From: glickman@husc10.harvard.edu (Mark Glickman)
Newsgroups: rec.games.chess
Subject: Re: USCF Ratings Committee
Date: 9 Nov 92 20:04:25 GMT
Article-I.D.: husc3.1992Nov9.150426.17257
Distribution: usa
Organization: Harvard University Science Center

In article <1992Nov9.134353.231@news.unige.ch> chachere@cui.unige.ch (CHACHERE Lawrence) writes:
>
>Since you asked, I will let you know just what I think of that
>USCF rating committee - basically it is about as incompetent as
>most other USCF committees.  

Ummm... I guess I should respond to this now that I'm the new
chairman of the Ratings Committee.  Hopefully, you may change
your mind about our committee during my tenure (which began
a month ago).

> About every six months or so, I get
>a letter from USCF (despite the fact that I let my membership 
>expire over a year ago, in order to protest the poor administration)
>stating that they have adjusted my rating on
>the basis of movement of my FIDE rating, from events outside the
>US.  

I'm not at all sure how the process of updating individual ratings 
based on movement of FIDE ratings got started, but I agree that
it is inane for USCF ratings to be adjusted just because your FIDE
rating has changed.  I'll find out more about the genesis of this.

My understanding is that the USCF wants to be able to come up with a 
reasonable conversion from FIDE ratings to USCF ratings for the
purpose of tournament sectioning and seeding of FIDE-rated players who 
don't have USCF ratings.  Also, I suppose the USCF wants to prevent overt
attempts at sandbagging as well.  Other than that, I don't see any
obvious reason to align the two rating scales because, as you say in
the paragraph below, the two scales operate independently.

> Not that it concerns me very much, since having a FIDE rating
>kind of makes a USCF rating insignificant; but this whole policy
>of adjustment is totally mathematically unsound, because the two
>scales are completely independent.  Besides the fact, that my personal
>tournament results outside the US are none of the USCF's business.
>If the USCF is worried about USCF ratings seeming relatively inflated
>compared to FIDE ratings, maybe they should just face up to the fact
>that ALL US ratings are inflated, and they should subtract about 100
>rating points globally, from all members.  The United States is probably
>the easiest place in the world to become a "chess master"; that title
>used to mean something over there when it wasn't a dime a dozen, and I
>am not talking about raw numbers, but also in terms of the overall
>percentage of members.

I highly doubt we'll take measures to globally change ratings, but 
obtaining a conversion factor from FIDE to USCF is in the USCF's 
interest.  I don't entirely agree that tournament results outside the US
is none of the USCF's business.  If properly handled, I think such
information could be useful.  For example, if two FIDE rated players
play against each other, and they *both* have USCF ratings, then
why not allow for the game to be USCF rated as well?
I'm arguing from the standpoint that it helps to estimate both
players' abilities.  I wouldn't argue, however, to try to rate
games in the USCF system where one player has a USCF rating and
the other doesn't.  Note that this comment of using FIDE rated
games for USCF ratings is different (I presume) from what happened
to your rating.

As for your comment about the ease of becoming a chess master,
perhaps it's easier to earn that title in the US but that
still doesn't make it easy to obtain.  I don't particularly
think this title should be made more restrictive.  

I do appreciate your comments being voiced - thanks for letting
me know about your situation.

        - Mark
Newsgroups: rec.games.chess