The Secret of Chess

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

Lyudmil, how many copies did you end up selling?

I hope it did well for you.

looking at my first dozen, but still not there...

I even published on amazon for lower prices, but it is just a trickle.

porn, on the other hand, seems to sell very well.

but then, obviously, no one is interested..., it is a pity because this book will be a reference in 20 years.

anyway, Nimzovich also died in poverty...

I think some of your ideas warrant a bigger audience - whether right or wrong haha.

If you'd like my help with marketing - that is - to relaunch the book (and perhaps your other book "pawns" as well) and use good marketing, professional book covers, revamped website, social media promotion, email promotions, etc... just let me know.

We'll work out a deal that satisfies both of us, and hopefully brings a ton more sales.

thanks.

I will leave things like that for another month, till the middle of September, to get a clearer picture, and then probably I will have to change my strategy.

I don't believe anything could be changed by social media, professional covers, etc.

this is a book for persons who like to read and engross themselves, and not stay on the surface.

if such person reads the book, he will like it, if not, I guess no covers will help.

what I need is probably someone to 'spot' the book, and expert in the field, preferably a GM, and spread word.
a couple of positive reviews might also help, but I am afraid my reviews will still be 0 in couple of months' time.

there simply seems not to be interest.
for example, there are 30 SF active developers, not a single one is interested in buying; I will certainly give free copies to a dozen persons on the framework in a while, but if no one from SF is interested in the book, what to expect from others?

also, from the existing 10 or so commercial chess engine programmers, only Komodo has bought a copy. what to expect after that?

I also sent some copies to solid chess publishers like quality chess, etc., they will have to read it, but I am very much afraid they will either find it stupid, or not understand it, which is basically the same.

Sure man, no problem.

That's okay, I'm pretty busy anyway - was just trying to help.

I'll make a few notes on what you said anyway, it's like an itch I can't help but scratch lol.

Firstly, people DO judge a book by its cover.

No offense, but the current covers of your books look like they were made in MS Paint by super-imposing some text over a stock image.

If a prospective buyer sees that, they'll assume (incorrectly) that the contents of the book is of the same quality.

Your books titles also aren't descriptive and tell prospective buyers nothing about how the book will help them.

"Secret of Chess" and "Pawns"? - with MS Paint covers?

You aren't giving your books a chance like this, man.

Don't you think that with an improved title - something like "Secrets of Chess: How ANY Programmer Can Create a 3800 Elo Engine" and a nice, appropriate cover, plus nice sales copy written in the description you'd get at least 10x sales?

Have you defined exactly the market you're trying to sell to?

I mean...if the market is people interested in a FREE chess engine (SF programmers), I wouldn't say that's a good market.

They haven't proven a habit of spending money on this stuff.

Could you not aim it at the average, working, adult chessplayer?

Something like "800 Points Higher Than Magnus: Crushing Chess Secrets Even Stockfish Doesn't Know"

My point is, it is well known in business that creating a product and then searching for someone to buy it is the fastest way to go out of business.

Its far better to choose your market, and then create a product they'd love.

Sending it to quality chess (a mass market chess publisher) as well as engine programmers, makes me think that you havent decided who it is EXACTLY the book is for.

I'd say that the computer chess community is too small for real economic success of a eBook.

But on the other hand, chess players who have an INTEREST in chess engines is a HUGE market of which I myself have a decent sized mailing list.

About having an expert or GM "spot" the book - I don't agree.

If this happens, I'd guess the prospective customer will get convinced, will see the cover and lose trust.

You simply can't assume that "if they read it they'll love it".

Why do you think booksellers trying to sell certain books, place them cover out on the shelf?

They don't leave them hidden and say "well, if they read it they'll love it" - that's naive man.

I know a guy who used to think like this, who used to change hourly for his services and say "ahhh just pay me whatever you think it was worth" - the guy is still struggling years later.

You have to be realistic in business.

Anyway Lyudmil, good luck with your ventures.

yeah, I used MS paint.

I am simply like that.

it would be better to stop discussing technical details here, as Harm gets angered.

[chetday]

Lyudmil, I'm just a patzer as far as chess goes, but I earned a good part of my living selling ebooks on the internet for 14 years before I retired, and I want to second what Brendan's been telling you. He's giving superb advice and meaningful suggestions for improvement that you should take seriously and follow if you want to give your book a better chance at being successful. Good luck!

[Sam Watson]

I bought the book recently and today started digesting it. The concept of the book describing how an engine evaluates is a really good idea.

