You're more than welcome to discuss this at _www.uschess.blogspot.com_
(http://www.uschess.blogspot.com) . It is a blog to discuss USCF issues
and
especially about the upcoming USCF election. USCF memberships not
required.


After reading this at the website:

I apologize for asking this question again. What is your official policy
regarding deliberate lies, deceit, misinformation and personal attacks? As I
said, I will not respond to these outrageous, malicious and false charges
and I will not participate in any discussion in this forum until serious
actions are taken against such individual(s).

How many chances does one get before losing the privilege to post on the
OFFICIAL USCF forum?

Important issues are being drowned out because of the same nonsense daily.
Are we an organization of 83,000 members or just a few unethical and
unprofessional people? We are supposed to be a professional organization.
For the sake of the USCF and US Chess, can something be done please?

Thank you!
Susan Polgar

Here was the President of USCF's direct response:


My understanding is that the official policy is that such posts are not
allowed, and that they may be removed, and the poster ultimately banned from
posting on the forum.

However, in my opinion this policy has been insufficiently enforced. There
is an ongoing Board discussion and vote relative to this matter and I hope
that things will be different before too long.

Bill Goichberg

--

And there you have it! - a call to unity rejected, a call for honesty and
decency rejected, and even a willingness to ban such views from the public
gaze. For some time I have personally watched all sorts of people attempt
'reform', both at Fide and at USCF, and if I may publicly criticise Susan
Polgar, I would say that some of her attitudes are naive; that is, she seems
to be addressing other people who she assumes care for chess as a primary
activity, even if not quite as much as she does herself, but this is a
fantasy. It is not pleasant to come to this conclusion, yet any other
assumptions are more problematic.

In a book by James Clavell, 'Shogun' we have the English 'Anjin-San'
confronting a powerful Japanese Daimyo, and who does not agree that one
should always respect one's master, and there is one circumstance which
justifies revolt.

"What is that?" asks an angry Toronaga-Sama
"When you win" replies our Anjin-san.
Whereas Toronaga laugh out loud.

This indeed seems to be the choice facing GM Polgar, both a t Fide and with
USCF: to be a reformer, or to start anew.

After interviewing for Chessville her business manager and VP of SP
Foundation, Mr. Paul Truong, I sought advice and reaction from seasoned Fide
watchers. One said, 'start now', and the other said 'start over,' [meaning
to establish a new organisation]. These would appear to be the available
opportunities - neither of which include carrying so much ancient dead and
even rotten wood.

I think people should understand that this is a very pregnant moment in the
life and times of chess in the USA which had a fantastic start, and has now
lapsed into an obscure hobby, whereas other countries seem not to be
experiencing this problem, on the contrary, chess is booming!

But increasingly clear is a status quo whose activity and ambition represent
very moderate chess thinking in the USA and who are more than seemingly
content with the way things are. It seems preferable to negate the chances
of other board candidates rather than propose anything much which interests
players - even the continuous national fiasco of the national championship
could be described this way.

Therefore Susan Polgar has to assess if she can engroup a majority on any
future USCF board, and if even that is worthwhile when dragging the joint
anchors of a minority opposition plus existing corporate culture; anchors
indeed which stir up the mud of the past, and make steering the ship
uncertain when steerage is most necessary.

Current leadership has clearly spoken to the acceptance of these ideas, as
above - and even that that cannot be voiced to members, and to be fair to
the current president, he seems not much different than any other incumbent
these past 15 years.

Phil Innes
Vermont,
January 12, 2007

Chess One wrote:


You're more than welcome to discuss this at _www.uschess.blogspot.com_
(http://www.uschess.blogspot.com) . It is a blog to discuss USCF issues
and
especially about the upcoming USCF election. USCF memberships not
required.


After reading this at the website:

I apologize for asking this question again. What is your official policy
regarding deliberate lies, deceit, misinformation and personal attacks? As I
said, I will not respond to these outrageous, malicious and false charges
and I will not participate in any discussion in this forum until serious
actions are taken against such individual(s).

