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Subject: Re: moderation

Author: Dave Gomboc

Date: 19:26:11 08/07/00

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On August 07, 2000 at 20:06:37, Tom Kerrigan wrote:

>On August 07, 2000 at 19:49:29, pavel wrote:
>
>>On August 07, 2000 at 18:58:20, Tom Kerrigan wrote:
>>
>>>On August 07, 2000 at 17:01:59, Randall Shane wrote:
>>>
>>>>On August 07, 2000 at 13:30:51, Tom Kerrigan wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>On August 07, 2000 at 09:43:16, pavel wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>On August 07, 2000 at 08:47:39, Alvaro Rodriguez wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>On August 07, 2000 at 07:06:00, Peter McKenzie wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>Wouldn't it be better for you two to have these conversations via email?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>I´m following the threads about the new cm-book, so I think this thread is ok..
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Alvaro
>>>>>>
>>>>>>I am sorry.....but this is what I THINK.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>when questions about crafty is asked ....moderators (some) requests to use the
>>>>>>crafty mailing list. ( yesh i know crafty has a mailing list and CM doesnt).
>>>>>
>>>>>Crafty questions are welcome on CCC. People who ask questions directly of Bob
>>>>>Hyatt are advised to do so via e-mail or the Crafty mailing list, seeing as it
>>>>>would be more appropriate.
>>>>
>>>>Question :
>>>>What about non-Crafty chess-programming related questions, directed to Bob
>>>>Hyatt, that are of a sufficiently general interest that anybody could answer
>>>>and/or discuss?  I realize that that is a vague and probably too general
>>>>question, but I am interested in the boundaries of the above announcement.
>>>
>>>If they are of such general interest that anybody could answer/discuss, then I
>>>don't see why the questions have to be directed to Bob in the first place.
>>>
>>>What annoys me is when people post simple questions directed to Bob on CCC,
>>>like, "Bob Hyatt, how does alpha-beta work?" There are dozens of respected chess
>>>programmers who read CCC and who could answer these questions intelligently, and
>>>it's sort of an insult to them when you only ask Bob...
>>>
>>>-Tom
>>
>>maybe because BOB can explain in more "details" than others.
>>since his program is freeware and strong and state of art at the same time, and
>>not to mention the source code is free to all. Chess programing question is more
>>likely to be asked to him, and other freeware programers than commercial
>>programers.
>
>Then there's nothing to keep people from sending him questions via e-mail.
>
>>Tell me. No one in this forum ever asked you regarding TSCP programing codes ?
>>or chess programing question "specially" to you??
>
>No, I don't think they have. I think people only ask me questions via e-mail,
>and some via ICQ, which I consider entirely appropriate.
>
>>I wonder how would you put that then?
>
>If someone posted, "Tom, what are search extensions?" then I wouldn't like it
>just as much as if they posted, "Hyatt, what are search extensions?"
>
>This has nothing to do with favoritism.
>
>>I have seenyou contributing to threads like "cpu" which has nothing to do with
>>computer chess in general. is duran better than AMD? or intel? ......thus that
>>has anything to do with chess.........at all!!
>
>I'm sure that if you think for a little, you can make the connection between
>_computers_ and _computer_ chess.

Here is a good example of why we have three moderators.  If I wasn't already a
moderator, I would send moderator email whenever I saw those long threads about
the details of various CPUs that _aren't_ brought back in some way into the
context of computer chess.  This is because I know that people who want to read
technical information and get expert opinions on what hardware to buy can visit
tomshardware.com, sharkyextreme.com, anandtech.com, and about ten billion other
places.  But explaining that program X gets an unusually high performance boost
from such-and-such because it has a way bigger L2 cache is quite legitimate.

Now, what I personally think of as "on-topic" might be generally tighter than
say Tom's idea of it, but I doubt that it's a proper subset.  With three people
doing the job, I think that overall things tend to balance out reasonably well.
Speaking personally, I think there are a few members who underestimate the value
of focus.  Now, it would certainly be ridiculous to cut out chit-chat: this is a
discussion board, not an announcement list.  On the other hand, people who go to
a needle shop shouldn't be forced to look through a haystack, so the more
unrelated a potential post is to computer chess, the more the author should
think twice about before hitting submit.

Dave



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