Tell Me Why...

Just my two cents - I read the Master's Bulletin every month. I'm 2325 FIDE and I learn from almost every single article, and I enjoy the "lighter" features the like the Endgame puzzles and GM profiles.

Of course I work for Chess.com, so I am biased. But it was a great product when it was on ChessVibes so I've read it for a while.

I don't like it because I think most of the articles would be too hard for me to understand. Besides that, I don't want to pay extra money.

I haven't subscribed because I'm already getting everything I want in a chess site with my premium membership. Honestly, I just don't really feel like the extra cost is worth it. That may not be true for everyone - that's just how I feel personally.

As a diamond member it erks me to pay for stuff I thought I would be getting with my membership... Hmmm I wonder what is on ICC... jk jk

By the way I am extremely interested in the MAsters Bulletin.

well, I guess it may be difficult to them to add new things to the membership without modify the prize. Chess.com bought Chessvibes which was doing the Master Bulletin... then they could include the master in the subscription and make it more expensive, or keep it as a thing which must be payed as an extra, anyway some people were going to complain

I had also never heard of it. I will look more closely at it, but I suspect it will be a bit over my head as a +/- 1300 player?   What headings is it linked from, in the homepage?

Danny, it sounded good when I first heard of it, but I have a hard time affording a diamond membership here.  I really cannot afford to increase what I can budget to this site, and actually I may have to cut back.  I'd love to use it but I can't.

I give you my honest opinion, as I'm in your target audience and I happen to have been a CVT and CVO subscriber at some point in the past.

As an avid chess reader, a general observation I've made over time is that chess pros usually don't know how to tailor their contents towards an amateur audience. So they aim for quantity rather than quality, and don't understand why people who can't devote 5 hours to chess a day (or can't grasp the essence of a position as fast as the pros do) won't buy another 100 pages of detailed chess analysis. Well I'd rather have one single page I can delve in and get educated from. We live in the Too Much Information era, so as a customer, I prefer to have 'a little', 'of interest for me', 'in a digestible format'.

You claim the contents is geared towards 1800-2300 players, but you may be overestimating us a little  I found theoretical articles way too specific and detailed (I'm talking about old CVO here - not sure if this has changed), and of course, most of them I have no interest in, as these are not openings I play. I suppose this kind of article may be of interest for people over 2200 elo who are looking for new ideas to add to their current repertoires, and even here, it would been better if you provided some kind of overview (like in NIC YBs).

News have no added value as they are available everywhere, chess.com included. Besides the positioning is not clear here : are you doing a CVT or a NIC ? Same for studies, there are plenty available everywhere for free.

Only section I found of some interest is the Endgame section, but I'd rather have it in some sort of 'Guess the Move' format so that I could at least use it for training. Else, I may as well pick one from the numerous quality articles on ... chess.com !

The format is also unattractive : it's priced like a written magazine, but it has to be read on screen or printed I don't think there's any interactive material either.

You probably have to rethink the whole concept.

Opening material needs to be adapted to the target audience, and there's already a lot of quality competition at the high end (2200+ elo)(*). Maybe time to invent something new (- here's a suggestion : 5-6 model games in an opening variation, in chronological order, but with the accent on the early middlegame ideas and typical middlegame patterns - pricing 6/7$).

For other training materials, some kind of interactivity might be necessary, as you can find excellent training material in book format at a relatively low price.

(*) see for example Chess Evolution recent death

Two reasons:

1) Lack of time.

and

2) Overabundance of chess materials available already.

Basically I have a hundred times more chess materials available to me than I will ever have the time to study, so I'm not going to pay any money at all to buy even more.

I downloaded the free sample issues some time ago now, and so far have not found the time to even look at it once.

Nailed it.

OMG, the dogster have spoken

Agreed. With the abundance of cheap (or free), good materials already available either online or via used book sales/USCF memberships, etc., anything above and beyond is typically getting into the flat part of the diminishing return curve. Especially when it is so costly.

$5/issue (!) can easily get me a good, used chess book from Amazon (e.g., $0.01 books with, typically, $3.99 s/h) or a used book store that, for a chess player of my level, will provide a better return for my money.

