1st Freestyle Masters Tournament
Monday, January 26, 2009 at 6:00AM 
Infinity Chess is not ready for prime time. I would love to say positive things about the 1st PAL Group sponsored Freestyle tournament held on the Infinity Chess server over the last two weeks. However in all good conscious, I can not. In my 30 years of playing in chess events I have never experienced anything quit like this tournament. Words like painful and shameful come to my mind. Along with detrimental to the concept of freestyle chess.
At the writing of this article no one knows who won, or how players finished. A few of the players that were in contention for the prize money went off on their own to play the final games in secret on other chess servers. The games played in this event disappeared every time the server crashed. Those responsible for this fiasco have promised to make all games played available to the public. I seriously doubt this will be possible. But we will see. A more extensive assessment of who benefited form the unfair playing conditions and who suffered, will be possible after the games are in front of us.
The Infinity Chess server crashed over and over, helping to create a cascading series of bad decisions by the tournament director. By the 9th round the TD had lost control of his event. No longer listening to the consensus of the players and concerning himself only with a few players that had been manipulating the conditions to their own benefit, he chose the easy way out. Disregarding fairness for expediency.
I personally felt cheated by several of the decisions the TD made involving my games. I was present for the entire tournament and can honestly say that many other players did as well. Here are the kind of things I am talking about.
1. Forcing players to take draws with 22 pieces on the board. (I had twice the amount of time on the clock 8 min. to 4 min.)
2. Asking players to restart games after server crashes with ever decreasing time controls. (How can you have some games played at 75-15 and others played at 35-15 in the same tour.) Some of these games were restarted 3-4 times, totally negating opening preparation.
3. Giving 6 Blacks and 4 Whites to some players and 6 Whites and 4 Blacks to others. (This alone invalidates the results of this tour and was absolutely uncalled for.)
There was and is, this issue of collusion between players when money is at stake. While it is nearly imposable to confirm, even the suspicion of it should be addressed. Some players in open chat offered money to get a desired result. While it may have been done in jest it should not have been allowed. Other players offered to help opponents playing against those that they were in point contention with. All this may have just been in fun, however it created a aura of impropriety.
My old Grandfather once told me. “its not enough to be an honest man, one must remove the impression of impropriety.”
I suppose my favorite incident in the tournament was when one of the top players begin to make the claim that he was not making the moves being played by the GUI. Telling the TD that a hacker had invaded the server and was making moves in his game. I am not absolutely sure but from what I could gather from the chat, moves were allowed to be made over in this game.
It looked to me like, the TD was being played like a violin in this event. (maybe a Stradivarius) Perhaps a puppet master was pulling the strings.
Reader Comments (6)
Kevin, Kevin, Kevin...!
There is much truth in what you say. "Not ready for prime time": you get emphatic agreement from me! Absolutely no doubt about that! But what I think you glide over is that Mr. Arno Nickel himself would be the first to agree (well, maybe first after me). Can you imagine what it must have been like to be the "general manager" of this protracted fiasco? Have a little compassion for him, he tried his best in circumstances that would have led you or me to a complete nervous breakdown. Truly it must have been torture as much for him as for us, and maybe more so, because the credibility of the whole Infinity enterprise and the future of Freestyle in general were being stung again and again.
As far as the rest, I can't agree with a lot of your fuming. As for there being some kind of grand conspiracy to ensure the best players always get the money...you're right! The name of that conspiracy is MERIT. The best players are the best players for one simple reason: they very rarely make detectable mistakes! Computer chess is overwhelmingly a drawn game; it is increasingly rare for two top players to face each other and have a decisive outcome. Why? Because neither side takes risks. Why? Because he who takes risks often loses in computer chess.
As for Arno losing control of the tournament--on the contrary, without his good judgment and even temperament the tournament could barely have survived the first weekend. Despite tremendous and near-constant adversity we managed to drunkenly stagger our way to nine complete rounds. Could you have done better? No way, you would have angrily called the whole thing off much earlier (I would have too). But Arno pressed on despite a lot of complaining and gratuitous personal abuse and it was the right thing to do. I cannot think of one single misstep he took the whole time. You might say this was Arno's finest hour; he has never shown his gentlemanly character and maturity in a better light. Very honestly: you owe him an apology. Again.
