"J.D. Walker" wrote in message
...
David Richerby wrote:

Fundamentally, though, chess does little more than entertain, just
like any other sport/etc.

*** To its niche market, ***

it's very entertaining. It would be foolish to base a `chess economy' on
anything other than its entertainment value.

Exactly. Explain it to the people who suggest moving into the mass TV market
to bring big bucks into chess.

Define "big"

99 golfers earned over $1 million dollars on the PGA
tour last year. #1 (Tiger) earned over $10 million. Is that big?

Wikipedia has an entry on professional Go
tournaments. It lists 7 major international
tournaments, with a winner's purse
totaling $1.6 million. Then it lists 16 Japanese
events with a winner's purse of $1.8 million, as
well as events in Korea, China and Taiwan. That would
seem pretty "big" to most professional chess players.

The world checkers title was recently defended.
The prize fund was $3740.

It is *not* a conspiracy driving the "checkerization"
of chess. It's good old-fashioned complacency, failure
to think analytically, an unwillingness to engage the
marketplace, etc. Basically, the professional chess
world (or what's left of it) defends its most stupid
and obvious flaws as virtues.