A compromise idea for the WCCC hardware limit

[Harvey Williamson]

Bob pays nothing to enter as his program is not commercial.

IIRC there is always a fee to pay, also for amateurs. 25 euro. The other costs are of course way higher, like travel and lodging, food, days off from work etc.
Richard.

yes you are right 25.

* Amateur: 25 Euro
* Semi-professional: 250 Euro
* Professional: 500 Euro

[CThinker]

Do you think a sponsor would have any interest in the even if they read Bob's statement above?

Bob's statement is for the current WCCC and the way it's being held until now. (Programmers pay those high prices to enter and spectators contribution is near zero.)

If situation changes and spectators become the main contributor of the event, perhaps Bob's statement becomes that WCCC is for programmers and spectators.

Bob pays nothing to enter as his program is not commercial.

How much do you think it cost Bob to develop Crafty? Years, which is almost impossible to compute in dollars.

In F1, the race day cost is nothing compared to the development of the car and the team.

[Harvey Williamson]

Do you think a sponsor would have any interest in the even if they read Bob's statement above?

Bob's statement is for the current WCCC and the way it's being held until now. (Programmers pay those high prices to enter and spectators contribution is near zero.)

If situation changes and spectators become the main contributor of the event, perhaps Bob's statement becomes that WCCC is for programmers and spectators.

Bob pays nothing to enter as his program is not commercial.

How much do you think it cost Bob to develop Crafty? Years, which is almost impossible to compute in dollars.
In F1, the race day cost is nothing compared to the development of the car and the team.

I also spend hours every day working on Hiarcs. i do not get paid for my work. However I value the fans, users and spectators. A world championship is about many things including of course the programmers.

[chessfurby]

**I also spend hours every day working on Hiarcs. i do not get paid for my work. However I value the fans, users and spectators. A world championship is about many things including of course the programmers


Same is true for me. Spending hours testing Sjeng etcetc. I am in it for the fun. The part where it turns "no fun at all" is that we spent quite some time setting up and testing a cluster which GCP was successfully able to do. Quite a lot of work went into writin, testing etcetc.

Allofasudden it is no longer allowed?!?!? Oh yeah .. sure it must be in the audiences best interest if the skills of some participants are severely hindered and artificially limited, just because others do not (or are skillwise not able to) do the work that comes with implementing a cluster/ smp/ GPU/ fpga version of his or her engine....

It is also not fun if- on relative short notice- you are being told "Ey listen all the time that u put into those projects is... err... NIL".

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

**I also spend hours every day working on Hiarcs. i do not get paid for my work. However I value the fans, users and spectators. A world championship is about many things including of course the programmers


Same is true for me. Spending hours testing Sjeng etcetc. I am in it for the fun. The part where it turns "no fun at all" is that we spent quite some time setting up and testing a cluster which GCP was successfully able to do. Quite a lot of work went into writin, testing etcetc.

Allofasudden it is no longer allowed?!?!? Oh yeah .. sure it must be in the audiences best interest if the skills of some participants are severely hindered and artificially limited, just because others do not (or are skillwise not able to) do the work that comes with implementing a cluster/ smp/ GPU/ fpga version of his or her engine....

It is also not fun if- on relative short notice- you are being told "Ey listen all the time that u put into those projects is... err... NIL".

And here you are....a living example of the stupidity of the ICGA decision of limiting the hardware platforms....
Nuff said regards,
Dr.D

[Harvey Williamson]

**I also spend hours every day working on Hiarcs. i do not get paid for my work. However I value the fans, users and spectators. A world championship is about many things including of course the programmers


Same is true for me. Spending hours testing Sjeng etcetc. I am in it for the fun. The part where it turns "no fun at all" is that we spent quite some time setting up and testing a cluster which GCP was successfully able to do. Quite a lot of work went into writin, testing etcetc.

Allofasudden it is no longer allowed?!?!? Oh yeah .. sure it must be in the audiences best interest if the skills of some participants are severely hindered and artificially limited, just because others do not (or are skillwise not able to) do the work that comes with implementing a cluster/ smp/ GPU/ fpga version of his or her engine....

It is also not fun if- on relative short notice- you are being told "Ey listen all the time that u put into those projects is... err... NIL".

How much notice do you want? GCP is welcome to borrow my spare 8 core as he has done before. However I know you spend a lot of time on Sjeng and the point I am making is that Bob's comment is just so strange about a WORLD championship.

[bob]

This event is for the _programmers_. Not for the spectators. Not for the users. Not for the players. For the _programmers_.

I wonder if the sponsors know this?
Is the Soccer World Cup just for the players?
Or as formula 1 is often quoted here is it just for the car makers?
etc etc etc....

I think that, in a way, those events are for the players and automakers. Racing has existed long before there were sponsors.

Also, the comparison is not valid, because WCCC does not get money from spectators. So, I don't think the spectators have a say here. In contrast, the programmers spend effort and money on both the development and the actual tournament.

