In the Age of the Internet, Why Has Interest in Chess Remained So Robust, and Even Risen Sharply? (bloomberg.com) 153
How and why a 1,500-year-old game has conquered the internet. From a report: Two years ago, the world chess championship match drew about 10 million online viewers, while this year's competition between Magnus Carlsen and Fabio Caruana, currently underway in London, is expected to draw more attention yet. Worldwide, chess claims about 600 million fans, which makes it one of the most popular games or sports.
It is noteworthy that China, one of the two most important countries in the world, has decided to invest heavily in chess. This year Chinese teams won both the men's and women's divisions at the Chess Olympiad, a first. That would not have happened without the active support of the Chinese Communist Party. The U.S. is stepping up too, with the aid of chess patron Rex Sinquefield. In recent times America has placed three players in the world's top 10, including Caruana, currently No. 2.
It turns out that chess is oddly well-suited for a high-tech world. Chess does not make for gripping television, but the option of live viewing online, supplemented by computer analysis or personal commentary, has driven a renaissance of the game. For one thing, computer evaluations have made watching more intelligible. Even if you barely understand chess, you can quickly get a sense of the state of play with the frequently changing numerical evaluations ("+ 2.00," for instance, means white has a decisive advantage, whereas "0.00" signals an even position). You also can see, with each move, whether the player will choose what the computer finds best.
It is noteworthy that China, one of the two most important countries in the world, has decided to invest heavily in chess. This year Chinese teams won both the men's and women's divisions at the Chess Olympiad, a first. That would not have happened without the active support of the Chinese Communist Party. The U.S. is stepping up too, with the aid of chess patron Rex Sinquefield. In recent times America has placed three players in the world's top 10, including Caruana, currently No. 2.
It turns out that chess is oddly well-suited for a high-tech world. Chess does not make for gripping television, but the option of live viewing online, supplemented by computer analysis or personal commentary, has driven a renaissance of the game. For one thing, computer evaluations have made watching more intelligible. Even if you barely understand chess, you can quickly get a sense of the state of play with the frequently changing numerical evaluations ("+ 2.00," for instance, means white has a decisive advantage, whereas "0.00" signals an even position). You also can see, with each move, whether the player will choose what the computer finds best.
Reality (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Reality (Score:5, Insightful)
Same reason why people play tic-tac-toe or checkers. It does not matter if someone else, be it a computer or not, can play better as long as you are having fun.
Same reason why people don't give up competing in the Olympics even if someone else has already had a better score.
no let's play global thermonuclear war (Score:2)
no let's play global thermonuclear war
Re:Reality (Score:4, Interesting)
Just about every culture and civilisation have their own board games. Egyptians played "Dogs and Jackals", Vikings played "Hnefatafl". Back in the 1980's "Space Lines" was popular , a 3D tic-tac-toe. Every 8-bit computer system had a chess playing game system with some AI. It is one of those games with unlimited number of moves.
Reality? (Score:5, Funny)
Because some people prefer reality. Simple enough?
I don't think real bishops just move diagonally.
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Boats? Aren't they equivalent to the elephant in the earlier Indian games chess is descended from?
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No, the rook is the chariot. King -> king, adviser -&;gt queen, elephant -> bishop, horse -> knight, chariot -> rook, foot-soldier -> pawn. Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] even agrees with me.
Agadmator (Score:2)
The reason, in a word? Agadmator. A channel just 18 months old and today it is just a few weeks away from being the largest chess channel on YouTube.
I grew up with an older brother who was rated at the master level while still in high school. He once spotted me a queen and rook, and still won. Easily. That sucked.
My father would spot me a rook, and win. That sucked.
In short, I never liked chess. And most YouTube chess channels did nothing to change that. Most analysts feel like Noam Chomsky.
Then alo
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The answer today is more like Bloomberg managed to plant a story to get people to go to their web site. Rising chess popularity, not likely, simply the internet aggregating the numbers, more effectively upon a global basis. So 7 billion people, of which 1% find it interesting, so not really that popular but 1% of 7 Billion is 70 million. It just depends how well the internet aggregates that number over time ie only a small percentage of that 1% connect but over time that increases, so the popularity is not
Re:Because autism (Score:5, Funny)
Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens
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This reminds me that the radio stations started playing Christmas music today and it just makes me sick that they consider "My Favorite Things" a Christmas song. It's not and I wish they'd knock it the fuck off.
In fact, I wish they'd knock the entire Christmas music thing off until like maybe 2-3 days before Christmas. Don't nobody need to hear those fucking songs again, especially the shitty versions.
