Author: Mike S.
Date: 03:21:56 01/26/04
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Another Fidelity story from the late 1970s: In Vienna, Austria, to my suprise I saw chess computers in the shop windows of "Viennatone", a small company which produced hearing aid devices. Strange. Much later, I found out what the reason was: The Viennatone hearing aids were imported into the USA by a company called Fidelity in Miami, run by Sidney Samole. Obviously this was his main business before he had the idea to produce chess computers. Btw. that was inspired by a star trek tv sequel, in which Spock talks utter nonsense about chess programming (nevertheless that was the ignition spark for computerchess available for everybody!). But that was why it was called Fidelity. Then they sent back chesscomputers in the other direction :-) I remember trying my first game against a chesscomputer in the electronics corner of a tool shop. I think it was against a Chess Challenger 7 or 8. I lost because of a mistake, allowing my opponent a 3 ply deep sacrifice combination. So I saw these toys could actually play chess. So, computerchess as it exists now in practise, is partially spock-based and also has - like many intelligent creations - roots in Vienna, Austria. We invented psychoanalysis, 4-wheel roller skates, Manner wafers, and helped invent chess computers. :-)) Regards, M.Scheidl
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