Borislav Ivanov had already been banned once for suspicions of cheating when forty Bulgarian players signed a boycott. But he allegedly gave cheating another go. From a fascinating report at ChessBase.com who interviewed the player who seems to have broken Ivanov’s code,  Grandmaster Maxim Dlugy:

So we all go into this room: the director, the head of security, my friend, myself and Borislav. They have metal detectors and go over every place very carefully if it beeps, and show that there is nothing there. The security guy says at the start “Look, I’m going to search him, you’re going to watch. If you want something else you tell us, but whatever it is we will do the exact same thing on Borislav’s opponent. I said yes, of course, no problem. This was a very funny moment. The search is completed and my friend goes “Okay, and now take off your shoes.” The security guy looks at me. Without a word I take off my shoes, I take off my socks and throw them to the floor – just ba-doom, there, I’m done, now show me your shoes, please.

Photo credit: ChessBase News

From the New York Times:

The tournament’s director, Christian Goldschmidt, said in a note posted online that when he asked to see the cellphone, [Jens] Kotainy pulled it out of his pocket and said it was turned off, as required by the rules. But Goldschmidt said that while he was holding it, the phone started giving off vibrations that resembled Morse code.

The Sinquefield Cup begins tomorrow (via the USCF):

The 2013 Sinquefield Cup is a chess event of epic proportions. The world will be watching Saint Louis as four of the best players on the planet, including the top two in the world: GM Magnus Carlsen and GM Levon Aronian, and the top two in the U.S.: GM Hikaru Nakamura and GM Gata Kamsky, vie for the $70,000 top prize and the inaugural Sinquefield Cup trophy. Only one will be King.

From the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of St. Louis website:

Live coverage of each round of the event will be hosted through our partner site,www.uschesschamps.com, but this event will offer an unparalleled spectator experience, featuring multiple live Grandmaster commentary teams, access to the playing hall and more!

September 2, 2013

Kramnick knocking on the door of the World Chess Cup and $90,000 take home pay … TROMSO, NORWAY …

Via the Mechanics’ Institute newsletter, which notes that the following announcement, signed by the FIDE president, has been published at FIDE.com:

I am proud to announce today’s launch of the limited test version of FIDE online arena, FIDE’s official Internet playing platform developed in cooperation
with CNC. In October 2013, after the Executive Board meeting in Tallinn, Estonia, the fully operational version of FIDE online arena will be in service and available all over the world. FIDE firmly believes that online chess offers enormous opportunities for millions of chess lovers who are unable to regularly participate in over-the board events for a variety of reasons: professional and family commitments, problems reaching tournaments and other difficulties, etc.

Now FIDE makes the virtual real with an online arena that allows players to compete in top class tournaments with official FIDE ratings. The attractiveness
and ease of online chess will also draw millions of new players – in particular the young. FIDE online arena will be an important step in achieving my goal
of ‘1 billion chess players’ throughout the world.

Andrew O’Hehir @ Salon reviews the new movie Computer Chess:

It’s easy to describe the superficial allure, or maybe anti-allure, of Andrew Bujalski’s film“Computer Chess”: It’s mostly set at a suburban chain motel in the early 1980s, and was shot in black-and-white using a video camera from that period. (“Black-and-white” is a term of art in this case, since the deliberately unlovely, squarish on-screen image is all different shades of dishwater gray.) This turned out to be a difficult undertaking. Since you can’t reliably find tapes or a working tape deck from that era, the video was recorded to a hard drive. If you really want to be a purist about it, this movie is faux-low-tech rather than the real thing.

The Advocate:

A suspicious package left on the front steps of a Mandeville residence Saturday morning triggered the evacuation of two dozen homes, the closure of several streets and the mobilization of dozens of law enforcement officials.

But about six hours later, authorities discovered that the brown briefcase contained a chess set, not the pipe bomb that they had feared.

June 23, 2013 GELFAND OF ISRAEL SHOCKS TAL MEMORIAL WITH FANTASTIC PLAY..WORLD #1 CARLSEN OF NORWAY IS SECOND … Moscow, Russia … an electrifying 10 super grandmaster tourney triumph for B.GELFAND /ISRAEL WITH 6POINTS FROM 9 POSSIBLE … World number one Carlsen/ 5.5 second … stopped cold  with a final round draw today by […]

$220,000 SINQUEFIELD CUP

THE GREATEST AMERCAN CHESS TOURNAMENT OF ALL TIME IS ANNOUNCED IN ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI … $220,000 GUARANTEED JULY 22-AUGUST 2,2013 … THE SINQUEFIELD CUP. No further details given but every available top player in the entire nation will be entered.