Why the Downgrade?

"The war is over" is a statement about why the V3 folks haven't bothered trying to defend V3 from your sort of attacks any more, rather than a defence of V3 itself. It's not because V3 is indefensible: it's because most people feel that they've got better and more  rewarding things to do than argue with V2 proponents who are clearly wedded to their particular opinion and are never going to be budged from it. From that point of view, the V2 / V3 discussion has gone the way of religion and politics - the two sides are locked in to their respective positions and any "discussion" is only going to lead to insults and "arguments" that the one side finds self evident and the other side finds incredulous.

My overall contention is that even if V3 is not as simple as V2, it is still good enough that the benefits it delivers is worth the change. @Spacebux clearly disagrees - which again leads to the question, if you feel so strongly about it, WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE? If V3 is such an abomination, why don't you spend your own time & effort learning the UI of a completely different site that is simpler and that would make you happier? By staying, you are actually contributing to the metrics that tell Chess.com that V3 is a success - if you and all of the others genuinely discontent with V3 really did leave, that's actually the most likely way you would have an impact on their decision making process.

You cannot speak for most people.  Not in the slightest.  Most people don't even have a choice, let alone a clue that one existed for so long.  Since mid-2016, v3 was on by default.  It took severe effort to get back to a stable v2 platform.  They even forced unwitting users to watch a 30 minute video about v3 to further dissuade users from ever venturing off the reservation.

"WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE?" -- ahh, yes, the quintessential dialogue ender.  Because I choose to be here.  I guess it never dawned on you that my disapproval of v3 does not mean I should just up-&-pack my bags.  You did not do that when Microsoft changed its policy on licensing, did you?  You didn't just up-&-leave OZ land for Canada.  Did you?  My staying equally has no regard on the success (or lack thereof) of v3!  You have a dizzying intellect if you can draw those conclusions.

My arguments are based on facts.  Technological facts.  Every attempt by a v3-spokesperson ends with emotional pleas or slurs of some sort.  You've included 2 in your last paragraph alone.  You cannot defend the deficiencies of v3 on merit alone.  Hence, the Cult of V3 (because it is a cult if you dismiss the faults and only see the fauna) resorts to low-level tactics of character assassination.

I do dislike the modern trend of having icons instead of words. So you have to scroll over everything just to figure out what it is. Pictures instead of words makes it feel dumbed down, like it's trying to appeal to little kids.

And all the white space.

Imagine a children's picture book. That's modern web page design. Simple and empty.

But I don't dislike v3. I switched almost as soon as it become available because I wanted to get used to it right away... I remember when we went from v1 to v2 people complained loudly as well.

Well, anyway, there are some legitimate gripes, but since I was never active in groups and vote chess matches and things like that I'm not aware of it.

Drama Queens....aka The Kardashian Effect.

@Spacebux, you're clearly not getting it - I've answered some of your initial points although you've been quick to dismiss those because they don't serve your narrative. I'm not answering them all in detail because - I'll say it again - I am happy to acknowledge that V2 was simpler than V3. You've had no response to my contention that V3 is still simple enough that it's not hampering new users successfully finding their way around the site and achieving what they want to achieve. I get that you don't care about new users and only care about your own user experience, but the site really needs to cater for more than just you.

If you are so invested in this site that you are choosing to stay here even after V2 is gone, isn't that an emotional position to take rather than a logical one? My workplace would have stopped using Microsoft products as much as possible if they had gone ahead with their proposed licensing model: Chess.com HAS gone ahead with its new model, it's unfortunate that you feel so trapped by it that you feel like you need to stay.

For my part, I think this has consumed enough of my emotional time & energy that I am now unfollowing this thread. Cheers!

Amen!  I have multiple problems with V3.  The three worst are:

1. Analysis board -- we can no longer delete a line without going out and coming back in, thereby erasing everything we'd previously done.

2. Analysis board -- We can no longer continue to do our own analysis after the game is completed -- to see what would happen if we'd made this or that move instead of the game's having ended either with a resignation or on time.

3. Challenges -- (I'm going to ask about this in the help forum.)  There no longer seems to be a way to challenge a particular person who isn't already a friend to an unrated game.  

