Well the interesting thing is that you are wrong, totally.
It is currently in the USCF rules that the clock can make an audible noise at the end of the time control. It is that simple. No other rules would negate that which is written.
Now, you may disagree with the rule, but it is still the rule in effect.
If you want the rule changed then go ahead and make the correct motions and actions to the rule committee and the delegates.
If you do not want the rule to be enforced in a USCF sanctioned/rated game while it is a rule (and yes it IS a rule currently) then that would be under the category of Tough Toenails.
Well the interesting thing is that I am right totally. though not to interesting. I usually am right. I don’t know what your fetish with toe nails is but i hope you keep that to yourself
Maybe if you would read closer you might get farther. The cheating example has nothing to do with any claim of cheating. It is providing an example that because something is “unbiased and impartial, i.e the clock” that does not in effect make a situation, action, problem etc fair. I could have just as easily said " Crazed insane shooter was just as likley to shoot person A, as Person B. so he was being fair!. The previous poster had noted, that since the clock would call flag regardless of which side it fell on and was impartial, so through this reasoning he moved to the conclusion, that this impartialness, made a clock notifying a player of the flag “Fair”. I’ll admit throwing the term cheating in there could throw someone off the point, but i was not making any claim in regards to cheating.
Can you speak the word flag, and it actually happen on the internet? Do the clocks automatically match or does time seal kick in due to lag, and report back opponent actually moved you just saw 0 time because of lag? Does speaking the word flag take less time than typing it? Why are computers and books allowed in correspondence chess? Would it be fair to use computers and books the same way in OTB? Would you feel comfortable risking your standard OTB rating in an online game with no proctor? If one playe has a optical mouse and the other a dirty roller mouse, are they equal? Why can’t the post office tax emails? The government built and supports the internet after all, or is just charging postage on real letters fair and not fair on emails? Why am i charged 10 cents a text message (a really short email)on my phone? Is internet chess and OTB the same thing? Why is one called internet chess, and the other OTB?
For the overall thread I’m going w/ Steve on this one in consideration of his National TD certification. And it makes sense – the clock will beep at the end of time control every game, every round, regardless of player or color. All that said, I’m not a fan of beeping or flashing lights as a player, and as a relatively new TD I would put the onus on the players to reject available equipment in favor something that doesn’t beep or flash.
I would submit that clocks that freeze are not the ideal option if options exist. Freezing clocks eliminate a legitimate pathway to drawing the game, e.g., the game is drawn if both flags fall before a player makes a win claim on time (there may be other details in there – don’t have the 5th edition in front of me at the moment). Based on this I would prefer analog over a freezy. Thoughts?
I’d prefer a non-freezing clock for a sudden-death time control. Both players should know in advance if the clock freezes.
Going a little off-topic, I’d also very strongly prefer a non-freezing clock for a non-sudden-death time control. Even when the move counters are accurate in non-sudden-death a player may not have a scoresheet complete enough to claim the flag.
In mutual time pressure in the first time control when my opponent stops keeping score for enough moves I then know that I am safe from a flag claim and thus can continue to keep score so that if I don’t run out of time I can still claim the flag if the opponent oversteps. When I have run out of time in this situation I simply call my own flag so that the opponent is prevented from catching up on the scoresheet before the time-loss is ruled invalid. An automatically freezing clock may require additional work to unfreeze it so that the game can continue properly into the next time control.
One of the real issues of the clocks that beep when the flag falls is for those players that have gotten use to it. They would actually be more likely to miss the flag fall if they were expecting to hear a beep indicating that time was up.
So I guess if you are playing with a strange clock you should ask ahead of time.
If for no other reason so that you don’t get a “He cheated. He used a clock that didn’t beep.”
In every tournament I’ve ever played in, almost everybody uses a clock that is set not to beep, so nobody is going to get used to the beep, and nobody is going to claim that using a beepless clock is cheating.
And I have seen games where, if the clock’s visual notifications were harder to detect, that “both flags would likely have fallen and the game would have technically been a draw”.
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Well, my experience was that about one TD for every 50 players was about right. Of course there is a limit to how many TDs a tournament can afford; the National Open is too big, nobody is going to hire 16 TDs just to call flags.
For a local or regional event with mostly volunteer staff I think you could do it up to 300 players or so - that’s about 6 TDs needed.
The real problem is how a TD would determine that the bystander was really unbiased. In the case of the clock, we know it is unbiased.
Keep in mind, too, that a player cannot guarantee that the clock their opponent brings will beep when the flag falls, but may be required to use their opponent’s clock in about half the games they play.
Another point to consider is: Why do you think it is fairer for a player to have to notice that their opponent’s flag has fallen? If both flags have fallen and there is no way for the TD to determine which fell first, it makes sense that the game should be declared a draw. But why do you consider this fairer than having the clock audibly notify the players when one of them has run out of time?
