Chess.com Articles

 I agree a better search function would help a lot. I'd like to see a narrowing search function, where you'd get one set of hits and then could narrow that set of hits by applying a second search. Example:

I search for Michael Adams -- I limit to Games category and get a set of games. I'd like to narrow THAT set to only games that have annotations, and exclude games that are just scoresheet data. Or another example would be to select by ECO and then narrow to games with comments.

That basic selection process would take care of the "winnowing through" -- for my purposes. I have a very simplistic and basic criteria for a quality article -- one with commented games. Others would have a more demanding set of criteria and for that I think the magazine(s) idea is good -- with a human editor you would have magazines focused on history, or strategies, or players, or what have you.

The difference between a magazine and a blog?  -- you could have more than one editor's input.

The difference between a magazine and a group? -- you would have a "best of" the group's postings packaged into a finished product for distribution. And this package would serve the group (and the website) as a way to "reach out" to others, or draw others in to its group. So instead of "ghettoizing" themselves, as batgirl warned, the mag would "market" the group to others, if they choose that.

Does that sound right? 

I like the idea, but I would like to add that we put in a +/- system to each article. This way, whenever an article receives too many negatives (like -5) it will be either placed in a separate section for "not so great" posts or be deleted. Any thoughts?

ADK

Perhaps multiple "Submit your comment" buttons where the commenter rates the article simultaneously with the comment.

Cofresi, you still seem to have one basic misnderstanding of the magazine system. The content of a magazine would not (necessarily) be written by it's editors, it would be selected by them. A magazine would be a set of recommended articles of a particular interest. I agree with your defence that the system would not "ghettoize" or "balkanize".

As I said, a refined search function would also greatly facilitate the process of connecting reader and content. That would be true for readers interested in history as well. So your tagging idea is still very valuable.

ADK, I don't think there would be much need for such a system, if more refined ones coexist. But it wouldn't hurt anybody either, so if that's what everebody wants, I'm not against it. In fact, I would propose a star system, analogous to youtube again. That would be of some interest to writers also (perhaps).

Except many people "need" fluff. That is what they find can help them, at least for my level, mini-articles do help me learn. I am not a chess-genius, about 80% of the site will have a rating lower than 1500, even small articles on a particular tactic or trap can be informative

"Except many people "need" fluff . . .  even small articles on a particular tactic or trap can be informative."

But an article on tactics or traps isn't fluff and the length of an article has nothing to do with its worth.

"i think we can fix this with a few changes: +/- recommendation tool (or getting people to use the RATING star thingy more"

For what it's worth, let me go on record as strongly opposed to any rating system.

Hmm... Batgirl, why are you strongly opposed to a rating system? It seems harmless at worst.

Hmm... Batgirl, why are you strongly opposed to a rating system? It seems harmless at worst.

hmm. . . simply look at what passed for site trophies (now seemingly defunct) based on popular voting. Voting and it's first cousin Rating are open to easy manipulation and therefore not only just untrustworthy but, as such, totally worthless - all under the guise of being reliable guides.  To me, misinformation is far worse than no information.

I must admit, I don't know what site trophies are (a gap in my knowledge that seems quite severe; it's the second time they come up in this discussion alone), but I think I still understand your point. I agree that such constructions are open to manipulation, although I don't think that invalidates them completely.  But, in fact, even if everybody voted with complete sincerity and nobody cheated, rating systems would still be of very limited use. There are certain articles that I consider very bad and would rate very poorly (I'm not sure that's the way to put it, so I'll state for the sake of clarity that I am exceptionally good at rating articles), if I'd rate them at all, but I know are considered top notch by others. Suppose as many people agreed with me as there were people disagreeing. The rating for such an article would be average and therefore completely useless. It wouldn't reflect anybody's view.

Obviously I'm not an advocate of a rating system, but I do feel it's harmless. Take a look at our big brother in this respect: youtube. It has a rating system that allows everybody to vent their views (I must admit to succumbing on occasion), but is rightfully ignored by any knowledgable user. In other words, everybody's happy.

(There is one way in which a rating system might actually be (remotely) useful. For articles that are only read by a select audience, such ratings would have an actual meaning. But they serve no purpose that actual words wouldn't serve better. (Again inspired by the youtube analogy, where I have seen the ratings used in this fashion on music performances; never to the satisfaction of the critics, who would still have endless, highly esoteric debates.))

Edit: corrected some spelling.

If the purpose of this thread is to explore ways for members to more easily find appropriate and useful articles, then, while there can be individual differences in how to accomplish this, most people would agree that anything that hinders the process is "harmful."  Of course, no one will need to visit an emergency room after following a rating recommendation, but due to it's lack of reliability, the chances of such a recommendation being useful is possibly 50-50. So, I would say, yes it's harmful in that it impedes the process we're trying to improve (at least in theory, since we're also pretty much powerless to implement anything). 

Well, I suppose I should be more principled in my rejection of faulty systems. I do believe that the basic flaw of a rating system is the same as the basic flaw of what I dubbed the Batgirl system and that it is actually less harmful because it is so obviously open to manipulation. And it might appeal to many people.

But I agree it's a bad system, so, you've won me over, I'll vote against it, given the opportunity.

Well it seems reasonably effective/accurate. I play actively on 2 different sites and both is my ragin usually between 1650-1750. A site which tell you to look at a few problems and give your best move, for your ELO rating gave me 1695, so it is fairly consistent.

 yeah...

Doesn't the chess.com articles already have a 1-5 star system like youtube?

ADK

Haha, that's rich. I think that proves my point that a rating system is not very harmful, because nobody cares anyway.

But ADK, if you knew it existed, why'd you suggest a +/- system in addition? Or did you just findout about its existence also?

I was searching through my older threads looking for something else when I serendipitously came across this 2009 thread I created on Articles. 

Several things struck me right of the bat, so to speak.

One is the total lack of trollish comments.
Second was the civility, even amidst disagreement.
Third was the quality of many of the comments.
Fourth was the presumption that the Article section not only had merit as it existed, but that the content was so diverse, exceptional and plentiful, it was in need of better categorization.
Fifth is that Erik participated as if he still cared about members' ideas and suggestions. 

Now the forums are overridden with nonsense. Even serious threads are peppered with unwanted trollish comments. 
When did chess.com start attracting, and accepting, this type of status quo?

Now the Article section has been - not gutted as I started to type but- limited to a very specific brand-oriented type of article making it one of the least diverse, least interesting, least inherently useful chess area on the internet.  

Erik seems to neither care nor to be interested in member input, let alone to be influenced by it. 

I had already found these things obvious, but stumbling upon this thread made them so striking (to me). 

I skimmed it. Looks like taken from another universe.

Not another universe, just qualitatively a far better time for chess dot com.