Simon Dixon wrote:In what way is there a link between the type of rating system the ECF use for domestic chess and the compulsion to be a member of the ECF?
The link is between ELO and ECF, we have ECF grades by default, if you want an ELO grade, you have to pay the ECF further sums for life to get and stay FIDE rated.
I don't think you know what you're talking about. Let me explain.
First, the Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) don't do rating systems. They do popular music.
For example. Professor Arpad Elo does rating systems. So it's an Elo rating system, not an ELO rating system.
FIDE don't have a God-given right to be the only organisation in the world that runs a rating system based on Elo's work. The ECF is quite entitled to have a national list based on Elo for domestic chess. Many other countries already do this. The two lists run in parallel.
Are you suggesting that all chess played in England should be FIDE-rated? This is nice in theory, but impractical. FIDE place several restrictions on what can be rated. For example
(1) Games in an open tournament must be a minimum length of 4 hours. How do you get this in an evening's league chess? Maybe adjournments? You can't have adjudications at all. Grade-restricted tournaments can be shorter.
(2) If you have a time control with a first time period, it must be 40 moves. So 40 moves in 100 minutes + 20 minutes to finish is fine. 36 moves in 90 minutes + 30 minutes isn't fine, and can't be rated. I guess when evening leagues are changing their time controls to get around (1), they can change (2) too.
(3) For FIDE-rated tournaments, you need FIDE Arbiters or International Arbiters to be at least a phone call away. England isn't awash with such things; and there's an awful lot of leagues for one arbiter to cover. He can't be expected to be on hold for four evenings a week for three-quarters of the year in case something goes wrong.
There are probably others, but that's just a flavour of why it won't happen.
So if we need a national list of our own to supplement the international list which is out of our direct control, we then have to work out how to fund its production. This may include things like Game Fee or compulsion to be a member. In any case, it's something in direct control of the ECF, and something that they can decide how it works.
Suppose then, that the ECF decides it wants an Elo-style national rating list. Fine. We still have just as many options with regard to Game Fee and Membership as we did when the ECF's national rating list used grades based on Mr. Clarke's algorithms. I forget his first name, but the ECF uses a system that he devised the basic principles of.
Does this make sense now?
