proposal for Ottawa event game capture

[Gary Ruben]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

2) yeah the spectators want the game record and they want you to work at entering game scores but they don't pay entry fees do they? Do what works for your agenda, not Hugh's or anyone else.

Oy Veh.....

[Egidijus Zeromskis]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

the possibility of publication.

It might be true. Games with higher rated players have more less smooth game, thus whole games might be published. Lower rated players have nice tactics (performed or missed) thus making a source for problems' articles :)

*-*

Aris, I think that your path is right. You will collect voluntarily almost all games where carbon sheets will be provided. For 100% you'll needed to remind players to tear off the copy :)

Just statistics: the page with HH Holiday Open games was viewed about 140 times. (the link was posted only here.) I assume that most of chesstalk reader went to see some games. (a post http://www.chesstalk.info/forum/showthread.php?t=4414 )

[Hugh Brodie]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

For 100% you'll needed to remind players to tear off the copy

And you keep the WHITE copy - the player keeps the YELLOW one - those yellow ones can be a challenge to read!

[Gary Ruben]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

It might be true. Games with higher rated players have more less smooth game, thus whole games might be published. Lower rated players have nice tactics (performed or missed) thus making a source for problems' articles :)

When I wrote our publication, I published the games of all the classes. From D class to the best players. I'd edit some of their notations. It was my feeling the every player should have to look to see if his game was published rather than merely check the ratings.

It had to be a good game for a player of the class.

[Jean Hébert]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

Yes - try to collect all the scoresheets ...

Do, or do not. There is no ‘try’.
– Yoda

[Paul Bonham]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

I see no reason why I would voluntarily want my games to be made public. Why would I want to make it easier for opponents to prepare against me?

Tom, you play poker, do you not? Every time you play in a hand, do you worry about the other players learning more about you and using it against you in a future hand?

I know, I know, poker isn't chess and vice-versa. But the point is, both games allow for transition and change, and in both cases, these are good characteristics. You have to think of yourself as a moving target. Once you do that, and practice it, you never need worry about anyone "preparing" against you. And in fact, if you know they are doing that, you use it against them. :)

[John Upper]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

I think the topic that started this thread is moot. Preserving games by collecting scoresheets is the wrong model. Although noone picked up on it, the last two points in my previous post address it: the ubiquity of databases and email make paper game scores irrelevant for people who want to preserve games. Anyone who wants their games in a public database can just email cbv or pgn files anywhere they want. People who don't want their games public (TO'D) have ways to circumvent all but the most tyrannical TD's.

If a database is missing games, it's because the players who have those games on their laptops don't care enough to email them.

[that was going to be at the bottom of this post, but I moved it up top since it's the most relevant]

Comments and responses to various posts in this thread:

The tournament organizer’s right re games played in their tournaments:

CFC Handbook:Section 4, Article 8.3

http://www.chess.ca/section_4.htm

" 8.3 The score sheets are the property of the organizers of the event. "

It is mandatory where the organizer decides to collect the scores, unless the organizer compromises his right and explicitly makes it " voluntary ".

The link gives me an error message. And visiting the CFC rules page just directed me to the FIDE pages.

Geurt Gijssen at Chess Cafe:

http://www.chesscafe.com/geurt/geurt.htm

where he discusses use of the Monroi... I am not sure he comes to any conclusion!?

I think he just reaffirms his previous opinion that if a player chooses to use a Monroi then it has to be in addition to the regular scoresheet. Which, of course, defeats the main advantage of using a Monroi. FWIW, I've used Monroi's at Canadian Opens and think they're great, and would always prefer it over a scoresheet... but the cost...

Please Somebody invent a scorebook where a copy can torn off and given to the organizer(unless it alreday has been).

This would make a game-collecting TDs life easier, but why would an average chess player pay more for a carbon duplicating scorebook than the normal kind?

As a tournament director, I wouldn't accept a game result without the completed scoresheet.

I've played in a lot of events, including ones run by FIDE Arbiters like Hal Bond and Aris, and I've never been asked or required to hand in my scoresheets.
Have you had any problems in the tournaments you've run with this policy? What do you do if/when players mark their score on the wall chart but don't hand in a copy?

Contrary to John's post - generally the higher the rating, the poorer the handwriting

My comment about "gamescore errors" increasing on the lower-rated boards was not about legible penmanship but about the accuracy and completeness of their scoresheets. So your comment is is supplemental, but not contrary.

I like to play soccer. Even though the World Cup is a televised event, I wouldn't want my soccer games broadcast world-wide. ;-)

Do I hear a proposal for TSN-6 ? :D

1). Print your own.... I got $0.035/ page regular scoresheets (qty 1000).... and no shipping/handling. You can do much better if you up the quantity. Just provide your local printer (or one of the chains like Business Depot) with camera ready copy.

Thanks, I hadn't thought of that. Good to know it's so cheap too, esp. if we host another big event in Ottawa.

the spectators want the game record and they want you to work at entering game scores but they don't pay entry fees do they? Do what works for your agenda... I'm not too interested in doing the work to make non-paying bystanders happy.

