"Correction: The result of the San Jose Hackers vs Las Vegas Desert Rats match has been affected due

"Correction: The result of the San Jose Hackers vs Las Vegas Desert Rats match has been affected due to fair play violations. See the revised standings and schedule."

This short disclaimer/correction was added after the fact, posted at the bottom of Chess.com's news posting about Week 6 of the Pro league.  I discovered it when I read the Week 7 preview, and the standings were just changed without any indication of why.  San Jose Hackers in the playoffs, Las Vegas Desert Rats now with a losing record and out of contention.  Not a word about how or why...so I went back and discovered the disclaimer at the very bottom of the old Week 6 story, where not many people would see it, because who goes back to re-read those?

Where is the accompanying news about what happened here?  Rumors are running around and posts are speculating that a titled player from the Las Vegas Desert Rats used an engine...but Chess.com has been entirely silent on the issue.

I know Chess.com has a big stake in this league, but stifling news that may make things look bad is a conflict of interest that needs to be resolved.  Does Chess.com report newsworthy events in Chess only when it doesn't affect them negatively?  Is Chess.com ultimately a trustworthy source of news about the chess world, or an event organizer that tries to sweep bad publicity under the rug?  Can't be both...and stories like this one right here are where future paths and policy are chosen and the character of an organization is determined.

Let's hear what happened.

Fair play violations in a match between a team calling themselves "Hackers" and a team based in Las Vegas... how fitting!

MGleason explains chess.com's position in the comments to this blog :

https://www.chess.com/blog/hellokostya/pro-chess-league-week-6-recap-san-jose-defeats-las-vegas-overturned-result

It think it's a joke that they are gonna protect the titled players identity. People have a right to know. Especially potential students looking for a coach.

This is a just a tad more important than the crap you are normally reading and expecting on these forums, and definitely more important than anything you've ever posted here.  So, try to suppress your natural ADHD tendencies and absorb something longer than a tweet

"San Jose hackers vs Las Vegas rats". Who the hell came up with those names? 

Next time it will be Stockton bums vs Philadelphia fleas. 

There may be legal ramifications to doing such a thing. I don't see them doing anything like this without a very good reason.

Thanks...I actually have read this already, but the position is essentially the same.  All he says is  that the teams involved are not at liberty to talk about it.  But if this were happening at Tata Steel or Boris Ivanov came out of retirement or something, then there would be a big story about the incident that lays out what is known thus far and then advises people to wait for more details, which would then be dutifully dug for.  The direction being taken here looks a lot more like "tell the teams they can't discuss this until the investigation is resolved" followed by the absolute minimum correction they could get away with posting, and, well...it remains to seen whether there will be any follow up or actual news posting at all...

That's the path an event organizer takes, not a legitimate chess news provider.  And yes, Chess.com happens to be both the news provider and the event organizer here.  I would be of the opinion that the former trumps the latter, and really must do so for Chess.com's news to be untainted.

Say chess.com does publicly declare that the player in question was cheating, and he sues. What then?

How about the Cambridge Tramps?

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-buzz/homeless-tramp-chess-champion-challenges-cambridge-s-best-minds?page=1

 Alas, the media these days.

Ivanov was a tried and proven cheater. That may not be the case here, if cheating occurred at all.

All the more reason to clear up the story instead of letting the rumor mill run.

As for Ivanov, "tried and proven cheater" is quite misleading.  Unless I missed something, he was never actually tried in a civil case to recoup prize money for the actual winners of the events he was in.  His "trial" was a tribunal of chess authorities, and he refused to stand before them and was banned in absentia.  He should have faced much harsher reprisals in an actual court for actual criminal activity.

Then Chess.com does what any news organization does.  They pay attention to and investigate credible lawsuits, and ignore the rest.  It's not like any GM can sick a team of lawyers on anyone.  Even Carlsen could barely afford something like that.

If you are a company who claims to have 17 million users, has arguably the most popular chess website in the world, and who sends "reporters" worldwide to cover chess news, then this is what you are signing up for.  You can't purport to be that kind of organization and then bow to the threat (actually in this case, merely the perception of a potential threat) of a single lawsuit from 1 aggrieved individual.

But let's say they cave anyway...that would then indicate that Chess.com needs to split off their event organization to another company, so that the event organizers and the news team are not intertwined at all.  That will deflect lawsuit liability as well as maintain journalistic integrity (assuming stories are not interfered with from behind the scenes anyway).

Hmmm...that raises a number of questions:

- First, how did Danny post that tweet in 140 characters?

- Second, I assume (or at least the implication is) that the Rats have taken steps to clean things up, and that Chess.com is expressing support for this?  This makes the lack of news even more alarming...cover up the incident, then spin the result as something positive/hopeful and placate the players involved so they don't complain too loudly?

- Third, if this tweet was posted as a standalone without context, then is the intent to make a "public" statement that is not really public because most people reading the tweet will have no idea what it means/refers to?  

The Desecated Long Tailed Whiskered Rodents would like to play in their stead

Ahhh, I see...when you said "on their twitter" I did not think you meant on the Rats' own feed.

Yeah there are some really weird names in this league:

Philidelphia Inventors - fear their smartness and strategery!

montclair Sopranos - because th....

Rio Grand Ospreys - 10 points if you know what the heck an osprey is

Norway Gnomes - everyone fears these lawn ornaments just a little right?

Amsterdam Mosquitoes - a little more annoying than fleas perhaps