2023 AGM Agenda

[dsatkas]

I believe it would be beneficial for the go community to learn what measures EGF is taking against cheating on pandanet. This issue was known to most of league C captains, the administrators decided to take action months after it was initially reported even though the evidence was damning from the beginning and it just kept piling. Some form of monitoring and harsher punishments might go a long way.

[kvasir]

Undoubtedly the talking process has begun at the EGF.

My latest attempt at summarizing my own views:

It should be held to be self-evident that cheating is incompatible with participating in competitions and being an official in the European Go movement. A suspension needs to follow when cheating is discovered and proven. Since no disciplinary code exists it is a matter for the Executive and the General Meeting to decide on a case-by-case basis if and what suspension is warranted.

Only if more people communicated to EGF and their country organization that they expect cheating to have consequences, that it is not something that can be considered over and done with when the tournament finishes.

[schrody]

This has been discussed before but how does one prove that there was cheating? This happens to be an open-and-shut case because the cheater admitted his guilt but most of them aren't quite so honest afterwards. I would perhaps agree with harsher punishments in cases where there is no reasonable doubt but I don't think there'll be many of those so this will have little effect on the issue.

On a related note, I'm against online tournaments counting towards rating (now that the pandemic is over) and I also believe that the use of cameras should be obligatory for all players if there is prize money or if the tournament is an important national or international event. With the way monitoring is done at the moment, cheating is all but encouraged.

[kvasir]

This has been discussed before but how does one prove that there was cheating? This happens to be an open-and-shut case because the cheater admitted his guilt but most of them aren't quite so honest afterwards. I would perhaps agree with harsher punishments in cases where there is no reasonable doubt but I don't think there'll be many of those so this will have little effect on the issue.

"Reasonable doubt" has nothing to do with it. The sports movement is not state authority and it handles disciplinary matters very differently from how the police and the state courts handle criminal matters. It is important to understand this and not draw incorrect parallels.

Usually, the standard of proof for disciplinary matters in the sports movement is ‘comfortable satisfaction’ or ‘preponderance of evidence’.

• Preponderance of evidence, also known as ‘balance of probabilities’, means that the facts are considered sufficiently proven when the decision body considers them more likely than not.
• Comfortable satisfaction means that the facts are considered proven when the decision body is comfortably satisfied that the facts are proven, absent of doubt being unnecessary. This implies a variable standard of proof; the decision body may require more substantial evidence when making more consequential decisions.

Comfortable satisfaction is applied by CAS (Court of Arbitration for Sports) when another standard is not clearly specified somewhere in relevant regulations and should therefore be considered the default.

“Good practice handbook No. 5” has this to say about the standard of proof:

It is legitimate for sports organisations and arbitration tribunals not to make the imposition of sanctions conditional on
the facts being proven beyond all reasonable doubt. Of course, there is a risk, and even some likelihood, that innocent
people will be punished. But this kind of injustice must be accepted in the higher interest of integrity in sport. As the
CAS has stated:

The vicissitudes of competition, like those of life generally, may create many types of unfairness, whether by accident or by
negligence of unaccountable persons, which the law cannot repair ... It appears to be a laudable policy objective not to repair
an accidental unfairness to an individual by creating an intentional unfairness to the whole body of other competitors.

If we accept (as we should) that comfortable satisfaction is the most appropriate standard of proof, then proving cheating is a matter of presenting evidence and arguments that are sufficient to sway the decision body. That could be witness statements, expert statements, investigation findings or reports, decisions by tournament directors and even confessions which don’t appear to be that unusual.

On a related note, I'm against online tournaments counting towards rating (now that the pandemic is over) and I also believe that the use of cameras should be obligatory for all players if there is prize money or if the tournament is an important national or international event. With the way monitoring is done at the moment, cheating is all but encouraged.

Having online events is a huge benefit to the community and there is always some balance to be struck.