Your comments about collusion: all you can do is enact rules, very clear and precisely-worded rules. When they are codified then you can at least cite rules and use them against cheats who are caught. But the thing you have to recognize and accept is that without honor and decency civilized society of any kind cannot stand and you rapidly approach a Hobbesian universe. What I am saying is that if people want to cheat they will, and in Internet tournaments there is no way to detect most forms of cheating. The more money (and glory) is at stake the greater the incentive to cheat. This is something we must acknowledge about human nature realistically. I think it was Hamilton (or maybe Madison) who said that if people were angels they wouldn't need governments, and if governments consisted of angels they wouldn't need a constitution. But neither are angels so the people need government and the government needs a constitution. At the present time in Freestyle Chess we have near-anarchy because the stakes aren't high enough to motivate people to arduously establish the machinery of government.
Finally, the bit about six blacks. Elementary analysis will tell you that it is impossible, utterly impossible, to guarantee that all players will have an equal number of blacks and whites in a live Swiss tournament. People quit, skip rounds, get byes and walkover wins, etc. and these circumstances result in inequities: some benefit, some get the short end of the stick. Get over it. It is the fortunes of war. If you want all tournaments to be double round-robin or knockout that's a totally different argument.
One final thing, Kevin. To improve your credibility please use a spell-checker! Believe it or not little details count.
Nelson:
Thank you for you comments, as you know I respect your opinion in this mater. Many of the points you make about my incomprehensible ravings are well taken. However I stand by my belief that this tournament was unfair and the TD incompetent. Stumbling threw ones duties like a drunken sailor does not gain my admiration. Nor does sacrificing fairness for expedience.
I do not believe in some grand conspiracy involving the elite players. What I saw was some of the cleverest men in the world taking advantage of an inexperienced and overwhelmed tournament director.
In regards to getting the Black pieces 6 times out of 10 games played in a tour, this is not normal. Not in chess, sanctioned under any legitimate governing body. It is possible to get more of one color than the other only if you get a bye, but that is the only way.
Colour allocation rules (FIDE Rules)
(12.1)
"Where possible, and by means of exchanges, each player shall be given the alternate colour; at the end of each even-numbered round each player shall have had an equal number of whites and blacks. Moreover, no player shall be given the same colour in three successive rounds."
The FIDE rules also call for players to be withdrawn if they do not show up to play in a round. This allows a bye to be used (Byes do not have colors) So, if a player does get one more black than he should, they also get a point from a bye. (This was not done in Infinity's Freestyle Tournament) I received no points do to forfeits or byes, meaning some one else got my white.
Truthfully, I do not seek credibility. I am only expressing my opinion which is my right to do. If others wish to write how wonderful it was to get benefits bestowed on them by the TD in this tour., I will not stand in their way. But you and I know, that those who profited will remain as silent as the grave.
I am sorry for the spelling and grammar mistakes. I am not a well educated man and make no airs of being one. However, I am a honest man and I expect others to be honest, not only in dealing with me but those around me.
Kevin:
Maybe you could find some points to agree upon, instead of trying to prove all of them valid.
I also was a witness to this strange (can we all call it like that?) tournament. Not only did I participate but also had ample time to read what people wrote. To be more precise, I should say that I'm still playing the tournament, as I have one game left. One of the things that transform this event into a weirdness.
1- Opening preparation. You never knew how much time your opponent would have to fight a novelty. If that negates a novelty depends on how though it is to refute or cope with.
2- Two players went to play their final game to another server, only one of them having real options to win the competition. But everybody was there to watch. The thing I criticized Arno about, was the fact that they indeed did so without him even knowing the game was being played. That simply diminishes his authority.
3- The crashes were constant from start to end, that's out of controversy. Only the sixth round could be played without problems.