But if you absolutely must hear a Xmas song, here's one for you that won't make you puke:
https://youtu.be [youtu.be]
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> I will get out and pull on my best frilly womens underware
Methinks you been listening too much to Bob Rivers' Walking Round In Womens Underwear [youtube.com] =P
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Some of the anti-semites claim that Christians are the real jews and that modern Jews are the people who couldn't cope.
There's always a weird twist when it comes to festering underground hate groups. Did you know that the main minority group attacked and repressed at the height of the Ku Klux Klan's popularity was Roman Catholics? That branch of the KKK didn't really ever go away. It just morphed into things like Pentacostals.
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I used to have a CD called "A Medieval Christmas" or something like that. The beauty of it was that unless you a) knew Latin and b) listened carefully enough to pick out the words you didn't know it was Christmas music.
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Have you been diagnosed?
We can't make it a 'problem' if you have not been diagnosed.
How can we bill you for treatment if it has not been diagnosed?
Iâ(TM)ve been playing chess on and off since (Score:4, Interesting)
Recently got back into chess now that my son is interested. Started playing Really Bad Chess on my phone http://reallybadchess.com/ [reallybadchess.com] to kill time and hone some skills.
I find it relaxes me and helps me concentrate on other things like tough logic puzzles...keeps me thinking a few steps ahead. Great for work and play.
Got interested at 40 (Score:2)
Same here, I did not even know the correct rules until my son got interested in chess. Does everyone know what an en-passant capture is ?
I tried to learn alongside my son, but at my age the right structures do not form in the brain. However, it was fascinating to see how one goes about learning chess, and what mental exercises you have to do to help you visualize the board. For example is F6 a light or a dark square ?
What I did learn is how to code up a chess engine, starting out with Sunfish : https://git [github.com]
it's simple, fun , and easy (Score:1)
It's a simple game, with simple rules, that doesn't require a large investment, and can even be played via mail, with pen and paper.
with ranking organizations, finding players of equal/good skill is easy.
I don't need a 8 core machine, with 16gb of ram, and 1tb of disk space.
it also leads to a lot of good algorithm development.
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Massive? I'd be surprised if they don't fit easily onto one side of A4.
Why? (Score:2)
It's a good game.
Exactly.
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A hot young stud oozing sex appeal
My daughter thinks Fabiano Caruana is sexier. But she said she will take either.
They have one game to go, and if it another draw, then Fabiano is in trouble. It will go to a speed chess tie-breaker, and Magnus is one of the best blitz chess players in the world. Magnus won the blitz world championship in 2017.
Have you seen the Hot Wheels Chess Set, Checkmate? (Score:2)
For Hot Wheels 50th Anniversary, they released a first edition chess set made up of Hot Wheels cars. https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.htm... [ebay.com] (Available on Ebay) called Checkmate.
So yeah, Chess is back, cooler than ever, and everyone enjoys it. It sure beats run and gun first person shooters. It's a game where you actually have to think two to three moves ahead... Oh my!
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It's a game where you actually have to think two to three moves ahead... Oh my!
Like Fortnite? /ducks
The US isn't as good as it seems (Score:4, Interesting)
What just puzzles me, and I have no explanation for it other than the usual "Commies like to win medals in world competitions" explanation, is why China cares so much about chess. They have their own variant, xiang qi, which is extremely popular. Honestly, it's considered a harder game to solve in terms of computational power vs. chess. Because xiang qi is considered a harder game, you could make an argument that China spending so many resources to win chess championships is kind of a case of them slumming and trying to win an "easier" game. Xiang qi strategy is very different from chess strategy and I believe the Chinese did successfully convert one of their best female xiang qi players into a women's chess star, in general I would not expect skills at one to translate well into skills in the other. I suspect once they identify promising chess players, they get them to stop playing xiang qi. To give readers a rough idea of the differences in the games, it's quite common in xiang qi for a knight (they call it "horse") to be moved to the side of the board early in the game whereas in chess that would usually be a bad move and it would be much better placed to be first moved towards the middle.
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Well, Australia certainly does not see chess matches on its TV -very low key.
I thought the Soviets had the collective Chess brains trust(and they do numerically), and USA -some on the East coast. However on IQ test scores, India sometimes produces superstars presently with only 50 GM's or so. Maybe we can make Chess more TV friendly by adding Harry Potter animations.
The latest lists (2017) of chess players in the world indicates that there are 1594 grandmasters:1559 (male), 35 (female.) SJW's eat your hear
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What just puzzles me, and I have no explanation for it other than the usual "Commies like to win medals in world competitions" explanation, is why China cares so much about chess.
