They also said that this would definitely get 1500 entrants and a few months later that they never intended to make a profit.
Millionare Chess Tournament in Las Vegas at October 2014
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Ashley can jabber on all he wants, he isn't the one down a million dollars.
Amy Lee seems pretty committed too. At the event, she overheard me talking to somebody at the registration desk about the lifetime 50% discount he was receiving for being an early registrant. She thought I had said there would only be one more of these and took offense (I actually had said something about there being "one THOUSAND" more of these). She sternly set me straight. We'll see if that commitment wavers when she sees the bottom line this year, but I don't doubt that she was deadly serious about keeping this event alive.
>> At this point the website bears all the hallmarks of an event that the sponsor (Amy Lee) has decided to cut their losses with and never bother with again.
@small_potato, please be ready for a disappointment if you are expecting that to happen. MC team is going away no where. I believe they hosted the environment in such a fashion that they have overwhelmed the expectations of the participants or hte players. Yes, the online part was not as much fun, but give them time, they will cover it up.
But I guess there is no reason you will "want" this event to be a failure or no happening again. You are just probably pointing out the scopes for improvement. In that case, stay assured those will be addressed by the organizers. Their determination and hatrd work is unprecented. We are at good hands!
>> We'll see if that commitment wavers when she sees the bottom line this year, but I don't doubt that she was deadly serious about keeping this event alive.
.. And i have been knowing Amy Lee over several months now (although face to face first time in this event) and I can tell you that you combine the determination of maskedbishop, rdecredo and any other MC critics on this thread together, multiple by 100 and still they will be far short of her determination and will power alone (for now taking out Ashley from the equitation just to emphasize)....
How many times do you want the organizers to make this commitment? They made the commitment before the tournament ended, they restated it during the closing ceremonies, and now you want them to recommit to it? Less than a week later?
rdecredico wrote:
Have the organizaers, since the end of the event, made comment/commitment regarding next year?
I realize that prior to the event there was claim they would be back. Just wondering if they feel the same way after
yes.
rdecredico wrote:
But now that I think more deeply about it, yes, I would like to hear a legit comment directly from them.
why? just curious since you're not playing. if you want more information read their newsletter. i'll post something Amy Lee posted in her last message.
Well, we do plan to host another event next year, but we have not as yet finalized a date and time. There are new sites we have to look at, dates we have to study and practices and execution in our first event we have to review. We will be sure to let you know once we decide when and where we will host the next MCO. We promise we will hold that tournament to an even higher standard than the one we set for this one.
She sounds confident of her ability to make a silk purse from a sow's ear.
You go girl!
They'll definitely be doing another one but for obvious reasons they have to wait till all negotiations are final before announcing MC 2015.
rdecredico wrote:
But really from that blurb from Lee, there is nothing there that is an actual confirmation.
Reminds me of Ben Bradlee's "Non-denial denial" line from All the Presidents Men.
AND, it is certainly a different tune than the one they were playing prior to the event in which they made it sound as if they had already committed to running it twice at the same venue.
Lots of squiggle room in her statement.
@rdecredo, they never gave even a slight hint that the next venue will also be in Las Vegas. In fact in the MC App, MC team asked the participants few months earlier where would we want to see the next MCO to be held location wise. People talked about all the major cities in USA and looked like no major winner was there. That is some people want it in east coast, some in west and some in mid. So from that also we were not sure where the next MCO will happen. But we were also not sure if it will not happen in Vegas in the immediate next year or not. I would assume Vegas will come back, lets say in MCO#5 or so (just a wild guess).
But if you are still thinking MCO#2 will happen or not, you are way too behind than us. We should talk about MCO#3, 4 or 5 now. Forget about the feasibility of MCO#2 - its above question. MCO#1 was too successful not to happen MCO#2. I know you will show money wise it was a loss - that doesn't mean it wasn't successful as a chess event. And I believe you already read GM Maurice Ashley's blog post few months back where he reasoned out why its important to invest seed money in a business and how they expect it to work out in the long run. I won't risk repeating.
I have finally compiled my experience of this whole event here -
http://dragonbishop.blogspot.com/2014/10/first-ever-millionaire-chess-open.html
ashikuzzaman wrote:
I have finally compiled my experience of this whole event here -
http://dragonbishop.blogspot.com/2014/10/first-ever-millionaire-chess-open.html
Nice write up!
My son had a very good time playing with your son in the skittles room.
Oh thank you. Ahyan was always excited about your son too like a buddy. They have had such a nice time throughout this whole event!
They really need to get rid of that high-stakes bullshit and just vary the entrance fee such as 100, 250, 500, 1000 ($). This is chess and not some kind of spectator sport, even the wcc there are not millions of people watching it on TV for 5+ hours straight although I would certainly like to do that if I got time to spare! Can't wait for the wcc though but I am not sure if MC will be held again next year. I hope so because more chess --> more theory and strategies. If it happens then I really hope they get better commentators, fix their website (just look at chess24 for example) because that was a disaster that you couldn't even follow the games.
TheRocketKing wrote:
They really need to get rid of that high-stakes bullshit and just vary the entrance fee such as 100, 250, 500, 1000 ($). This is chess and not some kind of spectator sport, even the wcc there are not millions of people watching it on TV for 5+ hours straight although I would certainly like to do that if I got time to spare! Can't wait for the wcc though but I am not sure if MC will be held again next year. I hope so because more chess --> more theory and strategies. If it happens then I really hope they get better commentators, fix their website (just look at chess24 for example) because that was a disaster that you couldn't even follow the games.
I hope they keep IM Lawrence Trent. He was a hoot, and his analysis seemed just fine to this C player. And I assume that's the audience that they are shooting for, chess fans of average or lower strength.
"However, to conclude from that that the event is doomed is a real stretch."
Correct. As stated above, I heard Ashley say they will definitely be having another event.