← Back to context

Comment by djierardi

8 hours ago

But computers have destroyed chess as a "sport". Nobody will sit to watch two chess programs compete, or analyze their tactics. Kinda like how now, anybody can construct a "game" over the weekend or a new song or a slop video. The value of each of these decreases to 0 as the slop overwhelms.

>Nobody will sit to watch two chess programs compete, or analyze their tactics.

I know nothing about chess yet I dare say that I'd doubt this. Surely chess enthusiasts would be interested in analyzing how a superior chess program came out victorious, no?

  • Yes you are right, some people do watch chess engines play. TCEC (Top Chess Engine Championship) [1] streams them. Popular chess YouTubers goes over engine games from time to time too.

    [1] https://tcec-chess.com/

    • That's not proof of interest so much as proof of commerce. It could easily be a money-laundering mechanism.

      Mostly nobody cares about professional chess. The number of people who are actually interested in today's game and not the drama are a tiny sliver of that. This is actually great because it means we can train and evaluate both without interference from chess players, possibly even building a stable society.

      1 reply →

erm actually, chess tournaments rose in popularity and more people watch now than ever