Moderation Policy Statement

[JuLieN]

Dear all,

after a few days of pondering and synchronization work, your team of moderators synthesized its moderation policy as will now be developed in this post. We think it covers the vast majority of users' opinions and will address all the main problems.

1. A first topic was "what to do with the Rybka case threads"? After we considered various options (like creating a specific sub-forum for such heated discussions), we decided to simply move those threads to Engine Origin when they start to derail. There is nothing wrong with that: you'll still be able to read and discuss in those threads without annoying other users. Engine Origin is a members-only subforum, but this is not a problem considering that everyone can become a member of Talkchess.

So, starting from now, you are responsible for such topics: you CAN publish them in the main forum, if they are purely informative (for example: "Levy's interview on Chessbase about ICGA/rybka" can be published in the main forum without problem), but if such topics start to derail into flame wars, they will be moved to Engine Origins. So, if you don't want that to happen, refrain yourselves from starting such wars.

2. The CCC charter forbids personal attacks and insults and we will enforce it. However, we also understand that the severity of the attack can vary significantly and can even be open to a certain degree of interpretation. Therefore, when making assessments on this issue we will put very heavy weight on whether there was an actual complaint or not.

3. Use of vulgarity and profanity towards another person will be immediately moderated. Talkchess is a public place, where people from very different cultures try to exchange as pleasantly as possible. So use your common sense and have minimum of respect towards other members. An “excess” of vulgarity and/or profanity, even if it is not against a person, is also not welcome.

4. We will also take special care to prevent threads to be deliberately hijacked by individuals willing to make direct attacks at other users.

5. We realize that it is not possible to please every member with every decision so we will NOT debate our decisions publicly. However that does not mean that we are not open to your concerns. Please don't hesitate to contact us privately if you feel that you need to open up a dialogue with us and we will be happy to listen to what you have to say.

Adam, Julien, Miguel, and Don

[JuLieN]

For reference, exhaustivity and precision, here is our candidacy statement to our second term:

Dear members of CCC,

Despite some bumps in the road during this past term (not an unexpected thing in a forum consisting of many diverse and intelligent people), we decided to run again for a second term as moderators, with Adam Hair filling in for Don Dailey. Don has much going on at the moment and does not have enough time to moderate, but agreed to run as the alternate.

Our reasons for running again were based on these factors:

1. We learned to appreciate each other, and we really enjoy working together. We gladly would work as a team for 6 more months. We had different perspectives on some issues, but we found consensus regarding our main policies. This investment phase payed off and we learned from each other.

2. Despite some moments where some people strongly opposed our moderating philosophy, we received much support, both publicly and privately. This has encouraged us to run again.

3. We have introduced several policies that we believe have improved the CCC forum. The CCC forum is and should be the center of all things concerning computer chess. What we implemented include:

A. We have redirected threads concerning clones, which engines are clones, who is cheating, etc ..., to the Engine Origins subforum. The effect of this has been to keep the main forum uncluttered and a more civil place. In addition, this benefitted the technical discussions regarding clones because of the slower pace of EO. The feedback we have received indicates that the members generally appreciated these action.

B. Many people, from within and without, came to "believe" that the CCC was controlled by a few. Whether this “control” was true or not is irrelevant. The fact is that several important discussions were taking place in other fora. CCC is supposed to be THE PLACE for all enthusiasts and authors. All discussions belong here as long as they are civilized. For that reason, we took action by enforcing CCC's charter and keeping a neutral stance in all situations.

C. CCC was devolving into a place where people felt free to insult each other, and generally act uncivil towards each other. We actively fought this by posting warnings directly in the offending threads and sending PM's to the transgressors. Civility is necessary in a place as diverse as CCC. The lack of it nullifies the great aspects of CCC and drives away members that we should strive to keep.

D. We actively worked to curb the practice of blatant "thread hijacking". Normal conversation between groups of people tend to wind around and touch upon several subjects. However, it was becoming more common for individuals to completely disregard the thread's topic and launch into a subject (often an attack) of their own choosing. The role of this forum, besides being a place for enthusiasts and authors to interact, is to facilitate the flow of information. Thread hijacking interrupts basic interaction and it is abusive.

We vow to continue to implement this philosophy. We feel, and believe that you feel, that it has improved CCC. It is for that reason, also, that we choose to run again.

Adam, Julien, Miguel, and Don

[JuLieN]

And here is our candidacy statement for our third (and final) term:

Dear CCC members,

after some discussions, we decided to run for one final term. Discussions because despite the mod team works well and we enjoy to work with each others the task does take some time, especially from developing our own engines, and can be lacking of interest at times. But we also feel that our job is not totally done yet. In particular, after the poll we ran asking you if the forum software should be updated, you were an overwhelming majority to vote in favor of it. And despite some quick patch were applied after the poll, like the pgn viewer, the promise remains to be fulfilled.

We would also be willing to welcome some motivated people who would like to take over after us. We would gladly help them mount a team and share our experience with them during our last term.

We vow to try our best to achieve those two goals, and we vow to continue to moderate along the same rules as we've followed up to now as they are written on the forum's charter and in our Moderation Policy Statement.

/Adam, Julien, Miguel and Don