Isn't that enough? All authoritarian regimes like to do generous amounts of chest-thumping, which brings funding for recruitment and training. And in people's mind chess is related to intelligence, even though Carlsen seems to mostly have an exceptional memory. China would love to have the world's smartest chess player, it's a great sales pitch to everyone who tries to dismiss them as being nothing more than the source of cheap trinkets and toys who get or take the designs from everyone else. Though I hones
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And in people's mind chess is related to intelligence, even though Carlsen seems to mostly have an exceptional memory
Memory is one of the important skills of chess, calculating deep variations is just as important though, and quite difficult.
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In the age of exascale databases and AI assistants, I don't think "we have the best rote memorization!" is a very compelling pitch.
Also you underestimate naivete.
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Well that, and Chinese leaders have a permanent inferiority complex since they have never submitted to a fair vote of them vs. other parties. They know they are illegitimate.
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Isn't that enough? All authoritarian regimes like to do generous amounts of chest-thumping,
No, wrong. Try again. True believing Communists think of their ideology as the pinnacle of Human Achievement. They figure since they are the vanguard of history, their intellectuals and smart people should and are the smartest anywhere.
You've got to get over the notion that Communists think 'we want to be in charge, hey this Communism thing will let us boss everybody around!' That's western cold war thinking.
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Honestly, it's considered a harder game to solve in terms of computational power vs. chess. Because xiang qi is considered a harder game, you could make an argument that China spending so many resources to win chess championships is kind of a case of them slumming and trying to win an "easier" game. Xiang qi strategy is very different from chess strategy and I believe the Chinese did successfully convert one of their best female xiang qi players into a women's chess star, in general I would not expect skills at one to translate well into skills in the other.
I don't know why you think it is computationally more difficult. The 'king' is trapped in a small box, for example. The range of strategies that are available to players is much smaller. It's a fun game, but chess is more complex (and Go is more complex still).
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Maybe the OP thinks the Chinese game is more computationally difficult because they've read scientific papers that say this. I know I have. It has a larger board and games tend to run on for longer. There's also much less likelihood of a draw, so apparently equal positions will probably yield a result.
Note that in my experience, Chinese people don't believe this. The think the game foreigners play must be more difficult. I believe this is one reason they undervalue their own game and don't promote it i
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Maybe the OP thinks the Chinese game is more computationally difficult because they've read scientific papers that say this. I know I have.
Link please.
It has a larger board and games tend to run on for longer.
You might be confusing "Chinese chess" and "go"
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To give readers a rough idea of the differences in the games, it's quite common in xiang qi for a knight (they call it "horse") to be moved to the side of the board early in the game whereas in chess that would usually be a bad move and it would be much better placed to be first moved towards the middle.
The horse in xiang qi strictly moves first straight and then diagonal. It can not jump over other pieces, unlike a chess knight. In other words, it has 4 sides where it can be blocked.
In chess the idea that
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Are you sure you aren't thinking about Japanese Shogi? Shogi has a much higher branching factor than chess due to optional promotions and the ability to re-use captured pieces ("drops"). As far as I know, Chine
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Japanese chess is the most computationally expensive of the three, but Chinese chess is indeed more expensive than the European variant. Also, note that "shogi" and "xiangqi" are written using the same characters (give or take simplification) and there are different rules native to Japan, but the most complicated game is the most popular.
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I seem to recall reading that basically Rex Sinquefield threw a bunch of money at 2 of the current USA's top 3 players to get them to change country allegiances to the USA. I think one of the 3 did actually move to the US as a child though. I don't remember his name, but I think it's the guy who was born in Japan
Nakamura moved as a child, and Caruana (the #2 or #1 in the world) was born in the US. Wesley So moved to America just a few years ago. The St Louis chess area is one of the best training places in the world right now.
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Hikaru Nakamura, although born in Japan, moved to the U.S. when he was two. I think that long predates any "changing country allegiances". His mother is also American.
Fabiano Caruana was born in Miami and only moved to Madrid when he wished to pursue a professional chess career (at the age of 12).
The only one fitting your description of changing allegiances is Wesley So.
Battle chess (Score:2)
It would be more interesting if they "enhanced" the matches for viewers - more like Battle Chess (or Wizard Chess from HP for you youngsters.) A little 5-second animation for pieces moving and being taken would spice it up a little.
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Those animations got old by the fifth time, though.
Because the pieces ... (Score:2)
... don't rat out the fucking players?
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Many is the time when I have looked at my opponent and said, "OK, I'm fucked."
