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Chessville
Advertise to Single insert:
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 TheParrot
Squaawks….!Opinions and Reader Feedback
TheParrot Says… 5-10-2008 Parrot calling! A Q&A telephone interview with Russ Mollot examining the idea of chess metrics – what they are, how much they cost, their international scope, and what’s next for CRX.
Q: What does this new TSI service provide that good old ratings do not?A: Tournament Significance Index is an indication of the event's importance in the overall chess playing population. Thus, an event involving 25 players is generally more "important" than a Quad. An event with 100 players is generally more important than one with 25 players, and so on. Also, an event among high-rated players is considered more important than one (all other things being equal) than one with low-rated players. An event with more rounds (more games played) has more significance than one with fewer rounds (all other things being equal). Finally, an event with a slow time control would generally be considered more important than one with a fast time control.
A. Any TD to attract players to their event, for example, to choose players who previously achieved a 1st place and how difficult that even was; and any player could estimate for themselves the suitability of attending a potential event by its TSI. These measurements are coupled with another new service to be announced which essentially will be an unbiased means of awarding scholastic titles. Q. How expensive are these new services? A. They all come as part of the basic service of CXR. Q. Why did you create these services to chess players?A. I can’t understand anything much about a player by simply reading one number associated with a name. In the computer age it is appropriate to expect more information – like the highest rated opponent defeated, or scores with white or black, or in fact, a host of other factors. We are about to make another press release on Scholastic Titles, where the importance of these services is comprehensibly explained. Q. But are these ratings legal?A. We use the same formula as Dr Arpad Elo, and slightly simplified math which has stronger emphasis on recent performances. In the spirit of his original idea we also have no rating floors and no ceilings! So yes! Q. This reminds me of the English system, which also weights recent performance. A.. We intend our system to be international. Q. Is it already used internationally?A. Yes! In England IM Adam Hunt uses it, and we have affiliates in Canada and Mexico, with new ones now emerging in Australia, in Egypt and in India. Q. This all sounds like a big increment to assessing chess players – so how much does it cost to provide all this material? A.. Through our affiliates, the cost is $5 a year for students and $12 a year for adults. Q. Is that a competitive rate worldwide? Compare it to the USA. A. There are several plans for Juniors in the US, but typically it costs $17 a year. For adults competitive services cost $40 a year.
A. Yup! And then the conversation went much deeper than any telephone Q&A interview could capture, but the result was that the Parrot suggested to interviewee Russ Mollot [here captioned, he says of himself, losing a league game] that he write with Chessville’s Senior Editor Kelly Atkins and tell Chessville’s readers in a series of articles why he began his company, the historical background of the mathematics of ratings systems including what skews them, and also to explain further the type of metrics he proposes for chess players in the 21st Century. To which he agreed, and which Chessville readers can assess for themselves over the next couple of months. If you can’t wait that long, call him yourself: (866) 486-4333 toll-free. I also independently checked out reviews of CXR, and found a group of testimonials at … Chessville. Pete Blanchette conducted an independent review for us back in 2003. Rare Chess Pictures:
Source: http://www.chess-shop.com/detail.aspx?ID=427
Chessville is still recruiting several positions: Assistant Publisher and Editors [two types]. People who should not apply: I recently discussed an editorial position with a current columnist who really wanted to do it. “Can you write your long, and very well-received column, while editing other people’s work, besides working for a living, without losing your current quality?” I asked. “No,” he said. That was easy, but the people we do want are those who can give a few hours per week on a regular basis; who don’t need to be in the front lines with their own material; who want to work with a team of others who, first and foremost, like chess. That you? 5-3-2008 An Encounter with ex-USCF board member, Mr. Sam Sloan In a public newsgroup following a discussion on varieties of ways to evolve chess to the general public, specifically the respective directions of SPICE and the Kasparov Chess Foundation [KCF], ex USCF board member, Mr. Sam Sloan uttered these challenginging remarks, challenging that is to anything normally considered consecutive or logical thinking… but also clarifying the role of USCF’s historical activities and orientation; what it does, and what it does not intend to do. Sam Sloan began with;-
> Do you feel
that by posting thousands of obscene and pornographic
Rare Chess Pictures: One of the rarest pictures of all time!
