Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm looking to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.

lawilson

Mississippi Chess Association
http://www.mcachess.org

Our site perhaps isn't as visually appealing, but we do have all the basics
you would hope to get at your State Association web site: tournament
calendar, tournament results, games, pictures, links to members, links to
officers, chess club listing, online newsletter, and some getting started
material.

I have two projects I would like to find time to work on: a list of state
champions and getting every Mississippi game I can get my hands on onto the
web site. I am in the process of going through old newsletters and entering
games into Fritz.

Since I doubt anyone who works on these web sites is a paid employee, I have
a high level of interest in getting together a mailing list (Yahoo group?)
of webmasters from the various States to share ideas. Why reinvent the
wheel?

---
Douglas Stewart

President, Mississippi Chess Association

"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD
meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm looking to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.

lawilson

Thank you very much. I like your site and the content. Do you have a
membership fee, and if so, what does it include? I perhaps overlooked that
on the site. Thanks again.

"Douglas L Stewart" wrote in message
...
Mississippi Chess Association
http://www.mcachess.org

Our site perhaps isn't as visually appealing, but we do have all the
basics
you would hope to get at your State Association web site: tournament
calendar, tournament results, games, pictures, links to members, links to
officers, chess club listing, online newsletter, and some getting started
material.

I have two projects I would like to find time to work on: a list of state
champions and getting every Mississippi game I can get my hands on onto
the
web site. I am in the process of going through old newsletters and
entering
games into Fritz.

Since I doubt anyone who works on these web sites is a paid employee, I
have
a high level of interest in getting together a mailing list (Yahoo group?)
of webmasters from the various States to share ideas. Why reinvent the
wheel?

---
Douglas Stewart

President, Mississippi Chess Association

"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD
meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm looking
to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope
you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.

lawilson

"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD
meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm looking to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.
lawilson

Pennsylvania State Chess Federation
www.pscfchess.org

We run the following tournaments:

PSCF PA State Championship - rotates from location to location from year to
year
PSCF Senior Championship - Haverford
PSCF Junior Championship and Bughouse Championship - Pittsburgh
PSCF Scholastic Championship and Quick Championship - Carlisle
PSCF Team Championships East and West - Philadelphia and Pittsburgh
PSCF Action Championship - Philadelphia

The PSCF maintains a list of PA chess clubs at the website.

The PSCF also publishes a quarterly magazine, The Pennswoodpusher.
Columnists include Dan Heisman, Ross Nickel, Alex Dunne, and Bruce Leverett.

Membership is $5 a year. Adult membership dues have not increased since the
1970's.

Neil Brennen
Historian, Pennsylvania State Chess Federation

I guess more specifically I wanted to know what value the membership has for
the end user. What would entice people, especially kids, to pay for a USCF
membership and state? If the state offers a great program, then I could see
the reason. I'm not looking to debate it, I just want some positive
insight. Thanks again.

"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD
meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm looking to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.

lawilson

The State Association dues for Mississippi are $5 a year. The only thing
that entitles you to do is play in MCA sponsored tournaments (i.e. the State
Championship, Quick Chess Championship, Action Championship, etc.). Some
private tournament organizers also require the dues in order to support the
State Assocation.

10 years ago we used to send out the newsletter as postal mail as part of
the $5 dues, but that was discontinued. The Internet is a much cheaper
distribution model of course.

If you look really hard you can find on the "About the MCA" link the dues
are mentioned there, but we are not aggresive about collecting them outside
of the tournaments.

---
Douglas Stewart

President, Mississippi Chess Association

"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Thank you very much. I like your site and the content. Do you have a
membership fee, and if so, what does it include? I perhaps overlooked that
on the site. Thanks again.

"Douglas L Stewart" wrote in message
...
Mississippi Chess Association
http://www.mcachess.org

Our site perhaps isn't as visually appealing, but we do have all the
basics
you would hope to get at your State Association web site: tournament
calendar, tournament results, games, pictures, links to members, links
to
officers, chess club listing, online newsletter, and some getting
started
material.

I have two projects I would like to find time to work on: a list of
state
champions and getting every Mississippi game I can get my hands on onto
the
web site. I am in the process of going through old newsletters and
entering
games into Fritz.

Since I doubt anyone who works on these web sites is a paid employee, I
have
a high level of interest in getting together a mailing list (Yahoo
group?)
of webmasters from the various States to share ideas. Why reinvent the
wheel?

