Fashion Plates

If you ever wanted a singular brimful example of expertise, insight, breathless passion and good punctuation in chess reportage, you could do worse than point to this marvellous report.

Mig Greengard for the Pulitzer Prize in chess writing.

smb, amsterdam

Mig,
that's the best thing you've written in months! Hard data, informative analysis, thoughtful comparisons and the hypothesis that the great players' opening choices effect the draw ratio. More, please!
Thanks!
tjallen54

Grischuk has played some powerful chess recently, in rounds 3 and 5. Both games were beautiful examples of the old guideline: Get as many pieces as possible near the enemy king, and something magical will happen! Too bad he couldn't quite find the win in game 3, yet even so, look at the "concentration of forces" that he created. I hope to see more good work from him.

Did you see Grischuk went 17 of 19 in the Moscow Blitz last month? That's against mostly GMs and IMs! 17/19 is Anand or Tal level blitz play!

tjallen

Yeah, great writing by Mig. Truth is that he is a knowledgeable and thoughtful guy.
Actually at times he seems too good, too smart and capabale of fine insights, for doing mere chess jornalism. With his brains he could have got any degree and did something really serious in life.

Ovidiu,
That's called 'daubing with faint praise, i think.
I don't think a life spent working with/around chess is less productively spent than one spent acting/singing/modelling.

Ovidiu, that's quite insulting and patronising. At the best its a very backhanded compliment. What makes you think he's not doing what he wants to?

Your search - "daubing with faint praise" - did not match any documents.

Results 1 - 10 of about 67,400 for "damning with faint praise".

An important factor one should also mention is the decline of the Sveshnikov. It was the weapon that got Leko his WM fight against Kramnik. At times it was considered so impregnable that the Whites rather sought their chances in the 3.Bb5/3.Nc3 lines.

Posted by: HardyBerger
Ovidiu, that's quite insulting..

Well now.. I was making factual comments, the insulting part was unavoidable just as when noticing that a woman is ugly or a man not that smart by nature. We are what we are.

Mig's personal loss is a gain for the chess scene and anyway he is now life-stuck with his chess journalism "career" just, at a different scale of course, as Lasker was stuck with being a chess-player even if he had the fiber of a first rate mathematician and philosopher.
Bad early choices or destiny ?

So..we can reasonably look forward even for top-quality books written by the witty-smarty Mig on the international chess scene, he can do it (after he outgrows his financial and emotional dependence of the "great" Garry).

Great post, great observations.

For my amateur eyes, it seems that the game at high level is turning in Black's favor. What I mean is that it is Black that can decide whether to get into drawish variations or introduce novelties. Especially in must-win situations it is better to have black than white.

Does this make sense? or not?

SJ

For my amateur eyes, it seems that the game at high level is turning in Black's favor. What I mean is that it is Black that can decide whether to get into drawish variations or introduce novelties. Especially in must-win situations it is better to have black than white.

Does this make sense? or not?

SJ

Ovidiu wrote: "So..we can reasonably look forward even for top-quality books written by the witty-smarty Mig on the international chess scene, he can do it (after he outgrows his financial and emotional dependence of the "great" Garry)."

As Bobby Fischer's high school classmate once observed, people who need people are the luckiest people in the world.

The "sharp" 1.e4 only fizzes out fast in quick draws in front of ever increasing defensive skills..but it has been gradually going this way since Steiniz.Now it's over for good.

Not that 1.d4 is any better in front of QGD or Slav but at least it allows to slowly build tension and hope to win in long and complicated games.

Ovidiu - your combination is quite funny - you denigrate Mig for 1) not doing anything more significant than chess journalism and 2) overdependence on GK, when in fact if I'm not mistaken his relationship with Kasparov has lead him to do work on behalf of pro-democracy groups in Russia. Or is that not of significance?

For my amateur eyes, it seems that the game at high level is turning in Black's favor. What I mean is that it is Black that can decide whether to get into drawish variations or introduce novelties. Especially in must-win situations it is better to have black than white.

Does this make sense? or not?