To the left we have a very eminent Astrophysicist indeed, next, an unnamed man in a t-shirt without a tie, then Grandmaster Susan Polgar, then Chessville’s Senior Editor Kelly Atkins. Why, you may properly ask, is this a rare picture? Because the unnamed person-without-a-tie has probably taken more pictures of chess players than any other human being, ever. And since this section of the Parrot features rare-chess pictures, perhaps in a 1000 years, future editorial writers of this column, re-titled “The Galactic Parrot” will wonder who he is, and since his evident Asian origin, it can’t be from Tie-land. That’s a poor joke, but its short.
With the English Chess Federation suffering the same circumstances as the USCF, essentially balking activities of a new board to do what they were elected to achieve - to get things moving again - the final word spoken about 20-years ago goes to: “The
small-minded leaders of the Unites States Chess Federation 4-26-2008 Make luft, not war.
“One of the
most ravaging civil wars in the world devastated our country ... the president said. “At least 2 persons in every family go to school each morning and we want them to bring back the knowledge of chess to their families so that at least one person experienced in chess may be found in every house.” Bringing it All Back Home: I remember Garry Kasparov asking last year, “what do American teenagers do with their aggression?” Which is a statement the great Konrad Lorenz would have appreciated. So what do we do? What comes between the impulse and the action?
This year in the US it was reported that for the first time the ratio of citizens incarcerated reached one in a hundred. Isn’t that approaching the level of an undeclared civil war –against youth? This year I also listened to a psychologist discussing who was most likely to wind up in prison. She said they were likely males under the age of 17 or 18, when the last stage of frontal development takes place in the brain, that part which lets us objectively assess and check our impulses. She was discussing various wild behavioral patterns, but I immediately thought of chess, and also that she, and now Dr Ahmed Abdi Hassan, both know something that we don’t care to look at too much. But maybe we should take this cultural aspect of chess more seriously – since once you begin to consider the question above, and ask yourself about your own neighborhood, and kids you know; what actually is the answer to the [healthy! Says Lorenz contradicting Freud] need to express aggression? Obviously the high school football team isn’t cutting it. Good initiative, and good luck from all of us. Go! “Wataac” Rare Chess Pictures:
4-19-2008 A Defining Moment in US Chess – Standards of Not? The Parrot sent the following letter to the USCF board plus some 30 other strong players, writers and organizers last Tuesday April 15th 2008. I beg you to indulge me in reading one final message, since I have received a private Hanken-gram, which leaves me in no doubt about anyone's character. I should simply like to tell you all about my associates, and then I will go away. 1) One character I spoke with last week runs the biggest marketing company on the planet; then there is the person responsible for marketing an entire car company; another is the financial guru for an airline; and finally there is the second-to-head honcho of the biggest insurance company on the planet. All are Americans and represent American interests. All are in-laws. Their conversations in terms of what is investible has always to do with standards - financials ones, plus those un-compromised and clearly decent to invest in. 2) I am also involved in chess and formal education of the mainstream type, and those people also stress formal standards that must necessarily be observed in order to even look at any organization. This includes background checks on officers and boards of various entities. That USCF has had board members who could not very evidently pass a High School background screening, and 'friends' whose standards are demonstrably at odds with what they profess about themselves, eliminates the organization from consideration.
If a board member with business sense actually quits his association with USCF over the liability of what he considers poor choice of actions [again to do with decency in public expression], just think what objectively cool persons as in the four categories above might think. And they do think! I have not liked from the start - let us continue to be frank - the obvious proxy political attacks which attend this board, and just as frankly continue to be shocked by those who operate in that vein, and the nothingness which emerges from their task-masters behind the scenes. I simply wish you all to know that in the matter of standards and especially in the arena of public decency, this is a defining moment for USCF. I am not the least resistant to directing money to what can be seen to be good, which has standards, which has transparent processes, and which attempts the mission! If that is abandoned, as perhaps it should be, then USCF is exactly akin to a private member club, since the very reason for its non-profit status is to promote the game, pro bono Caissa.
