GM Wesley_So Closing Account (Comments)

I agree, Wesley has left lichess in a very rough way. But there is something right in all his behaviour.
Lichess has recently closed topic about Lance5500. And that guy is very very strange. He has no name, no title, no elo, and still his is one of the strongest players here. If he tries to earn money by teaching chess, and is not a top GM, there is no reason at all to hide real name. He is very very likely a cheater.

Maybe Wesley was right, and lichess should compel strong players to disclose their names? Otherwise that just discredits the site itself? This is just like with the Panama Papers. When you do not tell something, you look suspicious and not credible at all.

#41 Does any other site compel strong players to disclose their names? It doesn't.
As about Lance5500, bring some arguments! He simply looks to be a strong player.
Cheaters are immature individuals, or trolls. There's nothing to be gained by cheating here.

I love lichess, i donated money, i bought a coffe cup (20 dollars for a coffe cup....) from the lichess shop. i support this site.....but....lichess have a problem....that in the real life is not a problem...but on internet is a problem ; IT IS 100% free.
If a site is free.....take all kind of people....good but specialy...VERY BAD.

if i'm a cheater, or a very bad person, or a very bad sportmanship person...i NOT go on ICC (payment site full of titled players), i NOT go in chess.com (where 70% is premium members, and is full of titled players) .... i go here, 100% free...full of normal players.....if the site ban me, i can open another account...and where i can play in anonymous.

Sorry, im italian, i hope that you understand what i mean.

gratuity is not a problem. Cheaters are. I like lichess because it's free.

I played more than 1000 games here, and I was suspicious about maybe 10 games to be against cheaters. There are cheaters, sure. They are not THAT many. They are too present in discourse on the forum as compared to their numbers.

any GM or whatever being paid not to play here, or not wanting to play here for a bunch of moronic cheaters, SHOULD NOT be a reason to change lichess. Lichess IS about free access, lichess should not be something about star system in itself.

Play, have fun, report suspicious players, and get over it! :)

Regis

Cheating is very scary. Especially if it hits close to home. Knowing there are cheaters is annoying, and starting every game brings a stroke of fear. It makes online chess comparable to competing in a boxing tournament where some of the participants have guns and will not hesitate to shoot you if given the chance.

Granted they will be arrested if they are spot. But any terrorist can make their bomb in a basement* and avoid surveillance. Cheaters can start fresh, engage like any good player, only to use their aid when they are finally prepared for it.

It's true that we name "engine abusers" as "bots", but it's always easy to forget that they should actually be named "botmasters" instead, because a human joins the site and uses a chess engine to play. Knowing that an account is linked to a real person isn't helpful, because every account does. Knowing that an account is a real master doesn't necessary make it safe, because there have been news of International Masters cheating online.

In an ideal world, everyone would have a Twitch.TV account and sink hours onto sharing their time with everyone else. Unfortunately, we don't. We cannot see beyond the parameters given by the user and its browsing environment. While it's true that we have tools and they are very powerful, all tools are but execution, not judgement. Unlike OTB chess, there is no guarantee that the person is actually there playing.

What we need is not more data, like the account owners, but a better way to make use of the data we already have and obtain information that is critical to determining if an account has cheated.

You probably won't agree with this, but it's fine. Everyone has opinions, with some of them conflicting and some of them helpful.

Back onto the topic, upon finding Wesley's forum post, expecting it to be harsh, "inflammatory, infuriating, frivolous, and vexatious" like the comments here had broadcasted, I read:

"I'm closing my account here in lichess. There are far too many cheater which I play almost every other day. Perhaps I'll be back after this site has rid of cheaters..."

"[...] I see I am at a disadvantage here using my real name while other players hide behind masks they just change every time they get caught. Lichess my advice is charge a yearly fee to play here and get these guys real names. That way at least you have their credit card number and can ban them permanently. A lot of sick people out there acting out because they think they're anonymous."

Where's the harsh?

Are these rough comments? Is it expected of everyone to use a begging tone when writing a forum post? I carefully sifted through every single word in the post and I can't find a single trace of insincerity.

This thread has been extremely sidetracked for a "Lichess Feedback" about "Wesley So closing his account". I will now summarize this post, and I encourage that if you have any other comments to make, write a blog. Any points to be said seems to be exhausted between the reddit post, the original forum thread, and this thread, which will not be deleted and be left for your reading.

"Regardless, he was just angry. No reason to close account, delete account, or throw away all that just because of a few cheaters.

"There is nothing that can be done. Even ICC with their paid-platform, still gets cheaters.

"It's part of online chess. You just gotta see it as an obstacle and adapt to it. There's nothing anyone can do.

"Lichess does a lot to ban cheaters.

"There's a lot more cheaters on chess.com I assure you. It's exactly why I prefer lichess. No need to bitch at lichess when they've done the most to detect cheaters."
- KhazarKhaganate www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/4e6qc9/wesley_so_just_announced_he_is_leaving_lichess/d1xsb83

Cynosure on cheat detection: www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/4e6qc9/wesley_so_just_announced_he_is_leaving_lichess/d1ydbuj

Reddit thread: www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/4e6qc9/wesley_so_just_announced_he_is_leaving_lichess/

Original thread: http://ja.lichess.org/forum/general-chess-discussion/closing-account#1

* This is a statement, not a word of encouragement, or stating that terrorism is easy