SJ

For my amateur eyes, it seems that the game at high level is turning in Black's favor. What I mean is that it is Black that can decide whether to get into drawish variations or introduce novelties. Especially in must-win situations it is better to have black than white.

Does this make sense? or not?

SJ

Great post, well researched!

Mig, one way of arresting this trend is if you could convince Garry to share his unused research with someone like Anand :) He has after all confirmed that he won't return to chess and wants Anand to win and more than that, wants Kramnik to lose.

- Kapalik

Derek wrote :
.. if I'm not mistaken his relationship with Kasparov has lead him to do work on behalf of pro-democracy groups in Russia. Or is that not of significance?..

Get real, Mig ain't Anna Politovskaya.
Getting involved too deep with Garry's clownish and surreal actings in Russian politics would be another (2nd) major life mistake for Mig.

I think he well realizes this but he seems as having no choice at the moment. Emotional dependence is something that one outgrows anyway with time ( 'familiarity breeds contempt') but the the money issue is another beast, more difficult to slay..so he has to live in "Hotel California" for the time being.

It would make sense that Kasparov's retirement would lead to a drop in Najdorf. But what about the other stuff, Sveshnikov, exchange, Kan, Paulsen, etc.? I don't associate these with Gary but we seem to have seen a near moratorium in any version of Sicilian defense played at uppermost level, period, in the past couple of years. Any ideas to what to attribute this to? Any info as to which variations were popular recently is appreciated.

On a different note, I wish I had Ovidiu to point out my life mistakes to me :(

Troll food....

Is Ovidiu emotionally dependent upon his right hand?

Don't knock self-love: it's a lifelong romance.

Does anybody know if this Mexican WC will be on the Oct1st FIDE rating list??

If yes, it could well mean Vishy becoming World Champion and crossing 2800 at the same time!!

An amazing feat by a great champion..

It's not that the Sveshnikov is broken--remember the Linares when everyone was avoiding the Open Sicilian because of the Sveshnikov?--but that 1...e5 has been even more spectacularly successful at neutralizing 1.e4.

In his 9/18/07 entry, Mig wrote: "The ultra-subtle Marshall got some work and Gelfand played a novelty on move six. You can keep your shuffle chess, thanks."

That was great for Gelfand and for all those who enjoyed the game too. However, the crisis is on the other half of the board.

I'm the furthest thing from a shuffle/FRC/960 advocate. I can't even stand to look at the pieces like that. But this tournament is giving tremendous ammunition to those who do want the ascendancy of that game over classical chess. You have Leontxo Garcia asking Svidler about it at one of his post-game press conferences and Mark Crowther seems beside himself at TWIC over this bloody Petroff.

Even the tone of Mig's last two entries ("Oy" on Leko's cop-out 2.Bc4 and Kaidanov's comments) suggests all is not right at the highest level of chess.

So, "thanks" or not, the calls for shuffle/FRC/960 will continue. :(

Personally, I just think that Mig is a great chess writer/reporter and leave it at that.

The changes in the opening fashions are interesting to watch, and 1. e4 and 1 ... c5 may rise again under different circumstances.

Really, we should also expect to see a small decline in main line 1. d4 and see some increase in Catalan/English type systems. Highly transpositional, hard to prepare for, still a lot of scope for novelties in the first 10 moves!

>So, "thanks" or not, the calls for >shuffle/FRC/960 will continue. :(

This will happen eventually. Chess has evolved, has changed the rules few times in its history.
But we need first a revolutionary champ, a Luther of chess, who will lead the Reform.

Unfortunately Bobby is not a leader, he is only a lunatic (textbook paranoid-schizophrenic case) and a visionary prophet.

Interesting analysis, as others have said. I'm wondering, while you were calculating the drawing percentages of 1.e4 vs. 1.d4, did you also calculate the scoring for white vs. black? Has white been getting better overall scores with 1.d4 lately?

"This will happen eventually. Chess has evolved, has changed the rules few times in its history.
But we need first a revolutionary champ, a Luther of chess, who will lead the Reform.

Unfortunately Bobby is not a leader, he is only a lunatic (textbook paranoid-schizophrenic case) and a visionary prophet."

