Saturday, May 12, 2012

Tired of Chess Cube

Chess Cube has been going downhill for a long time. There have been no new features in at least a year, but what's worse is that the game history prior to March 2012 was deleted for all users. I had a lot of games stored in my paid VIP account that were lost as a result of their incompetence. So, that nixed any chance I would renew my VIP membership. How can I trust a game site that loses my games? I also experienced random disconnects on a sporadic basis on chess cube. I guess the straw that broke the camel's back was that a moderator in one of the chat rooms decided to use his power as a soapbox for all his backward notions on gays. I don't need to pay a membership fee to be insulted. I was reluctant to leave Chess Cube because I liked the design and homey, small-town feel of the site, but I really don't see that I have any reasonable choice in the matter at this point. Time to buy a membership at another chess site and forget about Chess Cube. I am purchasing a year's membership on chess.com today. Some businesses need to learn that insulting and offending gays is not good business. I am more than happy to vote with my dollars if it will help with the learning process.

22 comments:

Anonymous said...

I know exactly what you mean. The way the system works gives administrator and moderators power to do what ever they like. It would be good if they added a group of volunteers, who can not communicate with the mods and admins, to monitor them. This way they cannot become "good pals" and let abuse of power slide. The way it works now the moderators can do whatever they like so long as the are friends with the administrators.

igor said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

These post hit the nail on the head. I too have recently given up on Chess Cube after seeing moderators abuse their powers and get away with it. Is it any wonder the site is having money problems? I doubt it will get better since the site managers either don't seem to care or place too much trust in the administrators.

igor said...

Chess Cube is still around? I expect them to go bankrupt any day now...

Anonymous said...

I've experienced nothing but unconstructive and deconstructive abuse, ignorance, unobjectivity, hatred, mocking, intolerance and ignorance on Chesscube by all staff. I was also falsely accused on the ICC of using an engine after four hours of a trial period.

igor said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
igor said...

Chess cube can never compete with chess.com. Chess cube is staffed by incompetent hate-mongers who have problems understanding computer technology. They lost the game history of all their registered users. They call their users names. Their staff lacks basic social skills. It is too bad, but anyway no one uses chess cube anymore, it is an old thing of the past.

Gerhard Chess said...

Last week we have filed in South Africa at attorneys at law, K. Bredenkamp, a suit vs. chesscube and their management as it is considered fraud to ban paying members without prewarning and detailled information (on the reason why they are banned..) as chesscube does since years (it is irrelevant what chesscube terms and conditions say on this topic..)
Further other topics are part of the file suit (Chesscube states a P. O. Box in Milnertons as only corporate address, what is a law infringement etc. ...)We'lll keep you informed...

Here are some notes regarding the history of chesscube and why this unpleasant things had to happen now:

At chesscube there has long time been no need to develop a decent business model that work, as Chesscube has had right from the start a 2 miliion dollar venture financing by south african venture capital fund InVeFin. Chesscube's management knew pretty well how to spend money but never knew how to attract paying members. Biggest problem till now: the site is facing a nearly complete lack of paying clientele!

2ng biggest problem: bad management, really bad leadership! Take the chesscube story and you can write a "how-to NOT-run-a-business" bestseller..A bunch of tech nerds and gamers like Sean: tech students,, young, unexperienced, lack of social intelligence, no idea of marketing, no idea of business plans, no idea of financings. Since Mark Levitt left Chesscube, there is anarchy on this site. Today a membership is offered for 40 dollars. If nobdy buys, then tomorrow you get it at 30 dollars. And finally for 20 bucks. While the biggest online chess site has nowadays >25.000 paying members and is already since 3 years profitable and even ... has above tenthousand paying members, chesscube has less then1500 paying clients. Fur sure not enough to run a professional service.

Thirdly: the mods. How is the saying: if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys. Well, chesscube is nearly bankrupt and paid less then peanuts. Tons of wrong decisions are the result. People were banned and unbanned according to the mood of immature amateur mods. No management, no business plan, no skills.

CC is not short for Chessscube but for Chess & Chaos...

Look at the picture of Sean (Chesscube) on Facebook and you know the future of CC: probably this dude can arrange a fan meeting at a death metal concert. But run a site or a business: never!

