Voir Dire

[bob]

I am against lifelong bans as a matter of principle. (I mean, it is not like we are dealing with a murderer knifing opponents on a WCCC.) Even if we belief in the rule "once a cheater, always a cheater", this can be effectively cured by requiring him to submit source + binary in advance, so to require this of him as a sanction seems good enough.

I can't/won't reveal all of our discussions, but I can tell you that I did not recommend a life-time ban. I recommended (for that part of the punishment) that he be allowed to enter a future ICGA event only after having submitted the source code to a third-party agreed to by both Vas and the ICGA, so that the source could be verified to be original.

Another option was to require him to add Fabien's name to the program, share revenues with him (ICGA could not force him to do this, but they could refuse to let him compete if he did not) and then the fruit code becomes legitimate although no fruit derivative could compete in the same tournament since one author can't appear on two different programs in an ICGA event.

The title vacation idea also was not mine. I was neither for nor against. rewriting history is hard. Particularly when we use Swiss tournaments, and those are really designed to identify the best performer, not the best two performers (unless you have enough rounds, of course.) Removing the top finisher makes the rest of the scores suspect. Some played him and lost and were penalized, others did not play him and were not penalized. That makes promoting #2 not particularly fair.

That was, however, the ICGA's call, and I can see both sides of the argument. It would be ridiculous to not vacate the title. It could be considered equally ridiculous to have no winner for the vacated years, as that would highlight what happened for years to come when someone would ask why there was no WC in these specific years...

Pandora's box...

If you ever play call of duty zombies, this is sort of like the mystery box. You never know what weapon you will get. From all-powerful electronic guns, to a colt 45 semi-automatic pistol. But once you open the box, you get what you get and no more. It's a gamble.

[Roger Brown]

If the juror has already formed a fixed opinion based on prior knowledge or prejudice related to a material issue in the case, then he will be excused from serving on that jury.

You mean like when Vas acted as judge, jury and prosecutor in the Ippolit affair?

Hello John Conway,

My, my, my, irony can surely bite deep...



Later.

[gerold]

I am against lifelong bans as a matter of principle. (I mean, it is not like we are dealing with a murderer knifing opponents on a WCCC.) Even if we belief in the rule "once a cheater, always a cheater", this can be effectively cured by requiring him to submit source + binary in advance, so to require this of him as a sanction seems good enough.

I agree a life time long ban seems to much. Vas maybe cut a deal and give Rybka to Fabien and any source he has of Rybka. Fabien then could continue to use it in ICGA. Maybe gave Vas a 1 year ban and he could have time to write or improve his old engine.

[Milos]

Yes, but the first time I saw Ippolit, it was clear that it's Rybkish. I think no one serious doubts that Ippolit is an improved Rybka 3, and now that Rybka 1.0 is an improved, bitboard Fruit 2.1. The ugliest thing was certainly Vas gaining money from a thievery, but as a general approach in building engines, I would consider all Rybkas, Ippos, Houdinis as legit. Forgot, the neglect in general view, and in particular on CCC, of the excellent IvanHoe, which is second only to Houdini as strength goes and as analysis tool.

You forgot one very important difference. Ippolit code is written from scratch. There is no Rybka (or any other known program) code in Ippolit, despite pathetic tries of Bob and Larry to claim copyright on tables (rotated bitboard and PST which is nothing but ridiculous). Since the very beginning Ippo source was available and still nobody was able to prove for even a single block of code to be copied either from Rybka or any other program. Whenever you ask for a specific proof (which is so easy to point out like lines of the original source or disassembled addresses) from any of these slanderers (Bob, Larry, Don, Chris, HGM, list is long) you just get either silence or pathetic arguments (like copying of tables).
Being Rybkish means nothing! If Ippolit is guilty of taking Rybka ideas so are all of these: STOCKFISH, KOMODO, CRITTER, NAUM, ... (the list is really long).

[hgm]

The list is no doubt very long... By the time the entire rest of the world is on your list of serious criminals, it would be a good time to have your head revised! (And cloning probably won't help there.)

[lucasart]

If the juror has already formed a fixed opinion based on prior knowledge or prejudice related to a material issue in the case, then he will be excused from serving on that jury.

You mean like when Vas acted as judge, jury and prosecutor in the Ippolit affair?

+1!

[bob]

If the juror has already formed a fixed opinion based on prior knowledge or prejudice related to a material issue in the case, then he will be excused from serving on that jury.

You mean like when Vas acted as judge, jury and prosecutor in the Ippolit affair?

+1!

Unfortunately, Vas was the _perfect_ person to make that particular claim. Just as I was the perfect person to claim that Vas copied Crafty to produce the pre-beta Rybkas like 1.6.1... The original author is uniquely qualified to recognize his own code, his own coding style, and his known coding mistakes...

So his actions there were not so bad. The only thing lacking was that he never offered any proof, while there is plenty of proof about the 1.6.1 vs Crafty case, offered in the report we compiled. Proof would have solved a lot of problems because then we would not be up to our armpits with all the ip*/robo* clones...

[lucasart]

If the juror has already formed a fixed opinion based on prior knowledge or prejudice related to a material issue in the case, then he will be excused from serving on that jury.

You mean like when Vas acted as judge, jury and prosecutor in the Ippolit affair?

+1!

Unfortunately, Vas was the _perfect_ person to make that particular claim. Just as I was the perfect person to claim that Vas copied Crafty to produce the pre-beta Rybkas like 1.6.1... The original author is uniquely qualified to recognize his own code, his own coding style, and his known coding mistakes...

So his actions there were not so bad. The only thing lacking was that he never offered any proof, while there is plenty of proof about the 1.6.1 vs Crafty case, offered in the report we compiled. Proof would have solved a lot of problems because then we would not be up to our armpits with all the ip*/robo* clones...

Agreed.

But if he didn't offer any proof after all that time... Don't you think there might be a good reason ?
Is it because he miraculously loses all his code, and just ends up with *.exe files of Rybka ?
Or is it simply because there *is* no such proof ?

[bob]

If the juror has already formed a fixed opinion based on prior knowledge or prejudice related to a material issue in the case, then he will be excused from serving on that jury.

You mean like when Vas acted as judge, jury and prosecutor in the Ippolit affair?

+1!

Unfortunately, Vas was the _perfect_ person to make that particular claim. Just as I was the perfect person to claim that Vas copied Crafty to produce the pre-beta Rybkas like 1.6.1... The original author is uniquely qualified to recognize his own code, his own coding style, and his known coding mistakes...

So his actions there were not so bad. The only thing lacking was that he never offered any proof, while there is plenty of proof about the 1.6.1 vs Crafty case, offered in the report we compiled. Proof would have solved a lot of problems because then we would not be up to our armpits with all the ip*/robo* clones...

Agreed.

But if he didn't offer any proof after all that time... Don't you think there might be a good reason ?
Is it because he miraculously loses all his code, and just ends up with *.exe files of Rybka ?
Or is it simply because there *is* no such proof ?

A third reason. Offering proof would also offer proof that he had copied Fruit. Caught between a rock and a hard place...

[noctiferus]

Or, from greek mythology, between Scylla and Charybdis...