I disagree. It is still not clear to me that chess needs to be drastically changed and much of its great history essentially thrown into the dustbin. But, if change is needed, it is only at the highest levels. There is simply no reason at all that, say, the under 1800 or under 2000 sections at the World open need shuffle/FRC/960. Chess will be quite fine, I think, at those levels for a long, long time to come. And the same or similar may even be the case for lesser master chess (2200-2400).

I don't like computer v. human chess but I think I wouldn't mind seeing the Rybka-Kramnik Petroff match someone suggested elsewhere here.

Posted by: cs at September 19, 2007 12:38
I disagree..that chess needs to be drastically changed .. There is simply no reason at all that, say, the under 1800 or under 2000 sections..

I disagree too..at that level it needs perhaps even more than at the GM-level.

It is amazing (and well known) how much time, all the time, the club-patzers devote to openings memorization and study.
It is 'as if' the study of the chess equals to the study of openings. I guess that some 90% of chess books are about this or that opening 'secrets'.

But it is simply a economic-rational cost/benefit analysis-investement by patzers and GMs alike, that is time is alotted to each phase of the game proportional to its importance for the final result of a game between players of somewhat equal strenght ( most games are played between such palyers).

Freee commentary at:

http://susanpolgar.blogspot.com Susan Polgar

http://www.chessdom.com/wcc-mexico-chess-2007/live/kramnik-gelfand Karakehayov

http://www.chessdom.com/wcc-mexico-chess-2007/live/anand-grischuk Karakehayov

http://crestbook.com Shipov

I think Ovidiu's comment about Mig doing something "worthwhile" as a career was meant as self-deprecating humor by a chessplayer. We all love chess, but we also know it's a little silly--it's a game after all.

Mig has one of those dream careers where people say, "I can't believe I'm getting paid to do this!" He gets to stare a lot at the chessboard, write ripping good commentary on the game, its players, and its politics, *and* he gets to hang out with us!

"I disagree too..at that level it needs perhaps even more than at the GM-level.

It is amazing (and well known) how much time, all the time, the club-patzers devote to openings memorization and study.
It is 'as if' the study of the chess equals to the study of openings. I guess that some 90% of chess books are about this or that opening 'secrets'."

I'm sorry but this is just ridiculous. Do you think 1700s are playing 24 move Petroffs and then shaking hands en masse?

And just because patzers or club players foolishly think they need to study opening theory like crazy and perhaps do, doesn't mean they need to or are spending their time wisely. They don't and aren't.

Let's say you had two club players of the same ability or talent and they both take 6 months of lessons with two excellent teachers/trainers. Player number one and his coach spend 75% of their study time on opening theory and the remaining 25% on the middlegame and endgame. Player two and his coach do the opposite: 75% on the middlegame and endgame and only 25% on opening theory. The two players would then play a match X number of games. Who do you think would win? My money would be on player two winning handily.

Club players spend way too much time studying and worrying about the openings when they would be better served studying the middlegame and endgame.

Great subject, but I'm afraid I have to question your numbers.

"At the 2700 level 1.e4 e5 draws 64% of the time. 1.e4 c5 42%" - Mig, how did you calculate that?

I've created a database of all games ever played between 2700+ players up until and including 2006, based on Mega Database 2003 plus weekly updates from TWIC. That's a mere 2737 games.

The overall drawing percentage is 58%.
Some numbers:
1.d4 61%
1.e4 57%
1.e4 c5 57%
1.e4 e5 64%

If I only count games in the period 2000-2006 (1735 games), I get these drawing percetages:
1.d4 61%
1.e4 58%
1.e4 c5 59%
1.e4 e5 62%

I wonder how our numbers can differ so much - are you counting games between 2700+ and sub-2700 players? Maybe the 2700+ guys use the Sicilian to beat the 2600-tourists?

Mig,

Thanks for the informative discussion of opening choices in elite chess. It would be terribly interesting to compare these results to those at the under 2200 level, which you can do with chessbase software. When I have done such comparisons in the past I have found rather interesting results. Notably, some openings considered dubious on the elite level are very effective weapons for club players. This is true of the Benko gambit, for example.

