Why I left chess.com for Lichess

I have to emphasize this point , there is virtually no accountability nor customer issue tracking. Each person picks up a support request and has no idea what if anything has been done on the issue previously. I was CTO at a small <50 person company and we had complete issue tracking. No employee would take action on a request without documenting, and in many cases, standard actions could be a button/macro that makes a standard comment and triggers sending communication acknowledgement to the requestor. I cannot fathom how a company like chess.com can operate without issue tracking support. Chaos!

"I have to emphasize this point , there is virtually no accountability nor customer issue tracking. "

Where do you get this from? I am sure they have tracking and accountability. As you said yourself, they probably would not be able to operate without it.

I mean, there are many reasons to leave chesscom, but the letter from the CEO you got is a good one to stay. Really not sure what you are trying to accomplish with this thread to be honest.

I agree withWindowmaker’s points. I found the letter genuine.

The point is that they have the website name. "Chess. com".
All new chess players googling for chess will always hit their website name and still 100 000 members will be paying membership fees to Erik.

What is the point of caring 1 out of 100 000 members whereas they can get millions of new members every year due to privately owning the " chess. com" website name.

Lichess is a free service and they do a better job of providing a good experience to users. Chess.com has millions in revenue and blames their inability to provide a good core experience on the fact that they have too many users. If they wanted to fix these problems they could, its just that they focus on attracting new users and adding bloatware. They are not focused on keeping users and improving the core chess experience, they are just focused on increasing first time users, which increases revenue without the obligation to keep anyone around. This is why they are adding new features, not addressing their core chess experience. It's their business model. Saying "we have too many users to fix things" is just an excuse and he's not taking responsibility for the problem. Instead he should say "we recognise there are some key issues to our service and are working to rectify the problem", that would be taking responsibility. He should promise change. But they AREN'T trying to change things at all. That's the problem His email is just basically public relations. They are only focused on attracting new users.

@RetepDrofdeb I'd say you nailed it.

Dear @TheoGantos reference #37,

I think you are attributing a post using the word "hate" to me, but I never used that word, and in the context of what I have contributed it doesn't fit with anything I said. So I think you responded to the wrong person.

My last post to you was conciliatory, I was worried that you would think my long list of great tings here a lichess was tirade against you. It wasn't. I really don't like chess.com. My anger is directed towards them.

Peace, and again I say welcome.

@killF7 not aimed at you brother, just tapping you on the shoulder. Some people like to be abused ... play cheats or have issues ignored, so chess.com also fulfills their psychological needs. :) Happy to be here, happy to contribute also. I get that small is better, as I live in a tiny house rather than heat, cool, furnish and illuminate 3000 square feet of space I don't use. I did not leave out of outrage, just came to the calm rational conclusion that chess.com was not going to work for me , was not worth paying for and finally that top management's direction was opposite my needs. I thought Erik was polite and respectful as was I, and I appreciated his time, we just are on different paths.

@WindowMaker Many chess.com admins have expressed that so-called “abuse reports” are just seen by these admins as single-event requests, as chess.com does not have an easy way for these admins to see history, only super-admins have the ability to search reports by username. Each action taken by many of these “volunteer admins” are made in isolation and since the responses are truly non-informational without reference to the user’s report, the user cannot even correct oversights. They choose to have this volunteer admin militia and keep the users in the dark. The result is that abuse reports are effectively discouraged, and looks like there is a dis-incentive to make reports that have a high probability of either going unanswered or misunderstood without any historical context. Could you imagine the chaos if such a strategy were employed for airplane crash investigations?

Perhaps I have been fortunate, in that all abuse reports I have made have resulted in an action being taken.

You don't give a source, so I just have to take your word for the rest of it. Not really worth spending time on figuring out what cc does either way. After all, we are on lichess now :)