Goodbye Talkchess

Discussion of anything and everything relating to chess playing software and machines.

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Roger Brown
Posts: 782
Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 9:22 pm

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by Roger Brown »

Sam Hull wrote:
(b) There has been a rather large misunderstanding, and Jeremy has slightly misquoted what I passed along from ICD/Your Move. The guidance is simply to not tolerate anything that looks like a LINK to illegitimate software in CCC. No one said anything about censoring discussions or removing posts that simply make allusions or offer evaluations. Graham misunderstood the intent of the guidance - I have clarified it in detail for him this evening via IM. Where the issue of clones is concerned, and for the board in general, the goal of fair and balanced moderation has not changed, and there is no desire for favoritism in ANY direction.

-Sam-



Hello Sam,

I respect your position even when I do not agree with it but here you are flat wrong.

There is no misunderstanding in Graham's efforts.

Take any of the following threads and tell me why any reasonable person would move them to the EO sub-forum or not move them out if they had been posted there originally:

http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=34837

http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=34698

http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=34753

http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=34770

Plus a number of Houdini posts etc.

I personally requested that various engine results be moved out of the EO sub-forum and placed in the Tournaments sub-forum.

Nothing doing. In fact I was told that it would be better to have them there than nowhere else as if those were the only alternatives.

Then it became clear that nothing serious was to come out of the EO sub-forum, even by accident. It was merely to be a place of dumping, a place where flames could be started without any moderator action because it was hidden.

There is no misunderstanding - Graham has been 100% consistent in his actions in everything to do with the EO sub-forum.

Such a pity really because it does have the capacity to lead the way in terms of discussion on the topic of engine origins if allowed.

Do not believe for a moment that there was any misunderstanding here.

Time to get the asbestos suit ready now.....

Later.
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Graham Banks
Posts: 41380
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Location: Auckland, NZ

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by Graham Banks »

Sam Hull wrote: (a) Sorry for weighing in late. Our downtown Dallas office building has lost power and shut down my entire network two business days in a row, and I couldn't get back to the board after posting the guidance from Quentin for the CCC mods until now.

(b) There has been a rather large misunderstanding, and Jeremy has slightly misquoted what I passed along from ICD/Your Move. The guidance is simply to not tolerate anything that looks like a LINK to illegitimate software in CCC. No one said anything about censoring discussions or removing posts that simply make allusions or offer evaluations. Graham misunderstood the intent of the guidance - I have clarified it in detail for him this evening via IM. Where the issue of clones is concerned, and for the board in general, the goal of fair and balanced moderation has not changed, and there is no desire for favoritism in ANY direction.

(c) I hope Jeremy will reconsider his decision. I have not had a chance to converse with him directly and have received no PMs from him. I posted responses in the moderator forum as soon as I regained internet access, but I am still locked out of e-mail and will be until tomorrow morning. I think Jeremy has been an outstanding moderator and I fully support his philosophy of moderation - always have.

(d) I don't set moderation policy. I passed along a request to the CCC mods that I received from Quentin, which came as the result of certain members haranguing ICD about real, suspected, and imagined clones. Graham misunderstood the message, performed some moderation on that basis, and Jeremy decided to post a grand exit without waiting to get any clarification about the guidance.

(e) Personally I am surprised that two CCC mods who share an opinion cannot simply outvote and override one mod on those occasions when has a different view. I got regularly overridden for two whole terms in CTF. I haven't complained, and nobody died. It's a discussion board, folks.

(f) If a member runs for moderator and is elected, I think it is fair to expect him to honor his commitment and serve out the term.

-Sam-
In a nutshell, our sponsor would like the CCC mod team to be as aggressive as possible in removing anything that looks like a questionable link, or any other encouragement to acquire software of questionable legitimacy.

This was the part of the message that I misinterpreted. My understanding was that any post praising the strength or qualities of the engines in question was actually encouraging members to acquire them.
Once Jeremy gave me the go ahead to remove some of the threads as long as I left a message (he was going to bed at the time), I went ahead and did so. However, it seems that I was too liberal in my interpretation of what he actually meant.

I therefore apologise to Sam, to my fellow moderators and also to the forum membership for the controversy and unfortunate situation that has occurred due to this genuine misunderstanding.
I am happy to work with Jeremy and Swami to undo as much of the damage as we can, if they're prepared to do so. This would include an amendment of the announcement posted.

Cheers,
Graham. :oops:
gbanksnz at gmail.com
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Graham Banks
Posts: 41380
Joined: Sun Feb 26, 2006 10:52 am
Location: Auckland, NZ

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by Graham Banks »

Roger Brown wrote:I personally requested that various engine results be moved out of the EO sub-forum and placed in the Tournaments sub-forum.

Nothing doing. In fact I was told that it would be better to have them there than nowhere else as if those were the only alternatives.