--- My original inquiry here was simple: to do with plain ordinary decent standards which exist in our culture, and to ask those who would advocate or represent any point of view to declare their own interest [financial or other area of gain] in the matter. I say again that that is a normal standard in American culture. Not only did I receive private mail which could be said to avoid those standards, in fact, to haughtily dismiss them, I also received silence from [most] others here - which itself is an answer to anyone's intent to act decently. I do not have billions, and not even millions to throw at chess. But of the 4 little problems: I have this pencil. Caption: Marcel Duchamp (1887 - 1968) Study for chess players (1911) Rare Chess Pictures: No, its not Da Vinci,
Manuscrit du
roman Guiron le Courtois de Rusticien de Pise Illustration courtesy: http://www.jmrw.com/Chess/Tableau_echecs/index.htm
Happy Birthday Susan! 4-12-2008 Foreigners, Power, and Two Missions This is a complex subject, literally so; it is composed of various factors in interaction. I should like to add a note to each paragraph from ‘Zarathustra’message, which in turn replied to ‘a complaint’:
The dictionary definition of 'racist' is someone who sub-divides human beings into 'races', rather than the more distinctive biology sense of race as being either, human, fish, dog. The interesting thing about playing chess, or reading a chess score, is that I can't tell any subdivisions of 'human' that way - I have no idea if the player is Chinese, or Female, or aged 15 or 60. WAS MORPHY NOW POWER To the second point - the original message [which I do no repeat here] talked of people who were originally American citizens running chess in this country, and their 'investment' in it, gaining them 'power.' Now - there is another 'complex' of factors for you. But it must also be said that before the age of chess federations there was Morphy, then the school-of-Marshall around NY City, and even that group of players who won 4 Olympiad gold medals in the 30's against all the world. Then again, there was Fischer who accepted help from individuals in the Federation, but hardly endorsed it! The native born Americans listed in the previous message do not seem to have advanced the game in general popularity, into mainstream media, nor into education to any noticeable effect throughout the entire post-Fischer era in American chess. A DISTINCTION WITH A DIFFERENCE I do not object to this, since what that group have performed is an essential maintenance activity, but what especially Susan Polgar and Paul Truong have been seen to achieve, both inside and outside the federation is not maintenance of chess, but advancement of chess. I suppose that those people who do not like to see chess advanced by USCF are therefore within their rights to object to changing the focus of the heretofore maintenance activities performed by it. Perhaps that is the only role a federation can play and American players are content with it? If so, then at least the players themselves should be canvassed for their views [rather than have chess burocrats speak of each others ‘fortunes’ in it]. SO WHAT? And if the Federation sensibly decides this way that it does not wish to promote chess, then two things may then occur. Another organisation can be established to do so, and in no competition with USCF who, after all, declined to take part in promoting the game. The second thing to occur is that USCF should redefine its non-profit mission statement to maintain rather than to promote chess, which is its current leading statement of its reason to exist. Rare Chess Pictures:
Now Showing … http://www.agopb.com/
"Your Move" at the Chess Collector's International Biennial
Auction
This will be the first major chess set auction in the United States since the last CCI Convention in the U.S. in Philadelphia in 2002. This Convention and auction will be will be held in conjunction with U.S. Seniors Open Chess Tournament to be held in Boca Raton. The sale will consist of over 140 lots of antique and modern chess sets and related items consigned by members of CCI and members of the public. Consignment is open to the public as is the auction. The inventory will include lots like an 18th century Burmese carved figural set, an English 19th century turned ivory set , a 19th century English bone traveling set and an elaborate 18th/19th century French/German Dieppe style carved bone figural set with leather hats. Also included will be a Russian carved mammoth ivory “Knights” figural chess set by Russian sculptor Oleg Raikis, a J. Jaques boxwood and ebony tournament play set from Frank Marshall, U.S. Chess Champion from 1909 to 1936, an exotic Egyptian carved ivory “Pharaoh” figural set, a rare Dominican carved amber “Medieval” figural set, a German 19th century wood, plaster and lead “medieval” figural set and a 19th/20th century Chinese export carved ivory figural set. The sale will be carried live online by LiveAuctioneers.com and Auction owner Brian Kogan says this may turn out to be one of the largest online chess related sales in history. Extra phone lines will be installed and absentee bids are welcomed. Preview for the sale will be April 29 – May 1 at the Gallery located at 1609 South Dixie Hwy, Suite 5, West Palm Beach, Florida 33401. A catalog with approximately forty illustrations will be available. For more information about this sale call (561) 805-7115, email info@agopb.com or visit the website at http://www.agopb.com/. Written by: Fred Taylor
And finally of all: ‘by chessplayers, for chessplayers’ is Chessville’s official motto. The unofficial one is ‘it takes a [Chess] Village to raise a Patzer.’
