Chess Club Live Blog

Chess, a game that embodies strategy, intelligence, and patience, has stood the test of time. Its integrity and honor are paramount. However, as with any competition, the temptation to cheat has cast a shadow over the game in recent years. The last year has had headlines of cheating allegations in chess at the elite level. The high profile case of Hans Niemann being accused by Magnus Carlsen and later banned from chess.com. Hans has been exonerated of allegations withdrawn by Magnus Carlsen and his access to chess.com restored. However, this drama as serious as it seemed belies the real issue of cheating in chess. Cheating in chess is now the norm. It is so easy to cheat in chess. I found that it is now the norm in online chess websites that everyone there has some form of illegal assistance. The minority play fair now. 1. A Look Back at Historical Cheating Before the digital age, cheating in chess was quite rudimentary. One of the notable methods involved the touch-move rule. As per t...

 "Did I get 31 in 1 minute? I got 31 in 1 minute, I wasn't even paying attention..." - Hans Niemann I was on the fourth live stream that week with Hans Niemann. He was trying to beat the Puzzle Rush world record. "I got 62, I'm not going to break the world record tonight folks!" And with that, Hans hastily ended the stream. He pinged me on DM afterwards, wanting to know how I found his show. I told him it was awesome as usual and that I'd be following the next day. Hans Niemann is a precocious talent and is bursting with energy. When I got to know him he was a chess streamer and a very hardworking one at that. He would do a 6 hour stream, sign off to study chess then catch some sleep, all interspersed with school work. He was an IM and had ambitions to become a grandmaster but this was not his central focus. On Facebook I had a community of 250,000 which he seemed mildly impressed with and he was interested in engaging with them.. I connected with his da...