Millionaire Chess 2!!

rdecredico you seem to have an unhealthy fixation on this. I get the feeling no matter which page I click on that 10 of the 20 posts will be you ranting about some minor detail that has somehow incensed you.

You may want to look into one of those personal growth retreats

Now this is a more reasonable line of arguement that I was looking for. I can counter argue that of all the 4 you talked about here, only Laurence Trent are in par with Maurice Ashley's commentery. There is a reason why Maurice has been always in the team along with Sierawan in the Sinquefiled Cup or why Maurice was chosen as a commentator in Deep Blue vs Kasparov match. But again here I am not to prove that Maurice is the 2nd or 3rd or 5th best chess commentator in USA. All I am trying prove is that he is a good and professional chess commentator, which is another attribute in him outside of being the first African American GM. 

I believe the only difference between your and my opinion is that you think he is not a good chess commentator and I think he is a good one. We can let others weigh on this and move to the next point if you "still" think Maurice has nothing much to offer other than being the first African American GM. 

To prove the idea of a high stake money chess "not welcome" in US Chess Arena (copyright maskedbishop), you don't have to bring down the credibility of the organizers of Millionaire Chess - Maurice Ashley & Amy Lee. You can do it without trying to prove that they dont have a track record to make MC successful (which is exactly opposite to the facts).

Another interesting relevant point is that I read a comment here where someone thought the idea of high stake chess is actually a good one but the implementation in the form of MC is wrong. That's a very good point to give thoughts about. While I know maskedbishop's point on this (where he is clear that its not just MC who is doing it wrong but the whole idea is wrong), I dont know if you are of the same opiion. To be clear, my opinion is both the idea and the implementaion are amazing and bold!

I don't know how much is idiocy, and how much is it's just a business. To them it's just a game. Who cares if e.g. they call the tournament scene an industry.

All business ventures are risky, and it seems all successful business people are mentally off... I guess I'm just saying don't let it bother you so much! :)

...and why you would think this type of track record is something of which to be proud.

There's none so blind as those that will not see.

No idea. I pop in once very few weeks and noticed you usually have a few posts (in this one and MC1).

Ok, fair enough!

None of business anyway :s

Well, this is a good one. As long as you put logic this way (and not attack...) - people will agree with you. So Maurice is lower in the favorite list of chess.com visitors here. But this can't be the only parameter. The lively and instant commenting he does - I see only can be matched by Lawrence Trent. 

I believe you are refering to me. The first problem I have is the large entry fee. They acted like this tournament was "good" for chess, possibly making it more mainstream. This couldnt be any more false. With an entry fee that high(not including the cost of a trip to Vegas) you only hit a small percentage of the chess community. We have to remember chess is a hobby for 99% of the players. If the organizers were willing to take a financial hit, why not make the entry fee comparable to other tournaments i.e. $100-200. This is a price almost anyone can afford. Hitting a higher % of the chess community = more players registering = more oppotunity for sponsorships. If you have more players you could definately work something out with a hotel to promise them guests(think of a package deal).What makes this tournament special is that you offer thousands of dollars to low level players. This will entice new players into the game. Aside from gambling(which, unlike chess, is mostly luck based), what other hobby offers thousands to people who arent good at it? Another small detail is that you could hold it in a more kid friendly location, but personally I dont think that is a big drawback.

Yes BMeck, I was referring to your post. So there will always be some gaps  and some reasoning behind the gaps. Its like design and implementation. We design a system, and during execution find gaps where it did not go along with the design -s o we refine the imeplementaion further. That's what MC is doing. They had an idea, a very risky idea and someone experienced like Maurice who has walked through the idea in the past. So in each iteration, they are refining the implementation - HB Global, MC#1 and now MC#2.

I will list out the points to take from this thread and my personal opinion in each of those.