We are still looking for an assistant publisher, and another infra-structural person, as well as more editorial support. Consider investing a few hours per week in the game, and send the Parrot a note if you would like to explore your options with us, and meet the Chessville team [caption; CV editorial meeting.] 4-5-2008
Official
Secrets A conversation with a correspondent…
You wrote
"from black's point of view you see, Max Euwe had almost killed the KID."
Not sure I understand what you mean. I found the statement you refer to. "It was Euwe who drove it [the KID] out of fashion in the 1930s, and probably Bronstein and Boleslavsky, in the late forties and early fifties, who did most to bring about the renaissance which still persists today." -- The King Hunt in Chess, page 51 Checking my database, Euwe certainly does seem to have done well as White against the KID. In 16 games played 1920-1940 that began 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6, he scored +12 -3 =3 (though some of these are Grünfelds), beating among others Alekine, Botvinnik, Mikenas, and yes - Yates. The
Parrot’s Commentary:
Its also notable, therefore, that
Russian efforts to revitalize the KID did not show up in Europe in the years
immediately before the war. Euwe was in Russia in 1934 before any new
KID material appeared - but even after the war the work by Korn, Griffiths
and Sergeant, appearing in 1946 had no glimmer of any analysis by Rauzer or
Boleslavsky. Similarly, Soviet theoreticians on the French Defence are
entirely absent, and these would be from Botvinnik, Konstantinopolsky,
Belavenets, Rauzer and Kan. REAL STATURE OF FISCHER If anyone really wants to comprehend the real stature of the chess-art of Robert James Fischer - then they must appreciate this fact, that to very large degree Western chess literature was hardly sustainable at GM first-tier levels.
Perforce, when more Soviets began
to play in the West the cat was out of the bag, and Western players were
stimulated to look much deeper, indeed, to look directly at the Russian
literature on chess. Not even the main journals, but those obscure little
technical bulletins, signaling, for internal use, that there was something
worth exploring. Rare Chess Pictures:
After last week’s April fool’s ‘episode’ in collusion with Paul Truong and Susan Polgar, I hesitate to report something he told me some time ago – but its true! He said that Susan Polgar had also played Deep Blue. “But you can’t talk about it,” he said.
Anyway, I asked after her results, and he laughed and said ‘quite good.’ I see that the Susan Polgar Blogspot has now mentioned some of the facts, therefore, so can I, and here is the proof. Looks like she is exercising her favorite Colle-Zukertort. Perhaps one day we will learn the result of the games and even see the game scores? I wonder if she did better than Garry?
