Why me and playing Internet chess are finished!

Incidentally, I'd be happy to play you with any preconditions you'd like to set -- I most certainly will not be using an engine, as with any other game I play.  Perhaps you can build a set of peers of your own with whom you have a level of trust established and can be assured that the games you play are fair.

There are thieves in the world, I better not own property.
There are unfaithful partners in the world, I better not fall in love.

People have overdoses, I better stop taking drugs :P

I do sympathize with you Gumpty, but I find the benefits here far outway the negatives. The cheaters don't gain a damn thing by doing it, but I take one step closer to expert! My rating on here is meaningless to me.

Good to see so many self-professed angels on here. If you ever challenge me a game, please quote this thread. Not accepting right now though. Msg first maybe.

Goodbye!!!!

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not quite Rael, lets just say ive purchased a burglar alarm and drawn up a Prenuptial agreement

Hahaha niiiice.

/ya gotsta get tha preeenup
//or so says Kanye

Gumpty, i understand your feelings. I experienced the same years ago at http://chess.hogan.cz/, btw it was during Fritz 6 era. There were no rules about engines, no policy about multi-accounts etc. and imagine, they started to organize tournaments! I thought, that people used engines for fun and in tournaments they wouldn't do it and they wouldn't enter tournaments under multiple accounts to "help" themselves with puppets. I believed in honour and fair play in chess. Oh, how naive i was! Of course they did use engines, even more than in free games. Engine use was The Dark Side of The Force. Wanna stay competitive? Join or be terminated. Disgusted i decided to leave and swore never play on internet again.

But... never say never

Last year i read some pages and discussions about cheating, because i needed to face this my old pain. Probably the best has been Dr. Unclear's page. Finally i searched something about chess and relationship between people and i found Batgirl's blog here on Chess.com. When i found that this site has rules hostile to cheaters, i decided to try and create an account here. Although cheating is present here, it is almost negligible thanks to staff's activity. I later even decided to upgrade my membership, so i could organize tournaments for my friends.

I am pretty sure you will sooner or later change your mind too, because chess is nice.

Hi gumpty,

after reading your blurb on cheating i felt i should contribute to the topic. i can't say i have ever played someone and thought, "hmmmm, i'm sure this person is cheating" although i suspect i've had my arse whipped by a program or 2 but you know what, this doesn't bother me at all, why? simple, i'm not going to let anyone spoil my love for the game of chess like you seem to be letting it spoil yours, by having a hissy and throwing your dummy out it seems to me you are happy to let these people win not only by the use of a engine but also by alienating you from something you obviously have alot of passion for. I think it's a case of sour grapes, you don't like the fact that someone who has sat back and let the puter do all the work get a higher reating than yourself, i guess this can be galling but so what? do you really take chess.com so seiously? These people gain no self satisfaction i'm sure for every victory is a hollow one and for every cheat i'm certain there are 10 times as many genuine players who are here to have fun and enjoy the game. if everyone just gave up then the cheats truely have won, i am dissapointed you are so meek Gumpty.

 

Cheers, Rich.

Hi Gumpty,

Please remember the saying quitters never win and winners never quit! So show chess.com that you are a WINNER.

An attribute of a good chess player is being psychologically strong.

so reconsider!

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Yeah, but if they're not winning by cheating then there's not a whole lotta point is there!  I entirely agree with MattMalone. 

Gumpty, I'll say now I've NEVER even considered that someone might be cheating here and I wouldn't care if they were, I lose, big deal.

Basically if you're playing against a cheater what's the big deal??  You won't lose out at all, sure you'll lose the game but this is what would happen anyway if you played a similarly highly rated player.  We all learn from all our games regardless of what the other person is playing.  I HONESTLY can't see why people get so worked up.

Another point is that if you are this concerned and as you have shown you obviously don't really mind about your rating, which is after all just a number on a website, then why don't you just resign games in which you suspect you opponent of cheating and don't play in any tourneys?

My two (or three) cents.

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PS. Rael is a legend, spot on!

There is no point in cheating!- Except to satisfy an unjust ego!

But I can see why it would wind up OTB lovers!

Hey gumpty, I am very new to this site and pretty bad at chess in general, but I disliked the possibility of playing an engine from the start. The best solution I can think of is a trust system where players give eachother a 'trust' rating that would basically be a percentage of confidence in not having played an engine. Obviously such a system would have drawbacks, as weak players would be quick to distrust strong players. A solution would be to have a distrusted game reviewed by trusted users.

Thoughts?