4- I too find odd that a player may complain about his client software making moves on it's own. But with such a buggy software involved, the very notion of that happening is not out of the boundaries of reality. If the player fabricated that excuse to get out of problems, then he is as sharp as his computer chess. Arno didn't have a good way to solve such an unprecedented situation.
5- Not all games will be made available to the public and/or they won't be complete or correct. With so many manual restarts, so many crashes and so much data corruption I have even been unable to reconstruct some of my own games. Surely, they won't be able to do better with other people's games.
6- Arno was indeed overwhelmed by round nine. Telling the players that the last one was not going to take place that day, only to change his mind a couple of hours later when the server appeared to be stable enough for the games to continue. Some players didn't come back and the tournament is still unfinished.
7- I was in no way forced to accept draws. In any case, my own unwillingness to play (on such a server) a position that didn't have something clearly advantageous to me in it.
8- Manual resume was something regrettable, but also has to do with the technical difficulties that have been established as a fact.
I hope I've provided a more dispassionate chronicle.
There is a difference between being honest and being emotional. You are quite emotional and it tends to overwhelm the perception of honesty. As for credibilty, a man's word and reputation are the most valuable things he has. You should always seek to be credible: it comes from well-reasoned and well-written commentary and gentlemanly conduct.
I think we are not that far apart in our assessments of the Infinity server and the current state of affairs in Freestyle. But I definitely disagree with any character assasination or mischaracterization of Arno Nickel. You simply do not have all the facts. You don't know the whole story behind Infinity and why it came about. You don't know the politics behind PAL leaving Chessbase. You don't know what guarantees the sponsor has made. You don't know why the staffing and technical support are so weak. I don't know any of these things either. It would be helpful if we knew, as we could understand the broader situation with greater clarity and make sounder judgments. Given the level of ignorance we both labor under it should be obvious that it is unseemly and unnecessary to call Arno an incompetent and heap abuse on him. You are frustrated: so am I. But your approach is destructive. Nothing can possibly be gained by alienating and abusing Arno, apart from the self-indulgent desire to blow off some steam.
Your citing of FIDE rules: please re-read the first two words.
By the way, that's spelled "assassination".
Nelson:
I am not attacking anyone's character, I am questioning their competency. There was a conscious decision made on my part not to use the TD’s name. To separate the man from the tournament director. You on the other hand have repeatedly used his name. Alluding to emotions and stresses he must have been under. (Making excuses for his bad decisions) I am sure he is a good man, loves his mother and feeds the small birds in the winter time.
You have defiantly hit upon something when you say we do not know much about Infinity Chess, its sponsors and its motives. What we do know is that Chess Base has washed its hands of the freestyle events. (Possibly because of complaints of collusion.) I have not been able to get much information about Infinity’s location or ownership. On the surface, it would seem that they are owned by The PAL Group of Companies. Trying to find out who owns and operates the PAL guys is where it get difficult. Whois list Sajeer Mohammed as the registrant of infinitychess.com (November 21, 2006) and his title as Technical Manager PAL Group.
Now here is truth: If a company sponsors an event and it is well received and successful, it brings positive publicity to their enterprise. On the other hand, if the event is not well done and poorly received the publicity will be negative. I played in this event and I found it to be the worst chess tournament I have ever played in.
Nelson, I know you were there for most of the tour. But what you may not realize is that this TD refused to help me as well as my opponents several times. Leaving the problems caused by the server difficulties to the players. He only concerned himself with a few and by doing this gave them an advantage.
Do not accuse me of abusing anyone. You are quite aware of my desire to see Centaur Chess become a true sport. With a governing body and as you so eloquently worded it . “The establishment of the machinery of government.” Let us work toward that end.
This website and blog are in fact therapy for me. A place where I can vent my frustrations in a constructive way. In my wildest dreams I would not have believed it would acquire the readership it now enjoys. More than once I have offered you a section on this site to express you own unedited opinions. This is because I respect you and know that you are a much better writer than I will ever be.
“The proof of the pudding, is in the eating.” I personally found the pudding being served up at the 1st Freestyle Masters Tournament bitter indeed.