#16 No, I cannot summarize decades of research on a complex subject into anything simpler than what Glickman offers. I can however make observations about the system as Microsoft researchers have done:
"The Glicko system was developed by Mark E. Glickman, chairman of the US Chess Federation (USCF) ratings committee. To the best of our knowledge, Glicko was the first Bayesian ranking system. Similarly to the TrueSkill ranking system, the Glicko system uses a Gaussian belief over a player's skill which can be represented by two numbers: The mean skill and the variation of the skill (called rating deviation in the context of Glicko). There are a few differences between the TrueSkill ranking system and Glicko:
The Glicko system (deliberately) does not model draws but it makes an update as the average of a win and a loss (per player). In the TrueSkill ranking system, draws are modelled by assuming that the performance difference in a particular game is small. Hence, the chance of drawing only depends on the difference of the two player's playing strength. However, empirical findings in the game of chess show that draws are more likely between professional players than beginners. Hence, chance of drawing also seems to depend on the skill level.
In the Glicko system, the uncertainty in a player's skill grows linearly with time not played. In the TrueSkill ranking system, it grows by a constant amount between any two consecutive games. However, this could be changed in the TrueSkill ranking system.
The Glicko system uses a different performance distribution known as the logistic distribution; the TrueSkill ranking system uses a Gaussian distribution (see picture on the right). This results in two different update algorithms for two player matches which make the actual update equations look different. However, conceptually both update algorithms perform very similarly. The Glicko system uses a different performance distribution known as the logistic distribution; the TrueSkill ranking system uses a Gaussian distribution (see picture on the right). This results in two different update algorithms for two player matches which make the actual update equations look different. However, conceptually both update algorithms perform very similarly."
http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/trueskill/faq.aspx