101 Pages with 'Matched Content'

In for a penny, in for a pound? After adding Google's 'Matched Content' to 25 pages last week, I added the same function to another 75 pages, making 101 pages in total. Until now, the only matched pages I've seen have been from my About.com CFAA content, but the following example (a TMER page) shows one matched page from my World Championship site, i.e. the 2015 World Cup.

Magnus Carlsen's TMER (2000-)
TMER = Tournament, Match, and Exhibition Record

It appears that all pages which can be linked via matched content have at least one image associated with the link to that page. That means pages without images, like the Carlsen TMER itself, would never show up as matched content.

Note also the link to Chess Tactics Illustrated ('French postcards illustrate basic tactical themes in chess'). This is an example of an image gallery, all of which use an architecture unlike the basic About.com pages.

I should also mention pages like Chess Openings - Initial Position ('Repertoire recommendations'). These have more Google functionality -- ads plus matched content -- than they have their own content, which is not at all what I want. TBA?

Alekhine 1913

In the weeks following Christmas, the short list for Top eBay Chess Items by Price always gets shorter. I was happy to find an item that fits in with another ongoing series, recently seen in

• Alekhine 1914-1920, and
• Alekhine 1921.

Titled 'Original vintage photo chess tournament Scheveningen 1913: Aljechin winner', the item shown below sold for US $345 after one bid. I've constructed a composite image from portions of the original photo to show its highlights.

The description added,

Cardboard-mounted black and white photo of the tournament in Scheveningen 1913. • Size of the photo: 22.5 x 16.5 cm; sheet size: 35.5 x cm. • Participants of the tournament: Aljechin, Janowski, Olland, Yates, Breyer, Ed. Lasker, Mieses, Englund, etc. • The photo is slightly faded, bumped and has usage traces. • The cardboard is dusty, stained and has strong edge defects, see images.

In the top portion of my composite image, Alekhine is seated to the left. At first I thought his opponent might be Frederick Yates, but all photos of Yates show him wearing glasses. The fellow sitting behind Alekhine's opponent, partially obscured by the curious rectangle, is more likely Yates. For more about the tournament, see Scheveningen 1913 (chessgames.com).

How Not to Set Up a Chess Board

When is a chess game not a chess game?...

The Elector Johann Friedrich of Saxony Playing Chess with a Spanish Gentleman (Anthonis Mor version) © Flickr user the lost gallery under Creative Commons.

...When it's a checkers game played with chess pieces. For more about the painting, which has a checkered story, see Jan Cornelisz Vermeyen: The Chess Players (updateslive.blogspot.com; includes a close-up of the board). On this blog, see: Why Y'All Playing Checkers with a Chess Set? (December 2007), and Matisse Was a Checker Player (October 2008).

FIDE Rating List - January 2017

A new year means it's time to look at the January release of the FIDE rating list. Last year I made two posts out of it:-

• FIDE Rating List - January 2016
• FIDE's 'Not Rated' Players

Once again, FIDE's download page (see last year's post for a link) offers six different lists and once again I chose to download the 'STANDARD rating list'. The January 2016 list had over 231K players and this year's list has over 265K. I'll look at the new list in another post.

***

The close of the old year brought news of another rating system for the new year. Shown in this video is 'Michael Khordarkovsky [sic], Spokesperson, The Grand Chess Tour', who is perhaps better known as 'Michael Khodarkovsky, President, Kasparov Chess Foundation'.

Universal Rating System (URS™) - New Chess Rating System (9:30) • '18 December 2016; For Immediate Release; Grand Chess Tour Introduces Innovative Universal Rating System'

The description continued,

The Grand Chess Tour (GCT) is pleased to announce that the selection of the 2017 GCT Tour wildcards will be based on a new rating system. This new system will be known as the Universal Rating System (URS™). The first URS™ list will be officially published on 1 January 2017 and will be accompanied by the launch of the official website explaining the methodology.

