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Not Abandoned

Good Morning, Campers!

I know it’s been a long time, but I just wanted to drop a quick note to tell you that this site has not been abandoned. However, I’m far busier focused on my YouTube channel and a few other projects these days. I still play and read chess regularly, but not enough to blog about regularly. I did, however, update to a new theme because the old site theme was approaching seven years old and was highly unstable.

I’m sure that I’ll resume regularly blogging at some point in the future. In the meantime, continue to enjoy the archives and occasional updates here on Campfire Chess!

Sincerely,
Ex

Eight Years Around the Campfire!

It’s been quite a ride so far as Campfire Chess celebrates its eighth birthday today! I started writing this blog shortly after closing an astronomy blog I had run for about 10 years called nightShifted Astronomy. Throughout its time, this site has covered world championships, local events, personal struggles, and a variety of topics throughout the chess world.

Campfire Chess began in May 2014 as Off My Chess and has taken many forms throughout the years. I am proud of the work done here and look forward to continuing as I keep playing chess and work to help others get to know the joy of the world’s greatest game.

Happy Birthday, Campfire Chess – A Personal Chess Journey!

Chess.com Is Lost

I’ve been openly critical of major chess websites before. ChessBase and Chess.com regularly receive praise here on Campfire Chess when they do things that further the development and promotion of the game, but they also get flamed when I believe that its necessary. This week, Chess.com went far beyond the necessity for a simple commentary. They’ve crossed into territory that should be unsettling for anyone who values our game. In fact, it’s my opinion that Chess.com has become so lost and has moved so far away from actual chess that I’ve made the unfortunate decision to stop playing and contributing to it for the foreseeable future.

Wasted Opportunities

Over the years, I’ve watched as Chess.com focused its attention on hideous endeavors like POG Champs and promotions that were designed to drive Twitch views more than actually promote the game in way that focused on longevity. Short-term exploitation of the Queen’s Gambit boom has led to negligible increase in the game’s long term interest. Then, they spent extraordinary amounts of money to house the Botez sisters in a Big Brother-like mansion in the name of (somehow) promoting the game. Yet, we haven’t really heard anything about it since. Why? Most likely because it doesn’t appeal to the wider chess audience and it’s a ridiculous waste of funds generated by site memberships.

And what did they learn from the fizzling of these activities? Absolutely nothing…

Selling Their Souls for NFTs

I have to admit that I was beyond furious when Chess.com announced its new NFT website, Treasure Chess. Now YOU TOO can mint your special 300 ELO Scholar’s Mate and charge $3000 on Chess.com for people to “own” it. No other technology available today infuriates me more than the peddling of cryptocurrency garbage like Non Fungible Tokens (NTFs). Or, as I prefer to call them, No F**king Thanks. This could be the first foul language moment in this blog’s history, but that’s okay. It’s time.

NFTs are one of the greatest pyramid schemes to emerge (so far) in the 21st Century. It’s a technology that prays on people’s lack of understanding of blockchain and cryptologic technology to get them to buy art, music, and now…chess games. These sites promise ownership of the purchased item, but all you own is a digital receipt or hyperlink to a receipt identifying you as the owner. Nothing stops other users from screenshotting the art, downloading the music, or retrieving a chess game from a database and posting it in another place. In essence, you own nothing.

On top of the fact that NFTs promise the future but deliver nothing, the power required to generate the crypto receipts for NFTs is enormous. It’s contributed to the insane price of Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) these days and the increased energy consumption is detrimental to the health and wellbeing of our planet.

Done for Now

I realize that Chess.com is not an airport and there is no reason for my to announce my departure. However, I have been blogging about chess for 8 years now and a majority of the games, analysis, and stories have come from Chess.com. I’ve watched the site evolve from a competent and inviting community for people to grow, learn, and connect through chess…into a monstrosity. I have hope that one day Chess.com will find its away again, but until then, I simply cannot continue to support the site through a premium membership or paid verification. Until the insanity is reigned in at Chess.com, you’ll find all of my future content here on the blog and at lichess.org.

Game on, campers!
Ex

An Appeal to WordPress

Dear WordPress,

For the love of God, please stop destroying your platform. Campfire Chess runs on a nearly 10-year old WordPress installation and for many years it was unbeatable as a blogging and content management system. More recently it seems that every time I log into my site to make an entry I am confronted with some unnecessary and extremely destructive redesign of basic features. At first it was the Gutenberg editor that divides paragraphs into blocks. Fortunately, there is a plugin to remove that nonsense and return to the classic editor.

And now it’s widgets. The small blocks of interactivity on the right side of Campfire Chess are done with WordPress widgets and until recently, it was a very easy and basic function of site management. Now it’s received its own Gutenberg upgrade an it literally destroyed my sidebar. Fortunately, there is a plugin to remove that nonsense and return to the classic widgets…

Are you noticing the pattern yet?

Come on, guys. Stop ruining a good thing. When the top plugins on your platform are designed to remove some of your most recent added features…take a freakin’ hint.

Non-chess rant over!

Game on, campers!
Ex

Website Code Refresh and Updates

It’s taken a few weeks, but I’m almost finished with the code refresh and cleaning out all of the junk here on Campfire Chess. You’ll notice that quite a few things have changed. Some are subtle and some are not so subtle. I’m still in the process of going through all of the old content to determine its historical merit. Some older content has been removed because the YouTube videos they reference or the websites/products they reference no longer exist. The world of chess is always changing and so will we. Here’s a brief overview of what’s happening so far:

  • More regular updates of news, events, and games from top players as well as local games and events.
  • Completely redesigned the Downloads page. More game collections are on their way.
  • Realigned all 300+ posts since the website opened to make sure they align with proper categories.
  • Removed 10+ posts referencing websites, products, and YouTube videos that no longer exist.

