Asian Teams Sweep Pairs Rapid at WMSG!
Saturday, 11 October 2008 09:56
After a hiccup to Pairs Blitz Winners Ecuador in the fourth round, hosts China finally hit form and led a sweep of Asian teams into the Semi-Finals of the Pairs Rapid at the 1st World Mind Sports Games.
China, again fielding GM Ni Hua and Hou Yifan, were very convincing winners of the preminaries with 15 match points. Hou is finally playing somewhere at her normal level and Ni found new determination in the last few rounds to notch several important wins.
Vietnam and Iran were both also worthy qualifiers on 13 and 12 match points respectively. GM Dao Tien Hai showed all his old form when he was his country’s No. 1 talent and he was well supported by WIM Le Lieu Thien Kim. Iran again fielded the reliable pair of GM Ehsan Gaem Maghami and WIM Atousa Pourkashiyan.
The finally qualifer was perhaps the biggest surprise – Indonesia who scored 11 match points – edging 5 other teams (India, Poland, Germany, Greece and Singapore) on tiebreak. But the combination of the experienced veteran GM Utut Adianto who now only plays occasionally and their young rising star WIM Irine Sukhandar worked well for them!
As always, full coverage of the 1st World Mind Sports Games is at www.2008wmsg.org/en and all games are broadcast live and available for viewing and download daily at www.2008wmsg.fide.com.
Source: FIDE.com
“Asian Teams Sweep Pairs Rapid at WMSG!”??
Although ultimately and independently not false, what is the purpose of such a bombastic headline?? What can be read between the lines? To create hatred between Asians and non-Asians?? To spread gossip on a racial issue? The author truly did not comprehend the spirit of “World games”, nor the spirit of chess as a sport, where Asia, America, Australia, Europe, Canada, etc, do not exist as such entities, as they do in political dividends, which we would wish mixed with sports and certainly and expressively most not with mind sports.
0/10 for headliner.
Troll!
A headline can cause hatred between Asians and non-Asians?
And all this time I thought racial tension was caused by “Tingles the Christmas Tension”!
Click my name to learn more about Tingles!
The object of this text is to bring together a definitive document to cover the utter sadness of the Internet troll.
Usually, a troll is nothing more than a passing nuisance, but, as this page will show, they can be a worry (stalkers).
However, it is almost invariably an inadequate individual who can be safely ignored.
This text will define the activity, and help with early recognition; once acknowledged, trolls can take up residence, and, like athlete’s foot, can be difficult to shift. And when you’ve finished here, I recommend this fairly comprehensive guide to managing sad thirteen year olds loose on Mom’s computer.
What Is A Troll?
The term derives from “trolling”, a style of fishing which involves trailing bait through a likely spot hoping for a bite. The troll posts a message, often in response to an honest question, that is intended to upset, disrupt or simply insult the group.
Usually, it will fail, as the troll rarely bothers to match the tone or style of the group, and usually its ignorance shows.
Why do trolls do it?
I believe that most trolls are sad people, living their lonely lives vicariously through those they see as strong and successful.
Disrupting a stable newsgroup gives the illusion of power, just as for a few, stalking a strong person allows them to think they are strong, too.
For trolls, any response is ‘recognition’; they are unable to distinguish between irritation and admiration; their ego grows directly in proportion to the response, regardless of the form or content of that response.
Trolls, rather surprisingly, dispute this, claiming that it’s a game or joke; this merely confirms the diagnosis; how sad do you have to be to find such mind-numbingly trivial timewasting to be funny?
Remember that trolls are cowards; they’ll usually post just enough to get an argument going, then sit back and count the responses (Yes, that’s what they do!).
Troll – Angler or Underbridge Dweller?
How can troll posts be recognised?
No Imagination – Most are frighteningly obvious; sexist comments on nurses’ groups, blasphemy on religious groups .. I kid you not.
Pedantic in the Extreme – Many trolls’ preparation is so thorough, that while they waste time, they appear so ludicrous from the start that they elicit sympathetic mail – the danger is that once the group takes sides, the damage is done.
False Identity – Because they are cowards, trolls virtually never write over their own name, and often reveal their trolliness (and lack of imagination) in the chosen ID. As so many folk these days use false ID, this is not a strong indicator on its own!
Crossposting – Any post that is crossposted to several groups should be viewed as suspicious, particularly if unrelated or of opposing perspective. Why would someone do that?
Off-topic posting – Often genuine errors, but, if from an ‘outsider’ they deserve matter-of-fact response; if genuine, a brief apposite response is simply netiquette; if it’s a troll post, you have denied it its reward.
Repetition of a question or statement is either a troll – or a pedant; either way, treatment as a troll is effective.
Missing The Point – Trolls rarely answer a direct question – they cannot, if asked to justify their twaddle – so they develop a fine line in missing the point.
Thick or Sad – Trolls are usually sad, lonely folk, with few social skills; they rarely make what most people would consider intelligent conversation. However, they frequently have an obsession with their IQ and feel the need to tell everyone. This is so frequent, that it is diagnostic! Somewhere on the web there must be an Intelligence Test for Trolls – rigged to always say “above 150”
Who is at risk?
Any newsgroup, bulletin board, forum or chatroom can attract trolls, but they don’t have the brains to attack nuclear physicists, and they are drawn to the quick response where sex, religion and race are found; so politics is easy prey.
One troll famously tried to infiltrate a mensa group; the results read like 100 trolls and one regular, it didn’t have a chance – but it was stupid enough to persist until removed.
When Should You Be Concerned?
Usually, no, though fractured funny bones and occasional waves of nausea have been reported.
When a troll become persistent and personal, you may need to consider the possibility that it has fermented into an Internet Stalker – equally pathetic, if not more so – but sometimes requiring weedkiller.