Hey @Rookium,
I appreciate your perspective and the time you took to share your thoughts. Your experience with chess over the decades gives you a valuable outlook that many newer players (and even some veterans) could learn from.
It’s frustrating to see cheating and rating manipulation, and I get how discouraging it can be. While Chess.com does a solid job detecting and banning cheaters, it sometimes feels like an endless battle. And those unrealistic puzzles? I’ve seen my fair share of them too—sometimes they feel more like a math problem than a real chess scenario!
As for the forums, I think you hit on something interesting—there has been a shift in the way people interact online, and it’s not always for the better. While there are still great discussions, there’s indeed more spam, one-word replies, and off-topic nonsense than there used to be. Maybe some stronger moderation or rule enforcement could help clean things up a bit.
At the end of the day, I think people like you—who genuinely want to help others, share ideas, and enjoy chess for what it is—are what make the game and community worthwhile. Hopefully, Chess.com will continue improving both its site and its forums so that serious players and learners can have a better experience.
Keep playing, keep sharing your insights, and know that there are plenty of us who appreciate your approach to the game!
Cheers!
I have been a member (mostly silent) for just around four years or so. I learned to play chess from my father at the age of 5, and my sister, shortly afterwards when she was 4-1/2, started playing with me (I was 7 then).
Been playing on and off throughout school, college and grad school, and also after with many friends and family members who play. learned a lot, mostly that I have a LOT to learn...
I am pushing six decades, 5-1/2 of which I have known the wonderful game of chess!
I spent a significant amount of free time during the "COVID years" playing, and mostly studying and learning to be better. I hit a nice plateau about two years ago, then got busy and now revisiting that again.
Reason for this post (and thank you for reading), is that I am a bit saddened and dismayed at my experience here. I see people who apparently love the game, but spend more time trying to cheat or play with "reinventing" the game in some ways.
I'll explain: My first game here, was a disaster. I lost, and to be honest I should not have accepted, because I was distracted after starting - just one of those days. However, I find out 2-3 days later that the opponent was cheating (Chess.com staff discovered it, though I suspected as well) and was awarded rating back. With apologies. Nice...
I have been pretty stagnant here until the past few months, and started again doing the daily puzzles, and interacting a bit on some of the forums that caught my eye. I have offered a few helping ideas to folks interested in getting better (assuming they were new) and even offered down the road to perhaps play a game or two later after they finished their journey.
Well, I got an invite recently, and taking into account the time zone differences, figured on a 3-day version, mainly for convenience. After less than 5 moves, I'm offered a draw. I see the history of the person I played against: Bots, and puzzle rushes mostly. When they actually started playing for real, they offer a draw, and I saw in a post recently that there was possibly a way to tweak your ratings by doing draws off more seasoned players, possibly both live and bots. Not sure if true, but that game smelled like it to me.
I then see some unique chess puzzle problems, rather interesting. Then start seeing ridiculous positional puzzle postings that are unrealistic, and can NEVER occur even remotely in a game!
Some of the posts on general special topic forums are getting outright silly with one word replies like: "Wooo", or "Dude", and that is it, even though the topic is more about interactions.
So I ask now: WHY am I here? WHY is this site asking REAL money for what seemingly is becoming a kids or young adult "hyper-nerd" forum with no major monitoring, or benefit, to those SERIOUS about helping new players, offering advise, learning form each other, etc., which is what I thought I was signing on for?
If the moderators and forum owners read this, I kindly ask to please clean up your soon to be mess! This site is getting a bit bizarre now and less functional. (however, the learning tools are not, BTW!
) I have been on many hobby related sites that also undergo these types of growing pains from time to time, but I am concerned with a trend of younger (assumed) folks not really as into chess as they seem.
Maybe revision of rules, or reminders in order?
Thanks for taking the time to read this. For those thinking I am just a dino venting, I ask: "what are YOU here to DO?" I am here to help where I can, learn where I can, and play WHEN I can. (some of us DO have lives off the KB BTW...
Rm