The mg, eg, cps abbreviation are annoying and an unnessasary lowering of the tone in my view. If those abbreviation are okay, why not refer R =Rook, Q= Queen etc.
Also, "the rook on c1 is a low-mobility piece", but the diagram shows c1 as a Bishop.

I'm wondering about the centipawn values given. Are they scaled? Stockfish scales them before final evaluation is given. How is this handled?

[duncan]

Something like "800 Points Higher Than Magnus: Crushing Chess Secrets Even Stockfish Doesn't Know"

I know nothing about marketing, but according to this he should be thinking about the benefit. eg. to become more knowledgable, to raise your elo etc and put it in the title.


http://www.printwand.com/blog/benefits- ... ur-product

Both features and benefits are equally important for effective advertising copy, but at the end of the day, it will be the benefits that give you the best advantages for converting customers.
The difference between benefits vs. features
The feature of a fast internet connection provides the the benefit of being able to find your way when you're lost.

A fast internet connection is a feature, but the ability to quickly find your way when you’re lost is a benefit.

Features are defined as surface statements about your product, such as what it can do, its dimensions and specs and so on.
Benefits, by definition, show the end result of what a product can actually accomplish for the reader.

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

I bought the book recently and today started digesting it. The concept of the book describing how an engine evaluates is a really good idea.

The mg, eg, cps abbreviation are annoying and an unnessasary lowering of the tone in my view. If those abbreviation are okay, why not refer R =Rook, Q= Queen etc.
Also, "the rook on c1 is a low-mobility piece", but the diagram shows c1 as a Bishop.

I'm wondering about the centipawn values given. Are they scaled? Stockfish scales them before final evaluation is given. How is this handled?

had no other choice; if I had not made use of centipawns to assess terms, then it would have been just white is better, or slightly better, or that term is favourable for this and that side.

do you find that more acceptable?

I am reading a lot of GM books, and almost all of them say +-, or +=, white has slight advantage, or big advantage, or, even more problematic, 'the position is unclear', identified with the infinity symbol, or, similarly funny, 'with compensation'.

what do all those enigmatic terms mean?

a position is either 'won', 'draw' or 'lost'.
no other option.

we are living in an age of engine rise, where we should try to get rid of all those inconsistencies.

I don't scale anything, the values are normal centipawn evaluations, with 100cps=1 full pawn.

on which page is this rook mentioning which refers to a bishop?

I recently reviewed again the contents and diagrams, found a small number of obvious grammatical mistakes and one or 2 diagrams with not fully correct display, but that was all.
I am my own proofreader, and certainly in this way it is possible for undesirable mistakes to slip in, but I have done my possible to avoid as many of them.

do other people who have read the book find plenty of issues with its content?

[Sam Watson]

had no other choice; if I had not made use of centipawns to assess terms, then it would have been just white is better, or slightly better, or that term is favourable for this and that side.

do you find that more acceptable?

I am reading a lot of GM books, and almost all of them say +-, or +=, white has slight advantage, or big advantage, or, even more problematic, 'the position is unclear', identified with the infinity symbol, or, similarly funny, 'with compensation'.

what do all those enigmatic terms mean?

a position is either 'won', 'draw' or 'lost'.
no other option.

we are living in an age of engine rise, where we should try to get rid of all those inconsistencies.

Seems a misunderstanding. I have nothing against use of the term 'centipawns', indeed an appropriate term for expressing precision. Just would like them called centipawns rather then cps.

I don't scale anything, the values are normal centipawn evaluations, with 100cps=1 full pawn.

Ok. Well I recall in the early days of TCEC the Stockfish eval for almost any given position with a plus was much higher then it's rivals. This got changed somewhere (around Stockfish 6 maybe?), but the high internal evaluation remains. Something to bear in mind.

on which page is this rook mentioning which refers to a bishop?

Page 41 in Low mobility peices on the edge.

I recently reviewed again the contents and diagrams, found a small number of obvious grammatical mistakes and one or 2 diagrams with not fully correct display, but that was all.
I am my own proofreader, and certainly in this way it is possible for undesirable mistakes to slip in, but I have done my possible to avoid as many of them.

Okay, any chance of saying the erratum?

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

had no other choice; if I had not made use of centipawns to assess terms, then it would have been just white is better, or slightly better, or that term is favourable for this and that side.

do you find that more acceptable?

