English Chess Forum

Out of interest over the last five days I've noted the total posts in both of our chess fora:

ECF: 40 (8 per day)
EC: 217 (43.4 per day)

It occurs to me that there must be a few members in the ECF forum who are missing quite a lot of the action and I was wondering if we could put together a digest service to let them know what has been happening over here?

They are trying their best by even now killing our links from the main ECF site but perhaps if they waste money on a sponsored link they might generate more traffic.

It's silent over there?

They need a few more high profile signings. I wonder what Roger's value is in the transfer market?

Richard Bates wrote:They need a few more high profile signings. I wonder what Roger's value is in the transfer market?

Haha, he would probably go for an ECF membership fee..

I think they are missing out by not having a "chat room" to discuss games in progress. The ecforum has "Live games" even though in practice discussion heads to either the General section or the ECF section.

I think it easier to make comments if you don't know the result or the opinions of the players. Andrew Martin's commentary could invite on-line spectators to make comments via the ECF's Forum. Actually I don't know that this isn't happening but there's no obvious site for live comment on games unlike on the ecforum.

I can recount my own experience from Torquay last year, that between shutting down before setting off to play at 1.30pm and restarting whilst passing through my hotel at perhaps 7.30 pm, there would be several pages of comment about that day's play. Perhaps because there are fewer live games, the length of the discussions this year has yet to build up.

There are the same number of live boards connected up, but we aren't for some reason sending boards 11 onwards to the outside world.

IM Jack Rudd wrote:There are the same number of live boards connected up, but we aren't for some reason sending boards 11 onwards to the outside world.

Load reasons the live hosting barely coped yesterday.

As well as there bing less boards, the layout is horile this year in my browser.

Paul

Paul Dargan wrote:As well as there bing less boards, the layout is horile this year in my browser.

In this case, I'll have to point out again that, despite the pgn4web software being mentioned in the page, right above the chessboards, the chessboard software is not pgn4web but a recent development from DGT themselves (the makers of the electronic chessboards, they implemented in javascript an equivalent of their classic blue flash chessboard)

Roger de Coverly wrote:I think they are missing out by not having a "chat room" to discuss games in progress. The ecforum has "Live games" even though in practice discussion heads to either the General section or the ECF section.

I think it easier to make comments if you don't know the result or the opinions of the players. Andrew Martin's commentary could invite on-line spectators to make comments via the ECF's Forum. Actually I don't know that this isn't happening but there's no obvious site for live comment on games unlike on the ecforum.

I can recount my own experience from Torquay last year, that between shutting down before setting off to play at 1.30pm and restarting whilst passing through my hotel at perhaps 7.30 pm, there would be several pages of comment about that day's play. Perhaps because there are fewer live games, the length of the discussions this year has yet to build up.

I am guessing the other forum has closed whilst the British is on?

Carl Hibbard wrote: I am guessing the other forum has closed whilst the British is on?

There's still a handful of guests.

After a slow start, the usual chatter has started here about games and incidents, if any, in the British. Not so on the official forum and there isn't really a "live games" or "discuss the British as it takes place" sub-forum.

The thing seems to have been set up in direct competition to this forum, but with no special differentiating factor. Maybe there was a mis-conception that there is a massive untapped market of would-be chess posters out there, who are disenchanted with this forum due to its alleged viciousness or whatever. But that is an extra market that doesn't exist, and it also ignores the fact that in reality there isn't much abuse on here - just the occasional blip, and a lot less now than in the past.

If the official forum is to have a place, it needs ECF officials to actually engage with it, reply to questions reasonably promptly, and help stimulate debate. Why they didn't make some sort of concerted effort to kick it off successfully by being prepared to do that engagement is rather beyond me.

It just has the appearance of a half-baked attempt to disrupt this forum, in a petty and mean-minded way. Given that most regular posters here are ECF members, including a few council members and other influential players and administrators, it's less than obvious why it is thought this is a winning strategy, and a worthwhile use of members money.

Its also always struck me as somehow symptomatic that the usual slur that the forum put sponsors off, arose from very prolonged dissection of the chess sets for schools initiative. But the point is that the questioning was completely justified, with the suspicions raised being accurate.

PeterFarr wrote: Why they didn't make some sort of concerted effort to kick it off successfully by being prepared to do that engagement is rather beyond me.

I'm reliably informed that forums for special interest groups are relatively straightforward to set up, being no more than a few boxes to tick, the real problem being the monitoring and the moderation if the volume takes off. You could therefore have had a "disposable" forum set up to accommodate gossip and chatter about the current British Championships and the games being played. Embedded in the tournament website, it could have become the discussion medium of choice. On past experience there will be a similar gathering of "fans" for the Olympiad. Again on past experience that gathering is likely to assemble here.

Did Roger go on a free transfer? Is he the Denis Law of chess forums?