If there were more Go players in Europe, then we would certainly have separate online rating, and be very happy about it. We would also have video monitoring if we had people to carefully watch the ridiculous amount of video that it generates. We would have so many good things

[jlt]

I'm against online tournaments counting towards rating

Since mid-2022, the FFG adopted two parallel ratings: a main rating which only uses real-life tournaments, and a hybrid rating which uses all tournaments (including online). I think this solves the issue.

Actually the two ratings are usually very close to each other, the difference is less than one-half rank for most players. I imagine that the exceptions are:

• Players who improved a lot recently, and played a lot of tournaments online and very few IRL.
• Players who cheated a lot recently, and played a lot of tournaments online and very few IRL.

Actually I can't find any player for whom their two ranks are several stones apart. I guess if this were the case, the player would be strongly suspected of cheating and would be kindly asked to play more tournaments IRL.

[schrody]

If we accept (as we should) that comfortable satisfaction is the most appropriate standard of proof, then proving cheating is a matter of presenting evidence and arguments that are sufficient to sway the decision body. That could be witness statements, expert statements, investigation findings or reports, decisions by tournament directors and even confessions which don’t appear to be that unusual.

I understand your point but it still doesn't sit quite right with me. If there's no incontrovertible evidence such as an admission of guilt or perhaps eyewitnesses or video evidence the decision will undoubtedly be at least partially subjective. While that risk may be acceptable in more popular sports, there's several national go associations that are struggling enough as is.

I'm also not sure if the AGM would be a good decision body. This year there was a vote for the lapsed member status which, after a brief discussion, went something like this: "Is anyone against all of these countries being excluded from EGF? No? Good, let's move on."
I know for a fact that not everyone was paying enough attention to know what's going on until the vote was already done. So if we do decide to go this route then I'd like that such decisions are handled by a disciplinary committee which would dedicate enough time and resources to each individual case.

Somehow, we end up with this discussion topic under "Miscellaneous" in response to our demand that the General Meeting (either a special general meeting or an annual general meeting) should decide on sanctions: a lengthy ban from all activities related to EGF, Go and any role in any Go organization.

Your proposed punishment is really harsh, especially since there was no money or rating points involved. Also, I'm not sure if the AGM should have the power to determine how other countries run their national go associations, baring really extreme cases (I don't consider this to be one of them). I'm also against a general go ban, though I don't think you'd even be able to implement or monitor it.

I'm saying this even though Slovenia was in the same group as Bulgaria and therefore on the receiving end of the cheating. I haven't talked to all players yet, but I think we're mostly just glad that the cheater was caught and that his games were forfeited. At the moment, we're not clamouring for any harsher punishments though a (temporary) ban from the PGETC might be appropriate.

Since mid-2022, the FFG adopted two parallel ratings: a main rating which only uses real-life tournaments, and a hybrid rating which uses all tournaments (including online). I think this solves the issue.

I've heard about this and think it's a good idea provided there's enough online tournaments to merit the extra effort needed from the organizers and officials.

[kvasir]

I understand your point but it still doesn't sit quite right with me. [...]

For us the first thing is to start a formal Disciplinary Procedure and if we can do that then maybe discussions about hypotheticals are for some other occasion?

I did provide a proposal to EGF president and EGF members on how to organize the Disciplinary Procedure. The possibility of delegating to a commission was mentioned but I’m of the view that a Special General Meeting could decide faster, and it is more straightforward (it takes less time, no nominations needed, no instructions needed for the commission, etc.). I think it misses the mark to argue that the Annual General Meeting can be confusing when we are not talking about that, but I accept that there can be arguments for delegating to a commission.

One possible outcome of a Disciplinary Procedure is to decide on suspension. I think it misses the mark to question from the outset whether EGF has authority and responsibility, or even the willingness to deliberate carefully. I have addressed authority and responsibility frequently but maybe not in this thread? It is apples and oranges to claim decisions on lapsed EGF members were not deliberated carefully enough, if that is what you meant.

I must also add that I am truly shocked by your own account of the reaction of the Slovenian Go community to cheating and your words that you don’t consider this to be a “really extreme case”. I do appreciate your candor but if I may I’ll warn against giving a completely wrong impression to the Go community about how we view cheating and what the consequences for cheating are in Europe.