1.    "Taking out prize number 21st to 50th from each section was wrong"- I don't agree with this. Prize number 21-50th had a value of $600 while entry fee is $1000. So natually this is not an attractive amount. I ended up winning $67 in MC#1 as part of this - what's the use of that? Instead now if someone wins even the last prize 20th, it will be a good amount even after getting divided amongst few equal position holders. But I agree there is room for debate here.
2.    "Millionaire Monday playoff rounds and short time control for that keeps away some solid chess players from playing in MC" - Its true but I think its necessary to make chess spectator friendly. We can debate even if we do so, will chess ever be more spectator friendly or not. But its the step towards making people interested to chess. I have given the analogy of cricket in the past . Exactly the way One Day Cricket and specially Twenty-Twenty cricket made cricket even more popular en mass - similarly this has a good chance of making chess more popular. So this route needs to be continued. This is actually the key part other than the high prize money to make MC distinguish itself from other traditional chess tournaments.
3.    "Hotel Name has not been announced yet for MC#2 - so they might be cancelling the event if enough participants are not there" - Well, the location has been announced. So why it matters if its Planet Hollywood again or MGM or Bally's besides or Bellajio? They clearly mentioned in the web site and newsletter that the hotel will be announced soon. I would imagine MC team will try to negotiate deals with several hotels showing them MC#1 success (marketing success, ok?) - so that end of the day, we, participants get a good deal. All we care about is we fly/drive to which location/city/airport while signing up for the tournament. I want to remind here that before MC#1, there were people roaming around this forum who doubted that this event will ever happen, that Amy will take the money and cross border to Canada and even if the tournament happens will never payout the pirze money in full out of their pockets etc. But we are here, MC#1 happened, all winners received their checks on same night and MC#2 on the way.
4.    "Very few will sign up for MC#2 as people who tried out just once in MC#1 will not have the same appeal to try out again( effect of one-time only participants)" - We will see it. I am expecting people signing up more around end of January, end of March and end of June.

>>Ashley has FAILED at two large money tournaments and has zero success in this field.

>>That is not opinion.

@redecredo, while I lookup for the definition of "fact" and "opinion" in the dictionary, please consider that its a complete misunderstanding and misinterpretation by you and few more folks.

HB Global was an overall success. The organizers got their money's worth of marketing. The fact that more than 1500+ players participated where entry fee was $500 at the year 2005 in a place lime Minnesota (without having the added charm of las vegas or orlando's vacation offerings)- itself is a huge success for chess. They would get lot more if they would continue to invest and make it a yearly event. But they didn't go that route. That's why Maurice was not going forward with this idea until he found a stakeholder as persistent as Amy Lee. Without Amy - anyone without a long term vision - and I am sure Maurice would not go for it and wait for the right investor no matter how long it would take. You can read further his blog if you want to know more but I think we have already talked on it in the MC#1 thread and we better avoid repeating it.

ashuikuzzaman...About a couple of your points above...

1) 21st to 50th may have only been $600 (are you sure none of them were for $1000?). However, the thing which grabbed me, and i'm sure a lot of other players was even if I didn't win one of the big prizes, I should be good enough to win my entry fee back, or close to it. This incentive is now gone, you win a big prize by finishing very high in the event, or you win nothing; and spend plenty.

2) Yes, time will tell if fast chess will become spectator friendly, but so far, it hasn't worked. They started speeding up time controls some 30 years ago and it has never brought the desired results. If MC 1 wasn't going to bother to cover anything except the top section on Millionaire Monday, then why make the lower ones play rapid chess? They lost a big oportunity to make chess appeal to the masses here. Example:

Way down here in the U 1400 section we have a 55 year old man duking it out with a 12 year old boy for $40,000. A pre interview could have gone like this:

55 year old: I've been playing chess since I was a boy and never thought I would be in a position like this, getting the media coverage and a nice reward for my years of enjoyment of the game"

12 year old: 'I've just been playing a few years, but after my homework is done, I sit up with a chess set and books until I fall asleep. My family supoprts my interest in chess as long as I bring home the good grades. with my winnings, we're going to Disneyland!"

This is something the public would like to see. This is something that could bring chess to the masses. Also, those lower section games could be highly entertaining to watch, even with the blunders! Folks like to see fortunes change....

