This third article for Chessville will briefly scan the history of the development of Distance Chess, contributors of note, and its current state of reception around the world, with a special note on the United States.

Distance Chess played on sensory boards developed from multiple sources, including the early efforts of David Bronstein with chess and computers, accommodations for unsighted people (a stepped brail sensory board), and from media demand to immediately share games around the world in real time.

Television as a medium was always problematical: it was expensive, non-interactive, intrusive to players, not global in the sense that each country had separate broadcasting arrangements, and appealed to too few people in any one country to ever be of interest to sponsors.  With the possible exception of Russian television there are no regularly scheduled chess broadcasts anywhere in the world.

Enter the Internet!  Here was an immediate and exciting alternative which was universal, inexpensive to broadcast and to receive, and allowed both real-time transmissions, and past-event interactions with an event. Immediately any game-score was published to the net as text, later as downloadable formats such as pgn, it could be shared around the world, and games could be re-enacted on the web by game-replay engines.

Also enter a computer-programmer and chess player from St. Petersburg who traveled to Elista to make the first live chess broadcast demonstration to the internet - broadcasts not dependent on slow keying of moves and with no typos!

This immediately proved the concept, and fostered demand by top players and chess administrators for an increasing range and complexity of features.

This demand for development has been on-going by very critical top players, who must have realized that in order for the technology to be useful for GM chess, it must perform as if it were almost invisible.

The clock can work as a traditional non-delay, with both Bronstein and Fischer delay-modes, and Kasparov-mode which does not add time, but permits a 'free' time period before the clock begins.  This delay-period can be easily changed to any number of seconds.

This 'internet-clock' also allows for draw offers to be discreet and deliverable at a distance by incorporating a special button dedicated to offering the draw.  On receiving a draw offer the button lights; reciprocate by pressing your own draw button to accept the draw, or ignore it and continue play.

The potential of this same system has been hailed by Anatoly Karpov this year on Russian television and in interviews, who re-emphasized that senior world chess management need to understand that until broadcasts become satisfactory, senior players will continue to resist second-rate alternatives.

Among other GMs to make public comments on standards for rated chess is the 8th ranked GM in the world Peter Svidler who notes the farce resulting from the past internet entry into the world championship, and for the possibility of cheating to be removed for serious rated play, by having a TD present at each playing site instead of, for example, Fritz.

Other bugaboos of sensory boards had been worked out to the satisfaction of players by this particular manufacturer, the same individual who made the first broadcast from Elista.  Edge of square sensitivity had previously meant that the piece had to be entirely within the square, which otherwise stalled the transmission, but now the majority of the piece within the square was sufficient even though several sensors registered the piece.

Plus that other disconcerting habit of sensory board broadcasts, a stalled transmission of moves because the software could not keep up with the speed of play especially at Blitz speed, or worse, a nonsense move is transmitted - before your startled eyes a rook drunkenly moves from a1 to d4 apparently reciprocated by the other player who moves pawn g7-g3!

While these performance features were being worked out between top players and a receptive manufacturer, a parallel in the sophistication of broadcasting was taking place (see previous article, Part Two - The Technology).

And here we are again, back in the now!  No longer a science fiction subject, with practically every top event in the world being broadcast, except from the United States.

To encourage and explore this American situation, some years ago I engaged the interest of a chess Master, a former Assistant Director for the US Chess Federation (1994-99) in a discussion of US oriented rules systems, which in general provide more options and responsibilities to players, with FIDE (The world governing body of chess) oriented rules which place more responsibility on the arbiter or TD.

My question was essentially, how do either of these systems support international Distance Chess which contains software which can itself regulate illegal moves, and what area of the rules can be modified from the US perspective?  I received a detailed paper from Eric Johnson, which I proceeded to circulate among some European sources, and to my intense amusement a certain world champion whom Mr. Johnson has never admitted liking, made the strongest endorsement of its discussion value in his reply.

It must be said however, that this sort of interaction is as rare as hen's teeth, and it seems that the attitude of many people in the US is a passive 'wait and see' one, rather than, as befits the most technologically powerful and media-savvy country in the world, taking a more pro-active stance by engaging the topic as a full partner with other countries, never mind taking a lead!

Current Distance Chess events therefore avoid this passivity by formal National and International chess organizations, and propose direct club-to-club engagements. One US club in particular has chosen to end the isolation of the American continent from the rest of the world by accepting an engagement in a team distance play tournament of 8 nations (the last example between USA and Russia for example was in 1947). Other US clubs have also expressed interest in joining the fun, however the rules for this particular competition stipulate "one club per country"). The tournament is fully sponsored and will cost the club nothing, except they will gain some equipment at the end, as well as a trained TD in Distance Chess, but most of all will gain new connections and experiences for their players.

Will US affairs continue this way?

In the last of 4 articles in this series on Distance Chess I will imagine developments based on current trends, so that if your club wishes to sponsor a player in a norm-achieving series of tournaments (instead of dispatching players to live in relatively inexpensive Budapest for 6 months/6 tournaments, as some NY City players have done, where they meet Chinese players doing the same!), or you just want to enter the under 2000 Continental Team National League, B section, how difficult or expensive and ratable will that be?

Phil Innes, August 9, 2003