Chess.com Teams Up With HashtagChess For African Event Coverage

Palo Alto, Calif., March 8, 2020—Chess.com is set to partner with HashtagChess as the official partner for African chess coverage. In an effort to showcase some of the top talent on the continent, Chess.com is partnering with HashtagChess to bring Chess.com users live stream broadcasting of some major African events in 2020 on Twitch.tv/Chess and YouTube.com/Chess. Minor African and South African events will also be covered on Twitch.tv/HashtagChess.

HashtagChess is the name under which South African streamers WIM Jesse February and WCM Rebecca Selkirk broadcast. February and Selkirk are two of South Africa’s top female chess players, having represented the country at a number of African and international events. Both are active chess players, and are passionate about promoting the game in South Africa and in Africa on the whole.

"HashtagChess' commitment and dedication to promoting chess in Africa is exactly what Chess.com is looking for in a presenting partner," said Nick Barton, Director of Business Development at Chess.com. "We believe that teaming up with HashtagChess will offer a spotlight for Africa's up-and-coming talent to showcase their abilities on a major platform. We are excited to work alongside Jesse and Rebecca to make chess more accessible across the continent."

Events which are under consideration for coverage include The African Individual Chess Championship taking place May 20-30 as well as the Commonwealth Games which will take place later this year. In addition, events taking place within South Africa will be on the docket for the HashtagChess channel.

“We’re excited to partner with Chess.com and put African chess ‘on the map’. In the past, African chess has not received much attention and is often inaccessible even to African players, so we look forward to showing an international audience what Africa has to offer and providing a platform for African chess enthusiasts to follow their countries’ top players,” said HashtagChess. They added, “We hope that bringing African chess to a wider audience will lead to greater support for Africa’s promising players, and that in time the continent will be producing more players like GM Bassem Amin.”

Amin, Africa's top-rated player, also weighed in on the announcement: "It's great news that chess.com announced they will be covering chess events in Africa this year on their main twitch channel and on HashtagChess channel." The Egyptian grandmaster continued, "It's a great opportunity given to African chess that hopefully will bring more support to chess on the continent!"

Keep an eye on the Chess.com homepage, Team Africa and Team South Africa clubs for announcements regarding which African events will be covered, or follow HashtagChess on Twitch or Facebook to receive notifications directly.

Contact:

HashtagChess:
Jesse February and Rebecca Selkirk
hashtagchesstwitch@gmail.com

Chess.com:
Isaac Steincamp
Business Development Manager
isaac@chess.com