I am reading a lot of GM books, and almost all of them say +-, or +=, white has slight advantage, or big advantage, or, even more problematic, 'the position is unclear', identified with the infinity symbol, or, similarly funny, 'with compensation'.

what do all those enigmatic terms mean?

a position is either 'won', 'draw' or 'lost'.
no other option.

we are living in an age of engine rise, where we should try to get rid of all those inconsistencies.

Seems a misunderstanding. I have nothing against use of the term 'centipawns', indeed an appropriate term for expressing precision. Just would like them called centipawns rather then cps.

I don't scale anything, the values are normal centipawn evaluations, with 100cps=1 full pawn.

Ok. Well I recall in the early days of TCEC the Stockfish eval for almost any given position with a plus was much higher then it's rivals. This got changed somewhere (around Stockfish 6 maybe?), but the high internal evaluation remains. Something to bear in mind.

on which page is this rook mentioning which refers to a bishop?

Page 41 in Low mobility peices on the edge.

I recently reviewed again the contents and diagrams, found a small number of obvious grammatical mistakes and one or 2 diagrams with not fully correct display, but that was all.
I am my own proofreader, and certainly in this way it is possible for undesirable mistakes to slip in, but I have done my possible to avoid as many of them.

Okay, any chance of saying the erratum?

thanks for the page number, I will check that.

at some point, I intend to publish a free update with minor, cosmetic-only corrections(I did not find substantial ones), it will be easy to provide for owners of pdfs, but I don't know how to gratify owners of paperbacks: probably, I will have to send revised pdf copies to them too, my problem is I would not know who bought the paperback.

concerning the book, I recommend starting the read with something more interesting, for example the chapter about pawns, imbalances, outposts, or something else.

material and mobility are definitely the most boring sections within.

thanks for the interest.

[BrendanJNorman]

Something like "800 Points Higher Than Magnus: Crushing Chess Secrets Even Stockfish Doesn't Know"

I know nothing about marketing, but according to this he should be thinking about the benefit. eg. to become more knowledgable, to raise your elo etc and put it in the title.


http://www.printwand.com/blog/benefits- ... ur-product

Both features and benefits are equally important for effective advertising copy, but at the end of the day, it will be the benefits that give you the best advantages for converting customers.
The difference between benefits vs. features
The feature of a fast internet connection provides the the benefit of being able to find your way when you're lost.

A fast internet connection is a feature, but the ability to quickly find your way when you’re lost is a benefit.

Features are defined as surface statements about your product, such as what it can do, its dimensions and specs and so on.
Benefits, by definition, show the end result of what a product can actually accomplish for the reader.

Was this for me?

I've written emails that brought in tens of thousands of dollars within a few days, so I have some idea in this field.

The features vs benefits concept is really quite basic, but yeah - a good guide to go by in the planning stage.

There's a lot of psychological triggers and things like this also at work, but thats another story.

I've been working in and studying marketing for a little while now.

Perhaps the subtitle could be:

"Crush Opponents with Chess Secrets Even Stockfish Doesn't Know!"

to offer an even clearer benefit, but it was a very quickly written advice - I assumed Lyudmil would ignore anyway - so I didn't put much thought into it.

If on the other hand, this was for our friend Lyudmil, than yes, these little pointers will definitely come in handy - even while writing future books.

We must always keep in mind the end result (benefit) the reader is looking for.

[leavenfish]

Lyudmil Tsvetkov

Other than your posts, is there something you can provide to recommend your qualifications as a chess author? Something other than your fooling around with engines a lot...say ELO maybe? I've just been wondering and thought I would finally ask.

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

Lyudmil Tsvetkov

Other than your posts, is there something you can provide to recommend your qualifications as a chess author? Something other than your fooling around with engines a lot...say ELO maybe? I've just been wondering and thought I would finally ask.

my book.

it is there, and it is for real.

you can not simulate writing it.

elo is nothing, Alekhine had no elo, Steinitz had no elo, Capablanca had no elo, some of those even had no titles.

I have not played for 12+ years, if I do some competitive runs now, I will get to over 2500 quite easily, at least, but I don't see the point of doing it.

OTB players are nasty.
I have been winning against GMs, who have been resorting to all kinds of tricks, in order not to lose, for example pressing down the clock button for a very long time, when both are low on time.

I don't like that kind of play.

You should understand that the average chess master/GM is very stupid. Maybe the top 50 or so are a bit intelligent, but overall, chess masters are very ordinary people without a lot of talent.

if a brighter person decides to put a lot of energy into chess instead of law, business or public administration, he will easily surpass them.

later