---
Douglas Stewart

President, Mississippi Chess Association

"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD
meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm
looking
to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope
you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.

lawilson

"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD
meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm looking to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.

lawilson

www.iowachess.org

Regards,

Matt

What you'll notice right away is that the ICA charges about 4 times as much
as everyone else, apparently for the privilege of receiving their
newsletter, which is pretty much crosstable reprints and TLAs, all available
on the Internet. Occasionally there's a feature article, although the last
one, on the local Kasparov simul, was spineless enough to not even mention
the most interesting part of that event from a chess player's perspective:
when Gary restarted a game after discovering a player's rating was too high,
since he use a "speculative opening." Naturally they didn't mention the
opening that Gary first used, or the safer one he decided upon for the
restart, all of which would have been very interesting to ponder, and not
insulting to Kasparov, which apparently the weenies who wrote the article
were worried about (as if he'd ever read the rag in the first place).

Instead, we got page after page of plugging for the sponsor, whose promo
copy was about 50% of the text. That was the final straw for me with the
ICA and their "magazine." Along with being one of the most expensive state
orgs in the country, they are also mired in the same kind of political
recriminations and back-stabbing that we've come to accept from the USCF. A
quick history of this newsgroup will bear that out, with current and former
ICA officers throwing mud at each other with depressing and embarassing
regularity. Recently they went after a local tournament organizer for
having the audacity to throw an event the same weekend as one of "theirs,"
conveniently ignoring the fact that they'd been running full-page
inside-cover ads for this conflicting event for months.

TMB


"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD
meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm looking to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.

lawilson

My feeling is that if the state organization isn't giving anything in
return, how can I rightly and morally convince kids to join the
organization? I hear people saying "support the organization." Support
them doing what? Running a few events a year, along with a mediocre
newsletter? I'd rather the organization focus on organizing and promoting
events, providing links to other chess sites, enable discussions between
members, and not charge for that. If someone would like to donate, they
could. I don't agree with the need for having a President, treasurer, and
all of that overhead. At least with USCF, we at least get a rating system
and national tourneys that are quite good each year for kids and adults.
This is why I wanted to see other organizations, so I can see what they are
really doing for the chess community, and I have seen real good ones. $5 is
a great charge. I'd pay that to support, but not $20 a year.

"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
...
What you'll notice right away is that the ICA charges about 4 times as
much
as everyone else, apparently for the privilege of receiving their
newsletter, which is pretty much crosstable reprints and TLAs, all
available
on the Internet. Occasionally there's a feature article, although the last
one, on the local Kasparov simul, was spineless enough to not even mention
the most interesting part of that event from a chess player's perspective:
when Gary restarted a game after discovering a player's rating was too
high,
since he use a "speculative opening." Naturally they didn't mention the
opening that Gary first used, or the safer one he decided upon for the
restart, all of which would have been very interesting to ponder, and not
insulting to Kasparov, which apparently the weenies who wrote the article
were worried about (as if he'd ever read the rag in the first place).

Instead, we got page after page of plugging for the sponsor, whose promo
copy was about 50% of the text. That was the final straw for me with the
ICA and their "magazine." Along with being one of the most expensive
state
orgs in the country, they are also mired in the same kind of political
recriminations and back-stabbing that we've come to accept from the USCF.
A
quick history of this newsgroup will bear that out, with current and
former
ICA officers throwing mud at each other with depressing and embarassing
regularity. Recently they went after a local tournament organizer for
having the audacity to throw an event the same weekend as one of "theirs,"
conveniently ignoring the fact that they'd been running full-page
inside-cover ads for this conflicting event for months.

TMB


"lawilson" wrote in message
...
Does someone here have links to GOOD state chess associations? GOOD
meaning
quality and value that they offer to the end user. Thanks. I'm looking
to
compare services that are offered against Illinoischess.org, so I hope
you
all can help, and keep this thread positive! Thanks.

lawilson

In article , lawilson says...

My feeling is that if the state organization isn't giving anything in
return, how can I rightly and morally convince kids to join the
organization? I hear people saying "support the organization." Support
them doing what? Running a few events a year, along with a mediocre
newsletter?

Although many state orgs are currently having their problems, there are other
things they provide that are typically undervalued until those things are
missing.

What state are you in? I assume you have a state scholastic championship?

Kevin L. Bachler