We posted this yesterday in the Chesscube forums, see here:

http://www.chesscube.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5494&sid=c4359250f6c41c98ae43268ca9693bb4

igor said...

Once I found chess.com, I wondered to myself why I ever bothered with "Chess Dubious."

Their outfit will disappear the minute the bills start showing up with no way to pay them... or technical problems shut the whole thing down because no one can figure them out on their own... or the staff starts biting each other and disagreements cause defections... this sort of thing happens over and over again in places where the management is poor.

Anonymous said...

I was an active member of Chess Cube for many years and was even considering becoming a paying member in order to support the site and chess in general. A few years back, Chess Cube had a system where you could actually buy, (and not just rent), their chess videos with cubits you had earned from winning your chess games. So I spent six months playing and earning cubits every day, trying my best to earn enough cubits so I could buy the two chess videos I really wanted. I made an innocent joke in a chat room on Chess Cube that was totally misunderstood by a Moderator/Dominator/Abuser and was without warning immediately banned, (on Christmas day no less!), with the result being I lost 20,000 cubits I had played my heart out to win and *six months* of my time, all gone.
Angry is not the word to describe how I felt. For this reason, I will *never* purchase a Premium membership from Chess Cube. Period. Since then, I know of thousands of other Chess Cube members who have been banned without warning or any explanation whatsoever. A business can not stay in business by kicking its customers out the door. This is common sense but it is totally lost on the people who run Chess Cube.

The Moderators/Dominators/Abusers on Chess Cube are not paid anything, so they could care less when Chess Cube goes out of business. The only pay they receive is the feeling of power/big head they get and this is exactly the *wrong* kind of person to attract...well, not if Chess Cube wants to stay in business. Many of the Moderators/Dominators/Abusers are mere teenagers or just a tad bit older and have little to no judgement whatsoever. I mean a *teenager* telling a 40+ year old adult what to do or not? Really? Give me a break!

Chess Cube used to have so many members, (hey Chess Cube staff, that term also means *customers*!), that Cube Cafe would scroll so fast because of all the comments that you could barely keep up with the flow of chat. Not anymore. It's dead. The Philippine chat room on Chess Cube always used to have 100+ people in it, but now that number is consistently 40 or less. Chess Cube is dying because of the extremely rude, uncaring, very young/teenage and abusive Moderators/Dominators/Abusers.

Is anyone taking bets on when Chess Cube goes out of business?

residentevil55574233 said...

well i have already taken a bet i am sure that this site is gonna go out of business very soon! its already going downhill like hell and the admins or mods doesnt help the site much with their immature childish worst than a 2 months old baby behavior and trying to justify the new vip requirement to play on chesscube.

Anonymous said...

Young kids as moderators? No wonder it's Chess Cubs!

Mandela made reforms against apartheid in south Africa but now he's gone a new breed of "racist" had emerge.

Unknown said...

Hey there,

Well. I am glad that I found something that appeals to my case as of late.

I have been IP banned off the server and allegedly harassed by the CEO of Chesscube directly. He never gave me a reason rather he harassed my contacts and shortly had me permanently banned off the server.

I also served as a room mod for a while. After all the hate, threats, abuse, troll allowances, intolerance, cyber bullying amongst other things I'm sure most experienced on Chesscube, I can honestly say I am disgusted at the administration of the server.

I surely will never go back even if my IP ban was ever lifted. The CEO himself is immature, my correspondence with him states so. It's a pity only because I've been an advocate of the site since 2009 and never encountered such problems so far.

For sure, it's a site I wouldn't recommend to any user. Furthermore, I for one, set up camp elsewhere so no big deal. Certainly I miss my old friends and chatting in real time, but sometimes things just can't be.

I found myself sitting well with Lichess and went back to Chess.com as of late. In so far, I don't think Chesscube can ever compete with both interfaces, the only good thing Chesscube has is the 'social' aspect to it, to increase popularity, but as for the rest the site lags like heck and demands for 'cubits' to play, also expects you to pay VIP memberships to increase certain features when in the long run, you either do not need those features, or else you can have them elsewhere and for free.

Anonymous said...