Additionally, I’m working to add some new features to the site as well.

  • Started working on the chess utility. Right now it’s just a board that can be used for quick online analysis. Eventually it’ll include libraries and openings, but it’s just basic at the moment.
  • More interaction and cross-blogging with Chess.com. Campfire Chess is now a Chess.com premium member and I’d eventually like to feature the content on this website alongside their top blogs as well. You can view certain content from this site cross-blogged here.
  • The YouTube channel for this site is dead, but I hope to revive it before the end of the year with some new content. I just have to decide what kind of chess content I’m going to feature.

I’m very excited to be bringing this project back to life and I hope that you’ll continue to take the journey with me. The best way to engage with Campfire Chess is on our social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.

Campfire Chess Socials Live Again!

As you might have noticed, Campfire Chess is slowly roaring back to life after an extended hiatus. The return not only includes some refinements to the design, a code refresh, a complete redesign of the Downloads page, and a few other tweaks…but it also includes the return of our social media accounts. I am doing my best to build a content system where I can consistently update them, but for now, the accounts are active and slowly coming back to life along with the site. If you’re into the social media scene, check us out:

Facebook: Campfire Chess
Twitter: @CampfireChess
Instagram: @CampfireChess

Campfire Chess: A Brief Update

Greetings campers!

It’s hard to believe that we’ve gone almost completely through 2020 without a blog entry here on Campfire Chess. There are many reasons and excuses that I could list, but I’m not sure that any of you are interested in those. If there’s anyone out there still reading the site, then you might be wondering: where the hell is the new content? Well, the truth of the future is much more complicated than I would like to admit. Suffice to say that I have the funds and resources to continue to maintain the site and will do so for as long as I can. I have no intention of taking Campfire Chess off-line anytime soon. In fact, I would love the opportunity to begin writing again regularly. It’s my hope and dream that I’ll be able to do that relatively soon.

In the meantime, to slowly restore site operations and to get myself back into the habit of writing and playing chess regularly, I’ve gone through the campfire chess social media accounts with a fine tooth comb and cleaned out a lot of the junk that has accumulated over the past few years. Hopefully by focusing on the social media accounts to begin with, I’ll be able to work up enough of a content catalog to begin writing again with some relative consistency.

The first order of business here on the website is for me to finally finish the updated downloads page that I’ve been working on for the last year and a half. No, that doesn’t mean that the downloads page is going to be some incredible and earth shattering project. What it really means is that it’s a small update designed to make accessing the information on the page much easier that has taken far longer than I would ever have expected for something of that size. With that in mind, I’m not going to set a date for the possible release of an updated downloads page or any changes to the site because I’m not sure if I’m able to keep those deadlines at this time.

Thank you to everyone who has supported Campfire Chess throughout the years. Your love and support has not gone unnoticed and is deeply appreciated. I still share a passion for chess although my life’s responsibilities and interests have taken me elsewhere. The site will continue to live on and new content is coming. I can only hope that I’m able to produce said content within a reasonable span of time. Until then, please continue to enjoy the archived content that is still posted here on the site and take advantage of the materials available in the downloads page. I look forward to journeying ahead with you all.

Sincerely, Wesley

Cleaning Out the Dust!

Whew! This place is dusty! There are spider webs all over the place and it is obvious that the power went out at some point on this website because there is a funky green mold growing in… Oh, nevermind. Greetings, Campers! Welcome back to Campfire Chess, an amateur chess blog that has seen better days. Seriously.

So, today you might have noticed (or not) the first official blog post since May 2018 and the first significant visual upgrades since 2017. Well, I decided to re-open the site’s core this morning and I was shocked to see how neglected it had become. At one point, Campfire Chess was my crowning (pun intended) achievement! It was heartbreaking to see how much the challenges of the past year had allowed it to decay.

Fear not, however! I have cleaned out the dirt, busted the spider webs, and made some minor upgrades to the site’s visuals and operational elements. It is my hope over the next few months to get back to regular chess blogging. Before I do that, I have to get back to regular chess playing, which is something sorely lacking for me these days.

I am working on that! I promise! In the meantime, continue to check back here for new content or follow Campfire Chess on any of its social media platforms using the navigation menu above.

See you on the board!

We Will Be Back

Attention, Campers!

Campfire Chess has been dormant since the summer, but fear not! It is not dead. I am prepared to return to regular chess blogging shortly after the new year, so check back in January 2019 for updates!

In the meantime, congratulations to GM Magnus Carlsen for retaining his World Chess Champion title. I was rooting for Fabiano (USA, USA), but alas, we will get it next time!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all!

Campfire Chess Marketplace Now Open

Do you have an old chess set, clock, book, or trinket lying around that you want to get rid of? Amazon and eBay offer great ways to buy and sell, but Facebook’s Marketplace has recently been offering ways for communities to be built around buying and selling goods. Personally, I have had much success with these groups trading old VHS tapes and memorabilia, so I am pleased to announce the opening of The Isolated Pawn: A Chess Marketplace by Campfire Chess!

Membership is open to anyone interested in buying, selling, or trading chess goods. Membership requires a review to prevent spam accounts from joining, but I promise to review and approve membership requests as soon as possible.

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