How many chances does one get before losing the privilege to post on the
OFFICIAL USCF forum?

Important issues are being drowned out because of the same nonsense daily.
Are we an organization of 83,000 members or just a few unethical and
unprofessional people? We are supposed to be a professional organization.
For the sake of the USCF and US Chess, can something be done please?

Thank you!
Susan Polgar

Here was the President of USCF's direct response:


My understanding is that the official policy is that such posts are not
allowed, and that they may be removed, and the poster ultimately banned from
posting on the forum.

However, in my opinion this policy has been insufficiently enforced. There
is an ongoing Board discussion and vote relative to this matter and I hope
that things will be different before too long.

Bill Goichberg

--

And there you have it! - a call to unity rejected, a call for honesty and
decency rejected, and even a willingness to ban such views from the public
gaze. For some time I have personally watched all sorts of people attempt
'reform', both at Fide and at USCF, and if I may publicly criticise Susan
Polgar, I would say that some of her attitudes are naive; that is, she seems
to be addressing other people who she assumes care for chess as a primary
activity, even if not quite as much as she does herself, but this is a
fantasy. It is not pleasant to come to this conclusion, yet any other
assumptions are more problematic.

In a book by James Clavell, 'Shogun' we have the English 'Anjin-San'
confronting a powerful Japanese Daimyo, and who does not agree that one
should always respect one's master, and there is one circumstance which
justifies revolt.

"What is that?" asks an angry Toronaga-Sama
"When you win" replies our Anjin-san.
Whereas Toronaga laugh out loud.

This indeed seems to be the choice facing GM Polgar, both a t Fide and with
USCF: to be a reformer, or to start anew.

After interviewing for Chessville her business manager and VP of SP
Foundation, Mr. Paul Truong, I sought advice and reaction from seasoned Fide
watchers. One said, 'start now', and the other said 'start over,' [meaning
to establish a new organisation]. These would appear to be the available
opportunities - neither of which include carrying so much ancient dead and
even rotten wood.

I think people should understand that this is a very pregnant moment in the
life and times of chess in the USA which had a fantastic start, and has now
lapsed into an obscure hobby, whereas other countries seem not to be
experiencing this problem, on the contrary, chess is booming!

But increasingly clear is a status quo whose activity and ambition represent
very moderate chess thinking in the USA and who are more than seemingly
content with the way things are. It seems preferable to negate the chances
of other board candidates rather than propose anything much which interests
players - even the continuous national fiasco of the national championship
could be described this way.

Therefore Susan Polgar has to assess if she can engroup a majority on any
future USCF board, and if even that is worthwhile when dragging the joint
anchors of a minority opposition plus existing corporate culture; anchors
indeed which stir up the mud of the past, and make steering the ship
uncertain when steerage is most necessary.

Current leadership has clearly spoken to the acceptance of these ideas, as
above - and even that that cannot be voiced to members, and to be fair to
the current president, he seems not much different than any other incumbent
these past 15 years.

Phil Innes
Vermont,
January 12, 2007

I wonder? Has there always been ONLY the USCF representing American
Chess? Has there always ONLY been FIDE representing international
chess? Is the USCF just a FRANCHISEE of FIDE?

Chess One wrote:


You're more than welcome to discuss this at _www.uschess.blogspot.com_
(http://www.uschess.blogspot.com) . It is a blog to discuss USCF issues
and
especially about the upcoming USCF election. USCF memberships not
required.


After reading this at the website:

I apologize for asking this question again. What is your official policy
regarding deliberate lies, deceit, misinformation and personal attacks? As I
said, I will not respond to these outrageous, malicious and false charges
and I will not participate in any discussion in this forum until serious
actions are taken against such individual(s).

How many chances does one get before losing the privilege to post on the
OFFICIAL USCF forum?

Important issues are being drowned out because of the same nonsense daily.
Are we an organization of 83,000 members or just a few unethical and
unprofessional people? We are supposed to be a professional organization.
For the sake of the USCF and US Chess, can something be done please?