I think the basic idea in Roger's post is the heart of the problem. Essentially, chessplayers (humans?) think other people's time and effort is worth less than our own. That's why this thread has so many posts about how other people can donate their time or money to contribute to something the poster values and why there are so few offers to volunteer to help others.

A sharp-eyed reader can even find two examples from people who do know better in the post that indirectly kick-started this one:

http://www.chesstalk.info/forum/show...8&postcount=12

where Aris testily but quite correctly says:

I find your "surely you can find volunteers" comment just plain inappropriate. Do you think I am incompetent, lazy, stupid, or perhaps IT IS JUST NOT THAT EASY TO GET VOLUNTEERS?! People are busy. I have asked many times for many different volunteer tasks, but people are busy....

Aris knows it's not easy to get people to help out. But that doesn't stop even him from forgetting later in that very same post that a player who's just turned a win into a draw into a loss might not be in the mood to hang around an empty playing hall for an indefinite time guarding Aris's stuff.

I think I'm saying something that is so obvious is should not be offensive, but chess players are notorious cheapskates. Getting them to volunteer to do anything for nothing --- other than "giving" their opinion --- is a losing game.

[I actually took a break here imagining how someone might try to argue that, as a group, chess players don’t deserve the name “cheapskates”. Worst Debate Topic - Ever.]

I expect chess players to be selfish cheapskates, so I don't bother to ask them for favours, even when I think doing the favour might be good for the Canadian chess culture they are a part of. I'll go out of my way to praise or help someone who volunteers their time for something I admire. e.g. Gordon Ritchie billeting GMs for simuls and lectures and donating book prizes at the RA Club. e.g. Paul Roschman, Vincent Chow, and Bob Gillanders driving from Burlington to Mississauga -- 45 minutes away from F*#@ing Burlington! --- every week so they can run a juniors' club before the adults play! I admire that and contributed when I lived there, but I'd feel like an idiot asking others to do the same.

I'm a cheapskate too, of course. But I pay for the scoresheets I collect, I get there early to distribute them, and I spend hours analyzing before sending them off to Tony for the CFC NL or Hugh's CanBase. Why would a cheapskate like me do all that? I don't do it because I was persuaded to "volunteer" my time. I think I do it because it's an interesting intellectual challenge to analyze and explain games in a variety of opening and middle-game types I wouldn't otherwise consider, and to do it under a publication time constraint. The published result might be entertaining or educational for anyone who bothers to play through them --- BTW, AFAIK, no one does --- but that's not why I do it. I think I do it for selfish reasons: it's a way to amuse myself until disease or some other calamity takes away my capacity for boredom. Until then, or until it gets boring, I'll keep doing it.

Apart from (sadly and mistakenly, it turns out) expecting people not to interfere with my efforts by stealing carbons that have been left on Aris's TD table overnight, I don't expect any help. I won't ask anyone to help or donate their time or go out of their way to make it easier. Why would I bother? I assume other chess players are more-or-less like me, and I know that if I didn't already think it was worth my time then there is no amount the CFC could afford to pay me to do it. As it is, I do it for $0.

(So does Hugh B, AFAIK. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if his bandwidth makes CanBase cost him $$, in addition to the time he spends collecting, editing, and posting games.)

I suppose I could end by suggesting doing something nice for volunteers, but doing something would take time and effort and who in their right mind would expect that from a cheapskate?


Happy New Year everybody!

[Vlad Drkulec]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

Thanks Kerry. I do come from a bit of a process background, so I wanted to line up everything, but had just not thought of Monroi. No one has ever used a Monroi at any of my Ottawa events the last few years, but I guess I should make a decision on that. If nothing is changed from the above proposal, then that would mean they could not use it alone. However, does anyone know, can someone email/transmit their game right after it has been completed, from a Monroi device being used without a server, to an email?

I would be disinclined to play in any event that required me to use both a Monroi and a scoresheet. I have used a monroi in tournaments where I then transferred my games to the tournament director's laptop via the SD card. I have also played in events where I emailed all the games to the TD after the fact. In the Ontario Closed the person compiling the games and posting them to chesstalk asked for particular games or clarifications of moves played and I posted them to chesstalk. It seems to me that the use of the Monroi saves the TD the effort of having to enter the games into a database himself (or delegating that task to someone else) and it is silly to add the extra step of handing in a scoresheet when you can get the pgn file in a single step.

I saw a few Monroi recorders at the Michigan Masters and Experts/Class Championships last weekend. There are usually a few of them in most of the southwestern Ontario tournaments that I play in. Lets not be Luddites.

[Michael Yip]

Re: Scoresheet sponsor

Mr Patterson's solution seems optimal. You might try asking ICC to sponsor the scoresheet cost.

First Saturday did that over in Hungary I seem to remember.

Michael Yip

[Jean Hébert]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

...Preserving games by collecting scoresheets is the wrong model...)

Agreed. Something that does the job, cheaply and simply must be "wrong model".
As I suspected this discussion succeeds in turning a simple change for the better (more games kept and preserved for posterity, and available for studies and preparation for players of all levels) into an endless discussion, as if it was a "revolution" likely to threaten our "way of life".

