Is Chess.com run by Racists and Negrophobes?

I've been a Chess.com moderator since April this year, and sometimes when an account is disabled for spam, that's because it may have triggered the automatic spam detection routine: this is a routine that detects and disables accounts that create more than a given number of posts or sends more than a given number of messages in a given timeframe. I am not personally familiar with what the various threshholds used by this automatic routine are, but it has been known to incorrectly disable the accounts of Administrators of the larger groups after they've sent a legitimate message to their whole group.

In such cases, we ask people to contact support@chess.com or to use the link at https://support.chess.com/customer/portal/emails/new, and their account will be re-activated: we can then also flag that account as a "not spam" account so it doesn't happen to them again.

This is the routine that disabled your account on Dec 4 - I do not know why, although it doesn't seem to be for forum posts: I do not have access to your messages so I can't check those, but as you are not part of any groups that seems unlikely: you can submit a ticket about it through the link above if you'd like it investigated, but I will also see what I can find out through other channels. After checking your account, the Support team would have been happy to re-activate it: the fact that you're asking is generally a good indicator that you're not the sort of spammer that the automated routine is policing. This is not a decision that is influenced by the person's race, country of origin, name, height, weight, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation or any other sort of extraneous detail.

Regarding offensive content, if the moderators see it or if it is reported to Support by a member (through the link above, with screen shots is helpful), then it will be removed and the offender warned: if the content is egregious enough or if they have ignored the previous warning and continued to post in that manner, then the normal action is to mute that account: this means that the account can continue to play chess here, but can no longer create any content (they can't post in the forums, send messages or speak in Live Chess Chat). If it's clear that the account is simply a spam or a troll account, it may be disabled rather than muted.

Chess.com has a very open membership policy, which means - as Martin has helpfully pointed out - that there is a lot of content to police amongst a largely volunteer moderating team. It also means that trolls can return under new aliases even though their previous accounts have been muted and/or disabled, and it can be hard to identify them: we value the assistance of the community in this regard wherever possible.

Please report any instances of abuse (racism, misogyny, homophobia, profanity, vulgarity, etc etc etc) through to the Support team via https://support.chess.com/customer/portal/emails/new, who will investigate - this may take a few days. For really severe instances of abuse, such as pornographic pictures in the forums, please report this in the Help & Support Chat room - there should almost always be a moderator in that room who can action something immediately. Please note, someone calling you nasty names in chat is NOT something that the moderators will action immediately: report them through the link above, but the FAQ entries linked by Martin earlier are also very helpful:

• https://support.chess.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1444785-my-opponent-said-some-very-abusive-and-rude-things-what-should-i-do-
• https://support.chess.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1444877-what-should-i-do-if-another-member-is-rude-or-abusive-
• https://support.chess.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1444846-what-are-the-rules-of-behavior-for-live-chess-

I hope that helps!

Publicly?  were?  suppose? (FYP)  You clearly cannot speak (or type for that matter) the English language, nor can you effectively grasp the point of the forum, so any future entertaining your trollery is beyond pointless. 

I will say that I have worked as a Software Developer for 12 years doing mostly Database architecture, python/C++ programming, and .NET framing.  Not that I expect you to know what any of that entails.

What I find very appealing about chess is that accross the board, race, religion, politics, whatever, melt away and what we are left with is chess.  I doubt very seriously chess.com could care less about any of those things.

In terms of returning Trolls,  why does'nt Chess.com simply block the IP addresses of the accounts that they ban.  This would prevent most from coming back as most people don't know how to spoof their IP address and not too many people use proxy chains or VPNs.  It seems like a common sense solution and would take little effort to implement.

Thanks David, Very helpful!

     Your right, I can't spell! but I'm pretty sure I know threads well enough.  Your salvo opening was to claim racism with the threat of informing outside media. And in 15 posts your attention seems to wander to correcting my spelling ??    You have a Merry Christmas Sir. David gave you some good advice and the most probable explanation.

That particular incident was not a problem with Chess.com's cheat detection routines, but with the cheater successfully deceiving the moderators into thinking he was also another innocent party (the aforementioned chess coach). The team has taken away some learnings from that about our processes, but it's unrelated to the accuracy of our cheating detection methods, which we do not discuss in the open forums (see the Cheating Discussion Group if you'd like to learn more about cheat detection).

Like reporting abuse, we value the help of the community in reporting and identifying it: it can be a challenge when the person reporting it doesn't see any immediate action, as emotions and the desire for justice run high, but that's because Chess.com does have a process that we follow and that we would like people to recognise the impact their behaviour has on other people and to change it rather than just banning people. If you do see immediate action after your report, it will be because the problem was really REALLY bad and merited that action, or because it was the latest of several instances that finally result in that action.

Please be conscious that the team also has to deal with false positives in various reports too - there are people here who believe that almost whenever they lose, the other person was cheating

We can and do block IP addresses, but unfortunately, you'd be surprised at how many do indeed know all about IP proxy addresses - so many that my personal preference is that we don't ban the IP address at all, but use it as a way of identifying new accounts belonging to known trolls and act on them BEFORE they start posting objectionable material, rather than having to wait until AFTER they do so: it's the approach I use, and I've made the case for it with my fellow moderators.