Thank you!
Susan Polgar

Here was the President of USCF's direct response:


My understanding is that the official policy is that such posts are not
allowed, and that they may be removed, and the poster ultimately banned from
posting on the forum.

However, in my opinion this policy has been insufficiently enforced. There
is an ongoing Board discussion and vote relative to this matter and I hope
that things will be different before too long.

Bill Goichberg

--

And there you have it! - a call to unity rejected, a call for honesty and
decency rejected, and even a willingness to ban such views from the public
gaze. For some time I have personally watched all sorts of people attempt
'reform', both at Fide and at USCF, and if I may publicly criticise Susan
Polgar, I would say that some of her attitudes are naive; that is, she seems
to be addressing other people who she assumes care for chess as a primary
activity, even if not quite as much as she does herself, but this is a
fantasy. It is not pleasant to come to this conclusion, yet any other
assumptions are more problematic.

In a book by James Clavell, 'Shogun' we have the English 'Anjin-San'
confronting a powerful Japanese Daimyo, and who does not agree that one
should always respect one's master, and there is one circumstance which
justifies revolt.

"What is that?" asks an angry Toronaga-Sama
"When you win" replies our Anjin-san.
Whereas Toronaga laugh out loud.

This indeed seems to be the choice facing GM Polgar, both a t Fide and with
USCF: to be a reformer, or to start anew.

After interviewing for Chessville her business manager and VP of SP
Foundation, Mr. Paul Truong, I sought advice and reaction from seasoned Fide
watchers. One said, 'start now', and the other said 'start over,' [meaning
to establish a new organisation]. These would appear to be the available
opportunities - neither of which include carrying so much ancient dead and
even rotten wood.

I think people should understand that this is a very pregnant moment in the
life and times of chess in the USA which had a fantastic start, and has now
lapsed into an obscure hobby, whereas other countries seem not to be
experiencing this problem, on the contrary, chess is booming!

But increasingly clear is a status quo whose activity and ambition represent
very moderate chess thinking in the USA and who are more than seemingly
content with the way things are. It seems preferable to negate the chances
of other board candidates rather than propose anything much which interests
players - even the continuous national fiasco of the national championship
could be described this way.

Therefore Susan Polgar has to assess if she can engroup a majority on any
future USCF board, and if even that is worthwhile when dragging the joint
anchors of a minority opposition plus existing corporate culture; anchors
indeed which stir up the mud of the past, and make steering the ship
uncertain when steerage is most necessary.

Current leadership has clearly spoken to the acceptance of these ideas, as
above - and even that that cannot be voiced to members, and to be fair to
the current president, he seems not much different than any other incumbent
these past 15 years.

Phil Innes
Vermont,
January 12, 2007


Goichberg and Channing should resign. Polger won't be elected. The USCF
rejected Seirawan and they'll reject her too. I predict Leroy Dubeck
will regain power with Marinello and me.

Sam Sloan

It is not my idle speculation, but Mike Nolan's.

...but if we took your claims at face value, it leads you to the
conclusion
that a club that runs 45+ events per year ...must be a USCF powerhouse.

the serious question is about rated games, and in another forum I have
now received information on members with less than 10 games and those
with more.

i have asked a few more questions since those figures are 30,000 members
short of the entire membership [and who may have played no games at all],
but more people have played less than 10 than have played more than 10.

this makes their ratings provisional - and if the 30k of missing players
also have less than 10, only 25k members have non-provisional ratings. it
is also important to know that 20k members have a rating average of 500 -
especially when catering to their reading habits on chess [if any]

i think this is rather important information to understand if you were
running any sort of chess group, and is the sort of study often called
'marketing' - that is, knowledge of the habits of the customer

phil innes


Suggesting that one target one's product -- playing chess -- to those who
do not play is...to use one word...STUPID.

Having started off with his own invention of 'do not play', Eric Johnson
will presumably make a sports analogy...

It is akin to a bowling magazine targeting people who never bowl.

One interesting feature of this inquiry returned the fact that FIVE times
more people in Washington state played //rated// chess than were USCF
members.

