Floor removal

[eweram]

Could you please remove my floor Greg so as I can sink to my natural level......
I thang yowww...

[gmiller]

done

[ventoux]

what is the rating floor good for? Are there more cases, where it should be skipped? The following looks starnge to me:

username: beammeupscotty
rating: 2200
..
gamesplayed: 1999
gameslost: 1079
..
averating: 1456
..
ratingfloor: 2200

i guess the 'real rating' should be in the range of 1400-1500 here!?

[katchum]

The solution was: remove all floors and if you have login problems, or you go on vacation or something you tell it to GMiller and he places the floor.

Normally, you know if you have enough time to play your games, we're not stupid are we?

[hamot]

The rating floor is meant for players who have a legitimate reason for timing out....ie vacation, personal emergency, etc.

Unfortunately, there are those who have found a way to inflate their rating by just signing up again as a different username and giving themselves a high rating. Then they play games against their other username and "win" them.

No, we are not stupid here. Some people will go to great lengths to boost their own ego by "giving" themselves a big rating. But we all know (or should know) that there is no value in something unless we have truly "earned" it.

That is true in all aspects of life. For instance, people who work hard and achieve a promotion at a job value that promotion much more than the "child of the boss" who is just "given" a high position without earning it. The same is true for someone who is a self-made millionaire. They tend to value their wealth much more than the lottery winner.

I like Earl Nightingale's definition of success - "Success is the progressive realization of a WORTHY goal." The success does not come with the high rating....it is achieved in the process of EARNING the rating. Also, successful people tend to set new goals once their goal is attained. That is why when someone graduates from a course of study (college, high school) it is called "COMMENCEMENT". Yes, congratulations are in order, but what are you going to do next?

This debate about rating floors at this site has been going on for years, and I guess I just wanted to voice my thoughts here, because I don't think that there IS a solution, nor does there need to BE one. The rewards here are in playing the games, the strategy, etc. The are NOT in achieving any kind of rating. The rating should only be used as a guide to see what kind of challenge a person would like to have. You should always consider a person's won/lost record as well to determine who you want to play against.

Ok, my sermon has ended. Thanks for listening (reading).

Tim

[purplekiller]

That is true in all aspects of life. For instance, people who work hard and achieve a promotion at a job value that promotion much more than the "child of the boss" who is just "given" a high position without earning it. The same is true for someone who is a self-made millionaire. They tend to value their wealth much more than the lottery winner.

I like Earl Nightingale's definition of success - "Success is the progressive realization of a WORTHY goal." The success does not come with the high rating....it is achieved in the process of EARNING the rating. Also, successful people tend to set new goals once their goal is attained. That is why when someone graduates from a course of study (college, high school) it is called "COMMENCEMENT". Yes, congratulations are in order, but what are you going to do next?

Thanks for listening (reading).

Tim

==========================================

Tim's message reminded me of the ant story...
Here it is, but it helps if one is Canadian to understand it...

==========================================

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house [ earning his chess rating point by point... ] and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool, and laughs and dances [ finds p\lopeholes to inflate jis chess rating's ] and plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The shivering grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.





Canadian Version:
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long,
building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The
grasshopper thinks he's a fool, and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed.
The shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others less fortunate like him are cold and starving.

CBC shows up to provide live coverage of the shivering grasshopper, with cuts to a video of the ant in his comfortable warm
home with a table filled with food. Canadians are stunned that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so while others have plenty. The NDP, the CAW and the Coalition Against Poverty demonstrate in front of the ant's house . The CBC, interrupting an Inuit cultural festival special from Nunavit with breaking news, broadcasts them singing "We Shall Overcome." Svend Robinson rants in an interview with Pamela Wallin that the ant has gotten rich off the backs of grasshoppers , and calls for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his "fair share." In response to polls, the Liberal Government drafts the Economic Equity and Grasshopper Anti-Discrimination Act, retroactive to the beginning of the summer.

The ant's taxes are reassessed and he is also fined for failing to
hire grasshoppers as helpers. Without enough money to pay both the fine and his newly imposed retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government.

The ant moves to the US, starts a successful agribiz company.
The CBC later shows the now fat grasshopper finishing up the last of
the ant's food though Spring is still months away, while the government
owned house he is in, which just happens to be the ant's old house, crumbles around him because he hadn't maintained it.

Inadequate government funding is blamed, Roy Romanow is appointed to
head a commission of enquiry that will cost $10,000,000.

The grasshopper is soon dead of a drug overdose, the Toronto Star
blames it on obvious failure of government to address the root causes of despair arising from social inequity.

The abandoned house is taken over by a gang of immigrant spiders,
praised by the government for enriching Canada's multicultural diversity, who promptly terrorize the community.

Who says we don't live in a democracy?
Sadly, it's almost true...

[bobbybellona]

I agree that having a rating indicating a higher playingstrength than you really have, can not give the same satisfaction as rising based on improving your play.

But problem is when you play against those people. Then you too will get a higher rating than you deserve. In time all players on the site will be 'overrated'.

And then ratings on this site will loose 'credibility' compared to ratings on other sites. Some don't think that is a problem, others do.

bobbybellona

[keithstuart]

if you play at IECG you automatically start on 800 unless you can provide proof of a higher rating certified by either FIDE or the USCF and possibly the BCF too allthough the BCF use different rating systems

[hamot]

Ok, here comes another sermon, so bear with me.....

I agree that having a rating indicating a higher playingstrength than you really have, can not give the same satisfaction as rising based on improving your play.

But problem is when you play against those people. Then you too will get a higher rating than you deserve. In time all players on the site will be 'overrated'.

And then ratings on this site will loose 'credibility' compared to ratings on other sites. Some don't think that is a problem, others do.

bobbybellona

This has already happened. That is why I said

I don't think that there IS a solution, nor does there need to BE one.

