End of the Torch Experiement

[CornfedForever]

All the people waiting for it to become public: when a new analysis engine, or new bots, become available in Chess.com, that will be Torch.

I am happy to hear that...don't think it's what all those asking are wanting to hear though.

[Modern Times]

Well, we are waiting for it to be made available to everyone Andrew.

Why on earth would chess.com do that, having invested what I think is a large sum of money in it in order to drive their business ? It seems that a lot of people think everything should be free these days.

[Damir]

Says the one who got Torch Engine for free as a tester..

[RubiChess]

Well, we are waiting for it to be made available to everyone Andrew.

Why on earth would chess.com do that, having invested what I think is a large sum of money in it in order to drive their business ? It seems that a lot of people think everything should be free these days.

My guess is that the money went into Torch development is just peanuts for a company like chess.com. But I agree that there is no value for them making it available for sale.

[Chessqueen]

Well, we are waiting for it to be made available to everyone Andrew.

Why on earth would chess.com do that, having invested what I think is a large sum of money in it in order to drive their business ? It seems that a lot of people think everything should be free these days.

My guess is that the money went into Torch development is just peanuts for a company like chess.com. But I agree that there is no value for them making it available for sale.

Torch last version could be sold to us, and donate some some money to the development team

[smatovic]

[...]

You can add a url via [ url] [ /url] (w/o white spaces) without being embedded as media player, you might annoy some users, just saying.

--
Srdja

[jefk]

well Srdja i've simply put mr CQ on my ignore ('foe') list, but his name (and quotes of his silly messages) still pop up
(also notified a moderator but didn't get a reaction; that they grant some freedom of expression is understandable
but his impulsive messages with posting misleading youtube clips for me became rather annoying).
Anyway, i did'n't bother anymore to react to his (confused) messages about anti-chess (earlier I already I
wrote that it had been solved with 1.e3, but he didn't understand and continued with misleading messages
the strength of an -older- SF(airy) version, before Nnue). Anyway, I think anti (or losers) chess is flawed, and did a quick
check with the Pulsar variant engine and winboard to see if it can be corrected; removing the pawn at a7 may be
an idea, and leads to more balanced (b/w) play again. Something maybe for https://www.antichess.org/
(otherwise for online play you most likely get cheating eg. with a database of the antichess openings).
His drivel about this highly flawed ''ARB system' was the main reason to say goodbye. Years ago this already
was discussed, viewtopic.php?t=48818
The inventor by now should be 75 yrs if still alive, and he (a certain mr Brown) was banned a few times
with different accounts on chess.com after continous spamming with his nonsensical system. Nowadays
with Nnue engines this odd system obviously is completely inadequate and as human playing as such you will be
quickly demolished. A more modern similar system is the (semi) Hippopotamus, (with ARB being reversed
Hippopotamus) with the emphasis on 'semi' otherwise White quickly -and rather easily- can beat this system
in variants with f4, and a later f5.
https://www.newinchess.com/the-hippopotamus-defence.
Concluding, as some others also wrote, the subtopic 'general topics' imo is being spammed with yt vids
and this probably inhibits other, more productive discussions. For this reason i had a look to open-chess.org
and the postings there (still?) seem to be of a higher quality, although it's also not very busy there;
apparently Discord nowadays is the place to go; besides the SF server there is a Discord server
'engine programming' but it seems to be about game engines and not (only?) chess (anyway i'll have a look
to see if they talk about GUI programming (for chess), otherwise the Lichess server is an idea.
PS regarding the latter topic, while i talked about (the oldfashioned?) topic of system development
'cycles', nowadays the concept of UI/UX seems to be the hot(test) topic, see eg:
https://www.codecademy.com/learn/intro-to-ui-ux
https://www.coursera.org/specializations/ui-ux-design
But i'm getting off topic now (wrt the Torch engine)

[smatovic]

well Srdja i've simply put mr CQ on my ignore ('foe') list, but his name (and quotes of his silly messages) still pop up
(also notified a moderator but didn't get a reaction; that they grant some freedom of expression is understandable
but his impulsive messages with posting misleading youtube clips for me became rather annoying).
[...]

Hmm, CQ got banned (cos of signature misuse) and if YT embed is the issue, the mods can deactivate that module in phpBB backend:

Youtube links
viewtopic.php?t=83925

Ban of member
viewtopic.php?t=83939

--
Srdja

[jefk]

ah ok didn't know this yet (his ban) well i can't regret this (lol) he had earlier complaints from others,
and while i was quite tolerant against him i (also) started to notice that it became almost impossible
to engage in reasonable discussions (not condemning the guy btw, he just may be a problematic person)
sigh
ah well, now back to 'normal' again

[chrisw]

well Srdja i've simply put mr CQ on my ignore ('foe') list, but his name (and quotes of his silly messages) still pop up
(also notified a moderator but didn't get a reaction; that they grant some freedom of expression is understandable
but his impulsive messages with posting misleading youtube clips for me became rather annoying).
[...]

Hmm, CQ got banned (cos of signature misuse) and if YT embed is the issue, the mods can deactivate that module in phpBB backend:

Youtube links
viewtopic.php?t=83925

Ban of member
viewtopic.php?t=83939

--
Srdja

We already did a youtube signature disable (back in April?) because he was spamming youtube vids into his sig back then. I'm assuming he must have found a way round the disable and then inserted a current political propaganda video, via sig, into the yesterday post. He knows it's not allowed and I, for one, do not intend to play a moderation war with him of escalating measure/countermeasure. Hence the ban.