What is the state today of Over the Board Chess, and the USCF?

I think with regards to classical chess OTB rating... the time controls are faster.  For example, a game could be 30/d5 per player and that would be considered a classically rated game.  That seems pretty fast to me.

I applied and was told that I had to solidify first as my last two official matches after 2200 were a loss and a draw.

That's why I'm playing on the 27th, I did not even plan on going.

All I need is a win and two draws.

Interesting.  That fits with what I read in the USCF Annual Report.  Steady numbers of players, but larger and larger percentage of kids.  I wonder why that is.

I suppose it is probably that the generation that is 15-40 these days is more interested in e-sports and video games.  Also, board games as a whole have become wildly more popular in recent years, so if you are a more social player there are more opportunities to head to a gaming group and play Ticket to Ride.

Or is it that ever since Kasparov lost to Deep Blue, and since then ever since your laptop could beat the original Deep Blue, Chess has lost some of its mystique?  Or online/computer play has gotten so cheap and easy that OTB can't compete?  

Kids still play because parents and schools push them, and they have fun doing it, but not as much fun as they would have with video games, so as they get older, they drop out?

All speculation on my part.  I'm sure someone, somewhere, has studied the phenomenon, but I don't know what they've come up with.

Of course, I always go back to cost as an explanation.  As long as they are spending mom and dad's money, they're willing to pony up the entry fee, but when they start having to spend their own, it's not worth it.  However, that might just be me.  I really am a cheapskate.

For a lot of US players, it's not that easy to find a lot of FIDE-rated events to play in. That might explain why their FIDE ratings are deceptively low. But in general, for players who have "legit" FIDE and USCF ratings, the USCF rating is almost always higher that their FIDE rating. 

I think USCF and FIDE are engaged to be married.

I'm just sayin' when you see those paparazzi pictures of them together...  remember who told you first

1. ghost_of_pushwood wrote:

   They belong together!

Did you have to send chess.com a copy of your ID as well?

Cause apparently  that's what they're asking of you want it to be accredited here.

The requirements are listed in the title application.

According to this survey, I can interpret like that in groups

1200- 1500 ---->>> USCF = FIDE+10

1500- 2000----->>>> USCF =  FIDE +60

2000+.        ----->>>>>USCF= FIDE +110

You never really know what you're going to get when starting a thread.  I wasn't really thinking about a comparison of USCF vs. FIDE ratings as part of the state of OTB Chess today.

In other news, I'm glad to say that although some of the tournament series that I used to play in are gone, other ones have taken their place.  I've decided that next Sunday I am either going to go to a quad tournament, or go see "Midway".  It depends on my wife's plans for the day.  If I don't get to that one, I'll probably wait until Robotics season is finished.

(I was just never quite serious enough to really fit in with USCF culture.)

I've been a member of USChess (formerly USCF) since 1968;  I would rate it's present status as "Very Good," and it's services "Excellent."

1) Regarding the annual dues ($40 for Adult with online access to Chess Life mag/$47 if you want a hard copy of the mag mailed to you):  In 1968 Adult dues were $10 (I was a Junior at $5).  Before Fischer became World Champion, there were very few clubs that ran rated tournaments, and, even near Boston, there were only 20 or so rated tournaments in a year.  Chess Life was a skinny publication that was often mailed late.  It could take up to 3 months to see your rating change after playing, and the organization struggled to financially fund a National Championship or to send players overseas to Olympiads and World Team.  So, in 50+ years, the annual dues has increased around 400%-500%.  The average inflation rate from 1967-2017 was 700%.  The annual dues rate is entirely reasonable, IMO.

2) USChess, in 2019 offers far more services than ever.  Tournaments are rated electronically within hours of completion.  Ratings are provided for Classical, Rapid(Quick) and Blitz events.  There are 10 times the amount of rated events available (in my area) compared to the late '60s.

3) The organizational stability, financial soundness and growth potential, has never been stronger since Fischer abdicated his title in 1975. USChess achieved full, charitable,non-profit status with the IRS, which has enabled it to secure far more donations to the cause of promoting chess.  With the assistance of Rex Sinquefield (and others), USChess has had much of the financial burden (of sponsoring US Championships and International Team events) off-loaded.  This has enabled USChess to expand it's efforts and resources to recruit more players to OTB events.

While the late 1990's saw a net loss of OTB players to the internet, there is now a net gain in OTB activity owning to a small portion of the huge number of players that first were drawn to chess on web servers.

Sounds like it's pretty healthy.  Some things about it still drive me nuts, though.  Why not a real calendar of events.  I don't get it.

Well, it seems to be working.  Based on the last financial report, it seems possible that even the adult membership trend has turned around.

For my part, I wish they had a lower cost short term or perhaps single day tournament membership.  I'll guarantee you that they would have gotten somewhere between 10 and 40 dollars per year from me if they had a 10 dollar one day membership available.  As it is, they got zero.

Of course, they would have lost money on anyone willing to pay the fourty bucks to play in a single tournament.  I don't; know how, overall, it would affect revenue or quality.

USCF Sales is now price matching.

Concerning the USCF vs FIDE, can’t really compare. FIDE events are relatively rare in the US, and most chess players aren’t traveling to Europe to play. So at any given time there may be a lag either way in the players rating. This is doubly true for younger players (they have those slaughterfest scholastic tournaments which isolates their ratings even more).

whatever you say, Goober.

I'm sure they do, but a lot of that is just a sign of the to times.  Databases and internet connections have changed the world.  

It just bugs me that I can't go to one place to find out where and when I can play chess.  I can't even find the answer if I limit it to USCF rated chess.  The tla page at uscf's web site is worse than useless, because it creates a false impression.  

That was one of my big pushed as a member of the outreach committee, but it was met with exactly zero responses.  It's embarrassing that six years later they still don't see a need for a real calendar.

not sure if you are aware of this site, it's pretty good for finding what's coming up

https://onlineregistration.cc/

The problem is that it doesn't.

It lists a subset of them, presumably there's a fee people don't want to pay.  What then happens is that a new person stumbles on the site and looks for tournaments in Michigan, sees two of them, and for whatever reason decided that isn't enough for him, or the ones listed are too far or too expensive, and doesn't play.

I'm going to a quad tournament on Sunday.  It isn't on the calendar.

What I wanted was just for the USCF to start sending emails to TD's encouraging them to create online tla's.  Nope.  Didn't happen.  I can't understand why not.

It doesn't cover every club tourney unless the club wants to list on that site.  MCF generally carries those on their site.  Between the two I would think you'd be pretty well covered.  Assuming the quad you plan to attend is the one in Troy?

actually it was raised relatively recently