[Knotwilg]

The law should always be constructed so that it is according to the governing morals. So, regardless of how disciplinary actions work in the EGF, what matters is what we think should morally happen. First however, we need to establish guilt. If there is no conclusive proof of cheating, then I find any punishment problematic. So "let's forfeit his games but not go any further, because we're not certain" doesn't sound right to me. The debate of whether probabilistic evaluation is good enough a proof has been held already and I don't want to repeat it. I leave that to specialists.

If there's proof of guilt however (e.g. probabilistic, if accepted as a valid proof), then we should ask ourselves what we think should happen to someone who has cheated in a tournament. I think a ban of 1 or 2 years is appropriate. In professional competition, the stakes are higher, therefore a longer ban might be appropriate. The stakes matter, because a higher reward should result in a higher risk, since a cheater's reward is proportional to the damage suffered by the victims.

Now to the matter of the alleged cheater being an official. I think officials of national or international bodies should hold themselves to higher standards than plain members, because they represent all members of their body. If I were a Bulgarian go player, I'd not want to be represented by someone who fell for the temptation to cheat, especially in a tournament where he represents me as a Bulgarian member. So I'd want him to resign from his position. I wouldn't want to be a member of an organization where the president has been known to cheat. Similarly, on behalf of its Bulgarian members, the EGF should not accept a cheater as their representative, because they can't leave it to individual members to stand up for themselves or leave the body altogether.

That's how I think. If someone else is more lenient towards the event and the person, I won't be "shocked". My morals are not absolute. That's why we have a democracy, to vote the laws that represent the common morals.

[kvasir]

If there's proof of guilt however (e.g. probabilistic, if accepted as a valid proof), then we should ask ourselves what we think should happen to someone who has cheated in a tournament. [...]

In this case there is a confession and there was a decision by the tournament organization/project to forfeit many games.

The cheating activity that was alleged is pretty much every game of that player in the European Team Championship for three years.

You are right that the particulars of each situation need to be considered when deciding sanctions. However, it is not only punishment, it is also how to protect the integrity of our game against an individual when we think that individual has shown himself to be capable of such destructive actions.

I think EGF in particular has responsibility to ensure that cheating results in suspension from competitions and that cheaters can't continue to be the leaders of their EGF member associations. When someone cheats for multiple years in a European Championship for national teams, while being the team captain and the president of the national association it has to be viewed as exceptionally serious. I also alluded to the risks of giving a wrong impression to how we view cheating and what the consequences of cheating really are.

What I have asked is that EGF start a Disciplinary Procedure for this particular case. That is an opportunity for EGF to communicate to the player/official that their actions were unacceptable, to seek corrective measures and decide on sanctions. There is nothing unreasonable or improper about it.

[schrody]

I think it misses the mark to question from the outset whether EGF has authority and responsibility, or even the willingness to deliberate carefully. [...] It is apples and oranges to claim decisions on lapsed EGF members were not deliberated carefully enough, if that is what you meant.

I would think that whether the decision body has the willingness and ability to deliberate carefully would be at the crux of the matter. After all, we want the decision to set a strong precedent for any future cases of cheating. On that note, you've also mentioned you were worried that no one would hear you when you presented your proposal and your worry was warranted since 90% of us couldn't hear anything that was said online. In fact, at times we couldn't even hear everything that those who were physically present said since the room was so large and the tables so far apart. With this being the last item on the agenda and everyone in a rush to leave, I am glad that there was no vote at the time since it would probably be more of a lottery than anything else. That said, if this issue can be properly presented, discussed and voted on at a special general meeting then I suppose that might be acceptable.

I don't regret the lack of a vote but I do regret that no discussion took place since cases of cheating continue to be very hush hush and quickly swept under the rug (as would this one be if Iceland didn't take such a strong stance). Of course I don't condone cheating and I agree that the EGF should take a firm and public stance against it, we just disagree regarding the sanctions.