I'm very cynical of abuse reports. I tend think they're lying first. Like in this topic the OP didn't answer my questions about spam or race, so I would have just ignored him.

Similarly with the cheating coach guy. Never believed his BS.

You're doing a very nice job here IMO :)

I just find it funny how you were hung up on the spam thing, which wasn't the point of the post, and you used that to try to divert the thread away from the issue at hand, yet now you indicate that you are aware (almost) of why the thread was started, which you've somewhat identified as racism in social media.  What you are missing is the potential impact on our children and the ripple effect that could have onthe way they will come into the world's socio-economic environment, which is the future of life and human civilization.

And there is no threat here, there will be a story because this isn't the only site where this is a serious problem.  There is a bigger picture, there is always a bigger picture, and most individuals' inability to focus on the bigger picture is unfortunately crippling to their understanding of reality.

It's a very entertaining thread. Firstly, Americans have a hang-up with racism and other -isms. Unlike the rest of the world where many different people live side-by-side and happily hate each other for hundreds of years, you guys think that this is aberration and trying to fix it. It's like fighting a flu virus - you can only vaccinate yourself against the last years' strain.

Secondly, a fellow here mentioned coding in Python - lol.... We should start a thread just for that

As long as in the same country you don't e.g. pass laws to limit each other's civil liberties. Not owning certain property, not holding certain jobs, not having access to trials, not voting. Things like that.

Although yeah, present day people do seem overly sensitive. "He called me a name boo hoo" What are you 10 years old? Get over it. 

      "There is a bigger picture, there is always a bigger picture, and most individuals' inability to focus on the bigger picture is unfortunately crippling to their understanding of reality"         Who votes for Donald Trump is none of my business              "What you are missing is the potential impact on our children and the ripple effect that could have on the way they will come into the world's socio-economic environment, which is the future of life and human civilization".              I wouldn't put your hopes on ME for the future of life and human civilization as we know it   Even thow I have none of my own, I do know a little about kids. I drove a school bus for 15 yrs. I guarantee you they come into this world ALONE, and they leave ALONE.

 That chess coach incident was a few years ago: I don't know if there was much "BS" about it. You may be thinking of the more recent incident earlier this year when Chess.com banned a titled player for engine use, where he tried to mount a case for his innocence through his wife's account.

But yes, false reports are unhelpful too: it's why I said earlier that screen shots would be helpful, although we are aware that these can be faked too. Often the report just points the Support / Moderating team to a particular account, and we'll then apply our standard checks without necessarily referencing the initial report.

If you get an abusive message, please don't delete it - report it to Support, and they will delete it after checking it. Same with abusive user notes on your profile or abusive forum posts, although the offender can subsequently delete that content (the former is harder to circle back to to delete than the latter, but it's still possible). Those things act as independent proof of what the other person is saying and/or doing.

Live Chess chat is trickier because that is not archived: again, there is an automatic bot that monitors for profanity, but experienced trolls know how to get around that, so this is the area where screen shots are really important.

Thanks for the tips.

Let's set aside the possibility that "Edgatroll" is only trolling for a second...silly as that may be to do.

If you are in fact black and have worked as a software developer, then targeting chess.com for possibly turning a blind eye to racism because they don't police the world's population in chat/forums well enough seems inconsequential compared to the *huge* underrepresentation of your particular minority in developer positions, which actually affects a lot of people's lives and wellbeings in a much more discriminatory and significant way...it doesn't just hurt their feelings.  

Maybe your efforts would be better spent elsewhere.  Fighting "racism" here at chess.com with threats of press publicity, etc. seems a little inefficient and petty.  Much bigger fish to fry.  Is chess.com a little lax on moderation and too reliant on volunteer staff?  Undoubtably.  It's not at an actionably negligent level, though.  They clearly try.

Never assume malice where inefficiency and poor communication will suffice.  They can't finish V3 in 3 years, how are they going to stay on top of customer service complaints and policy enforcement?

I say this as someone who constantly speaks up when racist/sexist/ageist comments are made here...chess.com does not in any way appear to be "run by racists".

   Edga Troll;  You seem like an educated man. Your more than welcome to post in my CNN thread whenever. If your kids need drum lessons let me know.

As icing on the cake, the ridiculous title. Of course mind immediately goes here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines

Hmmm. An "IT professional" who doesn't seem to know that the vast majority of ISPs use dynamic rather than static IP addresses. Who deflects any counterpoints with irrelevent spelling corrections. Who has "Troll" in his username. Yeah...

Why should anyone take you the least bit seriously? And if you're a 12-year professional in a well-paid field, WTF are you doing interning somewhere? I smell a whole pack of lies in your claims.

It's effective, but also insipid, and makes him look childish. His OP only strengthens this impression.