Thanks for this information. Especially you @hicetnunc

Danny,

I just purchased the April 2014 issue to give it a try. The website is a bit slow... but the order went through, I received the invoice email, and now I am awaiting the "login instructions"... 

I'll give feedback in the Masters Bulletin group.

No login instructions. It should have been emailed to you. Did you get it? 

Peter sent me the files, not sure what happened. Starting to read the issue but currently swamped at work... Thanks!

I agree with some of the comments. 1.) Price is too high. With a membership to the USCF you're already getting a chess magazine. There are tons of material available on this site for members, and other websites.  The "value" just isn't there at that price.  I'd buy a nice board, clock, random books from IM/GMs.

There's so much free GM vidoes and lectures/advice on youtube, random articles online, this site, that I hate to say it but it drops the "demand" that masters and above "supply".

2.) Time is an issue (this is a personal one). Married, child, full time work, college student.

Sorry for reviving this old threat... but I would like to offer some feedback / personal opinion.

Some month ago I wrote, that I would not be buying the Master's Bulletin because of an overabundance of chess materials already available and for a lack of time.

Never say never, or so people say.

In the meantime I have bought two back issues (single issues only, Jan & Aug 2014), and have to say that I am satisfied with what I got for my money (both amount and quality of content are good).

Why did I buy them? Because they had content that I am specifically interested in.

Will I subscribe The Master's Bulletin now? Probably not. But I will definitely buy future single issues, if they include topics that are of interest to me.

What I am most interested in is a brief overview over a lesser known or uncommon opening (variation). Of course this can not be as thorough as would be in a whole book devoted to this opening, but I like the format with the annotated games and it is enough to get you started, to understand basic ideas and to see if this is something for you or not.

I have to say, that I found the annotations to be of high quality, not just lines and variations, but plenty of text too. I like that!

What I would like to see less of in future issues are current top grandmaster games. You can get them anywhere.

What I am very interested in - and this would make me seriously consider a subscription! - is a new section with "forgotten gems". 3 to 5 brilliant games that are years or decades old and not very well known. Not the usual names like Tal, Morphy and Fischer. Games from players most of us have never even heard of. These games should be annotated extensively, of course.

I'm also very interested in more member game analysis. These are usually more instructive than GM-level games. Or just randomly annotate games of average tournament players rated between 1900 and 2250 Elo.

I see no need for chess puzzles and tactics problems. There are plenty of these for free on the internet.

What would be very nice are some(more) articles on general endgame strategy, on middlegame strategy, general plan finding (which could be illustrated in concrete example in annotated games).

I am totally not interested in player profiles / interviews. Not interested in current chess news. Yes, I do follow the news and current top tournaments, but for that I don't need the Master's Bulletin.

One more thing: I really like the fact that the Master's Bulletin comes as a pgn and as a pdf. That makes it good to use for studying alone at home on the computer and for printing it out, and studying it together with a friend.

This brings me to my final suggestion of what I would like to see in the Master's Bulletin:

I often study chess together with a good friend of mine. He has a book by Jacob Aagard (I forgot the title) which contains about fifty diagrams of early middlegames positions from real games. We set up one of these on a chessboard and try evaluate the position to find plans and strategies. There usually are no concrete "cool" tactics. Just "normal" positions. We look at the position for a couple of minutes, then discuss our ideas. Then we look up the solution/explanations in the book. I believe this is the best way to study, if you don't want to pay for a good personal chess coach on a regular basis.

This is what I would like to see in the Master's Bulletin. At least one, perhaps even two or three such positions each month. Include that and if the amount of content is satisfactory in relation to the price I would very likely subscribe. A slightly higher price would be very much okay, if there is more content too. It is not the overall amount of content I care about, just the amount of content that is of interest to me personally. For a 70-100 pages I would pay up to 10 Euro a month. Maybe 12 Euro if the stuff is really good!

Well, that's all I can think of for now. All of this is just a personal opinion and I certainly don't mean to come across as overly critical.

I started with a back issue, and now I subscribe...