Exactly how does this work? It seems last month (January) there was a published rating for January and February. Now, in February, I see just February. From the pattern I saw previously I would have expected to see a March published rating posted in addition to February. When does the “next” month’s published rating appear? Did something change recently in how this is done?
The March ratings list will be generated this weekend, starting at around 11:45 PM Friday evening. (For the last several years we have always cut the list off on the first Friday of the month.)
The March ratings will not become official until March 1st, but they will show on MSA starting some time on Saturday.
Just to confirm… is this in order to have enough time to print off a hardcopy of the ratings supplement for affiliates?
Has there been any discussion in discontinuing the hardcopy supplement in favor of the .pdf? It just seems more cost effective to me.
- Enrique
I believe this has already been done. First, the every other month printed supplement was discontinued and recently the Annual Supplement was also discontinued, I believe. I do wish it was back.
Bob, the USCF office can print copies of the annual ratings list, we printed several of them the last time I was in Crossville.
I think it costs them about 3 cents a page to print it at the office and somewhere between $2 and $3 to bind it at Staples, and probably another $3 to mail it out.
The annual list was around 220 pages, so for around $12.50 you can have your own printed copy. No, it won’t have the Top 100 lists and all the front matter that was associated with the printed Supplements, though.
We could go to more frequent rating cutoffs than monthly, if that’s what people really want, but there are still valid reasons for ratings lists that are fixed for some period of time, such as giving organizers (and their TDs) adequate lead time to know what ratings to use at their events and players time to plan what events to play in based on their current published rating.
The primary reason for the early cutoff for the next month’s rating list is that it is desirable to have the March issue of Chess Life have March official ratings on it. And we have to have that mailing list to the printer by about the 10th of the month.
That sounds more familiar. I knew there was something that needed to be printed that required the early cutoff. I just think it’s a shame that we can’t get more tournaments rated into each monthly supplement. (i.e. More January tournaments rated in time for the February supplement.)
If it takes only a day to generate the update, I would rather see the “go date” be closer to the end of the month than to see a rating printed on my magazine. But then again, I’m from the generation that thinks waiting 5 minutes for a meal to cook in the microwave machine is archaic. I might as well rub two sticks together and build a fire. 
- Enrique
I’m the opposite direction in the kitchen, I bake all our own bread from scratch and enjoy making things that take 4, 6 or 8 hours to cook but are SOOOO good when done that way. When I make beef stock, it simmers for a good 18 hours and the house smells wonderful the whole time!
I’m not sure how much further we could advance the cutoff date if we decided to ignore the editorial department’s needs. If you were playing in a major event that began on March 1st, would you be excited about changing what section you’re playing in based on your updated rating as of February 28th?
It would be grossly unfair to the players. If you’ve traveled to the tournament, I doubt the hotel or airline is going to refund your money. Also, it might reinforce the wrong behavior, by discouraging people from playing. The fact that something is possible does not make it a good idea.
The cutoff for monthly ratings lists are currently the first Friday of each month, for the reasons I stated above. I am NOT advocating any change in that, because I happen to agree with all of the reasons I stated above, and I do see an advantage to having March published ratings on the March issue of Chess Life.
I certainly understand the reasoning behind setting the cutoff as the first Friday of each month. On the other hand, I think I’d like to see the cutoff set at 11:45 PM on the seventh day of the month. This would allow TDs the full seven days to submit rating reports for events ending the last day of the previous month and to still make the deadline for the rating list.
In the worst case, the 7th would fall on a Friday, and the next business day would be the 10th of the month (when you said the list needs to be delivered to the printer). If that’s cutting it too close, maybe setting the deadline on the 5th or 6th of the month might be a possibility?
(Of course, you’ve pointed out that as more reports are submitted on line, most events are submitted within 48 hours, so the seven days is a generous allowance.)
Another advantage of cutting off the supplements on Friday evenings is that most tournaments are held on weekends.
This way way all tournaments held over a weekend are treated the same and since, as you pointed out, most events are now submitted online and quite a few of those within 2 days of when they end, the majority of the events held on the last weekend of the month should make the next supplement.
The Amateur Team tournament still uses December ratings for the tournament. Since many people try to get their team average to fall within a certain range they need enough advance planning to work it out.
That is an extreme example and one where I agree that immediate updated ratings is not practical. But what about the update being run on the third Friday of the month instead of the first. What are the pros and cons of such a suggestion?
(That was much shorter than my first reply!) :mrgreen:
- Enrique
The big negative from the office’s perspective is that it would mean that the ratings on someone’s magazine would be the previous month’s official ratings, ie the April issue would have the March official ratings on it. Whether members or organizers would consider that a problem is harder for me to say.
Another problem members might have is that an event held early in the month would now be dependent upon ratings computed (and thus not available) no more than 2-3 weeks ago, which may increase the number of events that choose to use an older ratings list rather than the most recent one as of the start of the event. (We already have the Amateur Teams using the December list for an event held in February and spring nationals using the previous list for an event that starts early in the month, ie, SuperNationals IV on April 3rd-5th is using the March list.)
Let’s say we pick the 3rd Friday of the month to run the ratings list. That means the September 2009 list would be generated on August 21st instead of August 7th.
Someone planning to play in a big Labor Day weekend event might have to enter a higher section because of that. (Some might not see that as a problem, those affected might.)
We could pick almost any day we want to run the ratings list, it wouldn’t even have to be a Friday, but any change will have an impact on people, some of whom may see things differently than you do.
- Enrique