FIDE's 400pt rule

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Brian Towers
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Re: FIDE's 400pt rule

Post by Brian Towers » Wed Jan 01, 2020 10:55 am

Chris Rice wrote:
Mon Dec 30, 2019 12:06 pm
II should probably add that Kobylianskyi sent the results for rating himself and is also listed as the Tournament director and the only arbiter of all the games he has played.
The FIDE Arbiters Commission is strongly against this practice. In the February 2016 edition of their magazine for arbiters they highlight such a problematic case.
FIDE Arbiters Commission wrote:This case covers 2 mistakes. However, it is very important to note that the 2nd mistake would
probably have been caught if the 1st mistake had never occurred.

1st mistake: An Arbiter cannot be a player in the same tournament.

The Qualification Commission specifies this in their FIDE Title Regulations:
1.17 No arbiter may play in a title tournament even just as a filler.

Even if the event is not a title tournament, it is inappropriate for an arbiter to also be a player. The
arbiter-player risks missing occurrences that should be dealt with by that arbiter. In the Laws of Chess,
Article 12, “The Role of the Arbiter”, clearly documents the attention that the arbiter provides to the
games under his jurisdiction. Anything less by the arbiter does a disservice to the game.
Ah, but I was so much older then. I'm younger than that now.

Alex Holowczak
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Re: FIDE's 400pt rule

Post by Alex Holowczak » Wed Jan 01, 2020 11:32 am

Brian Towers wrote:
Wed Jan 01, 2020 10:55 am
Chris Rice wrote:
Mon Dec 30, 2019 12:06 pm
II should probably add that Kobylianskyi sent the results for rating himself and is also listed as the Tournament director and the only arbiter of all the games he has played.
The FIDE Arbiters Commission is strongly against this practice. In the February 2016 edition of their magazine for arbiters they highlight such a problematic case.
FIDE Arbiters Commission wrote:This case covers 2 mistakes. However, it is very important to note that the 2nd mistake would
probably have been caught if the 1st mistake had never occurred.

1st mistake: An Arbiter cannot be a player in the same tournament.

The Qualification Commission specifies this in their FIDE Title Regulations:
1.17 No arbiter may play in a title tournament even just as a filler.

Even if the event is not a title tournament, it is inappropriate for an arbiter to also be a player. The
arbiter-player risks missing occurrences that should be dealt with by that arbiter. In the Laws of Chess,
Article 12, “The Role of the Arbiter”, clearly documents the attention that the arbiter provides to the
games under his jurisdiction. Anything less by the arbiter does a disservice to the game.
The problem with the opinion of the Arbiters Commission is that in several small countries around the world, there would probably be no FIDE rated chess as a result of such a regulation. Take an example like Jack Rudd's club, and assume their internal Rapidplay was FIDE-rated, then they have the following options:
1. Jack would have to not play in it
2. The club would have to not rate its internal Rapidplay so that Jack could play
3. They'd just have to name some other licenced arbiter who was never present but ticks the box as far as FIDE is concerned, which is sharp practice that FIDE wants to avoid

Philosophically, would you rather have:
1. IA Jack Rudd as a player-arbiter in the event
2. Some human being who turns up and has paid 20 Euro to get a shiny NA licence but doesn't actually know the Laws of Chess

Because the advice of the Arbiters Commission is that you should do 2.

To be fair, if there was a will, an arbiter could be trained in England, but this is not necessarily the case in many FIDE member countries. I think the Arbiters Commission was overly idealistic when making that advice.

David Sedgwick
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Re: FIDE's 400pt rule

Post by David Sedgwick » Wed Jan 01, 2020 1:57 pm

Alex Holowczak wrote:
Wed Jan 01, 2020 11:32 am
3. They'd just have to name some other licenced arbiter who was never present but ticks the box as far as FIDE is concerned, which is sharp practice that FIDE wants to avoid
Arbiters who are not present have a duty to do more than just tick a box.

Alex Holowczak wrote:
Wed Jan 01, 2020 11:32 am
To be fair, if there was a will, an arbiter could be trained in England, but this is not necessarily the case in many FIDE member countries. I think the Arbiters Commission was overly idealistic when making that advice.
An arbiter would only need to be trained up to NA standard, which is higher in some countries than in others.

I stand by my opinion that that is what Kobylianskyi should do.

Leonard Barden
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Re: FIDE's 400pt rule

Post by Leonard Barden » Wed Jan 01, 2020 3:19 pm

This case seems like a 2020 version of Claude Bloodgood of the US or Zaw Win Lay of Myanmar. A solution was found for the former when he reached No2 in the USCF ratings with only Kamsky ahead of him, and for the latter when it was calculated that Zaw Win Lay's rating was on course to overtake Kasparov and Karpov within a year.

Kobylianskyi's latest results have put his rapid rating up to exactly level with Vishy Anand at the same age(50) https://2700chess.com/rapid so that I guess that a solution will soon be found for his case, too.

He is from Ukraine which is a major chess nation and not some isolated Fide affiliate.

Kevin Thurlow
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Re: FIDE's 400pt rule

Post by Kevin Thurlow » Wed Jan 01, 2020 3:22 pm

I think when they write the Laws or Rules, they assume ideal conditions. They imagine that all chess events are 8 players staying in a hotel, with enough arbiters etc to run things. No consideration is given to a small chess club event or a weekend tournament. Many of the requirements can be unduly onerous in normal circumstances.

But obviously it's not ideal to have the same guy running the event and playing in it.

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