Book Extract – The Chess Revolution: Understanding the Power of an Ancient Game in the Digital Age

Excerpted with permission from the publishers The Chess Revolution: Understanding the Power of an Ancient Game in the Digital Age Peter Doggers, published by Little, Brown/ Hachette India.

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One afternoon in the spring of 2000, the Dutch grandmaster Paul van der Sterren’s phone rang. On the other end of the line was Sytze Faber, a member of the board of the Dutch Chess Federation. Shortly before the call, Van der Sterren had received his official invitation to the upcoming Dutch championship, which would take place in May of that year and, for the fourth time in a row, in Rotterdam. But this time, everything would be different. Faber notified him of a remarkable plan: he wanted to have a computer participate in the tournament.

‘I still remember exactly where I was standing in my living room when I got that phone call,’ Van der Sterren told me during a conversation for this book. ‘He informed me about this plan, and I felt the floor below me crumbling away. “What the hell is this? This cannot be true,” I thought. But soon, I realised he was serious.’ Van der Sterren protested, but Faber had already decided: ‘Sorry, Paul, but it’s going to happen.’

Although Deep Blue retired after the 1997 match, programmers of other chess engines, running on ordinary machines instead of $10 million supercomputers, still tried their luck for a few more years against human opponents. Or was it the humans who were trying their luck? As long as they could still put up a fight, man versus machine chess remained exciting and provided opportunities for publicity. At least, that was what Faber must have thought when he arranged for one of the 12 participants of the Dutch championship to be a special edition of ChessBase’s program Fritz, called Fritz SSS*.

It was the first and only time in the long history of chess that a computer had participated in an official national championship. The whole situation was highly controversial, if not bizarre, and was covered in international chess magazines. Two local journalists gave the same verdict independently of one another in their newspaper columns: ‘out of their minds’ and ‘everyone has gone mad’. But it all went according to Faber’s plan.

Except for Van der Sterren, the participants were persuaded to participate and play the computer in one of the rounds thanks to a sizeable increase in the prize fund from 100,000 to 170,000 guilders (equivalent to roughly €77,000 or $70,000 today; this was two years before the Netherlands adopted the euro). The money came from multiple sponsors, many related to the computer world, while ChessBase had somehow managed to set up an excellent deal as it only had to pay 12,000 guilders ($5,500).

Meanwhile, several angry chess fans set up a website under the name Chess Protest, where the name of the computer program was changed to ‘Fritz $$$’ and which received many statements of support against Fritz’s participation. Wasn’t a Dutch championship supposed to determine who was the country’s best human player?

Van der Sterren said, ‘I found it absolutely unethical to have a computer playing in a human championship, which would then be a disrupting factor. It just wasn’t fair, a kind of distortion of competition. I wanted to keep the tournament pure.’

The organisers had decided that if one player didn’t want to play against Fritz, they would receive zero points for that game and not share in the 70 per cent extra prize money. If two players didn’t want to play, the whole thing would be put off, and Fritz wouldn’t participate.

Besides Van der Sterren, two other players expressed unhappiness about the situation but played anyway. One participant, international master Manuel Bosboom, did sit down at the board against Fritz but resigned after four moves. It was not that he wanted to make his point without losing his money; he realised that if he didn’t play either, none of the participants would earn the extra money.

Van der Sterren, who lived in Amsterdam, didn’t even bother to make the trip to Rotterdam. His clock was started, and, after an hour, his game was declared a win for Fritz (following regulations) without a single move being played. Van der Sterren was praised by chess journalists and received many messages of support from all over the country. Several media requested interviews, including the popular talk show Barend en Van Dorp, but Van der Sterren refused. He didn’t want to join the hype and give the sponsors their desired publicity.

Fritz SSS* beat four players (besides Van der Sterren), drew with four others and lost two games. Many Dutch Chess Federation officials were unhappy with the situation and, after the tournament ended, they decided that this computer stunt was a case of ‘once but never again’. Within a few weeks, Van der Sterren noticed financial compensation of a few thousand guilders in his bank account.

