If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.
Policy / Politique
The fee for tournament organizers advertising on ChessTalk is $20/event or $100/yearly unlimited for the year.
Les frais d'inscription des organisateurs de tournoi sur ChessTalk sont de 20 $/événement ou de 100 $/année illimitée.
You can etransfer to Henry Lam at chesstalkforum at gmail dot com
Transfér à Henry Lam à chesstalkforum@gmail.com
Dark Knight / Le Chevalier Noir
General Guidelines
---- Nous avons besoin d'un traduction français!
Some Basics
1. Under Board "Frequently Asked Questions" (FAQs) there are 3 sections dealing with General Forum Usage, User Profile Features, and Reading and Posting Messages. These deal with everything from Avatars to Your Notifications. Most general technical questions are covered there. Here is a link to the FAQs. https://forum.chesstalk.com/help
2. Consider using the SEARCH button if you are looking for information. You may find your question has already been answered in a previous thread.
3. If you've looked for an answer to a question, and not found one, then you should consider asking your question in a new thread. For example, there have already been questions and discussion regarding: how to do chess diagrams (FENs); crosstables that line up properly; and the numerous little “glitches” that every new site will have.
4. Read pinned or sticky threads, like this one, if they look important. This applies especially to newcomers.
5. Read the thread you're posting in before you post. There are a variety of ways to look at a thread. These are covered under “Display Modes”.
6. Thread titles: please provide some details in your thread title. This is useful for a number of reasons. It helps ChessTalk members to quickly skim the threads. It prevents duplication of threads. And so on.
7. Unnecessary thread proliferation (e.g., deliberately creating a new thread that duplicates existing discussion) is discouraged. Look to see if a thread on your topic may have already been started and, if so, consider adding your contribution to the pre-existing thread. However, starting new threads to explore side-issues that are not relevant to the original subject is strongly encouraged. A single thread on the Canadian Open, with hundreds of posts on multiple sub-topics, is no better than a dozen threads on the Open covering only a few topics. Use your good judgment when starting a new thread.
8. If and/or when sub-forums are created, please make sure to create threads in the proper place.
Debate
9. Give an opinion and back it up with a reason. Throwaway comments such as "Game X pwnz because my friend and I think so!" could be considered pointless at best, and inflammatory at worst.
10. Try to give your own opinions, not simply those copied and pasted from reviews or opinions of your friends.
Unacceptable behavior and warnings
11. In registering here at ChessTalk please note that the same or similar rules apply here as applied at the previous Boardhost message board. In particular, the following content is not permitted to appear in any messages:
* Racism
* Hatred
* Harassment
* Adult content
* Obscene material
* Nudity or pornography
* Material that infringes intellectual property or other proprietary rights of any party
* Material the posting of which is tortious or violates a contractual or fiduciary obligation you or we owe to another party
* Piracy, hacking, viruses, worms, or warez
* Spam
* Any illegal content
* unapproved Commercial banner advertisements or revenue-generating links
* Any link to or any images from a site containing any material outlined in these restrictions
* Any material deemed offensive or inappropriate by the Board staff
12. Users are welcome to challenge other points of view and opinions, but should do so respectfully. Personal attacks on others will not be tolerated. Posts and threads with unacceptable content can be closed or deleted altogether. Furthermore, a range of sanctions are possible - from a simple warning to a temporary or even a permanent banning from ChessTalk.
Helping to Moderate
13. 'Report' links (an exclamation mark inside a triangle) can be found in many places throughout the board. These links allow users to alert the board staff to anything which is offensive, objectionable or illegal. Please consider using this feature if the need arises.
Advice for free
14. You should exercise the same caution with Private Messages as you would with any public posting.
I think that it is too much to ask for the CFC to manually update each player's FIDE rating on their CFC ID card so that is why I think the CFC should link to that player's FIDE card. I'm not sure how difficult this would be to implement, but I know that this is what the USCF does. To see an example of this, here's Hikaru Nakamura's USCF Member Card. http://main.uschess.org/assets/msa_j...n.php?12641216
The FIDE database is available to download for free. I wonder how difficult it would be to program their database to merge with ours. I don't have that sort of training, but can it be that difficult? At the same time, you could import FIDE numbers too. This would make running CFC/FIDE tournaments much much easier. Just a thought.
