ChessBase Christmas Study 2018

My friend Steffen Slumstrup Nielsen has accompanied one of his 2017 studies with a nice Christmas story to make the ChessBase Christmas Study for this year.

Now I am not entirely neutral, as I mediated the contact, but personally I recommend reading it here:
https://en.chessbase.com/post/a-christmas-study

The readers named Eva Nemcova should notice the dedication is to a woman of that name in Steffen's country Denmark. So it's not the Czech basketball star.

[Short story] A special night

(Note that I also have published this on Reddit today. It was originally uploaded an published on my Dropbox on 8 January 2018 but probably nobody read it there.)


The following story is inspired by true events.

-----

Andrew sat down. He was an old man, proud of the life he had lived. There were certainly a few regrets, but all in all his both grandchildren visiting him tonight were proof enough that this fateful night he would tell them about really had its good.

He started talking about his youth, how he went to school, about his parents who had died a few years ago, prior to him telling the story, but after his grandchildren were born. They screamed a short "greatgramma" and "greatgramps" but then continued to listen. It was a time of political tensions, and when an assassination took place on the Balkans, in a town called Sarajevo, the world turned to war. It was in the first year of war that Andrew was conscripted.

Andrew spared a lot of details about the conscription, they would not matter. What mattered was that a few weeks after the conscription, winter had come over the battlefield. In the cold of night, they were fighting to the last drop of blood, a war that lost its humanity. The enemy was a countless horde of man, but so was their own. They ran out of ammunition, the front line provided no warmth during the fight and it raged until deeply in the night. Finally the ammunition was out. They made it look like they still had ammo, but they had used too much for the week. Of course more was on the way, but it would only arrive the next morning. It was cold and dark and the enemy was everywhere. Some time went by but then the enemy started to notice there was only sporadic fire coming from them, and eventually no fire came at all. Two courageous Germans finally went out of their holes, coming closer. They had the guns in their hand. They came to Andrew, and he was sure this was the end.

The children heard the story for the first time, their shocked expression was clearly visible. "But then", Andrew continued, "a miracle happened." One of the soldiers pointed the gun down at Andrew, ready to shoot. The other one reached out his hand and gestured Andrew to follow. They would take him as prisoner, he was sure. Would they torture him now? They brought him to a tent, he had to sit down. It was rather warm inside, a small fire was burning. Then one of the Germans took a wooden box and opened it. They offered it to Andrew. Was that tobacco? The other guy reached him a bracket of chocolate. Was that poison? Reluctantly Andrew let it melt in his mouth, but he refused to smoke.

He didn't understand what was the reason for the Germans' behavior when they showed him their clock. He only understood when they started to sing, and in his own language he fell into the chorus: "Sleep in Heavely Peace. Sleep in Heavenly Peace."
Just like it was today when he told his grandchildren the story, it was that time to celebrate something bigger than all the differences of mankind. It was something that could stop a war. It was Christmas.

There is nothing new under the sun

Discovering a masterful battle of the rook against queen, Martin Minski and I gladly sent it to a tourney in Azerbaijan.

Siegfried Hornecker & Martin Minski

Dedicated to Klaus Rubin

ŞAHMAT BƏSTƏÇİLİYİ–15 YUBİLEY YARIŞI, 2018
Special Prize [final award]

White to move and win

1.Sf7+ Ke6 2.Ke8 g2 3.Sf7 Rh8+ 4.S:f8 g1Q

 5.Re4+! Kd6 6.Rc4! Ke6 7.Sf7 Qg2 8.Ra4! Qe2 9.Rb4! Qe3 10.Rb2!! (zugzwang) 10.-f5 11.Rg2! f4 12.Rg6 mate

A great study, very well worthy of the second prize given, if there was not, as found by Sergiy Didukh... (PS, 30 December 2018: but it received the Special Prize in the final award!)

Peter Krug

The Problemist, March 2013

White to move and win

1.Sf7! Be7+ 2.R:e7 Q:g4 3.Bh3! Q:h3

4.Rc7! Qg2 5.Ra7! Qf1 6.Ra2! (zugzwang) 6.-g5 7.Rh2 Qb1 8.Rf2+ Kg6 9.Se5+ Kh5 10.Rh2 mate

With this, our study, which is superior to Krug's setting, has only the bare minimum of existential right, but sadly no justification for any award. What a horrible coincidence!

But why was the dedication to Klaus Rubin?