I also think that there are more people playing on-line chess than are rated
members. If Larry Evans is correct and there are 40 million people in the
country who know the game, then this is not quite like targeting non-bowling
people, it means coming to the realisation that USCF in fact caters to less
than half of one percent of the playing community! That's what marketing is,
/looking/ at the market, actual and potential. But if you don't look you
aren't doing it.

USCF's product is tournament chess and tournament chess ratings.

Therefore it is not achieving its 'target'. Nolan affirms that less than
half adult members play even one rated game in any one year - and I pursued
that to discover that less than half of those people played more than would
for a provisional rating in any other country [more/less than 10 games].

So in fact only abt. 7,500 adult members play 10+ rated games in any one
year. That is, for better or worse, the state of USCF's union!

Semi-serious amateur tournament chess. By catering to that group...and
designing its products around that market, it provides access to that
activity to new players who never imagined it even existed.

By virtue of the lack of a national championship, and reporting only to
existing members, I must suppose that they will continue to imagine 'it'
even exists.

To dumb down its offerings would be a crime against amateur chess.

Do you suggest that local clubs spend scarce resources catering to the
whims of people who also do not play chess?

One interesting fact about Don's book was to contrast what happened to US
Chess clubs when weekend swisses arrived all over the place coupled with
introduction of the ELO system - an unintended effect, he says, was that
very many people, especially the stronger players, abandoned chess clubs and
just went to the very weekend tournaments that Eric Johnson here describes.

To quantify Johnson's argument it is necessary to understand that he is
addressing just 7,500 adults - or 0.05% of the chess playing community in
the USA, and this tiny margin is held to be central, while 99.95% are
ignored.

That is one opinion of 'marketing', whereas I intended the term as /looking/
at the estate occupied by the playing community. With minds like these who
will not even look beyond some fond and inflated memory of past-hopes,
serious chess in the USA will continue to decline like a Wagnerian melodrama
into some terminal twilight, both in absolute numbers and in playing
frequency.

If you are too frightened to look, then maybe everything you don't know will
seem stupid, no?

Phil Innes

ECJ

Does this mean the another chess organization or maybe even FIDE could
sponser the US CHampionships? If FIDE did that would that not effectivly
quash the USCF?
Rob


Are you totally out of touch with the way chess works, or do you ask this
to be funny?

Do you think the government of Guatemala will help finance a bridge in
Brazil?

Sometimes the level of chess 'thinking' about USCF leaves one gasping for
air: obviously the right comparison is not country to country, but region to
country. As if the America's were to support 'a bridge' or a chess event in
one of its constituent countries.

Obviously anyone can sponsor a US Chess Championship. It may not be a USCF
event, but there may not be a USCF event held! Is the championship
tournament any less for that? Same players! Same competition! So what has
been lost?

I see elsewhere that MIG wrote that the writing has been on the wall for
some time that AF4C were already 'done' with the championship, and the
current $25k is merely an exit gift. Why Bill Goichberg has had any other
expectation is (a) really strange, and (b) unreportable! since whatever he
thinks is secret [see Marinello inquiry]

Mig cites his own understanding of this as because the championship is so
poorly advertised it would not appear to warrant expenditure.

Phil Innes

ECJ

"Ambassador" wrote in message
ups.com...
A very good article, Phil.

Thanks for noticing

My problem with Susan Polgar on the USCF Executive Board is that she is
simply a Eurpoean migrant with a FIDE score to settle.

I am also a European migrant, and such as we, and a bunch of Russians, have
fueled US chess for 3 decades far more than native efforts - and this has
come from the SYSTEMS in our previous countries - its not some magic thing
that happens by itself - its the result of much greater administrative
efficiency elsewhere.

(BTW: Some time ago, I even received a note from a certain USCF president on
arranging a US Russia match that it would be politically unacceptable since
the teams would be Russia vs ex-Russia and satelite states. [pardon me,
Ukraine])

Susan Polgar
WILL DROP HER PANTS and take a drug test. How can she represent the
interests of US chess players in FIDE?

