It is finally time to announce:

[Michael Sherwin]

Partly out of frustration and partly to give people time to decide whether they want this or not, I am going to refrain from checking back until Friday. I will decide whether to withdraw this offer or to go through with it, based upon what I read here then.

I can see that when the spring of 2012 gets closer, that demonstrated interest should grow. I guess that it is just a little far away at the moment for most to get excited about. I will go on faith that the turnout will warrant such a large prize fund, for now. However, if the turnout does not materialize then I reserve the right to adjust the prize fund to match the turnout. I do not think that it will be necessary though. At least I hope not!

For those that are still skeptical about the prize fund though, I will open a separate account and start populating it with cash as it becomes available from the stock positions that I close. I will then send the original monthly statements to a well known and trusted person for verification.

i am fairly well known here i guess
If your serious about the prize fund then i will volunteer to verify and monitor the account

i am a CPA and managing partner in an accounting firm in NYC
PM me if you are interested in my participation
i will give you my office phone number and we can talk on the phone

Regards
Steve

I think that you are an outstanding choice for this task and thank you for volunteering!

[TonyJH]

Sounds like an interesting event to me, especially if shogi and variants are included. That is a very generous prize fund.

[hgm]

I just installed your WB and Pulsar, it seems there's a bug somewhere : sometime there's no explosion .
The game :

[Event "Computer Chess Game"]
[Site "VINVIN-PC"]
[Date "2010.11.08"]
[Round "-"]
[White "Vinvin"]
[Black "pulsar2009-9a.exe"]
[Result "*"]
[TimeControl "40/300"]
[Variant "atomic"]
[Annotator "1... -0.20"]

1. Nf3 f6 2. e4 h5 3. Bb5 Nc6 4. d4 e6 5. Bf4 e5 6. Bxc6 *

After 6.Bxc6, no explosion :-/

WB 4.4.x unfortunately only does the explosion when animating moves, not when animating dragging. I had overlooked that, and only discoverd it recently, when porting the code to XBoard. So moves by the computer (e.g. by the engine, or when stepping through an existing game) should always animate the explosion, and moves entered by the human as click-click moves trigger the same anmation routine, and thus also have explosions. Dragging the piece around is done by another routine, however, and when you release it on the target square, the move animation is suppressed, because WB assumes the move has already been done. (You don't want the piece to jump back to the starting square, and do the move again.) But in Atomic the explosion would still have to be animated, as you don't want that to start before you commit to the capture by releasing the piece.

This is fixed now in the development version, which we hope to release soon as 4.5.0. A WinBoard binary of this is aready included in the package http://hgm.nubati.net/Spartan.zip .

[michiguel]

Five years ago I was flat broke when I wrote RomiChess, but now, because, I started dabbling in the stock market about three years ago and got really good at it about a year and a half ago I am a multi millionaire. The money is a big deal, but, not a huge deal and I want to do this.

It couldn't have happened to a nicer and more deserving guy!

If I finish my re-write by spring 2012, then I will enter your contest.

Best regards,
Ron

I second this e-mail. It is really nice to see that fortune once in while smiles to a nice guy. Michael, I hope this financial situation make the burden of your health related family problems less stressful.

Back to CC:
Michael: Control your emotions otherwise the roller coaster will kill you! you cannot expect the people to flood the forum with messages about this initiative in a very short period of time. You posted Saturday night and Sunday early afternoon you were worried that there was no response. Things take time...

Besides money, there are other things that will make an initiative like this successful. IMHO, you should not try to overextend the organization too much at the beginning. I would do only chess at the beginning unless it is very clear there are good reasons to do something else. Maybe one variant...

Another thing to guarantee some success is to make sure that people would come. Prizes are a good incentive, but paying plane tickets maybe a cheaper way to attract some authors from overseas (or outside the midwest). Maybe some awards could be given for that purpose.

Associating this to an academic Dept is a good idea. BUT, you have to make sure they are interested. Not every dept is interested in in everything and it could be a burden for them. If they are interested, you could set aside a bit of money to invite a prestigious speaker in AI to give a lecture. That will be a contribution to the comp. sci. dept. that may justify their efforts in providing the venue.

A good thing is you are planning this well in advance. The community will be very grateful.

Miguel

[silentshark]

Well, I hope it goes ahead. Sounds like a fun event. Uniform platform is cool, too.

If the field is wide enough (i.e. its not just a small bunch of mega-engines), and other programmers are going to be there, I might be tempted to enter. I've done a few of the WMCCC events, and they were a blast!