Siegfried Hornecker

White to move and win (incorrect)

Original publication

Not: 1.S:c7? Q:b5+! 2.S:b5 B:d5 3.Sf7+ Kf4!! (3.-K:e6? 4.Sd4 mate!) 4.e7 Bc6+ 5.Kd8 B:b5 6.Sd6 Bc6 7.Sc4 Kf5! 8.Sb6 Ke6 draws

1.Sf7+! Kf4 2.Rb4+! Kf5 3.S:c7 B:d5 4.S:d5 K:e6 5.Se3! (or 5.Se7) Qf3 6.Rb6+ Qc6+ 7.R:c6 mate

Symbiosis of checkmate in try and solution. 

But Klaus Rubin, on testing, claimed that 2.Rc5! also wins. Upon further examination, I found the variation 2.-Qg1! 3.Rc4+ Kf5 4.S:c7 B:d5 5.S:d5 K:e6 6.Se7!, and the study now of the Azerbaijan tourney is reached, after 7.Sf7 there.

So seeing this idea, Martin Minski developed a great foreplay, leading up to the duel of rook against queen. Sadly, now it turned out to be anticipated.

"There is nothing new under the sun", the proverb says. But also not anymore on the chessboard?


PS, 30 December 2018: The original study for SB15 has received a Special Prize now. The text above is amended to tell this.

Selected Studies #01 - Stalemate Avoidance

I will start a new column here in which I offer studies to solve from time to time. You can post your solution idea in the comments.

We start with a study which is by Martin Minski and me.

This is taken from the new book of the late Mark Dvoretzky and Oleg Pervakov, page 150: "Etiud i partija ediny". Biblioteka FSHR. Moscow 2018. ISBN 978-5-907077-03-4

Martin Minski & Siegfried Hornecker

"Studies for practical players" tourney 2017, commendation

White to move and win

Israel, Arabia and the neverending chess controversy

With many thanks to a German chess official whose deep knowledge, this time in form of the following link, was shared with me quickly after sending him a nightly e-mail, I can present the following question to readers:
Why is Russia allowed, despite Ukrainians not feeling good going there, to host a World Chess Championship, but Saudi Arabia is denied the same for excluding Israeli players?

Original German link:
https://perlenvombodensee.wordpress.com/2018/12/03/schiffeversenken-im-schwarzen-meer-schnellschach-in-russland/

Google Translate link:
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fperlenvombodensee.wordpress.com%2F2018%2F12%2F03%2Fschiffeversenken-im-schwarzen-meer-schnellschach-in-russland%2F
(Note that "World Championship" is wrongly translated as "World Cup")

[German] Israel, Arabien und die nimmerendende Schach-Kontroverse

Dank einem mit fundiertem Wissen aufwartenden Schachfunktionär, der auf meine nächtliche E-Mail zum Thema den folgenden Link geschickt hat, kann ich die Frage an Leser weitergeben:
Warum darf Russland die Schachweltmeisterschaft ausrichten, obwohl dort Ukrainer sehr ungern hingehen werden, jedoch Saudi-Arabien nicht, da es Israelis die Einreise verbietet?

https://perlenvombodensee.wordpress.com/2018/12/03/schiffeversenken-im-schwarzen-meer-schnellschach-in-russland/

New FIDE creates new Women World Chess Championship cycle [Press release reprint]

FIDE Women's World Championship Cycle

Press release
FIDE and the newly elected President, Mr. Arkady Dvorkovich, consider the development of women's chess to be one of their most important priorities. We believe that this goal can be achieved by increasing the number of elite tournaments for women and by establishing a coherent and logical system to the Women’s World Championship cycle. We are pleased to note that the first official steps in this direction have been taken.
According to the existing regulations, in 2019 there should have been a Women’s World Championship match between the current winner of the 2018 Women’s World KO Championship and the winner of the FIDE Women`s Grand Prix Series 2017-2018. Unfortunately, the previous FIDE leadership were unable to hold the Grand Prix series, thus threatening the 2019 Women`s World Championship match entirely.
It is therefore why the newly elected FIDE leadership have taken the necessary decision to hold the Women’s Candidates Tournament in the first half of 2019. The winner will then earn the right to play a match against the reigning Women’s World Champion. At the last Presidential Board meeting, FIDE reinforced its support for women’s chess by increasing the prize fund of the Women’s World Championship from €200,000 to a record-breaking €500,000.
FIDE has prepared amendments to the 2020 Women`s World Championship Cycle and subject to approval the new structure will look like this:

• Women's Candidates Tournament – first half of 2019.
  
• Women's World Championship Match – between the winner of FIDE World Women's KO Championship and the winner of Women's Candidates – end of 2019.
  
• FIDE Women's grand prix – to be launched and conducted in 2019-2020.
  
• Women's knockout world Cup – to replace Women's KO World Championship with the same financial terms: August 2020.
  
• Women's Candidates Tournament – 2021 etc...

