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Chessville
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Online Etiquettepart twoIn general, most of the people with whom I have played online chess have been a classy bunch. But on occasion, I've run into some real jerks. In the unfortunate event that you also come across such people, I’d like to warn you about what sort of behavior you might encounter, and how I recommend that you deal with it. The worst sort of opponent which I have encountered is the one who wants to “talk dirty” or hurl insults at you while you play. I always imagine them as some sniggering Beavis-and-Butthead type, probably bored, and looking to amuse themselves by irritating others. Why it is that they choose a chess site for such shenanigans is beyond me; I mean, wouldn’t some adult chat room better suit their purposes?! In any event, I have found that the best way to deal with this kind of idiot is to ignore their comments completely, and instead simply focus on thrashing them at the game. Since they’re looking to make you mad, they’ll be delighted if you respond to their obnoxious remarks in any way at all; but if you ignore them, they tend to become bored and stop. Failing to respond is the best response, and if you win the game on top of that, they’ll have received their just desserts. Also, some online chess servers have a feature that lets you block comments from your opponents. If so, I recommend using it in such cases so that their comments won’t distract you while you play. Luckily, this sort of extremely poor behavior has been rare in my (admittedly limited) experience. There are, however, some other more common examples of poor chess etiquette you may encounter. One is requests to take back moves. I strongly believe that blunders and other bad moves are part of the game of chess, and that learning how to avoid playing such moves is part of a person’s chess skill. In that spirit, I highly recommend that you yourself never request take-backs, and furthermore, I recommend that you not allow your opponent to take back moves either. You are under no moral obligation whatsoever to allow your opponents to take back moves. If they become angry at your refusal, that’s their problem. They should simply learn to avoid making bad moves, and you’re really doing them a favor by reinforcing the importance of this. There may be some exceptions. Some people don’t mind take-backs during blitz chess. If you are such a person, that’s fine. Also, there may be some cases when your opponent obviously meant to make a certain move, but accidentally put the piece down on the wrong square; for example, if they accidentally lost their grip on the mouse while they were moving the piece. (Don’t laugh -- it has happened to me before!) If you honestly feel that is what happened, then the polite thing to do is to allow your opponent to correct the move. However, if they claim that this is happening on a regular basis during the game, they may be lying, and I believe you are within your rights to refuse take-backs after the first time. Another problem that I’ve come up against is people deserting a game without resigning, as soon as they realize that they are going to lose. This is quite irritating. Depending on the server, you may have no other option than to sit there and wait for their clock to run down, at which point you can claim a win by forfeit. It’s a pain to have to sit there and wait, but I recommend doing so, so that the deserter will be punished by having another loss on his record. Another strategy some people use is to make repeated draw offers throughout the game. You are never under any obligation to accept a draw unless you actually want to, so feel free to decline, and to force them to play out the game or resign. A similar problem is people who ask to have the game cancelled or to save the game and return to it later. Again, they usually do this once they realize that they are going to lose, and they are looking for a way to avoid playing out the game and scoring another loss. They usually try to make it sound like they have to leave for some other reason (“Oops, the phone is ringing, and it’s an important call, and I have to take it,” or some such other nonsense). Again, you are under no obligation to acquiesce to such requests, and I recommend that you do not. If someone logs on to play a game, they should be prepared to play it out, and if for some reason they cannot, then they should resign gracefully. Related to this, some people will intentionally disconnect their computer from the site at a point during the game when they know they are in a bad spot. Later, they log back on, claim to have been disconnected by the server, and ask to continue the game. Now, as a matter of fact, this sort of thing does happen sometimes; heck, it has happened to me on more than one occasion. Sometimes the site's server becomes overloaded, and it has to terminate some connections. So when this happens, I wouldn't get too jumpy about it. However, if you notice it happening regularly to certain players, you may reasonably become suspicious. They may be intentionally disconnecting so that they can have some extra time to think about the position, or to consult their computers for advice. If you suspect this, feel free to decline future games against that opponent, and consider reporting them to the site's moderator, so (s)he can keep an eye on the suspect. One last thing I’d like to mention are people who message you after a game (which you won) to make all sorts of excuses about why they lost, additionally claiming that they really should’ve / could’ve / would’ve won if only such-and-such hadn’t happened. I advise completely ignoring them. Sometimes they will become almost aggressive and demand to play another game with you. Whether to take them up on it is really up to you, but you are certainly under no moral obligation to do so. On the one hand, it might be fun to beat them again! On the other hand, you may feel additional pressure to win, which could interfere with your game. On the other hand, it’s probably good to learn how to play under such pressure! On the other hand, it will probably really aggravate them if you refuse, which would serve them right for being so rude in the first place! Like I said, it’s really up to you. Just be forewarned that this sort of thing may happen. Also take into consideration that they will have even more than the usual motivation to cheat (e.g., by using computer assistance) during a rematch, in an attempt to make themselves look good -- all the more reason to refuse rude rematch demands. Hopefully, this will be the worst you may encounter. Until then, good playing, and good sportsmanship! And on the lighter side, let me leave you with this amusing story, by our very own Chessville editor, Kelly Atkins: "Since my name is Kelly, a lot of online opponents assume I'm female, which couldn't be further from the truth. I was playing online last summer, when my opponent messaged me asking, "Do you have a sexy body?" I just laughed and ignored him, assuming he was just an obnoxious 13 year old. A couple of moves later, he asked [a more explicit sexually-related question]. This was even funnier, but I still ignored him. Finally, he asked, "What size bra do you wear?" I just had to respond to this one. I said, "I'm a 40 year old man who's built more like an NFL fullback than a Playboy Playmate. I don't usually wear a bra, but if I did, I'd probably be a B-cup. On the other hand, my wife says that if I don't start exercising and lay off the lasagna, I'll soon be able to fill out a C-cup quite nicely. Any more questions?" This must have rattled him, because he immediately hung a piece, resigned, and logged off. :-) " Copyright 2002 S. Evan Kreider. Used with permission.
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