It seems entirely plausible to me that people are best at judging the strength of people similar to them, in which case being "just" a 6-7d amateur might actually be better than a pro. Also it would seem entirely plausible that a pro who teaches a lot of amateurs would do better at this task than a top competitive pro like Ke Jie who I suppose is not so familiar with the typical mistakes of a European 4d. It's hard for me to tell the difference between a 15k and a 20k these days, but I was probably better at it in the past when I was often teaching such people.

So, O16 or P16?
Both points are basically same.

I'd like to reiterate that censorship didn't happen on L19. Moderation did. We expressed both privately and publicly that we would work with the user who made the Reddit claim, but our offers were met with no response.

I indicated this to Simba earlier in the thread, but instead of working with us, he ignored the comment and continues to claim censorship.

The fact that this thread is active with comments from both sides of the controversy is evidence that censorship isn't happening. We just ask that users abide by the TOS and work with us to express their thoughts in a reasonable way upon request.

Thanks.

Please continue with the discussion

_________________
be immersed

Thank you very much.


This is up to him. I understand he has lot of work to do for the congress. Only for reading everything here, it takes plenty of time.

I hope this discussion will help in finding the necessary cheating prevention method and measures, to make safe, as reasonable possible, the stronger players from cheating behaviors, and the weaker players from being unjustly accused.
I hope Pisa would be the place were to discuss about it and find the first important measures for the next on line tournament. I’m sorry that I will not be part of this group, because I have to work as volunteer during the free time from the games, but I hope there will be people that will give a good help to develop this method and measures.

Sorry if I am raining on anyone's parade, but to be perfectly honest I think there is no way to prevent cheating in online tournaments. You may spend days/weeks/months/years discussing and developing an anti cheating system but all such a system will do is eradicate the most blatant cheating and make cheaters a bit more careful. People who play as normal but have leela or some other program open during games as an insurance against blunders will not be detected. People who play their own game but get advice from a bot at one or two difficult points in the game will not be detected. Such people will always be able to say that they played a little better than usual and there is no conclusive evidence that they cheated and no one will be able to prove anything or do anything. Most annoyingly, if an anti cheat system has been implemented, then cheaters will be able to say that their cheating was not detected and that somehow proves they are honest people!

The only thing that can and should be done is to be realistic and honest and take the consequences. Continuing with online tournaments with no changes and pretending that nothing has happened is an insult to honest players. Given the situation, I can't really see why an honest player would want to participate in such a tournament.

(I stand by my earlier comment that a 6d player should be able to notice if his opponent is playing at a 4d level or 6d+ level during a serious game. It is not about whether he won or lost the game. He may lose the game, but it will still feel like he lost to a 4d. Not a 6d+. So, if a 6d player says that a 4d player was cheating I believe it.)

I concede the point: I checked the EGD search page again and it is apparently declared rank and so the 14.4% is possibly an exaggeration of the true winning rate.

Does this mean that the event is vanishingly rare? I believe not but at least that EGD search page can't answer that question.

Your last statement is a non sequitur. OC, if a 6 dan loses to a 4 dan he or she will feel like he or she lost to a 4 dan. That's what happened. That does not mean that the 6 dan can tell whether the 4 dan was cheating or not.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

No one can tie a camel that is gone and nowhere to be found.

The declared rank is usually the rank obtained from the national ranking system, and is not necessarily less reliable than the EGF rating (for instance when a player's national rank is reset at a more realistic level while the EGF rank remains unchanged).

Anyway I mentioned that (declared) 3 dans do sometimes win against (declared) 7 dans, this is an indication that people occasionally play at least 2 stones above or under their usual level.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

At the time I was still maintaining the ratings before they were moved to EGD I had several statistics done by myself including probabilities to beat 100 points stronger opponents etc. Maybe I could still find those old files but from memory I remember at the top end (stronger player about 6d) the probability of 4d beating 200 points higher opponents was about (more likely slightly less then) 10%. Thought, it is so many years ago that I do not remember it for sure. Definitely, the number is not negligible.