Fortunately, that crisis has passed, and it is not so likely for something similar to happen again soon thanks to the sale of the office. However even before that emails were not always answered, for whatever reason. All I can say is be patient, as you have got the attention and the promise of action from the current Executive Director Bob Gillanders, who does a good job overall giving all that needs to be done at the CFC.
Hi Kevin,
I think William and his daughter are being more than patient. If my correspondence titles had been held up with delays in applying, I'd have been jumping up and down and been very upset.
I think Yuanling's title should be applied for immediately. Having to chase people for things you've earned takes the fun out of it.
I think William and his daughter are being more than patient. If my correspondence titles had been held up with delays in applying, I'd have been jumping up and down and been very upset.
I think Yuanling's title should be applied for immediately. Having to chase people for things you've earned takes the fun out of it.
Hi Gary
You are right, but there are unpleasant realities to face here. The CFC is the only organization that can apply for FIDE titles on behalf of Canadians afaik. Right now the CFC staff is understaffed and overworked, and must deal with other matters even more urgently, I gather from what the Executive Director has posted. I can only imagine that every minute is precious to the staff, but if someone can show that they had time to spare or were dealing with lesser priorites (instead of dealing with 'customer service' first) then being upset is more than justified. I am giving them the benefit of the doubt.
Regardless, if the CFC didn't have a monopoly on FIDE applications then like a customer who received poor service at a restuarant, even because it was understaffed, I would go elsewhere to dine next time (though I might feel sorry for the poverty-stricken restaurant I refused to go back to, IF they had always been run nearly as well as possible).
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Murphy's law, by Edward A. Murphy Jr., USAF, Aerospace Engineer
A Balanced CFC 2009-10 Budget? What is Required to Get There?
Hi Kevin:
My concern is the 2009-10 CFC Budget. The Executive has announced that they are trying to work toward it being a balanced budget. This would be a great achievement, given four years of consecutive , significant losses.
But are they going to have to cut some of the hours of the three part-time staff to get to a balanced budget? I'm not sure what other expenses are left to cut, if cuts are still needed to balance the budget - I'd be surprised if there are any, except salaries or the webzine. It may be that despite all the fine restructuring implementation done this year, CFC still has severe problems yet.
I guess we wait to see what the governors produce as a budget, and what they had to do to get it to balance, if they do.
You are right, but there are unpleasant realities to face here. The CFC is the only organization that can apply for FIDE titles on behalf of Canadians afaik. Right now the CFC staff is understaffed and overworked, and must deal with other matters even more urgently, I gather from what the Executive Director has posted. I can only imagine that every minute is precious to the staff, but if someone can show that they had time to spare or were dealing with lesser priorites (instead of dealing with 'customer service' first) then being upset is more than justified. I am giving them the benefit of the doubt.
Hi Kevin,
The same can be said for the overworked tournament directors. Imagine if they didn't bother collecting memberships or sending in events for rating because they are too busy.
Applying for titles is basic. The players participate in International events and represent Canada on Olympic teams. Being too busy to apply for titles they win is not acceptable.
Who's the president these days? If he can't get the hired help to apply for the title why doesn't he do it himself?
My concern is the 2009-10 CFC Budget. The Executive has announced that they are trying to work toward it being a balanced budget. This would be a great achievement, given four years of consecutive , significant losses.
But are they going to have to cut some of the hours of the three part-time staff to get to a balanced budget? I'm not sure what other expenses are left to cut, if cuts are still needed to balance the budget - I'd be surprised if there are any, except salaries or the webzine. It may be that despite all the fine restructuring implementation done this year, CFC still has severe problems yet.
I guess we wait to see what the governors produce as a budget, and what they had to do to get it to balance, if they do.
