I reiterate my request for input from editors other than Fergus Duniho, as this looks like an impasse and might need adjudication.
"The policy of rejecting all cookies is what is backwards. You don't have to make rejection of cookies an all-or-nothing matter. You can put sites you trust on a whitelist while continuing to reject cookies from other sites by default. All the cookies used by this site are perfectly safe and harmless and contain no confidential information. All the confidential information is contained in a session, which exists on the server, not the client. Also, the cookies used by this site cannot be read by other sites. The cookies are simply used to identify you across multiple pages, so that you don't have to keep signing in for everything, and, EVEN MORE IMPORTANTLY, so that I can eventually offer greater functionality that depends on the ability to recognize you. This is all leading toward the goal of a site-wide game rating system, and it will not work without the ability to use cookies to recognize you. So just put this site in a whitelist for accepting cookies."
It still looks like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The great thing about this site has been that it has been open to anyone interested in Chess variants at any level - playing other people's, developing new ones, suggesting tweaks, building sets and boards, or just studying variant history. You seem to be out to turn it into a site for an exclusive clique. Some of the most interesting comments that I have had on my own pages have been from first-time visitors to the site. You have explained about the cookies to me, but a lot of people could come to the site, try and post a comment, get an impassable (to them) sign-in page, and not hang around for an explanation. I am not asking to get rid of the sign-in system, merely to retain alongside it the tried-and-tested system that has been easy to use for at least a decade by newcomer and stalwart alike.
"The policy of rejecting all cookies is what is backwards. You don't have to make rejection of cookies an all-or-nothing matter. You can put sites you trust on a whitelist while continuing to reject cookies from other sites by default. All the cookies used by this site are perfectly safe and harmless and contain no confidential information. All the confidential information is contained in a session, which exists on the server, not the client. Also, the cookies used by this site cannot be read by other sites. The cookies are simply used to identify you across multiple pages, so that you don't have to keep signing in for everything, and, EVEN MORE IMPORTANTLY, so that I can eventually offer greater functionality that depends on the ability to recognize you. This is all leading toward the goal of a site-wide game rating system, and it will not work without the ability to use cookies to recognize you. So just put this site in a whitelist for accepting cookies."
It still looks like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The great thing about this site has been that it has been open to anyone interested in Chess variants at any level - playing other people's, developing new ones, suggesting tweaks, building sets and boards, or just studying variant history. You seem to be out to turn it into a site for an exclusive clique. Some of the most interesting comments that I have had on my own pages have been from first-time visitors to the site. You have explained about the cookies to me, but a lot of people could come to the site, try and post a comment, get an impassable (to them) sign-in page, and not hang around for an explanation. I am not asking to get rid of the sign-in system, merely to retain alongside it the tried-and-tested system that has been easy to use for at least a decade by newcomer and stalwart alike.