-msc

Good comment, Bill. One of the Russian commentators yesterday joked in response to Anand-Svidler: "Oh, Marshall. Must be a pre-arranged draw." With the Marshall, Petroff and Berlin available to the Black that responds with e5 to 1.e4 the White might as well throw up his hands and try for d4. (and ironically of course Anand-Svidler ended with a victory for White)

However, Sicilian usually hasn't been a way to draw for the Black, has it? It's a way to play for counterinitiative with stronger chances for a win than most openings for the Black. In light of that, it doesn't seem likely that you would abandon c5 for e5 because it's an effective neutralizer.

The horrifying thing is that type 1 coaches actually exist, wasting hundreds and thousands of potentially good chessplayers. The understanding that openings memorisation is worthless for a club player doesn't easily occur to the players below master level.

The Sicilian is often more dynamic than 1....e5, thereby affording more chances for the player with superior middle game skills to play for the full point. If you want to score a win with Black, the Sicilian is still the way to go.

One of the implications for the trend is that, in contrast to Kasparov, the active Elite players seem to lack the confidence that their opening preparation (to play the Black side of a Sicilian) will be superior to that of their opponents. Of course, both powerful chess engines and huge databases of games existed back in the "Kasparov Era", yet Garry--and the many other players who followed suit--were willing to accept the risk of facing computer generated novelties.

In the past, the database statistics have indicated that, if one aggregated out the White wins, draws, and Black wins among Top players in the various openings, that the Sicilian was the best scoring defense for Black against 1.e4

This alone induced players to migrate to 1.d4 as White.

The question is whether 1....c5 still claims the best scoring % of defenses to 1.e4?

As a committed 1.e5 player myself, I've always had the belief that at a fundamental theoretical level, that 1....e5 was the slightly superior response to the King Pawn opening.

>Petroff wrote :
And just because patzers or club players foolishly think they need to study opening theory like crazy and perhaps do, doesn't mean they need to or are spending their time wisely. They don't and aren't. >

You do not understand the logic behind their behavior but you are quickly condemn. People are not that fools when they have a genuine interest at stake.
They do exactly what they should do to, they must do, so as defeat their club colleagues whom they play each weekend in a sharp in a Janisch variation, not to become able to defeat Anand and Moro in 5 years from now on.

It is rational and logical what they do and it is so because of the nature of the chess-game, that is the relative importance of the opening phase in chess for outcome of THEIR games ( of all games played between relatively equal strenght players, being them both 1900 or 2900)

>Let's say you had two club players of the same ability or talent and they both take 6 months of lessons with two excellent teachers/trainers.

You are back to your mistaken idea.
Yes I agree that this is the way to a greater strenght on the long term but on long term we are all dead therefore each player maximizes his benefit by investing in what will bring him definite gain in the game that he will play next week.
The patzer's behavior ( and GM alike) is rational profit-maximazing behavior. True that as a result patzer's progress toward becoming a GM is slowed down.

But it is a fault of chess, there is no opening theory in GO, for instance.
That was why I wrote that the change would be even
more profitable at 1800 level than at a GM level.

Ovidiu, your theory is, as always, provocative, original, and....utterly unsupported by any authoritative source.

Respected trainers who write about chess improvement are unanimous on the point that players below 1400 strength should spend zero study time on opening variations -- apart from studying the opening phase of complete games, as part of absorbing more general principles, not memorization -- and players below 2000 or 2200 strength should spend at most 25% of their study time on opening preparation.

Posted by Jon Jacobs at September 19, 2007 13:43

>Ovidiu, your theory is, as always, provocative, original, and....utterly unsupported by any authoritative source. >

Jon, the original meaning of "ad hominem" was "fallacy in argumentation by appealing not to reason and facts but to what famous, authoritative, persons have said on the subject".

Please don't "insult" me.

>Respected trainers who write about chess improvement are unanimous ..