End of an Era: the Last Man Versus Machine Matches

Humans played against computers for only a few more years. Vladimir Kramnik, the Russian player who dethroned Kasparov in 2000 to become the 14th World Chess Champion, tied a match with Deep Fritz 7 in Bahrain in 2002. Kasparov tied two matches against the programs X3D Fritz and Deep Junior in 2003. Three years later, the writing was on the wall when Kramnik lost a match to Deep Fritz 4–2, one that went down in history after witnessing the biggest blunder ever committed by a reigning world champion. Kramnik allowed a checkmate in one move in game two; an incredible oversight. Soon afterwards, ChessBase started advertising their latest program, Fritz 10, with the tagline: ‘Ask Kramnik how it feels!’

As if Kramnik’s loss wasn’t enough, humanity had suffered another, even bigger loss a year earlier. Playing from the Wembley Conference Centre in London, the top English grandmaster Michael Adams didn’t stand a chance against a computer called Hydra, backed by Abu Dhabi money. It ran on a 64-way cluster computer: basically, 64 computers connected and operating like a single machine. Hydra was a true monster, aptly named after the multiheaded serpent-like creature from Greek mythology. It won the match with a devastating 5½–1½ score. Adams had barely scraped a single draw and lost five games.

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Peter Doggers, The Chess Revolution: Understanding the Power of an Ancient Game in the Digital Age Little, Brown/ Hachette India., 2024. Pb. Pp. 400

Despite being 1,500 years old, chess has never been more relevant than it is today. The Chess Revolution explores chess as a cultural phenomenon from its biggest stars and most dramatic moments to the impact of the internet and AI.

Chess, as it turns out, isn't just one of the greatest games ever devised. It has inspired writers, painters and filmmakers, and was a secret mover behind technical revolutions like artificial intelligence that are transforming society. In The Chess Revolution the acclaimed Chess.com journalist Peter Doggers reveals how computers and the Internet have further strengthened the timeless magic of chess in the digital era, leading to a new peak in popularity and cultural relevance.

Chess is a staggering invention, if indeed it was invented. Maybe it just evolved. It is still evolving, now faster than ever, and Peter Doggers has traced and tracked its never-ending development with wit, vigour and insight. Nothing artificial about his intelligence — Sir Tim Rice

Peter Doggers has been covering the chess world as a journalist for almost 20 years, and no one knows more about its culture and controversies than him. Now he has undertaken a fascinating and synoptic survey that looks at the game's glorious past and what he hopes could be an even more storied future. Thanks to the internet, more people are playing and following the game than ever before, Netflix's The Queen's Gambit has triggered a new wave of popular interest, and computers and AI – far from killing the game, as many anticipated – have helped to remake it. Doggers argues forcefully that chess, for so long in danger of being marginalised after the high point of the great Fischer-Spassky world championship match in 1972, is returning to the mainstream and can be a winner again — Stephen Moss, author of The Rookie: An Odyssey Through Chess (and Life)

The game of chess deserves this book — Tex de Wit, comedian, TV personality and chess player

Doggers is an excellent guide . . . The Chess Revolution provides an entertaining and instructive overview of a game in the throes of reinvention. A decade ago, it would have been quite possible to view chess as a fading sport, as its mysteries were solved by computers and its audiences tempted away by video games and other less taxing entertainments. Instead, by embracing a heady mix of technology and globalisation, it has been re-energised – providing a lesson for other human intellectual pursuits far beyond the sixty-four squares — James Crabtree, Financial Times

Peter Doggers is one of the most well-known and respected journalists in the chess world. An internationally ranked chess player, he is the Director of news and events at the market leader in online chess, Chess.com. Doggers has played chess for more than 35 years and has covered it for more than 18. He has interviewed dozens of grandmasters, played basketball with Magnus Carlsen, and interviewed Garry Kasparov at Bobby Fischer‘s grave. Doggers lives in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.