Author: Lance Perkins
Date: 21:53:33 02/12/05
To me, what has happened today at CCT7 is a demonstration of what can happen when you try to marry automation with a gentleman's game. I could not post anything at channel 64 today although I was there for all the games except one. I logged as a guest because Enrico was operating Thinker. So, I'll post my thoughts here. Late as it may already be (I'm just hoping that this post will not get forfieted for being late). The rules of automated match is clear. Humans are not allowed to intervene with the game. Consider the case where your program made a move to promote a pawn to a rook, but your UI only understands queen promotions. Should you then type in the correct move instead? It is for this reason that I stand behind Peter's decision. The rules are clear. However, the sport of chess is still a gentleman's game. I wanted to convey this Peter today but he stopped responding to non-registered users. Despite the rules, we do take human exceptions. I have seen many instances where the human operators (not the programs) made the agreement to draw the game and intervened through whatever UI they are using to make the draw happen. The programs in these cases forced by the humans operators. Not very automated by definition. But it is the practical thing to do. And hence all of us allow it 'automatically'. It is for this reason that I understand why many, including Rafael, are not happy with the decision. There is also some level of expected sportsmanship here. As in any other sport, you can argue with the referee only up to some point, and then the game goes on. The players are normally expcted to play on and not to walk out (although in some sports, it is more common for a referee to throw out or suspend a player than it is for a player to walk out of the game). In any case, the referee (or TD in our case) is called upon to make an on-the-stop decision or else the game gets impractically delayed. This is where people get divided. Some will be and some won't be happy with the decission, but the decission has to stick. Many would like to voice out their opinion to convince the referee/TD, but the TD only has this very short time to make the decission, and in Peter's case, basing the decission on the rules is probably the better thing to do. I can't blame Rafael for leaving. It can become a very emotional event. He firmly believes that he has done what all others would normally do - click on the right places in your UI to accept the draw, and yet he still lost the game. It would seem as if he is being penalized for using the wrong (buggy) UI. What a day gentelmen.
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