We would like to stress that the prize fund of the new Women`s World Cup will be no less than the prize fund of the current Women`s KO World Championship. All players who are qualified for the Women's World Championship 2020 will automatically proceed to the Women's World Cup 2020 and retain all rights.
We believe that, not only will the new Women’s World Championship cycle guarantee a new range of top-level events but will also bring it in line with the World Championship cycle. FIDE is already working with potential organizers to secure future locations.
FIDE is fully committed to its pledges to make positive reforms. We recognize that there may be some transitional issues, but in the end, having a clear system can only be a huge benefit to chess.
Together we will make chess better.

Bidding procedure for the FIDE Women’s Candidates Tournament 2019

1. FIDE is opening a bidding procedure for the FIDE Women’s Candidates Tournament 2019
2. Each bid shall contain the following particulars as minimum:
a) Proposed exact place and dates of the event.
b) Proposed tournament venue.
c) Proposed prize fund for the players (minimum 200,000 euros should be offered net of any applicable local taxes).
d) The contribution to FIDE (net of any applicable local taxes and not less than 20% of the prize fund in addition to the prize fund).
e) Commitment to cover all financial obligations to FIDE, including all the stipends.
f) Commitment to cover all organizational costs, in accordance with the regulations of the event.
g) Category of official hotel (minimum 4 stars), and its name, with special room rates including meals.
h) A statement that the applicant accepts the regulations of the event without any reservations.
i) An invitation for at least two members of the GSC to inspect the proposed venue and examine the other conditions, with all travel and hotel expenses paid by the bidder.
j) The applicant's name, signatures and authentication
k) Letters of support from the national federation and relevant local authorities.
3. A bid is considered valid if it is accompanied with a non-refundable Bid Fee of 1,000 euros payable to FIDE.
4. With effect from 1st January 2013, a bid for any FIDE Competitions onwards shall include the name of a FIDE licensed International Organizer.
5. All bids should be submitted by the due date in sealed envelope or scanned documents to the FIDE Secretariat, postal address: 9 Syggrou Avenue, 11743 Athens - Greece / Fax: (+30) 2109212859 / Email: office@fide.com by 15th December 2018, 16:00 local time (UTC/GMT + 2 hours).

Wish we had a videocock affair!

If only Nixon would have been at the Hancock Hotel instead of the Watergate Hotel...

The new FIDE? President Dvorkovic elected, what does it mean?

The era of Kirsan Ilyumzhinov is over as president of the FIDE which is regarded as "World Chess Federation" but declares itself as "International Chess Federation". In the era upcoming where Mars is about to be colonized - what a time to live in! - this can become an important distintion, as by its title the FIDE could also be the head of chess federations on the Mars. This, however, will be something to be thought about in the next ten or so years until the projects start.

Today we will talk about the end of the Kirsan era. Kirsan was a man of great political power, but so is Dvorkovic. Mr. Dvorkovic is a (former?) high Russian politician, now president of the FIDE. That chess and politics can go very well is proven by the former Serbian sports minister Alisa Maric (yes, the strong chess master!) and of course by Sersch Sargsjan / Serzh Sargsyan (apologies for probably misspelling the name, as I can't transcribe Armenian, so I use the Wikipedia transcription). As head of the Armenian Chess Federation, the Prime Minister of Armenia (now former) has developed the chess to the level where Armenians won great international tourneys, including the Chess Olympiad, if I remember it correctly.

Everyone is aware that I am an opponent of Kirsan, but FIDE also profited from Kirsan. As Donald Trump has shown - whom I don't want to compare to Kirsan except for the brilliancy as businessman - the great politics led by businessmen can be very impressive, yet also controversial. As president of Kalmykia, Kirsan has built Chess City in Elista, he has shown to be a man whose love to chess is great and rich, and he has collected many sponsors all around the world. But the shadow also lies in those connections, as Kirsan was friends with many dictators, including a rapist of children as young as 16 years old. Now, I believe strongly that Kirsan was not aware of that, but he must have been aware that his friend violated human rights, the Libyan Muammar al-Gaddafi. Furthermore one of Kirsan's banks does business with the pedosexual organisation Da'esh (also known under their propaganda name "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" and under a name that insults the family of Egyptian gods who are holding the power of life and death, namely the sister of Osiris, Isis. Oh, what a shame to see their names be as much abused as the swastika, the holy symbol of protection, was by Hitler and his band of rascals!