this is an interesting article (though an old one it stil relates to today) from Doctor Unclears site. When (C)heaters play honest members, they don't care. They don't care about the amount of study time and hard work you invested to increase your level of play and ICS rating. They don't care about the money you spend monthly on your ISP or the time you spend on your ICS. They don't care about your reasons for joining an ICS. They don't care about your will to improve, your legitimate desire to learn. They don't care if you've set yourself goals through which you motivate your will to improve and learn. They don't care about your beliefs in good and sound sportsmanship ethics. They don't care about your finger/profile notes. They don't care about fairness, fair-play issues or other futile, rubbish, stupid discussions such as takebacks or mouseslips. For them, your very own existence as a chess player is nothing more than a 4 digit string of characters on their monitor screen. They don't care if you can be fooled easily or not. While you're greeting them at the beginning of the first game with a nice "Hello from city/country; let's have a good game!", they are setting board, colors and inputting time controls into their chess program. After winning games and winning rating points from you, they will tell you a stupid, nonsensical auto-alias-"tks" or they might "Thanks for the games" with a little smiley :) ... and they reset/"new game" their chess program looking for a next victim. They don't care if you're suspicious of them or disgusted after you've played them since there are a lot of members on your ICS to "play" with and they can "move" along after you, to someone else. So they don't care if you put them in your noplay list or censor list. They don't care if after a few games you're no longer sure/confident in yourself about some of your favorite openings, the way you handle some of your opening lines or if you're no longer confident in your tactical awareness. They feel (and know) they're powerful and strong with their (C)-toy. They want to feel what it's like to play at an IM or GM level in blitz games. They are curious, intrigued and fascinated by matches involving strong GMs and mighty chess programs, by human intelligence vs fast hardware. Some of them want to know if the chess program they bought can do the same vs titled members on your ICS: they believe that such curiosity is worth some of the money they spent on buying a chess program. They do "care" about playing a titled member, say an IM or a GM. They want to know if their chess program can handle a titled member, how well their chess program will handle such a promising/enticing scalp. They "care" about playing those rated higher than themselves. They enjoy seeing a titled member having difficulties in delicate positions, seeing a titled member or high rated member having time pressure. They fantasize on the sweat and adrenaline a titled member is having in difficult positions with/without time pressure in a, say, r 5 0 game vs them. They enjoy following on their (C)omputer program the increasing ply depth and the evaluation score as it slowly and steadily increases to their advantage. They are very curious about the evaluation score during a game even if they themselves have limited chess knowledge. They've a sadistical curiosity when they see the score evaluation slowly but steadily increasing in a game vs a titled member or when they see their chess program get out of tactical skirmishes/brawls with a decisive advantage. They're satisfied and relieved when they see on their screen a notification that their opponent got flagged or resigned. They love to see the server notifying them of their new increased rating after each won game. They enjoy receiving tells from weaker rated members saying how well they played the last game, how strong they are in tactics, how amazingly they finished off that previous opponent. They enjoy receiving tells saying: "You are strong", "well played", etc... from members. They enjoy nourishing and polishing their ICS chess-power image and status among their +notified ICS friends with ordinary lies, disinformation and forged stories about how long they've been playing, which chess teacher gave them lessons, at which young age they learned to play, etc... They care about the respect and politeness they deserve from weaker members. For (C)heaters, cheating has become a normal part of the "fun" of enjoying and playing chess on an Internet Chess Server. They don't care about helpfiles on abuse, on etiquette or about an ICS user agreement, its policies and rules. They don't care about how many people they fooled, how many people they lied to, how many people they abused. For them, cheating is just an overall amazing, intriguing and fascinating FUN! experience of enjoying and playing chess, of fooling people and achieving chess prestige. For them, making in broad daylight a mockery of all these helpfiles, fair-play issues is just an incidental part of the overall fun of cheating. For (C)heaters, cheating is such a little childish, trite "crime": no big deal at all! I'll never forget 2 obnoxious, jerk (C)heaters that I met on an ICS. The first one told me after the game: "Gotcha!". One week later, that ICS caught him and he was +(C)ed. Guess who complained about him... 10 months afterwards this same (C)heater, under another handle, was again +(C)ed. The 2nd jerk (C)heater I met was telling me during the game: "I know this opening better than you", "You are weak", "I own you now", etc... One month later, that ICS caught him. (C)heaters simply just don't care about you, no matter if you're a titled member, an honest playing member, a legitimate (C) operator. They don't care about the huge damage (global and constant negative atmosphere of suspicions, accelerated pace of time controls to avoid them) they've done and are doing to all ICSes. Maybe it's time you start to "care" about them.

cheats will not go to heaven

jesus does not like cheaters

I'm a better player because of Chess.com. If I ever get to the point where I'm going to quit Internet chess because I can't handle the cheaters I'm probably taking myself too seriously. 

I started playing tournament OTB chess 3 months ago. I went from not being able to hold my own against 10 year olds to playing at the first table in competition for the 1st place in the U1300 last night. If not for the experience I've gained and the knowledge that Chess.com introduces you to and the competition I don't know what my game would be like today.

Thanks Chess.com!

 

Sean

1. Your wrong Gumpty... there IS a way to defeat the cheaters. You play people you know!... absolutley know. These people are the ones who you have played over and over again..you know their style..and you know they have limitations and make mistakes (me for example and others you know).

2. By eliminating yourself, you are taking away one of the reasons why playing here is worth it. By playing some one like you... you can be sure that you are playing a first class player. Somoen who will give players like me (strong intermediate) a beyond my limit challenge everytime. Drawing you in our last game was one of the highlights of my experiences here at chess.com. I earned it!..against a formidable opponent.

3. By taking yourself away from regular play, your are not helping the cheating problem. With you in the pool of strong players to play, anyone that plays you can be sure that they are NOT playing a cheater. I take this to heart. Integrety is one of the highest character traits that a site like this demands. If you are not here as a player... the integrety level of chess.com as a whole, is whittled down just a little more.

4. DONT GO GUMPTY!!!

how can you cheat with chess.. :S seriously

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i got it.. computerbots