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Subject: Re: CM8000 or the beta version should Participate in WMCCC

Author: Michael Cummings

Date: 02:58:37 08/12/00

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On August 12, 2000 at 02:16:24, Uri Blass wrote:

>On August 12, 2000 at 01:57:51, Michael Cummings wrote:
>
>>On August 11, 2000 at 23:10:31, Uri Blass wrote:
>>
>>>On August 11, 2000 at 18:09:24, Fernando Villegas wrote:
>>>
>>>>On August 11, 2000 at 07:44:50, Vincent Diepeveen wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>On August 10, 2000 at 21:51:15, Jorge Pichard wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>It is a pity that with so many Chessmaster followers, the King Version 3.0 or
>>>>>>CM8000 beta will not be participatingin the WMCCC.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Pichard.
>>>>>
>>>>>Apart from the fact that i don't give it a single % chance to finish #1
>>>>>there, if you pay $500 entry fee, i'm sure Johan will participate.
>>>>>I guess that johan doesn't join because chessmaster doesn't pay
>>>>>his entry fee, otherwise he probably would have a shot at joining.
>>>>>
>>>>>$500 entry fee is quite a lot. I'm secretary of a big chessclub.
>>>>>We organize a lot of tournaments. With $500 entry fee i could live
>>>>>quietly the rest of my life.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Money is not the reason. 500 bucks maybe are a lot for you, but not for a
>>>>company. The reason is they are going to deliver CM8000 in a couple of months or
>>>>so they cannot take the risk to get even a second place. How much people could
>>>>be disappointed because of that and instead of purchasing CM would purchase the
>>>>winner? OK, not too many people as much CM aims to mass market, that does not
>>>>even knows about the tour, but even so why they should expend even just 500 to
>>>>lose only 10 customers from the professional niche? For what?
>>>>Fernando
>>>
>>>I think that at least the same number of people are going to buy chessmaster if
>>>it get the second place and are not going to buy chessmaster if it does not
>>>play.
>>>
>>>Second place is a good result and people can buy more than one program.
>>>If it does not play people may think that it is weak and not buy it.
>>>
>>>Uri
>>
>>But would the King engine he be using be the same as that in CM8K, Probably not.
>>Its not as though the CM8K program would be used either, or the interface I
>>mean. So the engine would most likely be tweaked and changed and nothing like
>>what we would see.
>>
>>But on the other hand the mass market would not know the finer details. People
>>who know nothing about chess or computerchess are still jumping up and down
>>because they now think that chess programs are better than humans, since the DB
>>defeat of kasparov.
>>
>>You do not know how many people I have heard who know very little about chess,
>>think they can walk into a store and but a chess program capable of beating the
>>best player in the world with 100% accuracy.
>
>The question is what the buyers of chess programs think and not what people who
>are not interested at chess think.
>
>I think that most of the buyers of chessmaster will not be influenced by results
>of chessmaster6000 in WMCCC
>Some buyers may be influenced.
>
>Fernando claimed that this minority will not buy chessmaster if it is in the
>second place.
>
>I think that this minority may also buy chessmaster if it is in the second place
>and not buy it if it does not play.
>
>Uri

I do not think it matters too much. Apart from here, I have never seen anything
in the major media here about any results from any big computer chess
tournament. Let alone human tournament.

I live in Sydney, which is the mecca of Australia, everything happens and gets
shown here. 2.7 million people live in Sydney and the surrounding area.

I know many people who own chessmaster, and with most of them it just sits
gathering dust. You ask any of them what the world computer chess championship
is ? They would not know. Ask them what Rebel, Shredder, Fritz is. They would
say 'who ?' , I know cause I have asked such questions.

Ask them to say something on computer chess, and you know what they tell me,
they tell me about Chessmaster, and they know that DB beat Kasparov, cause
unless we have a 7 year old chess prodigy coming to visit (which will not be
major news, but maybe shoved at the end of the news bulletin as one of those 5
second human interest stories.) Then you aint likely to hear anything.

I have cable TV here. I get CNN, BBC, and a whole heap of other news broadcasts
from around the world, during the last WCCC99, I did happen to see CNN give a 10
second mention and flash a picture of the winner on the screen for 3 seconds,
before moving on.

You have to realise, that even people who are interested in computer chess, are
mainly like that because they have gone to their local department store and
picked up a version of chessmaster, cause it is the only chess program compared
to the other trash (not including pro chess programs) that is there and looks
good.

Its no use asking your computer chess friends who are also on the internet and
know about this. There are more people out there who just buy the program and
run it and play. And do not care how strong the program is, other than the fact
the box said that it is strong.

Our little computer chess world and the environment that we play in, is probably
0.05% of the whole chessmaster market. The rest is made up of people who just
buy the thing and play with it for a few hours then it gathers dust for the rest
of its life.

I know I used to be one of them. It was not until I got on the net and happened
along this place when looking for a board and pieces, did I start to get into
this more.

As you can tell by the members here and else where, we are not big numbers, we
may think we are, but 99% of the people I know who play chess, could not give a
damn that I can talk and post to people like Bob Hyatt, Ed, and all the other
great chess programmers, they could not give a stuff. But all of them have at
one time or another owned or played with chessmaster.



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