‘of the players, for the players’ is Chessville’s official motto. The unofficial one is ‘it takes a [Chess] Village to raise a Patzer.’ If you too would like to support our game, via Chessville’s global village, then write to this Parrot, and indicate if your interest for a few hours per week is editorial, working with our Senior Editor, or infra-structural support, working with the Publisher. As for columnists, the Parrot would like to hear from chess writers in India and China about representing chess in their respective countries by publishing here at Chessville. I understand that Chinese access to western web-sites seems to come and go, and welcome reader’s comments on these initiatives which would engage 3/5ths of the world’s population. 3-29-2008 Best Chess Book Ever? Of course these things are intensely personal, but having encountered Bob Long last week, I thought I should mention he published my personal favorite. An indication of the range of the book is its index; so that in ‘D’ you have, da Vinci, De Jong de Sade, Dickinson, E, Domanski, Donins, Donner, J, Dostoyevski, Dryden, Dunne, A, Eckert, Einstein, A, Ek. For ‘K’, Kacian, Kafka, Karch, Karpov, Kasparov, Kavalek, Keene, Keres, Keynes, J, Khayyam, Kierkegaard, Kilmmre, King Paramount, Kipling, R, Kirc, Kito, Klovan, Kmoch, Knaack, Kopec, Kord, Kotov. Here is a book by a 2400-rated correspondence player which is not just about chess – although its games are adventurous, varied, well-informed, and presented with an almost unequal wit, indeed, sometimes they are Suttle! – no, this is a book about a feeling intellect who chucks in often self-deprecating and wry comments by such as Dostoyevski and Kafka as the games progress. This is a book about chess playing by someone who loves the game. Some overall sense of it is its rara avis honesty about how the player sees the game during its progression, which is formally rendered every dozen moves or so by his sense of his estimate of chances to win, draw or lose, measured as percentages. No simple précis of this kind can do this book justice, but what I want to know from Bob Long in our interview is how this book came about; which parts of it are purely “Mr. G” and which himself. And why, why, why, there is so much junk in print about chess, and why, why, why, we do not see more of this quality of chess title as is Journal of a Chess Master. Rare Chess Pictures:
Stephan spent his first 53 years in rural Massachusetts where he ran nine marathons, wrote five books, and became a Correspondence Chess Master. He played in five USCF Absolute Championships and one USCCC. He has ranked as high as #10 on the USCF Top-50 List. He has been president of both the Massachusetts and the New England Chess Associations. While in Massachusetts he inspected snow storms and rain storms and otherwise emulated Henry David Thoreau. In 1998, Stephan relocated to Princeton, NJ. There he taught chess as part of the regular curriculum in a small elementary school, his students winning numerous New Jersey Scholastic Championships. "Mr. G" left Princeton after three schools years there. Since then he has lived and taught in New York, Florida, Tennessee and Texas. He has been a tournament director at The Denker Tournament of High School Champions, The U. S. Blind Championship, the Tennessee Open Championship, and the Final Four of College Chess.
Recently volunteers have helped with marketing, and also re-formatting our chess town – results viewable soon! I’m not really sure Chessville has a mission statement, [actually we do, but its one of those pompous sounding things made up by the publisher in case Bill Gates chances by] but our motto is ‘Of the Players, For the Players.’ 3-22-2008 Drugs in the Rugs. EPO’s and Elo’s. You think drug testing in chess is nutz? What about in Billiards? Associated Press Reported: DUESSELDORF, Germany (AP) - Germany's first case of doping in billiards was announced Monday after national champion Axel Buescher tested positive for an EPO masking agent. Buescher's positive test came at November's German championships, where he captured the carom billiards title, the German Billiard Union said. The Union suspended Buescher for one year and stripped him of his title after he passed on his right to have the "B" sample tested. EPO is a blood booster most closely associated with endurance sports, such as cycling, where it has played a central role in several Tour de France scandals. Obviously endurance is a major factor in chess, especially when playing the Guicco Pianissimo on a wet weekend in Wilkes-Barre, so will USCF sign us all up soon, in case perhaps during a scholastic tournament your daughter is suspected of taking steroids and gets caught talking EPO instead of Elo. Officially the answer is ‘no’, but then again, USCF also objected to any of its players being tested – and when Susan Polgar was tested at the last round of the 2004 Olympiad, not a peep out of them. Would they do it if there was Olympiad money in it? While the board say no, previous delegates to FIDE only whisper no, or is that really a no? Can’t tell, its all so ssssh! Rare Chess Pictures:
3-15-2008 Keres & Botvinnik Revisited Contemporary importance of chess history.
