Important :I need your help for the publication of ICC games

[Marc Lacrosse]

Hi all

I agreed today with one of the owners of the Internet Chess Club not to publish any new ICC best games collection until we have a discussion with his co-owners on this matter.

I try to convince them that allowing public diffusion of a selection of the best games played on ICC could be a nice advertisement for the club : In my humble opinion there is no better way to prove that some of the most interesting online games are played there.

Initially my account was suspended yesterday but after an interesting discussion with Marty Grund, vicepresident of ICC we came to an agreement. I promised to suspend my collecting activities and not to publish my little piece of collecting software.

Marty Grund reopened my account and promised we would discuss the whole matter with his associates in the very next days.

My way of collecting and publishing games is no clear infringement of ICC rules (I very carefully checked this before I began to do this a few months ago) : I have no permanent dedicated bot online and I only use on a larger scale commands and features that are explicitly allowed for ICC members wishing to review other players games. Moreover I only collect pure PGNs and do not collect any private or proprietary data like chats, comments, learning stuff and so on. Pure PGNs are not copyrightable.

Sure I admit that this collecting activity uses a significant bandwith and sure it would become a problem in case many people would try to process similarly.

So I think that the best solution would be ICC deciding to publish the same or similar data from their own side, be it on their web site (or on mine if they wish).

With an appropriate presentation I am convinced that this could result in a very positive effect on their reputation, both as a place where top class chess is played and as generous contributors to the community.

I think that a way to convince ICC owners is to show them that there is an interest for such a publication in the computer chess world.

So I would like to ask those among us who have an ICC account to get in touch with Marty Grund. You may leave him a message at his ICC account : his pseudo is ********** (edited by moderator).

If ICC owners do not agree with the publishing of their best online games I do not intend to try continuing on my own.

IMHO this would be a pity : there is a treasure of nice games unexplored and unexploited there.

Marc

[Volker Pittlik]

... Pure PGNs are not copyrightable...

Correct, but they possibly have something in their terms of use that you aren't allowed to publish it elsewhere.

...With an appropriate presentation I am convinced that this could result in a very positive effect on their reputation, both as a place where top class chess is played and as generous contributors to the community...

Whatever we think they want us to pay to view the games of titled players.

...

... So I would like to ask those among us who have an ICC account to get in touch with ***** ***** You may leave him a message at his ICC account : his pseudo is *********...

Although I don't agree with them about the publishing of the games I think their privacy should be respected.

Volker


BTW: Your collection of links to go sites you posted at CCC is very interesting. I already learned that games (at least how to move). Very interesting in many aspects.

[Marc Lacrosse]

... So I would like to ask those among us who have an ICC account to get in touch with ***** ***** You may leave him a message at his ICC account : his pseudo is *********...

Although I don't agree with them about the publishing of the games I think their privacy should be respected.

Volker

I too : that's why I did not post his email address but well his completely publicly available ICC pseudo to which any ICC member with any kind of complaint is invited to drop a message.

Be sure : no privacy infringement from my side here Volker.

In fact Marty Grund is among other functions the chief of public relations and helpdesk at ICC.

Even his email address is publicly available there for all members for any complaint.

Marc

PS Remi Coulom answered with a much more complete and up-to-date list of top computer go references.

[mjlef]

I would just ignore them and continue publishing the games. Games are data and a matter of public record. The phone companies tried to stop other companies from republishing phone numbers, but the courts long ago decided that pure data is not copywritable. Sweat Equity (compiling the data)_ does not make it copywritable. As long as games do not have comments or other material in them, they have no legal leg to stand on. They simply do not own the games in any form.

Mark

[Volker Pittlik]

I would just ignore them and continue publishing the games...

Risking to lose his account.

Games are data and a matter of public record...

Yes.

They simply do not own the games in any form.

Correct. OTOH they can't be forced to conclude a contract with him.

Volker

[mjlef]

Just publish them without giving your name on something like tinyurl.com

[Marc Lacrosse]

Just publish them without giving your name on something like tinyurl.com

No.

First because I do not wish to try to do it secretly.

Secondly because collecting several thousands games per day results in a significant network traffic, highly superior to the one of ordinary players so that it is easily identified by ICC admins. My way of collecting games is not illegal nor even clearly forbidden by ICC rules but they do have the right of unilaterally closing my account even though I did not do anything forbidden.

Thirdly I wish to take this opportunity to try to convince them to publish the games by themselves.

Marc

[Nelson Hernandez]

The ICC's attitude is somewhat understandable, but I absolutely do not agree with the "network traffic" excuse. That is preposterous. Marc's share of network traffic is infinitesimal compared to the burdens put on the entire site. Peanuts.

The ICC could more persuasively argue that the games that are played on their site are a valuable part of their franchise, and they do not want them mass-distributed for free. In other words they might think they could sell them, or use them in some other product that could then be sold. In which case Marc would be effectively discounting the value of such products.

But if they don't have those thoughts, or cannot foresee actively pursuing them, then they would be churlish to stand in the way of Marc's efforts. It would demonstrate an ungenerous, anti-hobbyist mindset.