In any case, I believe strongly that Kirsan, be he an unscrupulous businessman, is not in his deepest heart one of evil. He is not a good man either, but - in terms of the D&D alignment system - rather on the (true) "Neutral" stance. His interviews given many years ago show that he is searching for the spiritual truth and has not found it yet. He does what he feels he should do, without consideration for the ethical values, but also without the drive to do evil. Unfortunately that brought FIDE in the situation where it is connected with such people who indeed are evil. Kirsan knows them of the both sides, the evil and the good, and this is the critique I must uphold against him. His personality brought FIDE dark clouds, which were recognized when he was forbidden from holding any more power in the FIDE. But with him likely many sponsors will go.

Mr. Dvorkovic is influential, I don't know about his personality, but he will have a rough start. He has the task of showing strength while also being diplomatic and at the same time acquiring new - or old - sponsors for the FIDE. His tests to come will decide if FIDE will prosper, and unfortunately it will also affect the chess composition, which thankfully receives a small funding by the FIDE, as well as the sponsorship for the FIDE World Cup (not to be confused with the game tourney of the same name) where composers can receive FIDE cerficates and small money prizes - big in the composing world.

Kirsan once said, he will go to the monastery when the time has come to stay there for a few weeks. Maybe now is the time, he can re-orient his life. Whatever the case, I want to lay aside my differences and wish Kirsan that he finds the spiritual truth, that he truly meets the love of God, which he is searching, and that he will see the consequences in what he will do in the future to contribute to a strong and prospering Kalmykia and Chess City, and to promote the chess and the kindness to many people.

As for Mr. Dvorkovic, I wish him the strength, the power and the luck to fulfill his difficult task. Maybe we are of one family - gens una sumus - but only the family's eldest and his close workers can do what is necessary now. God bless Kirsan and Mr. Dvorkovic! And God bless the FIDE and give the wisdom to the officials to now prepare a golden future, not to let go of the prosperity that Kirsan has brought!

For me, my personal battle is over. I can make peace. Will there be more to come, then only again for the best of chess - or what I believe to be it. In that stance, I am "Chaotic Good". I speak out when necessary. I put myself on the line. But I hope to do it for the best and not be blinded. Good people can do bad things, and bad people can do good things - against their intention. At least I did not offer money for rat tails to get rid of a rat plague, as it once was done by the British in India, I think. It only led to breeding more rats in order to receive the money for the tails, making the problem worse. Unforeseen consequences...

Stelian Lamba (3.ix.1936-13.vi.2018)

It is very sad that I learnt today about the death of several great composers. Stelian Lamba was publisher of the Romanian magazine Euxinus Pontus for which I was working as editor for endgame studies for several years until I felt I was unable to do the work in a satisfying fashion and asked for stepping down, which he had granted.

Now I didn't know Mr. Lamba in person, but I think that the great enthusiast George Teodoru, who recently turned 86 and who had back in the days organized our first contact, would have a lot to tell if he would write an obituary. If we happen to see one online, we will link it here later.

SOTM update (and a small rant)

I talked to my contact at ChessBase about the implications of the new EU copyright directive, should it be also upheld in the Spring 2019 election. Even if the directive - which I oppose, as it is a horrible blow for the rights of the free press and would essentially enforce for example Google to not link to any news websites anymore on its search engine and Google News (why should they pay money for it if they can just unlink media that try to blackmail them?) - is passed, the future of SOTM is safe.

United Airlines Flight 93 Memorial Service with President Trump

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLIBvZYJp0g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQBMaWAxxUE

On one Tuesday in September, 17 years ago, 40 heroes sacrificed their lives to save the lives of many others.

Christian Adams
Lorraine G. Bay
Todd M. Beamer
Alan Anthony Beaven
Mark Bingham
Deora Frances Bodley
Sandy Waugh Bradshaw
Marion R. Britton
Thomas E. Burnett, Jr.
William Joseph Cashman
Georgine Rose Corrigan
Patricia Cushing
Captain Jason M. Dahl
Joseph DeLuca
Patrick Joseph Driscoll
Edward Porter Felt
Jane C. Folger
Colleen L. Fraser
Andrew (Sonny) Garcia
Jeremy Logan Glick
Kristin Osterholm White Gould
Lauren Catuzzi Grandcolas
Donald Freeman Greene
Wanda Anita Green
Linda Gronlund
Richard J. Guadagno
LeRoy Homer
Toshiya Kuge
CeeCee Ross Lyles
Hilda Marcin
Waleska Martinez
Nicole Carol Miller
Louis J. Nacke II
Donald Arthur Peterson
Jean Hoadley Peterson
Mark David Rothenberg
Christine Ann Snyder
John Talignani
Honor Elizabeth Wainio
Deborah Jacobs Welsh

For the forgotten victims of the 11 September putsch and it's aftermath

Stay strong and fight on! The truth must be revealed!
45 years later, the perpetrators still can be brought to justice!