Here above is the main perspective, from Larry Parr. I didn't read it before saying something similar by other means, in my a-to-d sequencing and deconstruction of the discussion on Keres & Botvinnik. Mr. Parr allows the issue to remain with the primary charge, (a), and does not diverge into commentaries and reactions to them. As I believe I said before, 'records' in any archive may themselves be sophisticated, and the Russian gentleman, a GM historian, I believe I mentioned privately certainly has the goods on the whole 9 yards of Soviet invigilation of chess, after 30 years of witnessing it, including the interesting subject of who has gone on the record, but who may not be entirely honest, being, you see, a bit culpable! Taimanov managed to extract at least some of his /own/ KGB file. But getting this other gent on the record about the wholesale systemic 'invigilation' is very difficult ~ and to his credit, he does not want to celebrate any scandal for its own sake. Though, beyond scandals there is another apt point: I think the pity of suppressing that point of view is now become clear - and less for Western benefit than for Russians themselves - with media in Russia now becoming state controlled again; did they get enough sense of themselves and the world in the interim since the Wall came down to actually experience what light and air, and living without fear [!] of social censorship, and personal psychological censorship [!] to be able to now make a choice of one thing over another? Even though chess seems like small beer, if the relative innocence of issues in chess cannot be aired, then the fatuity of attempting more socially dynamic discussion is rather moot, no? How sad the Russians had not understood what the Founders in the US knew the new country must do! And which Europe had failed to achieve - you cannot have greater outward democracy, than you have inner conscience. Without permitting the fluency of an inner state, the outer one will be similarly crabbed. This indeed is the origin of the Idea of Free Speech, which was not to talk about what ever came into your silly head, but to speak one's conscience without fear of reprisal from the State. Rare Chess Pictures: Given all the hoo-hah in mainstream press about the DaVinci [?] materials, here are the two pages:
3-8-2008 Future
Perspectives; USCF at the Crossroads
Therefore, should anyone with a current job wish to apply to USCF for a position in chess, then that person should be aware of this circumstance, since USCF are apparently not too careful about personnel material and the law of the land, nor have any apparent procedures in place which oblige current or past board members to observe it.
What affairs this crew dice with! Seemingly even Federal law is nothing to them, in their certainties. The Parrot called for the ex-board member, Mr. Sam Sloan who promulgated this information, to be removed from USCF membership, including his current delegate status. Alternatively, prospective applicants should be advised in advance that their application will be public nor private. No answer was received from anyone on the USCF board, and methinks this will be another lawsuit – for a change not between board members - but with the Feds.
I rather wonder if the gentleman who wrote the Letter of the Week would
countenance this sort of in-activity
The Parrot understands that after forwarding this current message to the USCF board as fair notice of intended editorial comment, it reflects a majority opinion only, Susan Polgar responding strongly to resent the above and similar practices. At time of press no other opinion has been received, even though the initial complaint is some three months old. Rare Chess Pictures:
3-1-2008 Future
Perspectives; USCF at the Crossroads
The issue for USCF is that it behaves like a private-members’ club with only the guise of promoting chess, but actually just attending to maintenance activities of existing members - utterly indistinguishable from a private-member's club. A LOSING BATTLE USCF's maintenance activities to members are, by large agreement, those which would demand the energies of about a dozen people in any efficient and competent private business - and incidentally most of that by tele-commuting, requiring no HQ nor mortgage. This staffing level would not reduce current services to existing members at all. But USCF employs [including contractors] twice as many people as that - which it plainly cannot afford to do, and needs to drop not just one staff position but half a dozen. If it loses 'at least $100,000' this year [President Goichberg] then shall we think it could really be 150k or 200k, plus last year's losses? That's worth half a dozen staff salaries, just to stay afloat. And the real question has been for the past 10 years why USCF just doesn't do that - since if members don't suffer, and it floats the boat, then... This was written before the information in the How Bad is Bad? side-bar ‘surfaced’. A BORED BATTLE
And since not just this board, but boards for the past dozen years have failed to do anything for chess which increases any perceivable quality of chess for players, or quantity of players beyond the natural population growth of the 50,000 Fischer 'surge' 1970-1972, what do they actually do? Are we bored of these boards? REAL WORLD, REAL PLANKS
Instead, a board can come into being made of real planks: to progress chess in the USA, to American mainstream media, to US Education, and to its social life. This board need have nothing other than a liason relationship with SmallTent USCF [ChessHut!] and can actually be constituted on entirely different - and entirely normal - lines. For example, if you want big Media and you want big Education, admit appropriate people from those sectors of life to the board. This group could actually perform the tasks of assessing what is needed looking forward in the C21st, and exciting or anticipating interest from others, as well as cogently and openly operating pro-bono Caissa as a true non-profit aught. That is how the real world works, and comparison with the mish-mash of activities of the current board is simply to note how utterly hopeless and compromised they are as a group to represent us, the chess public, in forwarding chess. PRINCIPIA, NON HOMINES
Rare Chess Pictures: Second Piatigorsky Cup - 1966 Boris Spassky held off a late charge from Bobby Fischer to win the 2nd Piatigorsky Cup in Santa Monica, California. The event took place in the Starlight Ballroom of the Miramar Hotel from July 17th to August 15th, 1966. The prize money was twice that of the inaugural tournament and the number of participants was increased from eight to ten, with the same double round-robin format of play. The $20,000 purse was enough to lure Fischer to the tournament, as he had previously chosen not to participate in the 1st Piatigorsky Cup in 1963.