Then it became clear that nothing serious was to come out of the EO sub-forum, even by accident. It was merely to be a place of dumping, a place where flames could be started without any moderator action because it was hidden.
It would be helpful to quote where all this came from, because a lot of it did not come from me.
However, I know that I'm the target here, so anything goes it would seem. At least try to be honest please.
gbanksnz at gmail.com
mcostalba
Posts: 2684
Joined: Sat Jun 14, 2008 9:17 pm

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by mcostalba »

Graham Banks wrote:
Sam Hull wrote: (a) Sorry for weighing in late. Our downtown Dallas office building has lost power and shut down my entire network two business days in a row, and I couldn't get back to the board after posting the guidance from Quentin for the CCC mods until now.

(b) There has been a rather large misunderstanding, and Jeremy has slightly misquoted what I passed along from ICD/Your Move. The guidance is simply to not tolerate anything that looks like a LINK to illegitimate software in CCC. No one said anything about censoring discussions or removing posts that simply make allusions or offer evaluations. Graham misunderstood the intent of the guidance - I have clarified it in detail for him this evening via IM. Where the issue of clones is concerned, and for the board in general, the goal of fair and balanced moderation has not changed, and there is no desire for favoritism in ANY direction.

(c) I hope Jeremy will reconsider his decision. I have not had a chance to converse with him directly and have received no PMs from him. I posted responses in the moderator forum as soon as I regained internet access, but I am still locked out of e-mail and will be until tomorrow morning. I think Jeremy has been an outstanding moderator and I fully support his philosophy of moderation - always have.

(d) I don't set moderation policy. I passed along a request to the CCC mods that I received from Quentin, which came as the result of certain members haranguing ICD about real, suspected, and imagined clones. Graham misunderstood the message, performed some moderation on that basis, and Jeremy decided to post a grand exit without waiting to get any clarification about the guidance.

(e) Personally I am surprised that two CCC mods who share an opinion cannot simply outvote and override one mod on those occasions when has a different view. I got regularly overridden for two whole terms in CTF. I haven't complained, and nobody died. It's a discussion board, folks.

(f) If a member runs for moderator and is elected, I think it is fair to expect him to honor his commitment and serve out the term.

-Sam-
In a nutshell, our sponsor would like the CCC mod team to be as aggressive as possible in removing anything that looks like a questionable link, or any other encouragement to acquire software of questionable legitimacy.

This was the part of the message that I misinterpreted. My understanding was that any post praising the strength or qualities of the engines in question was actually encouraging members to acquire them.
Once Jeremy gave me the go ahead to remove some of the threads as long as I left a message (he was going to bed at the time), I went ahead and did so. However, it seems that I was too liberal in my interpretation of what he actually meant.

I therefore apologise to Sam, to my fellow moderators and also to the forum membership for the controversy and unfortunate situation that has occurred due to this genuine misunderstanding.
I am happy to work with Jeremy and Swami to undo as much of the damage as we can, if they're prepared to do so. This would include an amendment of the announcement posted.

Cheers,
Graham. :oops:

I read what happened and there are many thins that actually I don't like at all.

1) If some commercial author pushed the owner of the site to censor Ippo links (as probably has happened) then the owner of the site should openly and trasparently state that "the forum will not tolerate..and so and so ..." and not pushing his pawns behind closed doors to do the dirty job.

If the owner of the site wants to protect his cutomer and do not reveal that has been pushed by someone to take this decision then this is fair, but should at least put his face on this decision and state this clearly _before_ starting to remove stuff.

This has not happened.

2) Because the order has been sent privately, then privately the owner of the site should have been take counter actions if/when found something was going wrong and not (sorry for this italian expression) "give shit" publicly to a pawn/moderator that mistakenly made a double instead of a single push.


So I feel unconfortable to post in a forum influenced by "hidden" commercial engines companies (I'm quite sure of this because a site owner doesn't wake up a morning chosing to ban something if not pushed by some customer, I think I know quite well how these things work because is my day job BTW) and whose policy is not transparently declared before corresponding actions are taken. If I go to Rybka forum I know Rybka controls everything, but this is ok as long as "Rybka" is written on the name of the forum and it's up to me to decide if posting or not (I don't), but here I didn't expect something like what's happened.

At last I would like to say something also to Graham.

Graham, you have been voted by people here and you are moderator because of forum users (not owners) put you there, so you deserve loyalty to people that voted you, not to someone else. If someone else is in a position to force you to do something it is up to you to decide what to do, but I think that would be fair to say _before_ : "Dear users, dear people that trust on me, I inform you that I was asked to remove stuff, I have accepted that duty and I will start it now"
Roger Brown
Posts: 782
Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 9:22 pm

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by Roger Brown »

Graham Banks wrote:
Roger Brown wrote:I personally requested that various engine results be moved out of the EO sub-forum and placed in the Tournaments sub-forum.