It's the Russian bots (Score:5, Funny)
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If you're lucky then the god a she.
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I presume you are referring to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Widely know rules and no language barrier (Score:3)
Easy to play pick up games with anyone around the world.
Accessible, but nuanced and complex (Score:3, Interesting)
The rules of chess are relatively straight forward, yet the opportunity for strategy and necessity to think ahead make the game engaging and fun. It also feels like a true clash on intellects, as opposed to many games that involve rolls of the dice or better understanding of the rules.
Chess also seems to have an infectious quality. I've seen chess tournaments spontaneously erupt at summer camps and fraternities. People who you never thought would play chess can get the bug; and maybe this makes it more fun.
Top 3 US players in chess... (Score:2)
2) Wesley So [wikipedia.org] - chess prodigy born and raised in the Philippines; So transferred to the US 4 years ago as his country's federation could not adequately support him
3) Hikaru Nakamura [wikipedia.org] - Japanese-American chess prodigy who was born in Japan but moved to the US at age 2, his Sri Lankan stepfather taught him how to play
Immigration is a key factor in the recent rise of US chess.
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Caruana was born in Miami and discovered in New York. His parents are immigrants, but he is homegrown talent.
As for Nakamura, I'd say he most likely didn't know how to play chess when he moved to the U.S., meaning he is homegrown talent too.
Wesley So is the only straight-up import in the top grouping.
Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
It has set rules that a smart person can understand. That a really, really smart person can study and master.
Books exist on the topic. Web sites exist on the topic. The skill set is not kept hidden.
The ability to win at a city, state and national level with something fun thats almost free.
Winning is clear and not based on the artistic feeling of a set of judges.
Its not weather and climate related like some sports.
For nations that still study math its an easy tool to offer.
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And there are many web/internet sites where you can play chess internationally, mostly for free. That means regardless where you are and who you are, you can play. You get matched with similar rated players and can climb the ladder, can play simultaneously ... can play even by email aka one draw per day or similar.
Simple rules but very deep game play (Score:1)
Chess is in a sweet spot where a chess board plus pieces is cheap, the rules are reasonably simple (only castling and capturing en passant are a little bit tougher to understand), but the game play is very deep. Players to whom skills based games appeal get a lot out of a relatively small initial investment of money and time.
The internet actually helps chess because chess can be played online, players can improve their game by watching videos and reading articles about chess, while OTOH unlike the entertain
Fog of war (Score:2)
Old quote (Score:2)
Because it is violent entertainment. (Score:2)
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If you need more violence in your mind games, perhaps chess boxing [wikipedia.org] is for you.
passive content consumer to active participant (Score:3)
What does the internet have to do with anything? (Score:5, Insightful)
What a stupid article! What in God's name does the internet have to do with people playing chess?
That like saying, "in the age of drones, why are people still drinking cola?"
They have nothing to do with one another.
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Amusing thoughts about chess as a kickstarter (Score:2)
There's been this big interest in boardgames recently, and the state-of-the-art as it is has actually moved forward quite a bit from what it used to be. We used to be restricted to two general types: roll-and-move games where individual skill was mostly non-existent or fixed-position games like chess and checkers where in general, the person who had memorized the right patterns would usually win.
So the question I heard was, "How would you sell chess today if no one had heard of it, and you wanted to sell i
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So it doesn't involve much thought, just recollection.
This just shows your ignorance. You probably read that somewhere, and now are parroting it back without much thought. If you really want to understand the thought that goes into a game, you can start by reading some grandmaster commentary. Hint: when a chess player thinks at the board for 15 minutes, they call it thinking because he is thinking
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That's why you learn to play against engines -- so you aren't completely shitting your pants the first time you bump into a player who knows what they're doing. The engines can get you up to a really high level as well, if you want to put in the time. Most people want to play other people, though, even if it means slower progress.
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Because Millenials love Retro (Score:2)
Chess is the ultimate retrogame
Retro isn't necessarily bad (Score:2)
Morse code is more popular than ever in amateur radio even though the ITU and most countries dropped the requirement years ago. Sure, many/most CW operators are using computers but they also pick up enough to copy it by ear. And just the thing for mountaintop operating with lots of different CW paddle manufacturers.
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This is at least in part because most amateur radio users know that it's not a matter of if we'll have another Carrington Event. It's a matter of when.
Intellectuals (Score:2)
My theory is that chess seems intellectual, people appear smart by playing it. To play it well, I think you have to be. I hope Starcraft has the same staying power and becomes the game we play and watch for centuries :)