From my personal understanding, which is not certain but still... if it were
not for the threat to the team at the Olympiad, then I rather doubt she
would have submitted to a drug test at all, even if it meant losing all her
games as result. That was a form of Fide-inflicted bullying of her
personally and with the results of the whole US team held-hostage upon her
compliance.

Hell, I represent more of the
interests of US Chess players in FIDE and I represent another nation in
FIDE. This woman - Susan Polgar - represents the STATUS QUO in FIDE.

Hardly, Marcus! See above!

She has no business expereince to speak of, and she has no basis to ask
for or recieve the respect on needs to lead a non for profit
corproation.

The way USCF is run is entirely amateur, and unlike any known business
model. There is so much power on the board [albeit, uncoordinated and split
all over the compass], and so little vested in USCF's salaried officers,
that it makes no difference what business experience board members have.

The current president Bill Goichberg when he was Ex Dir argued like hell
with President Marinello for what he said had always been in the purview of
the Ex Dir, but when he himself became president he took that power with
him, and away from the new guy, Hall. So what is /apparently/ an act of
impersonal respect for office, is shown to be a dress of disguise for
personality. This is much of USCF's problem.

Board members should hoot [wisely, if possible] from the trees, and
expertise and competency should reside with salaried staff. The current
vector is to dumb-down the staffing even more, reducing its role to
relatively well-paid clerical help, while a board gone mad with ideas of
their own worth, ignore any feed-back or effectiveness of their actions. The
result is a Wagnerian slide into some twilight ending, where you can't even
see the pieces move anymore. And therefore, can't really care either.

What is different about Polgar's candidacy is that she does care beyond her
own need for surety of her personal worth. This is a novelty for a USCF
politico! Perhaps the last person this could have been said about was GM Max
Dlugy who had no need to spend the majority of his time proping up the basis
of his opinions, and could speak to many issues with direct and perceivable
authority - this was immediately winning.

To lead Chess in the US, you need more business
expereince, as the culture does not respect Chess as it is respected in
Russia or Europe.

As long as Susan will drop her pants for a FIDE drug test, I see little
she has in common with these United States or North America.

Susan Polgar is hell bent on settling a score with Sam Sloan, not
heping chess.

"Marcus Roberts is BAD for Chess." Susan Polgar, at a US Open, around
1997.

Net, net, Susan is a mean BITCH.

While I cannot agree or affirm your opinion from my own experience, I do not
deny your opinion thereby, except that I would wish to change the focus of
what is valuable from personality [yours, mine or hers] - which is sometimes
all we discuss here - to something beyond that. What is the value of the
/application/ of the personality to the chess scene? Some people cannot do
that at all, and it remains 'all about them', and they scarcely notice any
result that is 'not about them'.

It is also my opinion that efficient businesses run by having good systems
in place, and are not reliant on special people to operate these systems.
The board's work is to direct activity these sytems address, but it is the
salaried staffer's work to create and deploy them efficently. Currently
there is a great board muddle, and much board muddling, and the result of
that is massive confusion and inefficiency - so that no one ever seems to be
responsible for anything.

Cordially, Phil Innes

Marcus Roberts
Permanent Delegate of St Kitts and Nevis to FIDE

Chess One wrote:
Does this mean the another chess organization or maybe even FIDE could
sponser the US CHampionships? If FIDE did that would that not effectivly
quash the USCF?
Rob


Are you totally out of touch with the way chess works, or do you ask this
to be funny?

Do you think the government of Guatemala will help finance a bridge in
Brazil?

Sometimes the level of chess 'thinking' about USCF leaves one gasping for
air: obviously the right comparison is not country to country, but region to
country. As if the America's were to support 'a bridge' or a chess event in
one of its constituent countries.

Obviously anyone can sponsor a US Chess Championship. It may not be a USCF
event, but there may not be a USCF event held! Is the championship
tournament any less for that? Same players! Same competition! So what has
been lost?