Ohrid 2018 photos

Branislav Djurasević has uploaded the photos of the WCCC in Ohrid 2018, and shared the link in the MatPlus forum.
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1D6KBmJvlMTxHHrQ65Cew4kmYojJlm7wi

The undying Nissl/Davidson hoax

I have received a mail by a chess friend alleging once more that the famous Nissl rundlauf was anticipated by Davidson. As Michael McDowell with confirmation of Alain Godbout has reported many years ago, the position (solution see link) is a Nissl original, not anticipated by Davidson in 1899.

Dear Caissa, let's lay this rumor to rest finally!

Theodor Nissl

Akademische Monatshefte für Schach 1910

White to move and mate in 6 moves

My statement about Kirsan comes at earliest in October

As everyone knows, I was not a friend of Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. Now I have read he lost his presidency of the FIDE last month. I will write a statement once the new FIDE president is in office after the October election (currently Makropoulos is acting president).

I am just glad to lay this to rest after so many years!

Fact Check I: (WRONG) Was a 7yo Israeli girl denied access to a World Chess Championship in Tunisia?

The Times of Israel has published an article on 21 July claiming a 7yo Israeli girl was not allowed to participate in the rapid WCh in Tunisia.
Thanks to an informant who wants to remain anonymous it was found out that this information was plain wrong. The tournament there is a privately organized tournament. There was not a FIDE sanctioned event, let alone a World Chess Championship.

We can at the time not confirm if or if not a 7yo Israeli girl was denied entry to that private event, but even if so we would be unable to know the reasons for that (there could be safety reasons, worries for her, not wanting such a young girl to play far away from home, not necessarily an anti-Israeli motivation). However, I believe that a private organizer has the right to choose whom he wants to let participate, meaning even in the event that she was denied participation there would in my opinion be no obvious violation of FIDE guidelines.

So the Times of Israel article is WRONG!
https://www.timesofisrael.com/7-year-old-chess-champ-cant-compete-in-tunisia-tourney-because-shes-israeli/

Many thanks to the informant for the investigation!


Update, 6 August 2018: I was sent the following article:
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/tunisia-backtracks-allows-israeli-child-to-compete-in-chess-tourney-1.6342006
The child now is allowed to participate. Again, this is no official FIDE event and we don't know the reasoning of the organizers to not let her play at first or why that decision was changed.

[GERMAN] Hornecker-Studie bei Huschenbeth

Wie mir gestern Abend Martin Minski mitgeteilt hat, hat Niclas Huschenbeth eine sehr schöne Kleinigkeit von uns in einem seiner Youtube-Videos mit dem Titel "Unglaubliche Studien #12" besprochen. Der Hamburger Großmeister Huschenbeth war zunächst - neben Videos für einen großen Online-Schachservice - für seine Serie "Unglaubliche Züge" bekannt, in der er genialste Züge aus echten Schachpartien präsentiert. Nachdem Martin Minski einen jener Züge gesehen hatte, entstand eine Gemeinschaftsstudie der beiden daraus, die zur Grundlage für Huschenbeths Studien-Anthologievideoserie wurde.

Weitere Links:
Unglaubliche Züge (Playlist)
Unglaubliche Studien (Playlist)
Remarkeble Games and Moments (Playlist, englisch)

The mysterious Ephraim Halpern murder (10,000 Deutsche Mark offered as of 1984)

Apologies for something different, but this bothers me since I first learned about it in December 2017.

In September 1983, the Israeli citizen Ephraim Halpern was murdered in Hamburg. The murder weapon was a Wehrmacht gun P38 with the serial number "80 10 e". The gun was found together with two magazines in a trash bin. Police in Hamburg asks who is in possession of a Wehrmacht pistol P38 with a nearby serial number.
As of  December 2017, the Ludwigsburg Central for solving National Socialist crimes has had no lists of Wehrmacht gun serial numbers.

Ephraim Halpern supposedly was involved with secret services and gun deals, but it is unclear if this is true. What is known is that he worked for the SGH Spezial Gerätebau in Hamburg, a daughter of the Tadiran Isräl Electronics Ltd., Tel Aviv. The company is specialized in electronics and weapons, having fulfilled contacts for the (West) German Army "Bundeswehr". Prior to leading this business, Halpern was a Major of the Israeli Air Force.
Halpern likely worked for the MOSSAD. He might have been killed as a retribution for the killing of Saki El Selou. A few weeks prior to his murder he also met with arms dealers in Vienna, according to a 2017 book "The Secret War Against The Jews" by John Loftus and Mark Aarons.

The possibility exists that this is one of the last nazi crimes in Germany, so if you are able to provide any information, please contact the police in Hamburg. If this is not a nazi crime, it might be related to international terrorism.