Hey Tom,

If I can pull you and other famous warriors of the past out of (semi) retirement then that will be another huge plus as far as I am concerned!

Cheers, Michael, never say never! Recent CC events seem to have been shrinking (in terms of numbers of participants). I wonder whether there's enough interest here for another "biggie", say 32 engines or more?

[Michael Sherwin]

Five years ago I was flat broke when I wrote RomiChess, but now, because, I started dabbling in the stock market about three years ago and got really good at it about a year and a half ago I am a multi millionaire. The money is a big deal, but, not a huge deal and I want to do this.

It couldn't have happened to a nicer and more deserving guy!

If I finish my re-write by spring 2012, then I will enter your contest.

Best regards,
Ron

I second this e-mail. It is really nice to see that fortune once in while smiles to a nice guy. Michael, I hope this financial situation make the burden of your health related family problems less stressful.

Back to CC:
Michael: Control your emotions otherwise the roller coaster will kill you! you cannot expect the people to flood the forum with messages about this initiative in a very short period of time. You posted Saturday night and Sunday early afternoon you were worried that there was no response. Things take time...

Besides money, there are other things that will make an initiative like this successful. IMHO, you should not try to overextend the organization too much at the beginning. I would do only chess at the beginning unless it is very clear there are good reasons to do something else. Maybe one variant...

Another thing to guarantee some success is to make sure that people would come. Prizes are a good incentive, but paying plane tickets maybe a cheaper way to attract some authors from overseas (or outside the midwest). Maybe some awards could be given for that purpose.

Associating this to an academic Dept is a good idea. BUT, you have to make sure they are interested. Not every dept is interested in in everything and it could be a burden for them. If they are interested, you could set aside a bit of money to invite a prestigious speaker in AI to give a lecture. That will be a contribution to the comp. sci. dept. that may justify their efforts in providing the venue.

A good thing is you are planning this well in advance. The community will be very grateful.

Miguel

I am grateful for this reply and the advice. I will be relying heavily on good advice as things progress. Yes, I will contact the YSU computer dept very soon. YSU has built their own computer center building that is quite impressive and I understand that they have expanded their interest beyond that of just basic computer science. I hope that they will see this as a great opportunity.

The advanced notice was not only to give me time to plan it and get it right, but also to give engine authors and would be engine authors the time to prepare!

I want to keep the prize fund spectacular for obvious reasons! However, if things go well for me in the coming months then I will be able to do more. But, I can't commit to anything more at this time. There are other people with money that can help with plane fare for authors that can not afford to attend, if they are willing to contribute to the cause, that is. But, let me hear peoples opinions on this and I will consider reducing the prize fund in favor of supplying transportation and lodging.

[George Tsavdaris]

I did not know that there was such a thing as Atomic Chess.

The word Atomic in the event title just is a reference to the Atom processor and has nothing to do with Atomic Chess.

LOL. Super misunderstanding then....

It would be interesting anyway with or without Atomic Chess.

[Steve B]

Partly out of frustration and partly to give people time to decide whether they want this or not, I am going to refrain from checking back until Friday. I will decide whether to withdraw this offer or to go through with it, based upon what I read here then.

I can see that when the spring of 2012 gets closer, that demonstrated interest should grow. I guess that it is just a little far away at the moment for most to get excited about. I will go on faith that the turnout will warrant such a large prize fund, for now. However, if the turnout does not materialize then I reserve the right to adjust the prize fund to match the turnout. I do not think that it will be necessary though. At least I hope not!

For those that are still skeptical about the prize fund though, I will open a separate account and start populating it with cash as it becomes available from the stock positions that I close. I will then send the original monthly statements to a well known and trusted person for verification.

i am fairly well known here i guess
If your serious about the prize fund then i will volunteer to verify and monitor the account

i am a CPA and managing partner in an accounting firm in NYC
PM me if you are interested in my participation
i will give you my office phone number and we can talk on the phone

Regards
Steve

I think that you are an outstanding choice for this task and thank you for volunteering!

Hi Michael
was great speaking with you on the phone earlier
its my pleasure to assist you in this area
Best Regards
Steve

[CRoberson]

I don't see why the ACCA couldn't be a part of this assuming that all that is stated here is above board.

Steve B will be fine for verifying funds.

[Michael Sherwin]

I don't see why the ACCA couldn't be a part of this assuming that all that is stated here is above board.

Steve B will be fine for verifying funds.

That is very good news Charles!

I will be getting some dividends in a week or so. I will initiate the account then. January is the next big month for dividends so that contribution will be more substantial. The money will be in place well before the start date.