English Chess Forum

According to the Olimpbase files (http://www.olimpbase.org/Elo/data/elo1967-2001.zip) Tony Miles FIN was 403385.
Go along to the FIDE Rating site and type it in the search box and you get another player altogether.
Click on "Click to view all previous periods", scroll down to the bottom of the screen and you see entries for July 2001 and October 2001. Click on either of these and you see the ratings calculations for one "Miles, Anthony J." The next entry isn't until January 2007 and is for somebody else entirely.

Tony Miles FIN has been reused! This feels like something on a par with having your grave dug up and somebody else buried there. Shocking that this should be done to England's first grandmaster!

Brian Towers wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 18, 2018 7:32 pm

According to the Olimpbase files (http://www.olimpbase.org/Elo/data/elo1967-2001.zip) Tony Miles FIN was 403385.
Go along to the FIDE Rating site and type it in the search box and you get another player altogether.
Click on "Click to view all previous periods", scroll down to the bottom of the screen and you see entries for July 2001 and October 2001. Click on either of these and you see the ratings calculations for one "Miles, Anthony J." The next entry isn't until January 2007 and is for somebody else entirely.

Tony Miles FIN has been reused! This feels like something on a par with having your grave dug up and somebody else buried there. Shocking that this should be done to England's first grandmaster!

This was done in the past. By bad luck, I'm told that the practice was stopped in 2007.

I'm not sure that I quite share your level of outrage, but I agree that it would have been nicer for his number, and others, to have been retired.

I have searched for others, and have found the Spanish GM David Garcia Ilundain, who died very young in 2002.

Brian Towers wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 18, 2018 7:32 pm

Tony Miles FIN has been reused! This feels like something on a par with having your grave dug up and somebody else buried there. Shocking that this should be done to England's first grandmaster!

The reuse of ids is also (in this case at least) poor systems design and should have been properly corrected.

I imagine that changing the FIDs of players who have reused numbers would be difficult and would in any case create more problems than it solved. The 2007 decision to stop this practice was certainly a good one.

Like at least one other on the Forum, I was at school with Tony (I was in the year above). I was hugely impressed by his achievements, stunned by his sidestep when we played in the same rugby team and saddened by his demise; I treasure his memory. However, unfortunate (and unnecessary) though this may seem, I don't think it's highly significant.

Interestingly, Miles's FIN was reused for an older player. That can't have happened too many times.

Angus French wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 18, 2018 9:54 pm

The reuse of ids is also (in this case at least) poor systems design and should have been properly corrected.

I don't think whoever is maintaining the FIDE rating database has anybody remotely resembling a database expert. It is full of "dirty data".

Check out the years of birth of these players, some of whom must have escaped from the Highlander set .

FINs of the ancients -
11506946
10003983
3945669
2938316
3004236
9012435
8504687
30937175
30937540
54510902
30932548
21600376
73012114
1466801
30946263
11505761
3827852
1455648
6603343
4704118
1453475
1658344

Some of these are from Online Arena, which is a reflection of the standard of that interface, some are from federations which you could imagine not being particularly professional, but many are from "proper" federations (US and Western European) for players with proper ratings.

One of them (3827852) even has a title (School Instructor) and a picture. He looks really good for someone who is over 1000 years old.

Clearly there are problems at both the individual federation level and the FIDE level.

Brian Towers wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 22, 2018 11:48 am

some are from federations which you could imagine not being particularly professional, but many are from "proper" federations (US and Western European)

I shall look into this. However, your assumption that US and Western European federations are "proper ones" which might be expected to do things correctly is highly revealing and quite wrong.

NickFaulks wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 23, 2018 9:39 am

However, your assumption that US and Western European federations are "proper ones" which might be expected to do things correctly is highly revealing and quite wrong.

Federations from chess developing countries may need a certain amount of support, but otherwise it is surely not unreasonable to expect that all Federations try and do things correctly.

All too often that is not the case, of course.

A few years ago the Federation which was hosting the European Individual Championship had no compunction about assembling a team of arbiters the majority of whom had failed to apply and pay for their FIDE Arbiters' Licences.

NickFaulks wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 23, 2018 9:39 am

Brian Towers wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 22, 2018 11:48 am

some are from federations which you could imagine not being particularly professional, but many are from "proper" federations (US and Western European)

However, your assumption that US and Western European federations are "proper ones" which might be expected to do things correctly is highly revealing and quite wrong.

I think you fail to understand the use of scare quotes around "proper". With the USA leading the way on 4 ancients and Denmark second on 3, so called "proper" federations are clearly anything but. Not that their lack of competence excuses FIDE's failure to do basic checks on data coming into its system.

NickFaulks wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 23, 2018 9:39 am

Brian Towers wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 22, 2018 11:48 am

some are from federations which you could imagine not being particularly professional, but many are from "proper" federations (US and Western European)

I shall look into this.

Credit where credit is due, all but one of these have been fixed by removing the date year. The one remaining is Brina Jelen (FID), born in "0205".

However one new anomaly has been introduced, a "No-Name" from Thailand with FIN 6210090. Somebody called "Aden O'Shea" appeared with this FIN in the July and August lists. The name has been blanked out in the latest September list.

David Sedgwick wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 23, 2018 10:56 am

Federations from chess developing countries may need a certain amount of support, but otherwise it is surely not unreasonable to expect that all Federations try and do things correctly.

Would ENG be one of the above federations or has it stalled in its development ?