I have been a use of CC for about 2 years. I stay with it because I am a bit mean - I paid to buy cubits so wont leave until they are used up.
All the comments made are true - mods are there not to help but to indulge their own sense of power - one Richard head muted me for talking about a football team he didn't like whilst its clear that others are immature, unworldly and prejudiced. The owner/manager - Sean - is known to adopt various aliases so that he can spy on anyone/everyone.
How long can it drag on? I don't know. Currently it averages around 1000 online members - but many people have several accounts so how many individual members are active is hard to tell; I would hazard a guess at 500 people.
Its all a shame as the site is quite user friendly and does have a certain engaging atmosphere about it. But its run/moderated by people who are ill suited to the job, are bereft of ideas or how to communicate with their customers. It often doesn't function properly. My guess is that it will stagger on for another year or two before simply ceasing to function. Given its management there will be no attempt to say goodbye to the members or give explanation. It will simply stop functioning.

Anonymous said...

Update on Chesscube: It average 500 users now and around 100 games an hour. Sean uses the site to get over his sexual urges. One of the moderators Brankica actually sent him her nudies to get moderatorship

Anonymous said...

Update; CC continues to stagger on. I doubt it now has more than 50 -100 actual users. 90% of all tournaments do not run (and they only require between 4 and 6 players) whilst getting an individual game can take more than 10 minutes of waiting, according to the settings you place.

The cubit system still exists but cubits are useless as once you have viewed the few videos you want to see there is little else to do with them.

Interestingly the worst of the moderators seem to have moved on but it's too little too late. The owner/manager - Sean - still refuses to listen to anyone and would prefer to watch the slow lingering death of the site rather than acccept the need to change anything. Such is the nature of arrogance.

Anonymous said...

chesscube keeps going, because it steals users' money with crowns / cubit etc, you all have to RECORDING these frauds and report them to the police, together we can have them permanently shut down

LUCA GATTA

Anonymous said...

The CC site continues in a downward spiral. Online users, by count of the site itself, register at an all time low - sometimes as few as 350 are online. I guess it will drag on out of some kind of perverse pleasure gained by the numpty called Sean.
In Dec 2020 flash player will stop being operational. CC does not have the numbers, finance or interest to migrate to open web provision. I guess that will be the time for it to disappear.
Indeed a case study in how to destroy a once flourishing business by placing its success in the hands of idiots.

Anonymous said...

More dramatic news: CC is now trying to move to a new crypto currency. It is complicated but looks like they are trying another way to get people to buy currency. They really don't learn!

In so doing they have:
1) eliminated 'crowns' and replaced them by a few cubits. Winning crowns was very difficult and then to have them replaced by a few cubits - fewer than you would get by simply logging on - once again shows the disrespect they hold towards their customers.
2) They have eliminated tournaments!!!!!!!!!! Tournaments were the main means of winning cubits thereby preventing people gaining too many cubits ahead of the introduction of the new crypto currency (aka "we have ways of making you buy our crypto currency"). The few active players they have really only come in with the hope that the odd tournament would run.
3) They have eliminated videos, which along with the lack of any other facility (no tactics training, puzzles, connection to professional players, articles etc) means cubits are now completely useless, as doubtless will be this new crypto currency.
4) As a result of eliminating tournaments they are recording visitor numbers at an all time low i.e. beneath 300 and with so few people its even difficult to get a one off individual game.
5) The chat rooms are completely dead. A combination of low numbers and years of moderator stupidity means next to no one goes in them and barely a person speaks.

I truly could not invent this if I tried. A discredited business method being replaced by the same thing in disguise. I guess the turnip in charge must have been reading that famous book: 'how to keep on flogging your dead horse'

igor said...

I do not understand why you still use chess dupe? why not move on to chess.com? I left chess dupe a decade ago and barely remember it. buncha jerks over there

Anonymous said...

Igor, you are right - the site is pretty sad now and I do use Lichess and Chess 24 much more. I guess, in a strange way, I feel a bit sorry for CC - it's like an elderly and dying relative that you must see out of the world as peacefully as you can. Or maybe I'm just nostalgic.

But yes, I cannot recommend CC to anyone for any reason and would strongly suggest that players look to lichess, chess.com, chess 24 and all the others rather than CC.

igor said...

I'm not nostalgic. Chess dupe stinks big time. I left and never looked back. Life is too short to waste time on garbage. Personally, I would rather be playing chess on a good site and chess.com is pretty good. I bought membership there and have been happy.

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