I have started a new thread which may be of interest.
viewtopic.php?t=15836

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

One very important thing that I just noticed:
Game Metta-Ben David, during analysis of move 51, I noticed that this move showed as a top choice before white played move 50.
So I went to check similar approach with move 97, L7, which was rated low in analysis.
Before move 96 was played, Leela thought that white would play M2/N2, after which black should play L7.
After 96 was played, L7 was for a while top choice, and then it switched to N14, and L7 fell on D place.

This shows that Leela's choices change even more during analysis. Even if made analysis on same way and on same machine as alleged cheater played it's game, it would be impossible to have all same A suggestions.
That is why at analysis after certain number of variations, moves that were marked as C or even D, could be earlier top suggestion.

Therefore, analysis if moves match "only for A suggestion at one point" are not good in some examples.

I have updated previous analysis with Metta's EGC games.
Attached is updated paper (basically only part with EGC games, and conclusion) and all files used in research.

Thanks, great work and very much appreciated.

"By observing level of play and similartities - not just statistics - it is clear that in two analyzed
games played on PGETC help from Leela was used by Carlo Metta, which boosted his level of
play significantly. His level of play in live games was much weaker than in two examined
internet games."

I still shake my head in wonder, that Metta should even consider being a referee for a major tournament.

Thanks for the anlalysis Bogdan.
But maybe better to follow the same process with others european player to have a comparaison point?
Because someone can contest with differentcondition/jet-lag/irl stress/stress due to cheating accusation/one opponent stronger or games too old,etc, we can expect a difference between IRL and PGETC

At the start of this thread, Uberdude made some research for the % of moves in top 3 positions of Leela. I imagine that picking one of those players and using them as a comparison point might be useful in making the report of Milos more complete.

It is not clear to me that anyone in the EGF is going to look at Milos's report though. I didn't hear that the BGA made a new appeal, nor that Israel kicked off stage 3 of their appeal.

_________________
North Lecale

It would be nice if Bojanic could play the "4 dan or 6 dan ?" game. I wouldn't expect 100% accuracy, but it would be interesting to check if at least he never confuses a 4 dan with a 6 dan or vice-versa.

Why don't we just find 1000 distractions and then perhaps the problem will just be forgotten? Perhaps Metta should just be declared innocent because a bunch of kyu players can't tell the difference between 4d and 6d?

For this 6d or 4d test to make any sense, then it should be done in the context that it was created. A 6d player played an entire serious game with someone who is allegedly 4d, (but most probably just acting a bot for Leela). The 6d player said that it felt nothing like playing against a 4d.

Then someone decided to construct a "test", apparently for the purpose of showing that this 6d may not be a reliable judge of whether his opponent was 4d or stronger. My perception is that someone, with the intention of calling the 6d player's judgement into doubt created this "test". (I had the nerve a critical comment about it and was slammed for my "negativity"). For this test to make any sense whatsoever it should consist of a 6d player playing a serious game with an alleged 4d and after the game making a guess as to the real level of his opponent. Getting kyu players to decide if a 6d or 4d was playing, just by looking at the games is obviously absurd. It is also questionable to construct this test with online games where there is no way of verifying who was in fact playing.


I have nothing but thanks and respect for those who have spent time seriously researching the matter at hand, players who have shared their in game impressions and those who have provided insight as to the broader context of all this, for example how this affair is connected to the EGC.

I am not talking about kyu players here. Bojanic (5d) as well as other strong players say that it is easy to see from a game if a player is 4d or 6d. In addition, Bojanic can use computer tools to make more accurate analyses. Other people like Uberdude (4d) and Robert Jasiek (5d) think that it is not possible to judge from a single game or from a small number of games. Personally I am not claiming that anyone is right or wrong, I am just waiting for some strong players to play the "4d vs 6d" game. If Bojanic would like to play the game, then there are three possible outcomes:

• He guesses right most of the time, and never confuses a 4d with a 6d or vice-versa. This would be a strong argument in favor of the validity of his method of analysis.
• He confuses a 6d with a 4d but never a 4d with a 6d. The test is not conclusive.
• He confuses a 4d with a 6d. Then, either Bojanic's method is not accurate, or cheating has already occurred in the past as substitution of players (so maybe cheating in PGETC is much more widespread than we previously thought).

Whatever the outcome, I would find the conclusion interesting.