I see elsewhere that MIG wrote that the writing has been on the wall for
some time that AF4C were already 'done' with the championship, and the
current $25k is merely an exit gift. Why Bill Goichberg has had any other
expectation is (a) really strange, and (b) unreportable! since whatever he
thinks is secret [see Marinello inquiry]

Mig cites his own understanding of this as because the championship is so
poorly advertised it would not appear to warrant expenditure.

Phil Innes

ECJ


Why are you kissing Polger's ass? People like Marcus Roberts, Ray
Gordon and I don't want to see her succeed. If she wins the election,
we're doomed. She tried to ban me everywhere. Stop defending her.

Sam Sloan

What I complained about in August was your claim that $39,000 was paid
to Paul Truong because he "had contracts," including $20,000 because
of Diane Reese's erroneous invitation and $19,000 towards the Olympiad
Training Program.

--0--

Sam Sloan uses the word 'erroneously' in the context of a staff member
authorised to contract, and supervised by another staff member, the
then
executive director, Bill Goichberg. What Sam Sloan can mean by this is
unknown! I understood that in fact Bill Goichberg had two goes at this
Olympiad team contract. Is this what is meant by 'erroneus'? Payment
of $19k
is hardly a casual affair in any business and Board-member Sloan
should make
clear whatever his meaning is.

From the above it would seem to be a matter of very basic yet essential
competencies at USCF, and therefore, that is the place to look.
Mention of
other parties is politiking, and so absolutely fall over insincere!

As to the matter of getting paid, Sam Sloan should also make clear
if USCF
should honour its legal contracts, or if any vendor or partner, in his
opinion, should have to refer to the law while dealing with this
organisation?

Phil Innes
vermont

Phil,

Perhaps you have misunderstood my confusing posting.

The statement at the top, starting with the words "What I complained
about in August was your claim that $39,000 was paid" was written by
Bill Goichberg. After that, I responded to what he said.

Also, I have something that you do not have, which is the actual
contract Frank Niro signed regarding the Woman's Olympiad Team. That
contract DOES NOT STATE that the USCF will pay Polgar $50,000 or
indeed any money at all.

Thus, it is not a question of honoring contracts. There really is no
enforcable contract.

I wish I could show you the actual contract but Bill Goichberg has
forbidden me to show it to anybody outside the board.

Sam Sloan

---
LOL more official secrets? Is there anything that is NOT a secret at USCF,
no matter how much money is involved? $50k awarded for a napkin make-over
and no bidding! $10k for fund-raising with no performance measures or
benchmarks, and here is another $19k of which we are allowed to know nothing
about USCF's role and responsibilty.

If you are at all sincere, the place to avert blowing $79,000 in 2007 in the
most facetious manner, is right at home. What are 30 salaried people
doing!??? When you've cleaned up that stable, then take a look in the
ratings department and see if you can find anyone responsible for approving
Tanner's rating history, and if anyone bothered to even look at that before
awarding him a life title - after all, staff people are getting paid for
this! If the process is none too clear, then it is unlikely he is the only
recipient of an award, no? And if no one has looked at the issue, then its
going to happen again in 2007.

Then find out who authorised a ton of old Chess Life magazines to be moved
from New York to Tennessee and mixed up with both the [unindexed!]historical
archive and current business papers.

There is plenty of work for board members to do in their own shop, and even
a primary responsibility for them to attend to just that. Having sorted
those things out, then, and only then, can the role of other parties be even
known, nevermind fairly assessed.

If this secret [lol, not completely secret] contract cannot be shown in
public, then what is the value of this vast excursion involving other
parties - its politiks! nothing other than the most obvious sort of
remonstration against the aspirations of other parties - the point of these
messages is WHY it is not shown, and WHY therefore, the matter is still
exhibited in public?

I also note that my question about USCF's role in 'erroneous' contracting
has gone unanswered - but maybe no one cares but me [and all the absent
sponsors these past 10 years?]

Whose responsibility is it to oversee contracts; did they perform their job
responsibly; and if not, what /systemic/ measures have been taken to correct
these matters from happening in 2007?