Bob
Hi Bob
From what I recall and understand it is thanks primarily to the efforts of some CFC stalwarts here in Ottawa that the CFC managed to sell the office and receive fair value for it, not to mention handle the nightmarish paperwork and other details. That meant that the CFC is now a lot closer to surviving despite much reduced membership, compared to some years ago.
I'd have to see the cost of the webzine, but I would hope that it will start to pay for itself, i.e. the cost and time invested by the staff involved, sometime soon. Otherwise it might prove to be an expensive mistake. I hope the CFC knew what it was doing when it decided to publish it. At the moment it is not quite a satisfactory product, I think can be safely stated. I hope the CFC has not bit off more than it can chew in attempting to publish one on a regular basis sooner or later.
My instinct would have been not to publish/(gamble on) a webzine until the CFC was on a much better footing financially and any affordable staff might not be as over-stretched. Membership levels had bottomed out recently, the effect of regular CFC rating deflation on membership, if any (I suspect it was quite significant), was over, and any effect of abruptly cancelling the print magazine (which in my opinion negatively counter-balanced the boost to members' regular ratings at about at the same time) was over too, so the situation may have been becoming a lot more stable again, and it was a good time to take sober stock of the situation.
If I had to play CFC, instead of publishing a webzine I would have wanted the staff that the CFC could afford to hire use the time saved on as many little things as possible to improve membership satisfaction, such as more attention to FIDE matters, answering more emails promptly if possible, and correcting what is clearly the deflation to Active ratings, which probably is bothersome/depressing to at least some members (it is to me, anyway).
Now, if the CFC sometime decides it is necessary to discontinue the webzine to save cost and/or staff time, more members will be upset and who knows how many will leave this time as a result. Anyway, the decision to publish was made. Let's hope it works out, the sooner the better.
Last edited by Kevin Pacey; Tuesday, 17th March, 2009, 12:10 AM.
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Murphy's law, by Edward A. Murphy Jr., USAF, Aerospace Engineer
The same can be said for the overworked tournament directors. Imagine if they didn't bother collecting memberships or sending in events for rating because they are too busy.
Applying for titles is basic. The players participate in International events and represent Canada on Olympic teams. Being too busy to apply for titles they win is not acceptable.
Who's the president these days? If he can't get the hired help to apply for the title why doesn't he do it himself?
Hi Gary
Of course you are right, again.
Here is a link to the CFC Website Contacts link, in case anyone wants it (it contains the names and other info of CFC Executive Officers and Governors, etc: http://www.chess.ca/contactus.htm
Since the CFC has a monopoly on FIDE applications, they can almost do what they please without near-immediate consequence. If someone needs recourse for an unacceptable situation with respect to a business they can either refuse to do business with them in future or see if legal action is possible. I would not think that this situation has come to that, nor probably will it, however.
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Murphy's law, by Edward A. Murphy Jr., USAF, Aerospace Engineer
The Grassroots' Campaign had reservations about the Chess Canada Webzine, because they thought the CFC could not afford it, just like they couldn't afford the print magazine. They feared for the money available, if any was available, the product might be deficient and not satisfy the membership.
But the new President wanted it, and it seemed the Governors wanted it ( I talked to some who felt it was not affordable, but they were waiting too because they were clearly in a minority ), and so the GC held back on moving against the webzine until the finances clarified, and we saw whether, as the Governors believed, it could be afforded.
The proof I guess will be if they can balance the budget, have the webzine, and have enough of a budget to keep evolving what is clearly still a work-in-progress.
The Grassroots' Campaign had reservations about the Chess Canada Webzine, because they thought the CFC could not afford it, just like they couldn't afford the print magazine. They feared for the money available, if any was available, the product might be deficient and not satisfy the membership.
But the new President wanted it, and it seemed the Governors wanted it...