I know, in the mean time I notice what everybody does (like listening to pop-rock of Beethoven, for instance) in spite of what the cultural mandarins think that the rabble "should" do

My advice : do it as you think is necessary, you are right in fact and in time you may (if you have the fiber) become able to listen to Stockhausen, let alone Beethoven.

For the moment do what brings rewards and thus do what keeps you interested and motivated to do more. You are not wrong, in fact it is impossible otherwise to want to keep progressing even if listening to too much cheap pop-rock now may adulter your sense of what great music is.

For the first lesson, I want you to play over every column of Modern Chess Openings, including the footnotes. And for the next lesson, I want you to do it again. – Bobby Fischer (advice to his biographer, Frank Brady, who had asked for chess lessons)

Fischer's advice was brilliant. What he was saying was, "Immerse yourself in chess culture." The medium is not important--it could be MCO or a Reinfeld book or (as Yasser Seirawan did it) innumerable blitz games against strong players. The point is to look at a chessboard and absorb patterns.

This debate about ~1700 level players studying openings always seems to treat all openings as a group. But really, they're not. There are openings that require a lot of memorization to be played even at a low level, and there are those that do not. For example, I am about 1700 and I play the Two Knights. This opening requires some knowledge of concrete lines, and if my opponent doesn't have that knowledge, I can often score an easy victory. I have on several occasions. On the other hand, I also play the Panov-Botvinnik attack in response to the Caro-Kann. While at GM level there certainly is a lot of memorization required, I improved my results in this opening mostly by studying IQP positions from Marovic books. But anyone who thinks that even at 1700 level you can get away with playing something like the Dragon without doing some homework is wrong. It's just the nature of the opening. A better argument might be that 1700 players shouldn't play things like the Dragon that require so much memorization, but that's another debate all together.

This debate about ~1700 level players studying openings always seems to treat all openings as a group. But really, they're not. There are openings that require a lot of memorization to be played even at a low level, and there are those that do not. For example, I am about 1700 and I play the Two Knights. This opening requires some knowledge of concrete lines, and if my opponent doesn't have that knowledge, I can often score an easy victory. I have on several occasions. On the other hand, I also play the Panov-Botvinnik attack in response to the Caro-Kann. While at GM level there certainly is a lot of memorization required, I improved my results in this opening mostly by studying IQP positions from Marovic books. But anyone who thinks that even at 1700 level you can get away with playing something like the Dragon without doing some homework is wrong. It's just the nature of the opening. A better argument might be that 1700 players shouldn't play things like the Dragon that require so much memorization, but that's another debate all together.

>Ovidiu, your theory is, as always, provocative, original, and....utterly unsupported by any authoritative source. >

Jon, the original meaning of "ad hominem" was "fallacy in argumentation by appealing not to reason and facts but to what famous, authoritative, persons have said on the subject".

Please don't "insult" me.

========================
Ovidiu, I do not know what the original meaning of "ad hominem" was, but the current meaning is:
(From the Latin)
"against the man" or "against the person."

In other words, Jacobs would have to be directly attacking you (as oopsed to pointing out the supposed weakness or your argument) in order to be engaging in an "ad hominem" fallacy.

The fallacy of the Appeal to Authority is
known as "Ad Verecundiam".

Note that an appeal to authority is a fallacy ONLY when the authority that is cited is not a "legitimate" authority. That is: not qualified to make reliable claims about the subject in debate.

Obviously, we cannot evaluate the qualifications of Jacobs' authorities, since he provides no specific citations. Thus, while Jacobs' claim is certainly plausible, it is not yet convincing.

sdfdsafd

Yes, pirings for 6 and 7 are switched. http://www.chessdom.com says the reason is too many whites, but does not specify. In all cases they comment ALL 4 games, a nice thing to see no one is ignored.

I gave up playing serious chess a while back. But occassionally when I do play, it is quite easy to beat players who have specific opening lines in mind.
AN incredible success rate playing black with this: e4 d5 exd nf6
Rather than waste time studying opening lines, play instead, or even more fun - try some chess variants. (click on link to see)

Good point that some openings (i.e. Dragon, probably 2 Knights from either side, Botvinnik Semi-Slav/aka "Anti-Meran Gambit" from either side, and many others) can be suicidal to play without knowing some lengthy specific variations. So, even 1500-level players probably need to learn enough opening theory to know which mainline openings NOT to play until they've progressed far enough to memorize some theoretical lines.