[Kerry Liles]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

Agreed. Something that does the job, cheaply and simply must be "wrong model".
As I suspected this discussion succeeds in turning a simple change for the better (more games kept and preserved for posterity, and available for studies and preparation for players of all levels) into an endless discussion, as if it was a "revolution" likely to threaten our "way of life".

Have you ever looked at the Climate Change thread?? lol

Unfortunately, almost all threads on Chesstalk turn into a bit of a mess rather quickly. Mind you, without this particular thread, I would never have guessed that Tom O'D was so much against having to keep or hand in a score sheet...

[John Upper]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

Something that does the job, cheaply and simply must be "wrong model".

Sorry if I'm missing your point, but I just got back from teaching gradeschool kids chess and my irony detector is turned off.

I think your sentence above assumes three false claims:

1. Paper scoresheets are "cheap" only if someone else pays for them.
2. Collecting scoresheets is "simple" only if everyone has the same goals and agrees to play under the same rules and conditions (e.g. no Monroi, no personal score books, no preference for privacy, etc.)
3. Transcribing those games that get collected "does the job" only if someone volunteers to do the transcribing.

I've read the posts in this thread and it seems to me that none of those three things is true.

Or should I be reading between the lines and infer that Hébert is volunteering to do all three himself? If so, that's great news and welcome to the team! :)

[Paul Bonham]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

Sorry if I'm missing your point, but I just got back from teaching gradeschool kids chess and my irony detector is turned off.

I think your sentence above assumes three false claims:

1. Paper scoresheets are "cheap" only if someone else pays for them.
2. Collecting scoresheets is "simple" only if everyone has the same goals and agrees to play under the same rules and conditions (e.g. no Monroi, no personal score books, no preference for privacy, etc.)
3. Transcribing those games that get collected "does the job" only if someone volunteers to do the transcribing.

I've read the posts in this thread and it seems to me that none of those three things is true.

Or should I be reading between the lines and infer that Hébert is volunteering to do all three himself? If so, that's great news and welcome to the team! :)

Yes, and he'll also handle the demo boards and putting up the signs.

[Jean Hébert]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

I think your sentence above assumes three false claims:

1. Paper scoresheets are "cheap" only if someone else pays for them.

Since that you are not paying for them either, they should appear cheap to you too, if one follows your "thinking". But serious (even not so serious) organizers around the world do not find this basic expense to be a significant part of their budget. Through entry fees, players pay for them (if there is no sponsor...) which probably adds up to less that 1$ per player per tournament. To me that is "cheap" even if I have to pay for it.

2. Collecting scoresheets is "simple" only if everyone has the same goals and agrees to play under the same rules and conditions (e.g. no Monroi, no personal score books, no preference for privacy, etc.)

This causes no problem at all wherever this is applied, which is in most open tournaments in Quebec and outside North America. Players just hand out their scoresheets signed with the result. That's all. A few special nutcases having problems dealing with the outside world and giving away their precious gamescores may stay home. My guess is that for some reason or another they would stay home anyway.

3. Transcribing those games that get collected "does the job" only if someone volunteers to do the transcribing.

If you don't have the scoresheets, of course you wont need the volunteers to enter the games and one can be sure never to see those games, as if they had never been played. I myself have done quite a bit of entering (and volunteered for some more), but at times some TDs are uncooperative, even if they have the scoresheets. Putting it in the mail is apparently too much work. In some giant european opens, they sometimes manage to enter over 1000 games (every single game played!) within days after the events.
But even if finding enough volunteers may not be so easy, entering the games can wait and eventually be achieved, whenever someone is available. But this is possible only if the scoresheets have been collected by the TD (arbiter) or an assistant.

I've read the posts in this thread and it seems to me that none of those three things is true.

"Cheap" is relative, it cannot be true or false. If collecting scoresheets is not "simple", at least we know that it is being done routinely and successfully in most tournaments around the World, big and small. As for volunteers to enter the games, there must be quite a few around besides Hugh and I, otherwise Hugh would not have that many canadian games in his database.

Or should I be reading between the lines and infer that Hébert is volunteering to do all three himself? If so, that's great news and welcome to the team! :)

Inferring through an obvious lack of good will that everything would have to be done by one single person is clearly unworthy of someone with even an average common sense. Nothing worthwhile can be achieved by someone acting alone.

[Hugh Brodie]

Re: proposal for Ottawa event game capture

I'm always prepared to enter games - but it's up to you guys to provide me with the input data. I have had people emailing me scanned scoresheets.

Two Canadian IM's - who kept their own scoresheets since near the beginnings of their careers - approached me to enter their games (which I did). I will be doing the same for a third one soon. (I also have two shopping bags full of Montreal expert Serge Lacroix's games - unfortunately only about half of them have sufficient header info to make them useful).

(I played in a Toronto tournament in the 1970's in which the players had to pay for scoresheets - 10 cents for 6. I had a scorebook, so it didn't affect me).