None of those involve anyone else but USCF, and kiting the issue around
without attending to what /can/ be addressed is as if to declare complete
lack of care and responsibility. So what's new?

USCF lurches forward until the next scandal, never admitting its own role in
its own fate, nevermind doing anything about it. This scandalising has to
stop otherwise no further 'opinions' can be seen as the least sincere
attention to what the USCF board is charged to do. The dearth of sponsors
and partners is NOT an unrelated subject.

So you guys should get your heads down and fix your own systemic sieve which
leaks money, good will and any effort to amplify a pretty weak signal.

My biggest personal concern in USCF engaging any stronger forces in chess is
that it will let any resulting increase bleed away.

Thus the value of deploying someone such as S. Polgar within USCF is
problematic. She is not just a very strong figure on the US chess scene, but
also on the world scene. People should get some sense of proportion here,
and by all means clean out the stables so that any real increment to US
chess will not get mired in the muck and sloth of the past, therefore
wasted.

Do that, do your job, or resign. Don't write me more complaints.

Phil Innes

So in fact only abt. 7,500 adult members play 10+ rated games in any one
year. That is, for better or worse, the state of USCF's union!



Only 12 people play -- they just use different names.


Impossibly, but I see that this 7,500 active-player frequency is composed of
both club players and tournament players, and not the size of clubs alone,
which is necessarily less than that. And therefore to return to the subject
of marketing, we have established the size of the active adult player
population in the USA.

This might be taken into acount when numbers like 80,000 are thrown around
as if they were an homogenous constituency, since for example, media are
interested in 17-35 year olds as target markets, and here we would have much
less than even 10% of 80k representing active adult players.

In fact the numbers are so low that it is a wonder that they can still be
seen as critical or central to general chess activity requiring central
support - since after all - it is not /necessary/ to have an affiliation to
run a chess club, and as any 'brand' with such low numbers after 30 years of
evolution, can be considered a failed brand.

I am in fact not arguing against club chess at all - or against Eric
Johnson's sense of its worth, but point that inter-club chess fueled British
generation of GMs [and IMs and Masters and A players... all in proportion]
and in fact there are more active adult players in England than in the
United States!

If clubs relatively local to each other do not organise themselves to play
rated games against each other, and USCF doesn't perform that function
either... then on all this evidence, whatever is valued in any USCF-brand is
left to seek.

When it really comes down to it, ECJ has nothing to offer on this subject
other than a quip, even though this subject is 'core-market' material to
chess organisations all round the world - and there is a direct relationship
to chess health and playing serious organised chess.

Phil Innes

One interesting fact about Don's book was to contrast what happened to US
Chess clubs when weekend swisses arrived all over the place coupled with
introduction of the ELO system - an unintended effect, he says, was that
very many people, especially the stronger players, abandoned chess clubs
and

just went to the very weekend tournaments that Eric Johnson here
describes.


Bcause the clubs didn't run events -- clubs that run events do not have
this
phenomenon.

Skittles clubs died out.

This is to misunderstand the issue twice - if clubs /did/ run events then
players would attend /only/ those, and typical in my experience is that
stronger players enter tournaments rather than weaker players, and so clubs
were stripped of their natural mentors - mentors bored with being top dog
year after year with no real challenge - not even playing the equivalent
top-dog in another club on a regular basis to sustain their interest in
chess.

Hence the decline in frequency rate of serious rated play, and rather than
skittles clubs dying out, it made existing clubs more skittle-like.

This refusal to look at the real state of chess health in USA is a problem!
And not one that can be engaged properly in public debate when people excuse
it, and gloss it, as if it were not true, or they could dispense with it
with a quip.

USCF is /not/ an amateur organisation, not by definition. There are 30
people /paid/ to do their work [used to be 50!], and the measure of their
efficacy must be termed 'chronic', since this state of affairs would be
laughable in any mature organisation.

An average paid staff of 40 people at $25k, for 20 years is $20,000,000.

Money well spent?

Phil Innes

ECJ