New Member Ratings

I am sure that this has been brought up already but I have only just noticed it. I checked through a couple of pages of threads but I could not find this.

Could somebody please tell me why chess.com have gone insane and are giving new members random/ridiculous ratings?

Thanks.

Examples?

Keep in mind that in the first several games one has an enormous RD, and thus often an inaccurate rating.

See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glicko_rating_system. This is the rating system that chess.com uses.

I think new members are starting at 1400 now which seems inflationary.

I guess I wasn't that slow to notice then. As I understand it, new member are being asked how good they are and are then rated accordingly. Their ratings are identical across the board (same blitz ratings as TT as corresp. as stnd, etc). I have seen new members with ratings of 800, 1000, 1200, 1400, 1800. I am sure there are a couple of other options. Basically, they get to choose their starting rating.

Example: http://www.chess.com/members/view/ComplexWaitingMoves#games

I do not understand the urge of chess.com to let players decide their start rating when the Glicko rating system already covers this matter.

If an 1800 player is placed at 1200, it would take him just a few games to hit 1800 rating. Besides, the odds that an 1200 player joins is drastically larger than an 1800 player, so 1200 makes more sense anyway.

As Baddogno stated, all it does is causing inflation. Bascially letting someone start at 1800 is just absurd.

I am curious and inquiring, too. Some folks have ratings of 700-800 but seem to play much better, yet their rating stays the same. What does a player with a 400 rating mean?