Hans Niemann

[syzygy]

So, Magnus obsessed on Niemann after Niemann beat him and the latter did not pay the 'proper respects'...offers no evidence and life goes on (with Niemann unable to get certain invitations if the organizers think they have a shot at getting Magnus)...while Niemann keeps playing in OTB tourneys - un-shunned by others, and stays about 2700.

Hey, it's all fair...be it in sport, politics...anywhere, he rich and powerful get to play by different rules than the rest of us.

There are more players that refuse to play specific opponents. What are you going to do about it. Is Magnus so special that he is required to play by different rules?

[chrisw]

So, Magnus obsessed on Niemann after Niemann beat him and the latter did not pay the 'proper respects'...offers no evidence and life goes on (with Niemann unable to get certain invitations if the organizers think they have a shot at getting Magnus)...while Niemann keeps playing in OTB tourneys - un-shunned by others, and stays about 2700.

Hey, it's all fair...be it in sport, politics...anywhere, he rich and powerful get to play by different rules than the rest of us.

There are more players that refuse to play specific opponents. What are you going to do about it. Is Magnus so special that he is required to play by different rules?

Refusing to play someone is probably an offence against tournament rules, if it isn’t it should be. But that’s not really the point you’re making - if there is an offence by Magnus vis a vis FIDE, it would be of using his FIDE WC office/title to make an extra-legal attack on another player.

[towforce]

So, Magnus obsessed on Niemann after Niemann beat him and the latter did not pay the 'proper respects'...offers no evidence and life goes on (with Niemann unable to get certain invitations if the organizers think they have a shot at getting Magnus)...while Niemann keeps playing in OTB tourneys - un-shunned by others, and stays about 2700.

Hey, it's all fair...be it in sport, politics...anywhere, he rich and powerful get to play by different rules than the rest of us.

There are more players that refuse to play specific opponents. What are you going to do about it. Is Magnus so special that he is required to play by different rules?

A player who refuses to play their opponent forfeits the game. Or the player can resign, which Magnus did against Niemann. Not really a problem for the tournament. It could even be good for the tournament, because it generates publicity. Magnus refusing to enter if Niemann competes in it is bad for the tournament, so the tournament won't invite Niemann. This is harmful to Niemann's income - hence he's suing his accusers.

As a workaround, how about... tournaments with special rules to allow both to attend, but ensure that the two won't play each other?

[syzygy]

So, Magnus obsessed on Niemann after Niemann beat him and the latter did not pay the 'proper respects'...offers no evidence and life goes on (with Niemann unable to get certain invitations if the organizers think they have a shot at getting Magnus)...while Niemann keeps playing in OTB tourneys - un-shunned by others, and stays about 2700.

Hey, it's all fair...be it in sport, politics...anywhere, he rich and powerful get to play by different rules than the rest of us.

There are more players that refuse to play specific opponents. What are you going to do about it. Is Magnus so special that he is required to play by different rules?

Refusing to play someone is probably an offence against tournament rules, if it isn’t it should be. But that’s not really the point you’re making - if there is an offence by Magnus vis a vis FIDE, it would be of using his FIDE WC office/title to make an extra-legal attack on another player.

Here I responded to Cornfed criticising Carlsen for refusing to play Niemann (allegedly leading to Niemann being "unable to get certain invitations if the organizers think they have a shot at getting Magnus"). I don't believe there is any ethical rule against being picky. (And recently I read about other players refusing to play specific opponents, not sure if I can find it back.) Magnus is allowed to not enter a tournament, and he is allowed to resign a game without playing a move.

You can criticise Magnus for not being consistent. Sure, Carlsen might not be fully consistent in his stance against former cheaters in general. But being inconsistent is not against any rule, either.

The other criticism is the public accusation of Niemann being a cheater. Such an accusation certainly has the potential of being problematic (e.g. Topalov vs Kramnik), but there is a lot of context that needs to be taken into account.

[rainhaus]

I had not heard recent news about him, since the lawsuit was filed. I looked up his FIDE record, and saw he has played no rated games in the past three months. I think the last event he was in was the World Blitz in December 2022.

Update: May 2023

FIDE sets a new date for an official statement on the Carlsen/Niemann case
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/04/spor ... rlsen.html (subscription required)

The New York Times wrote on May 4 in the column "Sports" that FIDE has decided to postpone the official statement on the Carlsen/Niemann case until at least October of this year in order to await further developments in the civil proceedings between the two parties. So it has at least specified its message to the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation from April, in which the delay was still left completely open.

I don't think this reasoning or its vague wording is very helpful, as it gives even more space to speculation and rumors than was already the case.

Clearer would have been e.g. announcements like:
- FIDE does not want to influence the outcome of the civil proceedings with its report
or
- FIDE would like to make the completed report of the independent Ethics & Disciplinary Commission (E.C.D.) immediately accessible to the courts in the interest of reaching a judgment as objectively as possible.

Well, in the present state of opinion, it means for me that FIDE wants to react to the court proceedings and not vice versa, the court proceedings to the report of FIDE. Wrong world!?
Can the courts or lawyers not demand the report of the expert commission as important evidence? Seems to be still a juridically extremely complex and non-transparent thing.

It is clear that Niemann's lawyer is reacting to this latest appeal by the federation in the sense of his client "It comes down to money", he says and in his email to FIDE he notes: "Given the deep-rooted financial ties between FIDE, Chess.com, Play Magnus and Magnus Carlsen FIDE's sudden refusal to disclose the results of its independent investigation bolsters our belief that the results of that investigation are highly favorable to Niemann and raises serious concerns that this scandal runs even deeper than anticipated."
David Llada, FIDE's director of communications, responded immediately, saying that the decision to postpone the release of the report and any potential disciplinary action was made by the organization's Ethics and Disciplinary Commission, not by its president or any high-level executive.