Nothing doing. In fact I was told that it would be better to have them there than nowhere else as if those were the only alternatives.

Then it became clear that nothing serious was to come out of the EO sub-forum, even by accident. It was merely to be a place of dumping, a place where flames could be started without any moderator action because it was hidden.
It would be helpful to quote where all this came from, because a lot of it did not come from me.
However, I know that I'm the target here, so anything goes it would seem. At least try to be honest please.




Hello Graham,

Great.

Now you insinuate that I am dishonest.

Why am I not surprised?

Look in this thread for one example of what I am talking about.

http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopi ... highlight=

Of course I would expect a retraction of the dishonesty insinuation from anyone else but I do not propose to hold my breath waiting for it from you. Insinuate away.

The flames comment was not yours - and I never attributed it to you. In fact, it seemed to be a popular joke at the time of I recall. A joke with far too much truth unfortunately.

Later.
Roger Brown
Posts: 782
Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 9:22 pm

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by Roger Brown »

mcostalba wrote:
I read what happened and there are many thins that actually I don't like at all.

1) If some commercial author pushed the owner of the site to censor Ippo links (as probably has happened) then the owner of the site should openly and trasparently state that "the forum will not tolerate..and so and so ..." and not pushing his pawns behind closed doors to do the dirty job.

If the owner of the site wants to protect his cutomer and do not reveal that has been pushed by someone to take this decision then this is fair, but should at least put his face on this decision and state this clearly _before_ starting to remove stuff.

This has not happened.

2) Because the order has been sent privately, then privately the owner of the site should have been take counter actions if/when found something was going wrong and not (sorry for this italian expression) "give shit" publicly to a pawn/moderator that mistakenly made a double instead of a single push.


So I feel unconfortable to post in a forum influenced by "hidden" commercial engines companies (I'm quite sure of this because a site owner doesn't wake up a morning chosing to ban something if not pushed by some customer, I think I know quite well how these things work because is my day job BTW) and whose policy is not transparently declared before corresponding actions are taken. If I go to Rybka forum I know Rybka controls everything, but this is ok as long as "Rybka" is written on the name of the forum and it's up to me to decide if posting or not (I don't), but here I didn't expect something like what's happened.

At last I would like to say something also to Graham.

Graham, you have been voted by people here and you are moderator because of forum users (not owners) put you there, so you deserve loyalty to people that voted you, not to someone else. If someone else is in a position to force you to do something it is up to you to decide what to do, but I think that would be fair to say _before_ : "Dear users, dear people that trust on me, I inform you that I was asked to remove stuff, I have accepted that duty and I will start it now"


Hello Marco,

Wonderful!

Later.
BBauer
Posts: 658
Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 8:58 pm

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by BBauer »

I have been here from the very beginning (1997) and I am glad to leave now.
Graham has become a pest to this forum.

Kind regards
Bernhard
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Graham Banks
Posts: 41380
Joined: Sun Feb 26, 2006 10:52 am
Location: Auckland, NZ

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by Graham Banks »

Roger Brown wrote: Now you insinuate that I am dishonest.
"Being fair" instead of "being honest" would have been more appropriate, so I apologise. :wink:
However, it was quite clear that your post was targeted at me.

Cheers,
Graham.
gbanksnz at gmail.com
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Graham Banks
Posts: 41380
Joined: Sun Feb 26, 2006 10:52 am
Location: Auckland, NZ

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by Graham Banks »

mcostalba wrote: Graham, you have been voted by people here and you are moderator because of forum users (not owners) put you there, so you deserve loyalty to people that voted you, not to someone else. If someone else is in a position to force you to do something it is up to you to decide what to do, but I think that would be fair to say _before_ : "Dear users, dear people that trust on me, I inform you that I was asked to remove stuff, I have accepted that duty and I will start it now"
If it comes to a choice between doing as requested or risking the forum being shut down, I choose to do as requested.
I did post an announcement explaining the situation as I understood it at the time, before taking the actions that I did.
However, I misinterpreted the extent of what was expected and I've since apologised for it.

Cheers,
Graham.
gbanksnz at gmail.com
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Graham Banks
Posts: 41380
Joined: Sun Feb 26, 2006 10:52 am
Location: Auckland, NZ

Re: Goodbye Talkchess

Post by Graham Banks »

BBauer wrote:I have been here from the very beginning (1997) and I am glad to leave now.
Graham has become a pest to this forum.

Kind regards
Bernhard
I love you too Bernhard. I've forgotten how many times you've made such posts, but a search would show it. I can't recall having replied to you in kind though.
I think that it's good to have an extra forum for those interested in our hobby, and I've already wished Jeremy well with it.

Cheers,
Graham.
gbanksnz at gmail.com