It is finally time to announce:

[Michael Sherwin]

I will be holding the first annual, World Atomic Computer Chess Championships, in the spring of 2012. It will be held in or around the area of Youngstown, Ohio. Hopefully at the Youngstown State University's Computer Center. There will be a $120,000.00 prise fund put up and guarantied, by me.

There will be open sections and also 'open source' only sections. Everyone will be required to compete using only an onsite single core Intel Atom processor. Also some prize money will be set aside for variants and Shogi if there is enough interest.

I will need to assemble a team of qualified volunteers to man a rules and oversee committee. All the work and planning needs to be done. This announcement is the first step that has been taken, except the accumulation of the prize fund, which has already been accomplished!

Further details will be announced as they are confirmed.

[Michael Sherwin]

Really! Not a single comment? Not one engine author willing to say that they will be there if this offer is legit? Is there a believability factor at work here? It just so happens that in the last year and a half I have found that I have a talent that I am much better at than programming chess. And that is making money using three letter symbols. The money is there just as I promise. But, if there is not enough interest in the project and no one is willing to step forward to help organize it then it won't take very long for me to withdraw the offer. Your choice!

[Roman Hartmann]

Hi Michael, I had no doubt that your offer was meant seriously. And it definitely sounds interesting to me. I can't go as far as to promise to be there in 2012 though. But I might.

And including chess variants and shogi sounds just perfect to me as I started with a shogi engine just two days ago. Although I didn't do more than reading the rules of play and creating a data structure yet.

Anyway, just for the records, I'm interested.

best regards
Roman

[Michael Sherwin]

Thanks Roman!

That's a start.

[hgm]

Do you also have a section for Atomic Chess? That would be most fitting!

[Michael Sherwin]

I get the joke!

If there are at least two Atomic-Chess engines and if you include the protocol in Winboard so they can play each other then something will be arranged!

[michiguel]

Really! Not a single comment? Not one engine author willing to say that they will be there if this offer is legit? Is there a believability factor at work here? It just so happens that in the last year and a half I have found that I have a talent that I am much better at than programming chess. And that is making money using three letter symbols. The money is there just as I promise. But, if there is not enough interest in the project and no one is willing to step forward to help organize it then it won't take very long for me to withdraw the offer. Your choice!

Everybody was busy participating at the ACCA tournament, and commenting this post. Why weren't you there?

Miguel

[Michael Sherwin]

I was too busy with three letter symbols among other things. Besides, I am not everybody, I am just one person and I was not aware that the ACCA event was underway.

I will make it a point to attend future ACCA events.

[CThinker]

Do each participant have to bring their own Atom-equipped machines or will the site have them (for uniformity)?

[Michael Sherwin]

Do each participant have to bring their own Atom-equipped machines or will the site have them (for uniformity)?

If we can get Intel on board then maybe we can get uniformity which would be the ideal. The idea behind using the atom processor at least is to get everyone roughly on the same level and to make the level of hardware in reach of the most people. Anyone can pack a $200 1.6 GHz 8" notebook in their luggage! My goal is to get as many people to attend this event as possible because they do not feel hopelessly disadvantaged by poor relative hardware performance. Also I would like to see authors challenged to do better on lesser hardware and to squeeze more from less. I will at least make sure that there are extra machines available if they are needed.