Now, if the WCCC type of rules will be applied to F1, they would be limited to racing family sedans. That just demonstrates how silly the home PC limit is for the "World Chess Champion".

Do you think a sponsor would have any interest in the even if they read Bob's statement above?

Yes. Because they are _still_ a part of the competition. DO you not think that companies like TRW, Crane, Edlebrock, Carter, Holley, etc participate in these events so that they can use the results in their advertising? Do you not think the computer companies saw what IBM got with the Deep Blue exposure? The match _itself_ is not the attractive part of this. It is the _result_ of the match and the chatter it produces after the event ends that attracts the sponsors.

Who would want to sponsor an event where the entrants would be soundly thrashed by computer hardware in the playchess or ICC chess games? What would they gain if they could not even showcase their most sophisticated hardware? Oh, TRW, we want you to sponsor the event, but those ultra-light forged titanium pistons are not allowed, you can only use your bottom-end heavy aluminum pistons. And no space-age ceramic materials allowed either, they are too expensive. You have to use your old platinum-coated soft metal bearings.

Do you think TRW would be interested? The excitement comes from being a part of "the best of the best", not "the best of the rest..."

[bob]

Do you think a sponsor would have any interest in the even if they read Bob's statement above?

Bob's statement is for the current WCCC and the way it's being held until now. (Programmers pay those high prices to enter and spectators contribution is near zero.)

If situation changes and spectators become the main contributor of the event, perhaps Bob's statement becomes that WCCC is for programmers and spectators.

Bob pays nothing to enter as his program is not commercial.

Sorry, but that's wrong. I pay travel, room and board. I have to take two weeks off from work. I have to arrange hardware. It is not free...

[Harvey Williamson]

Do you think a sponsor would have any interest in the even if they read Bob's statement above?

Bob's statement is for the current WCCC and the way it's being held until now. (Programmers pay those high prices to enter and spectators contribution is near zero.)

If situation changes and spectators become the main contributor of the event, perhaps Bob's statement becomes that WCCC is for programmers and spectators.

Bob pays nothing to enter as his program is not commercial.

Sorry, but that's wrong. I pay travel, room and board. I have to take two weeks off from work. I have to arrange hardware. It is not free...

I pay that + 500 Euros and take the time off work. We intend to take part you have made it clear for some time that you won't so you will not have to make this sacrifice, one I am happy to make.

[bob]

**I also spend hours every day working on Hiarcs. i do not get paid for my work. However I value the fans, users and spectators. A world championship is about many things including of course the programmers


Same is true for me. Spending hours testing Sjeng etcetc. I am in it for the fun. The part where it turns "no fun at all" is that we spent quite some time setting up and testing a cluster which GCP was successfully able to do. Quite a lot of work went into writin, testing etcetc.

Allofasudden it is no longer allowed?!?!? Oh yeah .. sure it must be in the audiences best interest if the skills of some participants are severely hindered and artificially limited, just because others do not (or are skillwise not able to) do the work that comes with implementing a cluster/ smp/ GPU/ fpga version of his or her engine....

It is also not fun if- on relative short notice- you are being told "Ey listen all the time that u put into those projects is... err... NIL".

How much notice do you want? GCP is welcome to borrow my spare 8 core as he has done before. However I know you spend a lot of time on Sjeng and the point I am making is that Bob's comment is just so strange about a WORLD championship.

No, you are just not paying attention. The competition itself, is solely for the programmers. Write your best. Find the best hardware. Test the best way you can. Develop the best book. Then show up with that stuff and compete against the best that everyone else has.

What you want is to turn this into a completely uninteresting and irrelevant tournament, which will always be subject to the criticism "but the 16 core fritz in the playchess server could thump _any_ of the programs in the WCCC including the winner" and you would have absolutely no defense to that claim, and it would render the WCCC completely irrelevant.

Makes no sense to me. Yes a _few_ non-programmers are interested in the results. Those are in the thousands, not millions. Sponsors could care squat about providing a lot of hardware that might be seen by a few hundred at most, and then forgotten about because the hardware was so run-of-the-mill. But ask them to showcase their latest big server or cluster, and things are different, because this produces a "buzz" far beyond just chess. Cray Blitz used to have a big "fan club" at the super-computer conferences where many ACM events were held. Guess why? Not because of "chess" because most of these people didn't even play chess. But they were interested in supercomputers and wanted to see their "favorite brand" win another tournament and show the superiority (an impression to be sure, but still there) of the Cray brand over all the others.

You want to render the WCCC completely irrelevant, which is fine by me since I consider the CCT events to be more prestigious anyway since there are far more entrants and still with sophisticated hardware platforms.

BTW, for "notice" a _year_ should be the minimum. I am working on the design for a "cluster Crafty." Which will probably be ready in time for the WCCC if we choose to enter. But apparently that won't even be possible and all the effort expended so far is for nothing. Better would be two-three years if it is such a major and radical departure from the past 40 years of computer chess history.