Address: Caffamacherreihe 4, 20355 Hamburg, Germany

Phone: +49 (0)40 428670777

Do not contact me (this might put my life into danger) nor post in the comments but directly contact the police. You likely can also contact your local police and they will forward the information to Hamburg. If it is true that Halpern is a former MOSSAD agent, you might also want to contact the police in Israel.

Address: Public Complaints Unit, 91 Herzl Street, The Government Complex Building, Ramla 7243003, Israel

Email: tlunot@police.gov.il

(Some of the information here is taken by the internet and marked as speculative as far as the sources might not be reliable. Other information is taken from the German TV show "Aktenzeichen XY... ungelöst" of 11 May 1984. As this might be a nazi crime, I have a personal ethical interest that the perpetrators are caught.)

EDIT, 15 July 2019:
Maybe it is helpful to link to sources:
SGH Spezial Gerätebau, Germany
"The Secret War against the Jews", allegation of meeting with arms dealers

Other links that were not used back then as sources:
Probably a German conspiracy theory publication, with newspaper clipping on the last page
(Important info from there: "Kommando 17. September", a Palestinean terror organisation, says they killed Halpern, he was 37 years old, he supposedly - according to the terrorists - was a former Israeli Air Force officer and was killed in front of his apartment - source: dpa - no mention of where they'd have gotten the gun from, so that might be a false confession)

I don't remember what other sources I did or didn't use. Should have written them down back then. But most info not found there or in "Aktenzeichen XY" is to be doubted.

Harlan Ellison (27.v.1934 - 27.vi.2018)

At the age of 84, the legendary writer has died in his sleep last night.

I have a mouth, and I want to scream!

About project "Study of the Month"

I have sent my annual report to the WFCC president and the president of the Subcommittee for Endgame Studies in the WFCC yesterday. I believe the project "Study of the Month", which is hosted by ChessBase, is a great success, and although not many people comment on it, I have the unofficial comments per e-mail that tell me that the chess composers are reading it, they enjoy it, and they are unfortunately too polite to tell what should be changed when it should.

For this year, i.e. 2018, we have undertaken the historical examination.We have shown several early composers, and will continue to do so. For December a special christmas issue is already in the works, but details can't be given yet.

The articles about the following main topics were published in 2018 so far:


January: Alexey Troitzky
February: Platov brothers
March: Kubbel brothers
April: Nikolay Grigoriev (extensive)
May: Chess Studies; or: Endings of Games

The following topic is scheduled for June, to be published on June 30.
Henri Rinck

So far only very famous composers have been covered, but those are incidentally the most important figures. I am worried about the new EU copyright directive, as it might prevent the re-use of still copyrighted endgame studies for educational and scientific purposes without permission of untracable heirs. History might end with the studies of people who died in 1947 then. This would be a horrible cultural holocaust. (Link in German, as there is no English article fitting.)

PraggnANANDhaa Rameshbabu is grandmaster!

https://en.chessbase.com/post/praggnanandhaa-a-game-away-from-becoming-a-grandmaster

"Pragg" (* 10 August 2005), as he is often called, has received his third norm in the small Italian village Ortisei. Congratulations!

Satire: How I became World Chess Champion

You certainly have heard of the World Chess Championship 2018. World Champion Bogolblanca had to fight against me. With new FIDE rules, it was a "best of 10". The first game went like this:

Bogolblanca - Hornecker
World Chess Championship 2018, game 1
1.f4
Bogolblanca plays the Bird opening, but I have prepared the Englund gambit, to which I want to continue 2.f:e5 f6.
1.-e5 2.g4!
Bogolblanca offered an interesting gambit. I was shocked. I had never seen anyone play this opening before, and I was a master for over 30 years now. So what was to be done there?
2.-e:f4
Of course, a gambit can mostly be refuted by taking the pawn. The game went on:
3.Sf3! h5 4.g5 Be7 5.h4 d5 6.d3 Bd6
I thought to be safely a pawn up by now.
7.Bg2 Se7 8.Sd4 Sg6 9.B:d5 f3 10.e4 c6 11.g6!! S:g6 12.B:f7+!!
Needless to say, I lost in a few more moves. I analyzed the variation and after an easy draw with White in the second game he played it again. I managed to hold this time. The further games ended in draws, and after game 5 the colors were switched. Finally, in the last night of the match I found a surprising refutation of his gambit.

Bogolblanca - Hornecker
World Chess Championship 2018, game 10
1.f4 e5 2.g4
Now I presented my refutation of this gambit, after which, as you know from the press, even the most stubborn of grandmasters ceased to play it.
2.-Qh4 mate with a small advantage I converted into a full point.