I recall hearing a Chess in the Schools coach, Joel Yoffie (whose brother Marc represented the US in Student Olympiads in the 1960s, alongside the likes of Rogoff, Soltis, maybe Tarjan), complain about elementary school coaches who allow or encourage their students to play the Dragon, even though White's reflex h4-h5 attack is always decisive against an unbooked opponent.

It's odd to see "chess variants cool" mentioning 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Nf6 as an un-book line. Although not the main line any more, there's plenty of theory on it, and I'm pretty sure it was something of a main line until about 10 or 20 years ago. (Back in those days, many opening theoreticians still felt today's mainline Scandinavian Defense (2...Qxd5) couldn't be quite sound, due to loss of tempo with Queen).

>Ovidiu, I do not know what the original meaning of "ad hominem" was, but the current meaning is:
(From the Latin)
"against the man" or "against the person."

Sure, I was word playing, 'ad hominem' means in Latin "relative to a particular person" (not necessarily against that person or that person necessarily be your opponent in the argument) but it has come to be used by English speakers as "against the person with whom you are arguing".

>Note that an appeal to authority is a fallacy ONLY when the authority that is cited is not a "legitimate" authority.

Yeah, there are all sorts of "experts" in every field.
I have been involved with chess, incuding formal training and regular tournament play, for some 20 years now therefore Jon "should" take my conclusion for granted, religiously so (at least he should if he can not follow my argument and then use his own critical reason to asses its worth, find its flaws, and offer an contra-argument).

>It's odd to see "chess variants cool" mentioning 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Nf6 as an un-book line. Although not the main line any more, there's plenty of theory on it, and I'm pretty sure it was something of a main line until about 10 or 20 years ago.>

Yes, you are right. I recall back 1987 or so prepring 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Nf6 3.d4 Nxd5 4.c4 Nb6 5.Nf3 Bg4 6.Nc3 e5 ( or something, the idea is an early e5 followed by sharp attack in many subvariations even with Qs exchanged, look in Suetin's manual)..I was a 2150 junior player back then but I spent a whole night during a tournament to help a guy (I.L.)preparing the variation. Next day he used it to crush the national junior champ (now the IM Daniel Moldovan and more of a bridge player)..he just caught him of guard with the homework not well done. It was all over in 25 moves or so.

Ovidiu, one of the biggest problems with the Internet is it allows anyone to call themselves an authority with little or no verifiable basis.

I would say that's exactly what you just did in your last paragraph. But in view of the quotes you put around "should," and taking into account that you are a consistent devotee of irony, my best guess is that you meant that last paragraph to be taken ironically -- perhaps, even as a parody of what you took to be my way of thinking.

Just in case you weren't being ironic, or in case other readers might miss the irony, I'll make it clear that the reason I often appeal to authorities in these matters is because many (although far from all) of the issues that get debated here on Dirt require real chess strength to get to a well-informed answer. In the present instance, it would be a combination of real chess strength, teaching experience, and recognized success in chess instruction. I don't have any of those qualities, nor do you, nor do the vast majority of readers here.

So anyone who makes categorical statements that require some widely accepted level of expertise, solely on the basis of his own judgment or authority, should be taken with not a grain of salt, but a bucket.

For instance, if taken at face value, your statement, "I have been involved with chess, incuding formal training and regular tournament play, for some 20 years now," would accord you exactly 50% of the degree of authority I could claim, using the exact same basis you just asserted (number of years involved with chess, including regular tournament play). But I realize this is moot, since I think your statement was not meant to be taken at face value, but as irony.

(My preceding comment relates to Ovidiu's comment 2 up, not the one about 1.e4 d5; our comments crossed in the ether, so to speak)

"But occassionaly when I do play, it is quite easy to beat players who have specific opening lines in mind"

chess variants,

Sure. The better prepared any player is, the easier they are to beat. If I could just get Anand to prepare a few speicific lines against me I'm sure I'd crush him "quite easily". Chess requires work and, in some concrete lines, memorization. If chess variants got popular they would require the same thing. Memorization of openings does not make a player an idiot or even a weaker player--just prepared especially for very specific situations.