I changed my mind on the number of entries they would attract. Here's a prediction:

<300 entries, event gets canceled and we never hear of Millionaire chess again.

approx 750 entries: Amy Lee loses $600,000 and comes back to lose at least that much in MC 3.

For #1, tyes 21st-50th was $600 prize money in each section. And that's why I assumed its more worthy to add these money to the upper 20 positions so that each prize (not only first 5 or 10) becomes attractive. The lower position you give prize for, the more dividations will be for the same score. That's how I ended up winning $67 while my son in Under 1400 section secured 13th to 17th position joinly to win $1000.

For#2, yes we have to wait. But see FIDE has added rapid and blitz world chess championship already.

>This is something that could bring chess to the masses.<

There it is again: "the masses." Putting aside the blinkered elitism that uses that kind of phrase in 2015, the notion that offering a $1000 entry fee tournament is going to increase USCF memberships is beyond absurd. 

It didn't last year, by the way. Why would it now?

>She was/is the perfect mark and Henry Gondorf himself could not have cooked up a better grift. <

I don't think this was a con job. My impression from that link is this was two people who got rather full of themselves (which generally happens at a "personal retreat") and decided to jump-start their mutual professional ennui with this grandiose scheme.

I don't think they particularly cared about the actual market or chances for real success- the lack of any effective survey or analysis is pretty telling in that regard. They had the money, time and energy so they went for it. High-profile failures are better than no-profile ones. 

The tournament and promotional materials have been as much about the personalities of the organizers as about chess.  One of the "perks" of the entry fee was to get your photograph with one of them on a red carpet. It's all kind of bizarre, kind of self-indulgent, and it distracts considerably from what should really be supported and cultivated in tournament chess...but it will be over soon.

Which hotel will this be in? They already have the National Open in Las Vegas at the Riviera with a Monday morning poker tournament!!!

You are a troll, and a useless person for chess, because all you do, all day long, is to wait that someone tries to do something for chess, and put them down.

You don't add anything to chess, but please show the tournaments you have organized in the last months, and how many people came from different states and countries.

Please let us know whom of these players decided to go pro after winning one of your tournaments.

As you can see these are all rethorical questions, because people like you is the reason why chess has not the widespread notoriety other sports have.

I know you will reply to this post, because that is what trolls do, but let's hope that one day chess.com understand that giving time on their forum to people like you doesn't do anything for chess, and the spreading of chess.

By the way, I will participate in MC2, and every other edition they make, just to be sure that trolls like you are wrong.

Of today 133 players already enrolled, and this edition will have more players than before!

>You are a troll, and a useless person for chess,<

And you are a useful person for chess because....you entered a tournament?

Low standards indeed. But have no fear, Cavalier...to keep you honest, I'm still here.

>because people like you is the reason why chess has not the widespread notoriety other sports have.<

Get an English dictionary, dude. 

TMB

He is putting it down because it clearly isnt doing anything for chess. You could participate all you want. The tournament was a failure last year and will most likely be an even bigger one this year unless they make a few changes. 

I dont understand people like you. Just because someone has a different opinion makes you not like them. MB has done nothing but give his reasons on why the tournament is, for lack of a better word, stupid

There are some legitimate arguments to the pros and cons of running this type of chess tournament, from what I have read, some don't like the so called elitism that this event could attract and poor old Joe Bloggs cant afford to spend $1000 on an entry fee let alone the expenses of getting to and staying in Las Vegas. I think the same argument was put forward when Airlines started to offer Business Class and the poor traveller was afraid that Airlines would see that they make much more money from the Business Class passengers that eventually the poor people would have to resort to Bus, Trains, Ships to get where they want to. Well that has not happened and both types of passengers can happily go about there personal choices for travel. 
The same goes for this MC event.
You know when detractors of this MC event have lost all ability to debate the cons of the MC event is when they resort to personal attacks against the organisers and the actual competitors that have either gone or intend to go. 
Will wait for the negative comments about my post and possible attacks against my character in due course, even spelling mistakes are welcome as we all know that intelligent debate has to have intelligent grammar.