Since the research of Kenneth Reagan, the anti-cheating expert commissioned by FIDE, we know that FIDE has not found any current evidence of cheating on the part of Niemann.

Actually, everything cries out for a hefty compensation for Hans Niemann. And Niemann himself ? As mentioned earlier, he hardly gets any more invitations to the major tournaments as in the previous year and has to earn his bread at the smaller, less lucrative tournaments all over the world.
This has done nothing to his chess performance. When Magnus Carlsen broke the scandal in September 2022, the US American was 49th in the world rankings with 2688 Elo. In May 2023, he was ranked 31st with 2708.

[Collingwood]

Since the research of Kenneth Reagan, the anti-cheating expert commissioned by FIDE, we know that FIDE has not found any current evidence of cheating on the part of Niemann.

What do you mean by "current"?

Niemann would have to be crazy to continue cheating right now.

As for the past, Regan said he largely agreed with chess.com's report on Niemann's cheating on that forum.

[Collingwood]

It is sad for Niemann that he is publicly crucified in front of the whole world in the first place. Instead of taking it up behind the scenes in peace and quiet. I don't endorse cheating, but you can see what Magnus has set up, a terrible mess for himself and the accused. Someone who makes a mistake once as a teen, does not mean that it will happen again. I think the public are being harsh on him, he was after all only in his teens. There is a difference between someone at that age and an mature adult.

But chess.com did take it up behind the scenes in peace and quiet. Did that help? No, it did not.

And it was not just "once". He cheated over and over again.

The whole "teen" excuse makes me extremely sad. I didn't have lower ethical or moral standards when I was a teen than as an adult. It's all so insulting to teenagers.

[chrisw]

It is sad for Niemann that he is publicly crucified in front of the whole world in the first place. Instead of taking it up behind the scenes in peace and quiet. I don't endorse cheating, but you can see what Magnus has set up, a terrible mess for himself and the accused. Someone who makes a mistake once as a teen, does not mean that it will happen again. I think the public are being harsh on him, he was after all only in his teens. There is a difference between someone at that age and an mature adult.

But chess.com did take it up behind the scenes in peace and quiet. Did that help? No, it did not.

And it was not just "once". He cheated over and over again.

The whole "teen" excuse makes me extremely sad. I didn't have lower ethical or moral standards when I was a teen than as an adult. It's all so insulting to teenagers.

It’s amusing to read all these Americans (I assume mostly) with these very high ethical and moral standards, or so they never cease to tell us ad nauseam, utterly condemning even the slightest transgressions aged 10, yet surrounded with the world highest prison population, the worlds worst drug addiction problem, massive mass-shooting problem, endemic racism etc etc. must be weird living where one is s o o o o good and righteous and others s o o o o o immoral, unethical etc. quite the contradiction. Should we believe it?

[towforce]

Since the research of Kenneth Reagan, the anti-cheating expert commissioned by FIDE, we know that FIDE has not found any current evidence of cheating on the part of Niemann.

What do you mean by "current"?

Niemann would have to be crazy to continue cheating right now.

As for the past, Regan said he largely agreed with chess.com's report on Niemann's cheating on that forum.

I have a news subscription that gives me access to this article. I think it constitutes "fair use" to quote the end of the article verbatim because, IMO, it's important for interested people to know (no doubt people opposed to Niemann will disagree). Also, I sincerely believe that if I took the time, I could find the same information from another source:

"Though the full contents of the report remain a secret, one crucial detail is known. FIDE retained a professor of computer science at the University at Buffalo named Kenneth Regan, who has developed what is widely considered the world’s most sophisticated cheating detection algorithm — a way to track how closely a player’s moves mirror those of supercomputers that can outplay anything with a pulse.

Regan was asked by the chess federation to study Niemann’s playing during the Sinquefield Cup and other over-the-board tournaments. Did he find evidence that Niemann had cheated?

“Unequivocally no,” he said in an interview on Wednesday. “And there’s not much more to say about it.”

Time is slowly adding heft of its own to this verdict. Niemann has continued to play in professional tournaments, and he keeps getting better. His rating is higher than it was during the Sinquefield Cup, and has now crossed the 2700 threshold that separates merely great players from the most elite. When the Sinquefield Cup began, he was ranked 49th in the world. Today, he is ranked 31st."

[CornfedForever]

It is sad for Niemann that he is publicly crucified in front of the whole world in the first place. Instead of taking it up behind the scenes in peace and quiet. I don't endorse cheating, but you can see what Magnus has set up, a terrible mess for himself and the accused. Someone who makes a mistake once as a teen, does not mean that it will happen again. I think the public are being harsh on him, he was after all only in his teens. There is a difference between someone at that age and an mature adult.

But chess.com did take it up behind the scenes in peace and quiet. Did that help? No, it did not.

And it was not just "once". He cheated over and over again.

The whole "teen" excuse makes me extremely sad. I didn't have lower ethical or moral standards when I was a teen than as an adult. It's all so insulting to teenagers.

Then you are better than the average human.
Heck, when I was a child (not a teen), I came out of a grocery store with my parent and a box of milk duds in my pocket. My dad saw me in the rear view mirror eating them...turned the care around and took me back to pay for it.
I guess that means I must carry a bit 'C' on my chest the rest of my life.

Anyway, Collingwood makes the salient point: Hans continues to maintain his rating...increasing it slightly with all eyes on him. 'Respect' some would say.