The tie-break match went nice for me, but after a blunder it went into the Armageddon game. As I had Black and had to win the game, my experience with crisis situations came in handy. The venue was robbed during our game, and just as I was about to be checkmated, the robbers broke into our playing room. I quickly made a move, and my opponent didn't realize he was to move as he had to hold his arms up. I paid the robbers nicely afterwards and kept his watch as a memento. Wait, I was not supposed to write this. How can I delete this text?


[EDIT: Somehow I messed up the moves in the first game and can't seem to "recover my thoughts" for the original game. So if you have any clues what I left out, please let me know. I think White castled  kingside and played Sc3, and Black also did something in that time, probably bringing the knight to e5 or something similar. But I can't seem to find a realistic line where B:f7+ wins.]

Emil Joseph Diemer 110

The great German master Diemer, founder of the (propagandist) "Deutsches Kampfschach" slogan ("German fighting chess"), explorer (with Studier, Gunderam, et al.) of the Blackmar Diemer Gambit, an improved version of one of the both Blackmar gambits (1.d4 d5 2.e4 d:e4 3.f3?? was improved to 1.d4 d5 2.e4 d:e4 3.Sc3 Sf6 4.f3!! [!?] e:f3 5.Q:f3!! [again not objectively deserving the exclamation marks, but they are for the crazy idea]). The gambit is objectively refuted (source: Studier 2004, personal talk), but very dangerous at a hobby and club player level below title ranks.

The "Prophet of Muggensturm", as he was jokingly referred to, at the end of his life, as - including me - many of his followers believe, indeed developed prophetic powers. This, however, came after falling for decades of not working esoteric beliefs, such as biorhythms (not to be confused with the medical biorhtythms). Studier told me how his book contians one big error regarding this: Indeed Diemer tried to warn Wolfgang Schäuble of the assassination. The assassination however was on 12 October 1990, two days after Diemer's death.
Was this another itch, which for once was hitting? Barely, as a German chess historian reports meeting Diemer once who said that he would know where Bogoljubov's grave is when he tries to go there. Indeed, at that day the sun shone and there was a reflection that could be seen widely... coming from the grave...

Did Diemer just assume the sun would reflect there? Did he just have intuition telling him of the Schäuble assassination? After the many failed prophetic attempts of Diemer one could attribute it to luck, to just an usual "prophetic" hit rate. On the other hand, one might be inclined to believe that the man who died on 10/10/1990 at 10:10 AM(!) at the end of his life indeed found a truth he was searching for always.

Diemer's legacy is that of an eccentric gambit that brought spectacular wins, brutal losses, a fanatic fellowship, a chess master who - depending on the viewpoint - either totally failed to promote "his" opening and became crazy, or who was more than the human shell was able to show: A soul in searching for the ultimate truth, a predecessor of the fictional Fox Mulder in his stoic believe that the truth is out there and he would eventually find it. Whatever it was, somewhere over the rainbow an old man become young again right now might smile down on us, knowingly and with a smirk.

Happy birthday, Emil Joseph Diemer!

Open source chess engine tries to reproduce AlphaZero algorithms

https://www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/882jr8/leela_chess_zero_the_fork_of_leela_zero_for_chess/

Some people here probably followed Deepmind's AlphaGo, then AlphaGoZero and finally AlphaZero's achievements. However Google did not release the weights for all thoses networks, so a community has formed trying to reproduce and maybe improve the AlphaZero engine.
To do this, a distributed effort to play self-play games has started, and the training is done on a single powerful computer (It can update the weights in about 5 hours currently).

The developers also allow everyone to play against their engine:
http://play.lczero.org/

Further information can be found on the website  http://lczero.org/ which necessarily is rather technical.

And while people like Magnus Carlsen struggle to reach 2850 Elo, the engine struggles as well... to reach 4250 Elo. Yes, that is a 4, not a 3. But how "real" that number is, is the real question.

Imageboard activists donate possibly several 100,000 Euro to cancer charity

Protesting against an article by cybersecurity "journalist" Brian Krebs, users of a big German imageboard donated - using the pun of "Krebs" as being the German word for cancer - an official 103,000 Euro to the Deutsche Krebshilfe until several hours ago. As the donations are still ongoing, the DKMS received also a lot of donations, and some donations were also made to foreign charities and other diseases' charities, the entire sum of the donations will likely remain unknown but in my estimation could be as high as 500,000 Euro.

The semi official slogan of the action:
Krebs ist scheiße >_

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/angry-users-donate-120k-to-cancer-research-after-brian-krebs-coinhive-article/

Using the Google Translate widget to translate almost any foreign website

The following text was written for my "Study of the Month" article for April 2018, but is taken out and published here in advance, so as to not bloat the article more than necessary.

