Blitz - harmful or not?

Blitz... i play a lot of blitz games but i felt that i need to reduce it now. I want to improve better in positional understanding. 

Okay thanks. Some of advices i received from strong master say try to avoid it. hurm.. there is one thing first time in my chess life i heard of don't play waiting move because there is no such thing as waiting move. LOL

Another member said something similar to this about blitz: "Blitz serves as a showcase for your chess ability.  The problem is that at anything less than an expert level, the showcase is empty."   

Generally agree w/the above, and add that unless you know your openings and have a fast mouse, blitz is a humbling and not very fun experience. Better to start slow and build your opening repertoire.

Agreed . Play at slow time control first.

I would guess that most masters teaching students would advise against too much blitz for several reasons.

Blitz serves as a show case for your ability in blitz but too much blitz will weaken your over the board  or correspondence play.

3 minute blitz is horrible 10 minute blitz is bad

Yes, many British cities suffered during the Blitz.

There is nothing wrong with blitz as long as you have a goal in mind at the end of the blitz session.  Do you want to practice certain openings work on a particular style?  All this is possible and therefore can be thought of as learned or at least practiced knowledge at the end of the session.

Some masters who teach chess believe blitz is bad because it gets people into a way of thinking that is not good for regular chess.

1. no real time to think much ahead-needed for standard chess

2. blitz can rely on cheap, unsound tricks which would not work in regular chess.

3. You cannot really "study" the openings or middle game or endgame playing blitz as in a blitz game things are more often decided by blunders.

There's nothing wrong some blitz now and then.  If nothing else its fun and helps the chess mind unwind.

If it's all you do then you'll be practicing bad habits.  You'll get faster at what you do, and develop good speed skills (tricks to work time advantages) but your analysis skills for example will not improve.

What about 10 minute blitz?  is that long enough time to practice real chess?

I recall some GM or trainer said the winner of a game between players under 1900 is the better analyst.  "Real chess" could mean different things to different people, but if we're talking about games where this statement can hold true, then the games are certainly longer than 10 minutes.  Something like G/30 +5 is about as fast as I'd want to go if I'm practicing for OTB tournament chess.  G/60 would be more comfortable.

Of course you can analyse freely after a game, no time limit at all.  So you can play 10 minute games and work on analysis skills afterwards.  You'd just have to be disciplined to work hard and not move the pieces and stuff like that :p

I think blitz is harmful to a relatively inexperienced player. One must develop both computational skills and pattern recognition. This takes time. Both post game analysis and practice at longer time controls are essential. Blitz is for higher rated players who have already developed advanced skill.

Well, chess.com blitz players seem to be solid.  Like ICC or FICS, it's a knowledgeable user base.

However a beginner could probably go on yahoo and find plenty of other beginners with no opening knowledge playing crazy stuff in blitz time controls... not that this is the ideal way to improve ;)

Blitz teaches you to make impulsive moves.

Standard play teaches you to analyze.

Blitz and bullet are nothing more than chess variants. FIDE doesn't give titles for those time limits.

Get IM or GM give some comments. Let hear what their say about this matter.

players rated above 2200 generally advise to very much limit your blitz if you want to improve your game. It teaches bad habits for one thing.

There are some players who have already achieved high rankings who like to play blitz but if you are under 2200 and want to learn--limit your blitz

There is no 10-minute blitz, it's called rapid