Let me explain.

There are a number of options to try to "solve" this problem, but none of them will be satisfactory. For instance:

• 1. We could start over, with everyone starting with a set rating of, say, 1000 (or whatever...the number is not significant to my point here). Greg could write an algorithm to prevent people with the same IP numbers (IP stands for Internet Provider) from registering more than one username. However, the people who have "earned" their rating would just lose it and start over. Also, anyone could just go to a public library (or any place else that would give a different IP address) and sign up a different username. Getting an additional email address is commonplace, so we would have the same type of problem with people playing against their other username to inflate their rating. All this does is make it more difficult, and the people with legitimate high ratings are "punished" (not an accurate description, but you get the idea).

• 2. We could just stay where we are, but we have all sorts of people who have inflated ratings (and not of their own doing, either). This will eventually settle down, but it will take some time. But let's face it, if Kasparov is only rated in the 2800's (I don't know his exact rating), obviously we have some people here who are overrated.

• 3. We could manually adjust people's ratings to a more appropriate level. This would be a very involved process, and would be unfair (or some would claim that it was unfair) to most.

• 4. We could just drop everyone's ratings by, say, 200-300 points. Or we could index this - perhaps muliply everyone's ratings by 0.9, which would drop everyone's ratings by 10%. Again, the percentage is not significant to my point here. Once again, everyone is punished for the actions of a few. Plus, Greg may have to rewrite his algorithm if it is based on something more than just ratings (for instance, a person's win/loss record may enter into their rating, or the strength of players that they have beaten, etc.).

I am sure there are other ideas for solutions, but I think you see my point.

I don't think that there needs to BE a solution at this point. Eventually, the rise and fall of ratings will naturally occur. The ones who have inflated their own rating either leave the site, or just go with the natural ebb and flow of their wins and losses. Occasionally, I have seen (well, at least I think I have seen this) Greg manually adjust a person's rating when it is obvious that they have hyper-inflated their rating.

But again, are we REALLY concerned about "accidentally" inflating our own rating by playing someone who has chosen to inflate theirs? If so, then be very picky about who you play. Don't join open challenges and don't offer open challenges. Do what eweram did and ask Greg to remove your floor until your rating adjusts itself naturally with the ebb and flow of the times.

There are many things that you can do yourself to prevent this kind of thing from happening. And even if it does, don't worry too much about it. Your rating will take care of itself over the long run.

As far as credibility is concerned, again, don't look at the rating for credibility. This site is WELL established among the chess community. I do not know of a more credible group of chess players who are long-established than this group. If you want to play credible players, I suggest you challenge someone who's name appears on mluka's chess ladder and/or someone on a chess team. These are ALL credible players, in my opinion.

Tim

[keithstuart]

I would like to add if the ratings were ever reset using the average rating of all your opponents would make a sensible new starting rating


Now for a question

If all new players atart with a rating of 800 (or what ever FIDE use) and after each game the total ratings of the two players remains the same how do people get upto to 2500+ as i am pretty certain there are not vast numbers of players with sub 600 ratings

knowing me i have forgotten how the rating change algorithimns work and that ther is a slight rise on total rating points after each match/game

[dragonpower]

Purple killer.

The ant story brought a smile to a very Canadian face. (I still think these emoticons are too much) Sometimes, our elected officials need a slap or something.

Thanks for sharing that!


Ciao,
DragonPower aka Jonathan Pettit

[afilby]

interesting debate (new for me) about ratings, floor removal etc, i have now (since this afternoon) three users on one IP and one email address... but no attempt here to increase ratings etc , just trying to encourage the kids to learn chess. they each have their own id, to get them started they are playing each other ... and i challenged my daughter to show how the site works... but they both now have other games going and in future we will be avoiding each other! ... not surprisingly we do have a board here at home which is still a better alternative if we want to play one another! ...we are all enjoying the site ,
thanks
andrew

afilby, annamaria(10) and otf(8)

[tellymetwise]

How about just making sure that the Rating represents the quality of your chess games? At least that's what it is supposed to show.

[keithstuart]

How about just making sure that the Rating represents the quality of your chess games? At least that's what it is supposed to show.

There already is an average rating listed of all your opponents to date and this is normally quite a bit below your rating

mine certainly is as i tend to play newcomers quite a bit

[tellymetwise]

Here is a link to a page concerning win and lose chances:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elo_rating_system

In short: a rating difference of 200 should represent
a 75% chance of winning a game and 25% of losing the game.
(win chance + 0.5 draw chance = 75%)
(or: 50% win, 50% draw, 0% lose;
or: 65% win, 20% draw, 15% lose)

If you manage to boost your rating after 500 games from 1500 to 2500 due to better chess knowledge gained etc etc, who can say that your average opponent rating combined with your win/lose record are representive to your actual strength?
If you played the last 50 games at 2500, I can only say: Congrats, Keep it up. As long as those 2500 shows your current, (net-chess relative) playing strength.

So if you played the last 50 games at a strength below your floor, either drink some coffee and wake up, or accept the fact you don't pay that much attention anymore to your games, and accept a floor correction, as I've seen some request by themselfs.

I don't know how easy it is to show an "actual rating" vs "actual performance"? I suppose that as a newcommer, my rating will be adjusted to the actual performance after which the actual rating will come in place.

Maybe that's something worth using to recalculate the floor,
if performance drops significantly below the floor rating (-200?)
and
your rating would have dropped below your actual rating (if the floor was not in place)
then
lower floor by 100 and adjust rating with new floor in place?

[keithstuart]

Thats an excellent link which i edited to make it clickable

for future reference just before you type the link in click on the URL button or type and use to close the link at the end