Jon wrote:
..Just in case you weren't being ironic..

Of course I was being ironic. Wasn't Fischer an authority well involved with chess by the time when he claimed that he refuted the King's Gambit with his d6/g5 variation ?

When Anand thinks 30 mins for a move, it means trouble for him.

I did not mention 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Nf6 as an 'ubook' line, just a line that most people never study so it is easy playing this line just knowing the above.
The fact is chess is overanalyzed and played out. This is why chess variants are important to continue the tradition of chess before it becomes extinct.
The point I was making is most weaker sub-2000 players are not going to improve much by memorizing openings .
As politically incorrect as it seems there is a maximum rating you could achieve with maximum study and that is limited by your IQ. Just as in math, and science. You can go far in studying but not as far as as a genius.
Why would someone memorize opening lines of a game just to get a few rating points more especially if they are not having fun?

Totally off topic: But i thought you wanted to know that Garry just got a peaceaward in Copenhagen yesterday! The Pundik-price is worth 100.000 Dkr. (1$ = ca.7 Dkr)

Not really that off much topic Morkore.
Didn't Yasser Arafat got the Noble prize for Peace ? It was stolen by Hamas after they took over Gaza few months ago.
Some say that this, since they have one already, at least spares the Oslo committe to immediately considering awarding them one too.

Look at this: "The ICC website is currently off-line, undergoing repairs. Thank you for your patience." Anyone knows what is going on?

Ovidiu, why have you spent all day responding to comments on this chess blog? Do you have nothing better to do?

How about calling ICC incompetent jerks and morons- they cannot manage their own website. Didn’t such a reputable company as ICC need to ensure that during the most important event in the world their servers would work. Or maybe users should ban their services completely. They should perhaps return all users their money, because of misleading inducements to pay for access and then providing only a blank page. Or to initiate a hysterical attack against anyone working at ICC. This would be quite silly and inappropriate, of course.

Start of Audit. There are talks on the streets that ICC does not work at all. End of Audit.

Chess Variants Cool mentioned 1. e4 d5; 2. ed Nf6 as an opening to catch unwary opponents.

I once saw Dzindzi play that OTB in a tournament against someone who was probably a mere master. It worked! After 3. d4 Nd5 (maybe Chess Variants plays 3. . . Bg4?! instead) 4. c4 Nb6, poor white thought that developing either knight was fine, so he played 5. Nc3? after which Dzindzi's 5. . . e5! already gave black the initiative.

While we're on the topic of deviant debuts, does anyone remember GM Joel's book "Baroque Chess Openings"?

r,

I remember thumbing through that book at a used book store a few years ago (the book is probably still there on its dusty little shelf). I remember it being full of fun Bishop Opening-esque openings that resulted in brilliant tactical finishes. Of course, my memory can be as dusty as that shelf was.

Yes Joe, that would be quite silly and inappropriate, given that ICC is not the official games broadcast for the tournament.

ICC is charging their users for live commentaries and games. Even worst. When I pay - I expect to get perfect service. If I do not pay - there are no expectations.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the next World Champion . . . Boris G.!

He's hot.

Yowsir!

Gelfand's book, "My most memorable games" is one of the best I've read.

Is it one of the shortest too?

Ah, Joe, but there we differ. When a service is the official games broadcaster of an event, then I have big expectations. I think that is quite reasonable.

1...e5 is a very powerful move, grabbing a lot of real estate in the town center. It's very strange indeed that the top players are now realizing this. 1...c5 does not intimidate me, but when someone plays 1...e5 on me, I feel cramped. I feel small.

