The worst broadcast I'd ever seen

I can't resist to share my stupefaction about broadcast's organization of the Candidates this year !!!

I'm not only talking about prohibition for others sites to broadcast the tournament, but also about the poor if not terrible quality of the live... 

Firstly,if I can understand they want excusivity but I cannot understand why they are spying us ! Here their justification of why we need to login with  emails to watch the live: "we would like to know the geo location, statistics, ages and the whole lot", I had never seen a real broadcast requiring this !!!

Secondly, did you see the live ?? Stuffed of sponsors ads, and less than the half of the time concerns games and their analyses... Even presentator Evgeny Mirosnichenko seems to be worried about the organization of the live. The only good points is presence of good guests as Guelfand currently.

And thirdly, a little detail but quite worrying : why are they not putting the game in full screen ? There is only a little chessboard on th edge of the screen.

I really did not expect that and wanted to share my thoughts... React !!

(P.S. : I apologize for my poor English, but you are nonetheless lucky that it is written and not spoken as my accent is even worse  )

I get to the login screen, but whichever login option I choose nothing happens.

Big wtf.

Sure Guelfand is excellent !  Mirosnichenko and Kosteniuk are not that bad too Ajatsatru, they are just forced to take breaks to display ads...

The commentators are good, Gelfand was a joy, but the overall presentation is appalling - far too much corporate flag-waving and very little actual chess.

I've switched to Game 7 of Muzychuk v Hou, even the ads are classy - Lviv looks amazing!

I agree with the first nine posts on this issue - very disappointing presentation of such an important tournament.  Not surprised considering the sponsor!   Why is it FIDE just can't seem to get this stuff right?  Maybe it's the crazy guy at the helm of the organization or could it be just the usual greed that has spoiled things?  

I can't access the site.  I either get "bad gateway", or "maximum number of clients reached.  So incredibly frustrating

http://worldchess.com/broadcasts/europe/2016/03/10/fide-candidates-tournament/round-1/

Evgeny Mirosnichenko is much more important than whatever event it is that is going on in the same building.  Why must the producers occasionally interrupt his random musings on chess and life in general to remind us of some silly games  going on in the next room?

Seriously, I was looking forward to this event, but the coverage is unwatchable. 

While not the best i have seen, its not that bad.

It is bad.

1. You can't watch on cell phones/ tablets

2. Because of the use of (dangerous and faulty) adobe flash for the livestream apple users can't watch

3. There is no move list, the navigation doesn't work properly

4. Engine evaluation isn't working properly. You don't see variations. BTW, rumours say they use Fritz 11 [Edit] I don't need engine evaluation but I understand that some people want it. But you even can't switch off the engine evaluation, as it is possible e.g. at chess24.com

5. In case you log in (no matter whether via facebook or e-mail) you accept that you are not allowed to report live about the event. This includes live discussions about moves and positions on twitter or facebook. AGON/Fide/theworldchess a threatening with legal actions against everyone who violates this rule

6. I understand the necessity of broadcasting ads, but here it is ways to much. My eductaed guess is that advertising and other films during the breaks makes more than 50% of the whole stream.

[Edit]

BTW, for asking several times these three simple questions regarding the official broadcast:

»@theworldchess Where can I find a move list? 2. What engine is behind ? 3. Are you using dangerous flash for livestream?«

the official twitter account of the #Candidates2016 blocked me on twitter.

Why are people visiting that site to fund the advertising of these Russian mafia people?  They don't want free speech, remember?  They'd probably get this site shut down if they could.

1.  It streams fine on my PC.  Try watching it that way.

2.  Do you have a PC/Laptop?

3.  The move list shows up fine on my PC.

4.  I agree with you on the engine eval.  I dont need it either.  I owuld rather do my own analysis.

5.  Then you either accept what you agreed to to watch, or you dont watch.

6.  Agreed...the ads are a bit much.  I just turn off the sound while they run.

That should be easy to ignore. Have a relative, for example your brother, log in with his facebook account and watch it together with him. Feel fee to report live as much as you want on your own facebook account - after all, you agreed to nothing, and your brother never agreed to stop you.

I'm not a lawyer, so don't take that as legal advice, but I wouldn't be worried about legal action at all regarding that point.

They can't take legal action against everyone as that's impossible, it's a group of mafia people thinking they can control everyone, same as other big business on the internet I suppose.  

I didn't register... i don't use facebook...

I visit TWIC in the evening to download the games for review, and read their report.

1. We live in 2016, not 1996. Smart phones and tablets are state of the art for more than 10 years now. Other providers already proved years ago that broadcast is possible independent of the device I use.

2. See No 1. In addition: it's known for years now that adobe flash is dangerous and exploitable by crackers every two days. Modern browsers don't support flash anymore by default, apple has banned it permanently. Nowadays you use html5 for providing streams and films. The admins at #candidates2016 probably never heard of it.

3. There is no move list _during_ live broadcast. AGON provides the pgn _after_ the game is finished.

5. Yes. And other disappointed chess enthusiast do the same. And in a few years everybody will wonder, why tournament chess isn't popular anymore and why no sponsors are willing to support chess.

What AGON/Fide offers is nothing but an unnecessary beta test for a below-average broadcast in times where other companies showed, that it is possible to make a brilliant offer. Technically and contentwise.

Ciao

acepoint

You might be right here. But what I see e.g. on twitter points to the other direction. There is nearly no discussion about the games during the broadcast  by Grandmasters or Chess publishers in the social media.

I agree. There is no move list, the navigation doesn't work properly. Live watch is not bad and I found interesting for someone like me (ELO 2000). There is maybe too much advertising, but is quite normal and we have to accept. The live comments must be shared on 4 games that are simultaneously going on. Anyway I would prefer 4 dedicated entries (4 live cams, 4 live commentary with FM,IM or GM) so it would be possible switch from one game to another depending on our own interests. The press conference with the player is very intersting, but sometime the analysis are too much fast for me (see for example the press-conference after Caruana-Giri).