There's something I'm really curious about: Which factors should contribute towards the severity of the punishment:

- the player's official functions and roles (there's clearly several votes in favour)
- the player's age: Should we be more lenient towards children and teenagers?
- whether the player is a European professional and therefore partially funded by the EGF (I'd say this would make it worse)
- whether the player is a first time or a repeat offender (At what point would a lifetime ban be appropriate?)
- Was there a monetary gain? Was the tournament rated? Did the player unfairly gain anything else (title, qualified for a prestigious tournament, etc.) - I consider such cases of cheating worse
- Did they cheat once or were they continuously cheating over a period of time?
- Is the player showing sincere remorse?
- Was it an online or a face-to-face tournament?

I'm also curious whether any individual player has ever been (temporarily or permanently) banned by the EGF (due to cheating or any other infraction). I haven't heard of any such cases.

[RobertJasiek]

There were a few minor cases of a player failing to show up in particular rounds of important tournaments (with consequences for SOS of other players or so). Such a player sometimes got a penalty issued by the EGF Rules Commission (as it was its name then), such as prohibited participation in the same tournament during the following year. In practice, it affected players that would skip then anyway. However, we wanted to establish the precendent of unacceptable, untolerated behaviour.

[Knotwilg]

- the player's official functions and roles (there's clearly several votes in favour) --> yes, stronger action, since they represent a group
- the player's age: Should we be more lenient towards children and teenagers? --> yes, weaker action, since they are in an evolutionary process
- whether the player is a European professional and therefore partially funded by the EGF (I'd say this would make it worse) --> eligible for abolishing the professional status, at least the funding
- whether the player is a first time or a repeat offender (At what point would a lifetime ban be appropriate?) --> a long period is worse than once, recidivism is good enough for a life ban
- Was there a monetary gain? Was the tournament rated? Did the player unfairly gain anything else (title, qualified for a prestigious tournament, etc.) - I consider such cases of cheating worse --> agree
- Did they cheat once or were they continuously cheating over a period of time? --> see earlier
- Is the player showing sincere remorse? --> difficult to judge
- Was it an online or a face-to-face tournament? --> no difference (online cheating is easier but face to face doesn't have the excuse of deceiving an anonymous)

I'm also curious whether any individual player has ever been (temporarily or permanently) banned by the EGF (due to cheating or any other infraction). I haven't heard of any such cases.

[Javaness2]

Cheating is an unpleasant issue to have to deal with.

Apart from AI scandals, we can mention such choice examples as
* copying the moves from another tournament game
* turning down the volume on the clock
* agreeing a draw
I think I'm right in saying that all three of those weren't explicitly covered by the rules.

It's probably the sort of thing you want to have an EGF committee to deal with. Give them an initial steer with regards to punishments, and let them get on with it. Maybe such a committee exists today?

They should also be able to handle disciplinary matters for bad behavior. Typing dirty words into KGS chat in order to get the congress IP banned, or trashing a hotel room, the sort of typical high jinks dan players usually get up to.

Regarding Bg, I think an online competition ban certainly appropriate as a start. If the federation want to keep them on as their representative, not much can be done about it - see Italy in 80s/90s for an example there

[Knotwilg]

Cheating is an unpleasant issue to have to deal with.
Apart from AI scandals, we can mention such choice examples as
* copying the moves from another tournament game
* turning down the volume on the clock
* agreeing a draw

For these 3 suggestions:
1) I fail to see how that can even be done without the cooperation of the opponent, or else it boils down to knowing fuseki
2) is that an issue?
3) what do you mean by that? does that happen and what's the effect?

No criticism intended, I probably fail to understand what you meant with these shorthands.

[RobertJasiek]

Silencing clocks:

Unless mandated by tournament organisers or rules, it is the players' right to turn on / off / adjust volume. If the players have agreed and then one of them deceives the opponent by secretly turning off, this can be unsportsmanlike (prohibited by the EGF General Tournament Rules) but not exactly what one expects to be called cheating.

Preagreed jigo:

Was used at London GP by Ivan Detkov and another Russian to maximise both players' projected combined prize money for places 1 and 2. They were penalised. Related cases of Russians in France: intentional losing to let other Russians get better top places by SOS.