English Chess Forum

This morning the ECF Forum comes up totally empty - No posts made in the last seven days.

Update: It now shows an announcement on the ECF Academy, which copied to both forums.

Michael Flatt wrote:This morning the ECF Forum comes up totally empty - No posts made in the last seven days.

This has actually happened before, on Wednesday 9th December. Please see the attached screenshot, with the "LCC (London Chess Classic) Staff" log-in a giveaway regarding the date.

To answer your question, the three main protagonists for the ECF Forum were Phil Ehr, Bob Kane and Chris Fegan. Council passed judgment on two of them on 17th October. The third withdrew his candidature for election a week or so the before the meeting.

We await the current ECF Board getting round to putting that Forum out of its misery.

To be fair I'd be a bit worried if the forum vanished completely as I'd prefer some threads to remain in the public domain, especially if certain individuals choose to have a second tilt at election in 2016 (something I'd be happy to see). If nothing else it does have the full context of the Controller-Arbiter Nexus comment on its pages.

The forum was always a good idea in principle but was atrociously moderated and the decision to try and put a popular if controversial forum out of business proved a disaster from the outset. Carl might disagree here but the ECF does need a means of communicating with their members and (within reason) controlling that debate.

EDIT - typing error corrected. I meant see, not do.

Andrew Zigmond wrote:To be fair I'd be a bit worried if the forum vanished completely as I'd prefer some threads to remain in the public domain, especially if certain individuals choose to have a second tilt at election in 2016 (something I'd be happy to do). If nothing else it does have the full context of the Controller-Arbiter Nexus comment on its pages.

The forum was always a good idea in principle but was atrociously moderated and the decision to try and put a popular if controversial forum out of business proved a disaster from the outset. Carl might disagree here but the ECF does need a means of communicating with their members and (within reason) controlling that debate.

It is somewhat unfortunate if the only threads worth preserving are those that remind the electorate how un-electable certain individuals are

On the subject of ECF forum moderation I am still awaiting an acknowledgement and reply to a post I reported on the 27th September although when I raised this with the board a week ago I got an acknowledgement the same day with a promise to investigate.

Andrew Zigmond wrote:The forum was always a good idea in principle

Not really, no

Andrew Zigmond wrote:Carl might disagree here but the ECF does need a means of communicating with their members and (within reason) controlling that debate.

I do agree actually but perhaps an ECF blog with moderated comments checked even before public display would be a better method.

It is a lot of work for a moderator however.

Carl Hibbard wrote:

Andrew Zigmond wrote:Carl might disagree here but the ECF does need a means of communicating with their members and (within reason) controlling that debate.

I do agree actually but perhaps an ECF blog with moderated comments checked even before public display would be a better method.

That's not going to flow, though, is it?

Carl Hibbard wrote:It is a lot of work for a moderator however.

It's a full time, paid job for a moderator.

If they're serious about communicating then they should a) just use this forum for forum-like communication (after all, you come for free ) and b) tack on a blog to the ECF website with directors tasked with producing a blog post to update members once per month per director with moderated comments a la Wordpress.

In terms of content I don't recall any there being significant difference between the two forums and on several occasions posts have been duplicated because it wasn't clear whether they should posted on one or the other.

In general, the most prolific posters have tended to join the discussion on both. A very small number insist on posting on one particular forum as a matter of principle, even though the thread they contribute might have originated on the other.

The forum has never achieved the objectives it set itself and resources spent on it might be more usefully be allocated to the website.

Are ECF officials still banned/discouraged from posting here?

Andrew Bak wrote:Are ECF officials still banned/discouraged from posting here?

Yes.

Carl Hibbard wrote:

Andrew Bak wrote:Are ECF officials still banned/discouraged from posting here?

Yes.

I can only speak for myself, but I am an ECF officer and I am neither banned nor discouraged from posting here.

That is one respect, although not the most important one, in which life has got easier since 17th October.

As things stand, I would still consider it necessary to post any announcement made in my official capacity on the ECF Forum first.

It only extends to the board then it seems.

Alex it seems is unready to do so as he is in doubt. Alex being in doubt is not a legal position however! Can anyone point to anything in any code anywhere that actually says this? The personal pressure of a removed CE is hardly sufficient.

Michael Farthing wrote:Alex it seems is unready to do so as he is in doubt. Alex being in doubt is not a legal position however! Can anyone point to anything in any code anywhere that actually says this? The personal pressure of a removed CE is hardly sufficient.

http://www.englishchess.org.uk/wp-conte ... onduct.pdf

I suspect it's this bit: "3.4 ECF officials shall preferentially communicate on the ECF website/Forum (e.g. news of ECF events should be published on an ECF site before other sites)" although I don't see this stopping them from using this forum, only that the other one should be given priority. When I was on the board the CE told the board not to use this forum but when I asked if he was asking or telling he relented to "asking". Because of the number of people here, as opposed to the other place, posting here was far better for publicising events, finding players, getting feedback etc

It was indeed, Lawrence, that very passage which led me to make the post. The written word clearly presents no bar to posting here though to expect official announcements to be made first through the official medium is hardly unreasonable. What is unreasonable is that the CE should even think that he can 'instruct' the Board. Now that he is no longer there he can clearly no longer even consider 'instructing' and the written word is all that is left. That seems to be unambiguous.