I'm a poor player and so the fancy stuff that some have written about doesn't impact me, but these certainly do make a difference to my ability to learn!

@Caedrel -

I started this thread asking the question of "why the downgrade".

I gave 12 technical examples of shortcomings with the product after it was launched more than 5 years ago.

You attempted to partially rebut one of the twelve items.

Your only conclusion then is for me to leave chess.com.

The ☛ point ☚ again (for the 3rd time now) is for chess.com to understand it has spent 5 years in development of a lesser product.  No time or energy is required on your part to understand this.  This is for chess.com's own Development Team to comprehend and rectify:  v3 is a downgrade.

Ok, but most of your points are wrong, confusing, etc.

And chess.com is a company. Their only agenda is money. If most people were mad they'd change it. Also if most people were mad we'd see tons of topics about it.

OP: Quite frankly, I think you already know the answer to your questions.  Personally, I wasn't particularly active when V2 was around and I'm not a computer person, so I can't dispute your claims.  What I can say though, is that the reason V3 was created and still exists is rather obvious.  Even if you are right that V3 is a downgrade, Erik obviously didn't know if at the time V3 was being planned.  People make mistakes, and it's possible and quite likely that he thought V3 would be great but it didn't pan out.  The reason he stuck with it is also obvious: he was so committed to V3 that backing down wasn't an option.  With the time and money spend on this huge project, to call it a failure and go back to V2 probably would have cost him his job, along with the jobs of many of the developers.  When people commit as fully as Erik did, they have no choice but to double down and claim their innovation was a success.

Another reason I suspect V3 was created is because in the tech world new is synonymous with good and old is synonymous with bad.  If V2 is old, then it needs to be replaced with something new.  End of discussion.  Tech people also need to do this in order to justify their own existence.  Why hire more people and pay your executives a bunch of money to just mind the store?  They need to come up with new, innovative ideas (allegedly) in order to show why they should have jobs.  So they tried a giant overhaul and it didn't work, but they can't back down, and now we have V3.

As for V3 itself, I don't have any serious issues and I do like the addition of variants and Chess960, which IIRC weren't in V2, although perhaps they could have been added without the overhaul.

I whined and complained about being forced to use V3.  But ya know what?  I finally started using it when V2 went away.  I look back at it now, and all i was doing was whining and complaining because chess.com was forcing me out of my comfort zone.  While i don't care for all the symbols replacing words, i also understand that its "modern and hip" web technology.

LOL, but you know I'm right about the Flash kill date.

Yes, there were gazillions of posts about it from those unhappy with the changes.  A majority of those forum threads (some with 1,000s of posts in them) were capped and sealed by STAFF to stifle voices of dissension.  So, yes, we did.  I'm just here to remind the STAFF of this.

You seriously think FLASH support / use will suddenly end on that date?

I love how most of the proponents and defendants of v3 continuously push emotionally driven arguments to counter all that is wrong with the current state of things.  Wow.  Has individualism, logic, and common sense truly left the planet?

If you go and buy a new car, bicycle, phone - what have you - with the latest model number, latest technology, et. al., and yet it doesn't perform as well as what you had before, wouldn't you at least question what's what??  Or do you all just blanket-ly accept what is handed to you??  In a restaurant, or carry-out, the menu doesn't change, but suddenly you're given fewer sides and smaller portions, but its on a razzle-dazzle new plate ... that's ok with you? 🤷‍♂️🤷

Version 2 of this web site performed BETTER than the current state.

Version 2 of this web site had better features, was easier to use, and did not require 14 30-minute YouTube videos to teach users all about it.

Version 2 of this web site is an UPGRADE to the current version of this site.

🙈🙈 Powers of Logic Help Those to See the Truth and Recognize it! 🙈🙈

LOL no, there will be some old sites that continue to use it forever, but some browsers have already stopped supporting it by default.  And after 2020, no more security fixes; it's an open door for hackers.

Right on, @Spacebux.

In almost every detail, but definitely in the bigger picture.

Go Spacebux!

+1

+2

The Cult of V3 has Re-assembled, even though the "war" is over.  How quaint.