Why the hypermodern school isn't popular?

Umm, what is 1.e4,Nf6 called?  Why is it called that?  What were Fischer and Kasparov's main replies vs. 1.d4?  (It involes a kingside fianchetto, in fact Fischer had a famous game where he cracked a broad pawn center with the King's Indian and went on to win) What do Petrosian, Karpov and Carlsen's repertoire consists of?  That's right, all played the English and sometimes the Nimzo-Indian. 

"Hypermodern" openings are very popular. The term "hypermodern" seems out of fashion though, probably because these ideas are totally mainstream these days. I think the term was invented like 100 years ago.

The hyper moderns were all given Ritalin and calmed down.

Hypermodern was 80 to 90 years ago.  We are all PO-MO, now.

Postmodernism, all the rage.  So get with the program. 

Nah it's all tactics now. You give yourself a gaping hole on d5 or give up castling rights and just attack lol.

Alekhine ...

Many famous musicians in the 19th century remained unknown until 100 years later when people become able to understand their works. Playing hypermodern openings (for example, Reti opening, and King's Indian Attack which differs from KID) need deep understandings about various structures caused by the flexibility of pawns, and it's really difficult for most players to handle these.

By the way, openings which FerroMaljinn has just listed are not real hypermodern openings, they're just openings which are popular now. As the first comment says, hypermodern openings have special ideas involved, which are against the "tradition" opening ideas.

1. Fianchetto the bishop on your kingside

2. Castle short

3. Play e4 or d4 whichever is more suitable for you.

4. Watch your opponent struggle as they try to break open your fort.

5. Die laughing.

For me, the main challenge in hypermodern theory is the precise timing needed for the pawn breaks that attack the opponents center. It takes a lot more calculation than does classical theory. 

the main reason it is not popular is because black can copy move after move and maintain perfect symmetry, and white has to be the one to figure out how to break it.  A  I have played a few blitz games where I copied my opponent's moves for 20 some moves as black and then my opponent's first move to break symmetry is good for black.  White achieves no advantage not mention the annoyance factor.  As for black, pure hypermodern openings score very poorly.  Modern legit hypermodern openings all mix some hypermodern ideas with classical ideas.

"

1. Fianchetto the bishop on your kingside

2. Castle short"

Yes please oh please do and play right into my attack it makes it so much easier for me.

There is joy (and frustration) in going from playing hypermoderns, to conservative pawn players. All types are here.

The Reti either transposes to the English or let Black have a nice advance with d5-c5 and a delayed Nc6. You can't just hypermodernize everything you do, most of hypermodern openings work (and especially with Black) because it answers one kind of setup from White against which it's really effective (but not most of the time, i.g. KID). See the Grünfeld and the nimzo-- both of them answers the d4-c4-Nc3 setup, and in thei own way.

@Simon_ESIEE - Must disagree.  The early d5 is bad for black in the Reti, though transposition to the English is common (and good) for white.  You can, in fact, maintain a hypermodern approach to the center in the Reti system regardless of what black does in reply.  It's good to know the QGD transpositions anyway (some of which are good), but in no way is white forced to transpose or accept any disadvantage for refusing to do so.

Nimzowitsch's positional principles are universally applicable - even in traditionally "classical" openings.  It was Petrosian who demonstrated this definitively.  That's not saying hypermodern principles teach you everything - far from it - but it is a more solid positional foundation than the classical (Tarrasch) method.  The center pawns are most certainly a target, and once you learn how to restrain and undermine them, the classical openings look much, much weaker.

schools of chess really dont exist anymore. All top players have incorporated all principles of modern chess into their repertoires. You wont see a top player not fianchetto because he is dogmatist (and even tarrasch was that strict either).

the experiments of the hypermodern school are fairly well understood in regards to their objectivity. Some of the openings like the Reti , the nimzo and queen indian, and so are still popular at the highest levels, other creative ideas are considered decent but secondary and not objectively best. 

But even your average master has a good knowledge of the principles of good chess from all previous movements.  the importance of development wasnt ignored by the modern Steitninzian approach, the value of control by pawns wasnt lost on hypermodern players and so on. Each new movement was an addendum on established theory, not a refutation.

My guess is, what you see as hypermodern school not as popular is a set of openings which where seen in the past that now you rarely see. (when is the last time you saw 1.g3 e5 2.nf3 or 1.d4 nc6 in a GM game?). The thing is, opening theory is far more developed now than in the past. Lots of unconventional stuff is actually still relatively ok, but especially at the top level, you want an optimal combination of objectivity and flexibility. All those popular openings you see, often have mazes of variations which make preparing an unpredictable novelty or at least being hard to prepare agaisnt since you can play so many sidelines.

Great post and informative.