How to get a fast overview on longer foreign websites

Let us talk about how the research for this article was done. While the Google Translate service can only translate a part of the page if entered directly on the website, you can use its widget to translate the entire page, but must modify the code.
First download the website to translate (in this case the Russian article), best might be to download it as “Web page, complete”. Now rename the extension to .html.txt and enter here your widget preference: https://translate.google.com/manager/website/
In this case, after clicking that you want to add the widget to your website, enter any website in the field - it does not matter, it seems, and use the website language - in this case “Russian” - in the field below. Now click on “Next”. Add all languages or specific languages - I chose specific languages and selected only English, as to make the widget easier to use for me. Choose a preferred display mode, and disable all checkboxes below at “Advanced”. I chose “Inline” and “Dropdown only”, but all should work. Possibly you should not use “Automatic”, but you can try that also to see if it works.
Click on “Get Code” now. Important: You must modify the code by adding a http: after the “ prior to the website starting with //translate.google.com/ - if you don’t do this, the widget will try to load it from your file system where no such file exists. Copy this modified code now into the html.txt file under the line </head> or copy the original code and modify it there. You might want to add empty lines prior to and after the code to find it easier if you did something wrong and need to replace it later.

Now save this, close the file and rename the format from .html.txt to .html which enables you to load it into your web browser. If you use a security tool that disables JavaScript, activate the JavaScript for your file system and for translate.googleapis.com and the top left corner of the page should show the widget now. After this, click on it and select the language you want to translate it to - in my case the only option is English. After a few seconds, the entire page is translated. Strangely, the translation is different from what it is on Google Translate directly, but you should still be able to understand some of the content even with the poor translation. Better readable results require to translate small text snippets at once on the Google Translate website instead, making the widget rather an overview tool than a really useful translation tool. In any case I envy those who understand Russian!

Warning: Never download or visit websites you don’t trust, as this can lead to an infection of your computer if the website contains a virus or other malware! Common sense and caution is one of the most important tools to prevent infections, in some opinions even more than a virus scanner (this does not mean you shouldn’t have some form of software that protects you, however. Personally I use a military-grade sandbox/whitelist tool that also protects system files in addition to the built-in Windows Defender). When in doubt, run your browser in a sandbox (see the Wikipedia article), check the safety prior to visiting the page at all with a scan tool like Virustotal and, when you visit it, modify the script in real-time with your browser’s tools.

Gisbert Jacoby (3.v.1943 - 1.iii.2018)

The former CEO of ChessBase, chess trainer from Hamburg, Gisbert Jacoby has died eight days ago. There is an obituary on ChessBase by André Schulz about him with a few photos.

My favorite candidate 2018 is Ding Liren

Just for the record, my favorite candidate 2018 is Ding Liren. I believe that he would be able to give Carlsen a highly interesting match. Could he beat Carlsen? Only if the stars align. But then in spectacular fashion.

Zinar's five knight promotions in the pawn endgame

On the task of five knight promotions in the pawn endgame, Mikhail Zinar now has shown a great study.
http://didok.ru/%d0%ba%d0%be%d0%bd%d0%ba%d1%83%d1%80%d1%81-%d0%b2-%d1%81%d0%be%d1%81%d1%8e%d1%80%d0%b0-120/

You must have JavaScript enabled to see the entries, Zinar's entry is of 14 February 2018. I shall edit this post to reprint it here in a few days.

Jan Timman 65 JT - award

The award of Jan Timman 65 JT is available not only as special supplement for eg but also on ChessBase now, courtesy Yochanan Afek.

17 January 2008: The lone king wanders off...

Ten years ago, on 17 January 2008, Bobby Fischer has died.
I remember going into the chess club at Friday evening that week, and being told by my fellow player Uli G. whilst going into the basement room in the hotel in my home city that Bobby Fischer has died. I'm not sure if I cried that night, or if it was later. I went on to buy the New In Chess that dealt with Bobby Fischer afterwards. "The lone king has wandered off...", the title story of van Geuzendam proclaimed, detailing Fischer's life - and death - in Iceland.

Two new ChessBase articles are interesting to read now, ten years later.

ChessBase has found an interesting coincidence: 17 January 1951 was the first public appearance of a young jewish American chess prodigy. His name? Robert James Fischer. "Bobby".
 https://en.chessbase.com/post/17-january-1951-bobby-fischers-first-simul

Another article on ChessBase deals with the last days of Iceland's most famous grandmaster...
https://en.chessbase.com/post/bobby-fischer-s-final-days