict:Im sorry to say, You cant please everyone 

Why play 100+ minute games if you think that 10 minutes is way too long for a move?

it sounds like he means a popup like they have in chess mentor.  it basically says "hey, it's been a while, are you still thinking?"  pop up at ten minutes and if you don't click in 2 mintues you forfeit.  i am not sure how annoying this will be to people though.  i am guessing people don't often spend 10 minutes thinking about one move, so it probably wont be that big of a deal. 

100+ minute games.....wow...just wordless...

just so you know, we do punish those people (they get flagged for violating the FAIR PLAY policy and eventually are unable to play). 

we have considered a "are you there?" button that must be clicked every 3-7 minutes (randomly so it can't be predicted) and give 30 seconds to respond. but even then, rude people will just check back every few minutes or just sit there and punish. jerks :( 

good point.  why do jerks have to be so smart. 

But isn't one of the advantages of hundred minute games being able to use the bathroom?, in which case this is far too little time.

Haywood can relate.

It's not funny and I'm serious and I'm not fat godammit!

How many times do they get to abandon games before they violate FAIR PLAY and how long are they barred from playing? Just curious.

not telling on the first question (to avoid gaming the system). they can never play openly again. they will have to play with friends until they reduce their ratio of poor play

Could you make a statistic next to their rating (or somewhere) that shows the # of games in last (let's say... ) 10 days a player does what prompts that message "such-and-such may have violated the fair play policy and may have their account restricted"? Users don't abandon games on purpose if they're winning, so if the statistic only involves games that someone abandons, or lets time run out, while losing, people can make up their own minds whether to play someone that twice in the last week "couldn't come up with a move for the last 10 minutes of the game" or "had a bad connection," which (by some crazy coincidence) occured right after their queen got forked, or they found themselves down by 10 pieces.

it's a win-win: keeps users from leaving the site (more likely to resign and start another game to boost their self-esteem, rather than look at their 5 myspace friends during the last 10 minutes of a game in a triumphant act of revenge), and it keeps good users happy