Hi Bob
If one is in charge of anything, such as money and/or an organization, that is not one's own, and there is little accountability involved, one is apt to take unnecessary chances or be careless with it, unless one constantly treats it like it was one's own. If there is a significant degree of uncertainty over the wisdom of embarking on a new course in one's own life, and the risk is unnessary and recognizably great, a prudent person would err on the side of caution. If you don't know whether you can even afford taking such a risk, that goes double.
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Murphy's law, by Edward A. Murphy Jr., USAF, Aerospace Engineer
It would be great if you could prepare that comparison list of CFC and FIDE ratings each quarter and submit it as a feature for the webzine. I am certain there are a few members like Kevin who would appreciate it.
This was done and publish in the webzine. I tried to paste in the forum, but the table does not want to be nice...
I included only active FIDE players. If anybody are willing to see their names added (e.g. they are active only in CFC tournaments but hold old FIDE rating), let me know.
Not all CFC players has FIDE ID number included in the CFC file. Some of them are ceased and their FIDE # replaced by other players (e.g. A.Yanofsky). Thus datasets were brutally manually managed.
What might be a command or script to retrieve only CFC current ratings for players with CFC #
blabla#14705 gives 2210 (it's mine :)
...Regarding CFC Active ratings, does anyone know why these were not deemed to be deflated by the CFC's ratings committee (or more properly, the CFC Ratings Auditor) when action was taken to correct the admitted deflation to regular CFC ratings a few years back? It seems to me that CFC Active ratings were and still are just as deflated as regular CFC ratings used to be.
Since the CFC Ratings Auditor/Committe nor the CFC Governors/Executive seems to be in any hurry to do anything about the longstanding obvious deflation of CFC Active ratings, I will now be boycotting CFC Active events until a correction to the CFC's Active rating system is made. I do not wish to pay an Active rating fee in order to continue to receive a clearly deflated rating.
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Murphy's law, by Edward A. Murphy Jr., USAF, Aerospace Engineer
And, you expect your boycott to have what effect? How much Active chess is rated in Canada each year? I would be surprised if it was much. What the federation needs is one rating system with different formulae depending on the type of chess ie. reular, active, blitz...
And, you expect your boycott to have what effect? How much Active chess is rated in Canada each year? I would be surprised if it was much. What the federation needs is one rating system with different formulae depending on the type of chess ie. reular, active, blitz...
I prefer only rating "real" chess games - eg: regular (and that requires definition too: minimum time controls etc). Rating active or blitz has always seemed like a waste of time to me. I don't see how a single rating could possibly incorporate different conditions: regular versus active/blitz/correspondence? etc.
I seem to recall Bob Gillanders recently commenting (was it here somewhere?) that rated active tournaments are few and far between in Canada. I believe the Burlington CC has stopped having active tournaments rated due to the rating fees...
And, you expect your boycott to have what effect? How much Active chess is rated in Canada each year? I would be surprised if it was much. What the federation needs is one rating system with different formulae depending on the type of chess ie. reular, active, blitz...
Ken
Aside from the fact that here in Ottawa there are several Active events a year, held at the RACC, the CFC charges an Active rating fee, so it should provide true value or quit providing an inferior service that may contribute to members playing less in Active events than they otherwise might, and damage the CFC's already delicate image, leading possibly to less participation in regular events, and less members as well.
Further, to quote part of a post I addressed to NJF on the OCC message board:
"...even a former CFC ED we both know admits CFC Active ratings are deflated. Why the CFC didn't correct the Active rating system at the same time they corrected the regular one is beyond me...well, other than the usual CFC inertia.
When you want to get the attention of a mule (= CFC) first you have to whack it on the head. Hence my resorting to a boycott by a master such as myself."
I talked to at least on Governor here in Ottawa who was completely insensitive to the issue. Maybe now he will wake up.
btw, I registered for the CFC Discussion Board but am still only allowed to view, not post. I seem to be in some sort of a queue for posting privileges, based on what I read, but this has gone on for days. I begin to suspect that people who have expressed strong criticism of the CFC in the past are not so welcome to post.
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Murphy's law, by Edward A. Murphy Jr., USAF, Aerospace Engineer
Tweet
Comment