I also recently did my own analysis of how the various Mexico participants have done in the past few years against elite opposition. I found that Boris Gelfand is the only one of the eight who actually does better with Black than White, against 2700+ opponents. If you just look at performance with Black, Gelfand and Anand are the two participants who play with 2775+ strength. With the white pieces in the last few years, Gelfand has only played at about 2640-2650 strength against elite opponents. So if Gelfand has found a way to play much stronger with the white pieces (and his two wins so far have been with White) then he will truly be a force to be reckoned with.

Leko on why he played 2.Bc4 : "In the Russian [Petroff] all the lines are practically by force worked out till the draw."

http://www.chesscenter.com/twic/event/mex07/rd5.html

I've always imagined that the main reason club players are so much more interested in studying openings than endings is because they find it more enjoyable. And why not?

From that point of view, the fact that opening theory exists is a strength rather than a weakness of the game.

>I've always imagined that the main reason club players are so much more interested in studying openings than endings is because they find it more enjoyable.

A piece of tautological thinking from rdh. One can also say that the main reason for anyone being interested in what he moves is because losing sucks and wining pleases.
The first chess lesson typically is being mated with 4.Qf7#..after that you do no longer doubt that you have to study openings if you want to play the endgame, as bad as you club opponents but nonetheless with equal chances.

Hi Paul,

Perhaps Mexican organizers made a mistake for not charging spectators, but let ICC and Chessbase to make money on their live games instead. Mexicans invested millions of dollars in prize fund and organization, only for ICC to get new subscribers and Chessbase to make ducats. It would be OK for each organizer to charge for live games, so those funds could be invested towards better spectator experience, like content, web-developers, commentators. This would create fair service expectations. It is not acceptable that ICC server was down when you pay for services, as users could ask for disbursement. It is even less acceptable to hysterically yell at ICC all over the web about it, as they are one of a few companies in chess which help chess players.

>Perhaps Mexican organizers made a mistake for not charging spectators>

Absolutely, such decision only sends the message that the thing ain't of any worth.

http://www.chessbase.com/news/2007/mexico/anand06.jpg

This image from chessbase made me curious.

Does any other player have a sponsorship obligation? No one else in the elite chess world seem to be wearing logos

Like ericclapnot, I too found Vishy's NIIT shirt a bit jarring (http://www.niit.com/vishy/). Somehow for chess it seems tacky, but who can blame Vishy for making a living?

I'm not looking forward to the day when super GMs show up to play slathered in brands like NASCAR drivers.

Sure, Gelfand could make big bucks by signing a contract and rocking a pair of Speedos at the board. But where's the dignity in that?

"While we're on the topic of deviant debuts, does anyone remember GM Joel's book 'Baroque Chess Openings'?"

I remember that one from the public library when I was a kid. I don't remember most of it, except that Joel liked Stonewall setups and also joked that the perfect chess game was 1. d3 d6 Draw.

"While we're on the topic of deviant debuts, does anyone remember GM Joel's book 'Baroque Chess Openings'?"

I remember that one from the public library when I was a kid. I don't remember most of it, except that Joel liked Stonewall setups and also joked that the perfect chess game was 1. d3 d6 Draw.

r posted, at 09.22: "Sure, Gelfand could make big bucks by signing a contract and rocking a pair of Speedos at the board. But where's the dignity in that?"

I suspect the Speedo marketing agency might pay Gelfand NOT to wear the product. The threat of wearing Speedos might be stronger than the execution.

The Mig roller-coaster: that's why we love him so much!

Yesterday, he relays Kaspy's undignified comments, which in turn elicit a truckful of other undignified comments by kibbitzers and Mig alike.

Today, he comes up with an insightful, fully research piece, doubtless his best in weeks, which in turn elicit a comment by the great Jeff Sonas and other insightful (and some less insightful, I have to admit) comments by kibbitzers.

Keep up the good work, Mig!

"While we're on the topic of deviant debuts, does anyone remember GM Joel's book 'Baroque Chess Openings'?"

_Baroque Chess OPenings_ (subititled "How to play your betters at chess") was by an amateur named Richard Wincour. Fun book, though perhaps not hugely useful. GM Joel wrote a book called _Unorthodox Openings_ with Eric Schiller, and it was... well, each of them has done better work. It had some funny moments, though.

Thanks for the correction, ed g.