How do I delete my thread?

How do I delete a thread I created? Some mod decided he didn't like my thread and locked it, so I'd rather delete the thread than have a useless thread hanging that no one can even respond to.

By the way, why is it that we can talk about Houdini, Fritz, Komodo, Hiarcs, etc., but the second I mention Shredder, my topic gets locked because it's supposedly a competitor to chess.com?

 We used to be allowed to talk about Shredder until Master Splinter became a moderator.

I sent a message to David asking how is it a competitor site.  It's just the homepage of Shredder.

I hope he comes back with a good excuse. I literally was about to finalize checkout on a premium account here, and that stunt of his has put a severely bad taste in my mouth for his site. One of the main things I look for in any paid service is good customer service, and my first impression of it thus far has not been pleasant.

Sorry, it looks to me like you're overreacting. It's not that big a deal.

The moderation team is a huge wildcard as far as being communicative and even-handed. Policies for the most part are vague directives given to the mods to sort out, so they use their own interpretations which vary. I've asked erik and other mods multiple times to provide clear examples to flesh out the forum rule "no religion and politics" (understandably nebulous), but no dice yet.

    You've only been here for 5 days, its no big deal. We've got a cemmetary full of locked threads. Its a good way to get your foot in the door with the mods thow.   Its BECAUSE you're new that probably caught their attention. Don't worry about it, purchase the premium account. That standing won't give you any extra privileges with staff. You're catching them at an awkward time. Erik has everybody switching over to V3. The forums should settle down mid October. 

I'm confused. How is asking why my thread was locked considered overreacting?

Your response to my post.

Hi there,

If it was just about the Shredder chess engine, it would have been fine: however, when I went to check out the site, it seemed very much a competitor site, offering membership sign ups, tournaments and so on.

If those parts of the site are non-functional and it's really is just somewhere to download the chess engine, I'd be happy to unlock that original thread.

Cheers,

David, moderator

My question on that thread was literally about playing against the computer, to which I still need an answer. You allow all these posts about Chessbase, who literally offer all those things plus training, whereas the other site doesn't have hardly any features comparable to chess.com. There are also a ton of threads talking about the actual online matches on the shredder site, but not a single one of them got locked. I wasn't even advertising anything about the site or mentioning paid memberships or online tournaments, which I don't even use there. If what RonaldJosephCote said above is true, and I am just being targeted because I'm new here, then a better explaination as to why my thread seeking help was locked would have been a preferable greeting to the forum instead of being immediately shut down and rejected. A statement letting me know that I need to modify the content of my post to adhere to a specific written policy (which I'm still trying to locate regarding this specific instance) would have been preferable and would have shown more helpful and less brash customer service. I was hoping to see that members here are at least treated with some respect before I start dropping my hard earned money on a premium membership here, so I'm going to need more time to verify that the community here is not toxic, including moderators. 

On a side note, I see posts like the most recent one from AviaSharma which is straight up insulting chess.com and using excessive profanity, but no action seems to be taken against those threads.

   Wow!   While this is one of the better threads I've come across in quite awhile because you articulate very well, its possible I was wrong. You may be new but your no young kid. In regards to a specific written policy that you cannot locate--https://www.chess.com/legal.   Unless your a lawyer please don't split hairs with them. You have David who is one of the better ones OFFERING to re-open your thread. This is a large site with 20 million members and a moderation team scattered around the globe. I am a bit puzzled that because you "feel insulted",  you're going to with hold your money. We must be 2 different kinds of animals--no pun intended--because I've actually purchased accounts for people who have insulted me. Your account will teach you about CHESS. The forums will teach you about insults. The chess will cost you money no matter where you go in life, and the insults are free     no matter where you go in life. 

If my statement came across as a threat to withhold subscribing, I apologize. That's not my intention. I meant to voice my concern with regards to what to expect with regards to support in the event that I do subscribe, so by waiting I don't mean abandoning the site. I only mean to do a little more observation and get a little more insight before making a final decision. I've been using other means for learning from sources such as CB and CK before discovering this site, so I'm still need to evaluate the training resources here anyways. Regarding moderation, I've become accustomed to mod abuse on other forums that I won't name here, so I may have jumped conclusions when going on the defensive. Again, I apologize if I came across harshly, and don't want to cause myself to become a burden to the community. I do wish to fit in once I've become better adjusted to the group and the layout of this site.

I'm sorry that you felt that was a bit harsh - I tried to explain the policy to you in my reply to that thread, and rather than just delete the thread and send you a message, I left it up so that other new people could see the message and learn about the policy too. If you re-word your post so that it's clear that it's about the Shredder chess engine and leave out the reference to the site, that would be fine - I actually tried to do this for your post while unlocking it, but I think I might have hit the "Delete" key rather than the "Edit" by accident, so my apologies for that.

The Terms of Service that RJC links to is pretty broad, and to be honest, who reads all that stuff up front anyway?  It's an expansion of point 2 in the paragraph on "Member Conduct" that people generally learn about in the forums (often through discussions such as this one we're having at the moment).

Chessbase is a news site rather than a chess playing one, and Chess.com does not regard them as a competitor for the purposes of this policy. We are actually okay with people sharing games they've played elsewhere, although the game should be displayed here rather than linking to the other site. We're okay with casual mentions of the competitor sites in a non-comparative manner, but I felt this was a little more than that - if I had looked at your other posts asking about other chess engines rather than looking at this one in isolation, I probably would have made a different determination and amended the post rather than locking it, so that's certainly something I will take on board for the future. 

That profanity has been actioned by a moderator, and Chess.com is actually pretty tolerant of criticism made of the site, even if we feel some of it is a unjustified - we understand that people need to rant sometimes, but we do ask people to be specific so we can actually perhaps do something about it.

As to whether the community is "toxic", there are a number of active posters who quite enjoy shifting the conversation into silly territory - there are also other posters who fish for inappropriate responses, and others who have been banned who keep coming back and making more trouble for a short time before we disable their latest account and delete that content. Chess.com policy tries to keep the more controversial topics (ie. politics and religion) out of the public forums, and has set up a largely unmoderated Open Discussion club where people CAN discuss those things - some people who have checked that out feel that that's very much a toxic environment, but it's somewhere that people can choose to go rather than being as visible as here in the public forums.

I hope that helps and that your other experiences to date with the community in your other posts have been positive for you.

Cheers,

David, moderator

David,

Thanks for the response.  I apologize if I came across as abrasive and accusatory, and I understand after reading my posts above that I have been a bit unreasonable with my expectations and how I conducted myself in response.  I sometimes have a habit of expressing myself outwardly in a manner in which my verbiage is in contrast to my actual intended message, so I will work to improve that so as not to generate any animosity or conflict.  I do see the value of this site and its community, and would like to be a welcome part of it if I haven't already overstepped any boundaries.

Thanks,

Joe

The Terms of Service that RJC links to is pretty broad, and to be honest, who reads all that stuff up front anyway?                                                                                                                                                                      

3 years later and still no answer to his original question which was how he can delete his thread? lol can he or can he not?

No, you can't unless there is only one comment. In that case you can delete the comment and the thread is also deleted. If there are replies, it will only delete the comment and as it stands today, the second poster inherits the topic.

When a topic is locked I don't believe a poster can delete their comments.

So the OP and you now have your answer.

Satisfied ?..... I doubt it.