Someone really likes the trademark symbol ('TM'™)! For the rest of the press release, which is signed 'Graham Jurgensen, Technical Director, Grand Chess Tour', see Grand Chess Tour Introduces Innovative Universal Rating System. According to the release, the first official list should be available by now, and I'll also look at in another post.

January 1967 'On the Cover'

After the December 1966 'On the Cover', we open new volumes of our two American chess magazines from 50 years ago.

Left: 'U.S. Championship Committee Chairman Maurice Kasper with Robert J. Fischer, champion for the eighth time, as pairings for the 1966-1967 event were being announced. -- Photo by Beth Cassidy'
Right: 'Armed Forces Champion'

Chess Life

Fischer wins U.S. Championship (Ho-Hum) by Burt Hochberg • By defeating Samuel Reshevsky in the 10th round, Robert J. Fischer was assured of undisputed 1st place in the 1966-67 Unied States Championship. This is the eighth time Fischer has won the title, and he did it comfortably by two full points, not having lost a single game.

Maybe it wasn't so 'Ho-Hum' after all. This was the eighth and last time that Fischer participated in the U.S. Championship.

Chess Review

SP4 CHESTER T. WOZNEY • The new winner of the Thomas Emery Trophy for the Armed Forces Chess Championship also receives President Johnson's congratulations (on color photo) presented by White House Army Aide, Major Hugh G. Robinson (left) at the American Chess Foundation awards dinner in the Sheraton-Carlton Hotel, Washington, D.C. George E. Reedy (seated, and see page 357, December issue), formerly Press Secretary to President Johnson presided at the dinner. The new Champion, actually of Parma, Ohio, came from the Eighth Army, Korea, to compete in the week-long seventh annual title tournament in the American Legion's Hall of Flags in [Washington].

That CR writeup was illustrated by a photo from the previous event. The photo's caption explained,

One year ago, Major Hugh G. Robinson (left: and see "On the Cover" below) presented President Johnson's congratulations to an Air Force man, David M. Lees of Connally AFB, Texas. G. Randle Grimes of Atlantic City, New Jersey, American Chess Foundation Vice-president, presented the sterling silver Air Force trophy.

Going back a year (as in January 1966 'On the Cover', where the CR cover featured Pal Benko), the January 1966 coverage of the Armed Forces event used the same Robinson/Lees photo. As for George E. Reedy, the December 1966 CR showed him in another photo captioned,

GEORGE REEDY • Former press secretary to President Johnson, now President of Struthers Research and Development Corporation, MC-ed the American Chess Foundation's Thomas Emery Awards dinner.

'Thomas Emery Trophy', 'Thomas Emery Awards dinner' -- who was Thomas Emery and what was his connection to the American Chess Foundation?

Google's 'Matched Content'

In last week's post, Engines, (Google), Korchnoi, I tried Google's 'Matched Content' on my most popular page:-

• How to Set Up a Chess Board

The results have been satisfactory, so I added the same functionality to the 25 next most popular pages, starting with these 10:-

• Improve Your Middle Game (Part 1 - Patterns)
• Top 10 Popular Chess Openings
• Chess Equipment : Chess Sets, Boards, and Clocks
• The Origin of Chess
• Positional Play : Pawn Structure
• Improve Your Middle Game (Part 2 - Combinations)
• Improve Your Middle Game (Part 3 - Plans)
• Positional Play in Chess
• Positional Play : Piece Placement and Chess Strategy
• 1844 Romantic Game; Every Move Explained

Below is an example of 'Matched Content' on one of the other 15 pages, which happens to be the most popular index page. The pages that Google suggests are entirely appropriate to the context of the index page.

'From Beginner to Advanced Beginner'

Learn to Play Chess

Note that there are eight images/links in this example. Google also offers the possibility of substituting ads for one (or more?) of these links. I'll keep this turned off for now.

Happy 2017!

https://cooltext.com/

Has it really been ten years since I first wished 'Happy New Year!' (1 January 2007) on this blog?