Kramnik answers to his suspension on chesscom
Following his suspension on chesscom, GM Vladimir Kramnik provided his official statement on this matter.
History
On September the 3rd, the former World Champion GM Vladimir Kramnik lost a game to GM Hans Niemann in an online event. Their second game was a short and ironic one, as Kramnik played 1...f6, followed by 2...g5 to get checkmated, but Niemann preferred to resign. After that, Kramnik published a 45-minute analysis on their game, openly accusing Niemann on cheating.
His passion to “clear” chess from cheating led him to openly collect and publish data on interesting statistics, even from top players like Hikaru Nakamura, and made an open call to chesscom to investigate dozens of profiles! On December 24th, chesscom published their decision to close Vladimir Kramnik’s blog on the platform and mute his account for violating their terms of services, due to his “out-of-hand accusations” according to the chess fans.
Instant reactions
Many people think that Kramnik is not swimming on safe waters with his “unbased” statistics, but after chesscom’s actions many top players rushed to defend the former World Champion. More specifically:
Levon Aronian tweeted: “Somehow i feel that chesscom is becoming everything that they claimed they weren’t before the merger with chess24 . I love Danny as a person , but the whole trend is making me sad.”
Ian Nepomniachtchi followed with: “Yes, maybe Kramnik goes ahead and does not mince words, but your platform cannot cope with cheating. As they say, accepting a problem is the first step to solving it. Try this instead of sanctioning one of the best players in chess history.”
GM Vasif Durarbayli also commented: “Kramnik’s accusations were mostly incorrect, and he was not qualified to conduct his statistical analysis.However, I don’t believe his account should have been muted. It’s not up to corporations to dictate which voices are heard, even if we disagree with their arguments. Whether it was his baseless accusations against players or his criticisms of Chesscom that led to his account being muted, I’m not entirely sure.”
Kramnik’s response exclusively on World Chess
Dear chess fans!
In full accordance with my expectations, the chesscom platform took another step in trying to “shut me up” and unreasonably blocked my blog on their platform and the right to comment publicly on anything there. I have not received any letter from them about the reasons for these actions. As previously, I also did not receive any responses to my statistics publications or even to my complaints about direct threats received from members of their platform.
Indeed, I have repeatedly informed Chess com privately about some extremely suspicious statistical performances of some players, but I have never received a clear reasoned answer, and in most cases, none. This extremely disrespectful attitude towards the former world champion, coupled with an unwillingness to consider cases of obvious statistical anomalies, forced me to act in a public way, for lack of an alternative.
The only promise I received in writing from the management of chesscom, about my correctness in the matter of headphones, and unequivocally The assurance given to me six months ago that the use of headphones is contrary to chesscom’s policy and will be prohibited, unfortunately, has not been fulfilled. I admit that this episode undermined my confidence in Chess com. My question a couple of months later, why headphones are still not banned, was ignored.
The only factual response to my (and almost 2,500 signatories to the well-known petition) recent request to Chess com was replete with gross logical and factual errors.Which I have pointed out more than once in my public blog articles on the platform. And again, in response, the “royal” silence.I don’t see any reason to block me on the platform since I havent done anything else than publishing the true open source statistics, asking the platform to examine obvious anomalies.
Especially since a well-known grandmaster and streamer, who was comprehensively pushed by chesscom, made direct insults to me, and did not suffer any punishment from the platform for this. As well as many other members of the chesscom, who allowed direct insults to my address.
These double standards and attempts to drown out the world champion by those “businessmen from chess” are deeply incorrect and will not achieve its goal.
I’m going to open a Facebook account, which I’ll report in the next couple of days, where I’ll continue to tell the truth and publish statistics chesscom is trying to ignore,no matter how hard they try to stop people from knowing it.
Vladimir Kramnik
Magnus’ statement
At the World Chess Rapid & Blitz Championships Opening Ceremony, GM Magnus Carlsen stated: “I want to say that in general, freedom of speech is very important! I will not talk specifically about this case [Kramnik’s suspension on chesscom], but in general I think that opinions should be answered with other opinions, but not with silencing.”
What’s your opinion?