Caption from left to right, Boris Spassky, Mr. and Mrs. Piatigorsky, Bobby Fischer. These images are from the chess site http://www.rookhouse.com/events/piat1966.html FINAL RESULTS
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Q.
Q.
Just to make sure I have this correct, your rates for 30 different
measurements instead of just one are approximately 1/3 of typical US rates –
do I understand you correctly?
“For
the last three weeks we have been meeting with school managers and we have
jointly agreed on including chess lessons in schools academics,” ...said
Somali Chess Federation President Dr Ahmed Abdi Hassan during an exclusive
interview with the Somali chess website 
Chess
has been described as being a war-game, but not well-described that way.
It is a culturally acceptable means of expressing ritual
aggression; a check between that impulse and the trigger-finger, or for
‘older children’ the bombers.
But
there is not the slightest chance that you all can possibly be recommended.
The misogyny recently exhibited is a little eye-watering, bringing people's
children into the picture to further scandalize affairs is infamous.
And these are now become common anecdotes in national newspapers.
This
situation continued until approximately 1961, and even then Soviet
publications on chess were hardly candid - suggesting some dead-end lines,
while ignoring ones with more prospect. The infamous forward to The
Soviet School of Chess, Kotov and Yudovich, even warns the reader both
about the Soviet political spin, but also that the variations in the book
are ‘spun.’
“O!
Thank you very much!” I replied tartly.
Stephan
"Mr. G" Gerzadowicz
One
day, possibly in our lifetime, those archives will come open. Odds are we
will then find out in some detail precisely what happened.
Just
a little while ago a friend applied for two positions at USCF. A past
board member has seen fit to blast this personnel information all over the
internet.
A
message to the board two weeks ago did not receive even any acknowledgement
by the Executive Director nor the President of the USCF, Mr. Bill Goichberg.
in
anything he thought would progress table tennis?
thing!
...then,
why is any board necessary to run a 12 person office of principally clerical
activities in a maintenance relation to chess? Given normal competencies,
that is. If USCF wanted to partner with chess promoters, by all means add an
extra staff person as coordinator with chess developers to make 13, and 'do
a Fide' with it, which is to take a few percent or even 10 to cover costs,
or even cost-plus - but not too much!
If
USCF seriously retrench, which seems an inevitable situation to confront in
the next 12 months, to a dozen or so folks, sell the building, and move back
all the way to where they came from, a little office down in Greenwich
Village, and settle down to the relatively simple tasks of administering to
the nuts and bolts activities of the maintenance in chess in the USA - then
there is utterly no need for a board to decide over 'policy', since there
are no policies!
And
thereby, by clarifying goals; distinguishing one thing from another,
especially maintenance from promotion, right-sizing staff levels, justifying
being non-profit, rather than whatever the current and more than somewhat
compromised relationships are; by, in short, describing the principals and
systems of how chess is to be maintained and promoted, then the cult of
personality is entirely done away with and chess is re-established on sound
forward-looking lines, not obscene and retrograde ones, ad homines, and in
all, given a chance to work and succeed!