Hi, my name's Ish, I'm 24 and started chess very young. I quickly became the best in my family- supplanting my older brother (then aged 11) as the best player in my primary school. I consistently lost, though, to a Polish guy called Artec who was a friend of our family and used to hum whilst he played incessantly and infuriatingly! A guy at church also gave me a good thrashing, so I knew I wasn't the greatest player in town! I won entry into the Intel Chess Challenge aged 11, but mum refused to let me play as she'd already agreed to let me go to Cub Camp that weekend. I remember begging my mum to let me play and even offering to pay for the camp (at the time, this was 10 weeks' pocket money and a huge amount of money for me!) but she wasn't to be moved. My best friend, who I taught to play and was the number 2 player in our school scored 3/6 in the first round and was eliminated (5/6 needed to get to round 2). I used to score around 90% against him, so I was frustrated not to play. He came into school the next week with 2 trophies in his arm claiming he came 3rd out of 2,000- even though he was 3rd of 6! Can you tell I was jealous!?

Since there was no club around after my primary school's, only a tiny fraction of people were on the internet and there was no chess in secondary school, I gave it up. How different things could have been, we'll never know!

When I was 16, I got Yasser Seirawan's book Winning Chess Tactics out of the library and never looked back! I found a tournament around 10 miles from where I live through Ceefax (the BBC's old terrestrial text-based service), played in the bottom section and scored 0/6! I kept practicing, and now here I am 8 years later. I currently play in the Major section (ECF grade 148), but based on results this year, I may be relegated back to the Intermediate! I played 2 games and got a win and a draw against the guy from church a couple of years back, so I'm sure I've improved since childhood though!

Just made a Wiki for my videos which is here: http://www.chessvideos.tv/wiki/index.ph ... %27_Videos

I aspire to at least be a FIDE Master one day although currently that's a long way away!

Hi, my name is Jonathan, I'm 22, working on my master's, and live in the great state of Virginia. Nice to meet everyone

@ Ish: Wow... The unofficial welcoming committee dropped the ball in your case -- of course, things have been a little slow of late on CV.TV -- except for the tournament, of course. A belated welcome aboard!

@ Jonathan: Welcome to our little corner of cyberspace!

Hi, my name is Cristi and I'm 16. I've been playing online for about one year and a half. Currently aspiring to get into Class B, and also find some people to play longer games with.
Nice to be here.

Hi Cristi! Welcome aboard! This is a good place for aspiring players to hang out.

Welcome aboard you knuckleheads I mean it.

Hi! I'm Kyle, 28 years old, 20 years of "playing" chess and about six months of seriously studying chess after I finally got sick of being very bad at it. Heard about this forum on another forum, and I'm always looking for more places to meet people and talk about the game.

Hi Kyle! Welcome aboard and make yourself at home!

hi

i am jamie 31 from the UK. I played chess for about 7 years from like 18 to mid twenties then gave up playing for poker. I was around 2000 elo but got a bit frustrated and poker, well its easier and lots of money involved

Anyway, my interest has started to peak in chess again and I am starting to play semi seriously again. My plan this time is to learn to play endgames decently (never really bothered before) and not focus on the opening so much

In the meantime any advice or pointers to which vids to watch on here would be great as well as a explaination of the credit process?

Happy New Year to all

Hi Jamie,

Welcome aboard! I guess if you're a "Buffy slayer" that would make you the "big bad" eh?

=wild=

lol nah its my poker name, which came from buffy the vampire slayer being on TV when I created my account. I dont even like the program

I'm new to chess, but old enough to have accumulated a little wisdom and strategy. Is 60 too old to learn? I will invest an hour or so every day to learning, researching and playing. Any suggestions regarding best use of my time? I play against the computer on my iPad. I really enjoy the videos where the player talks about what he/she is thinking while playing. This gives me a footing. Otherwise, without a lot of experience, I wouldn't know if my thinking is traditional or irrational. I'll have plenty of questions. Like, as a novice (or less), it is important for me to learn classic opening moves? Or should I spend the bulk of my time playing against the computer - or humans? Anyway, I hope to contribute here, not just brain pick.

Thanks in advance for the expected warm welcome,

JJ

Hey JicJac ^^ Welcome =D
One is as old as one feels
To your questions, well,...I guess playing against humans is much more beneficial and fun than playing against the computer. Best would be to look if you find a chess club that is near...much more fun if you have someone to talk to while enjyoing a drink ^^ If that's not the case there are plenty of opportunities to play online for free (like FICS http://www.freechess.org/ )
Classsical opening moves...well, no, you don't really have to learn them. I mean, just abide to the opening priinciple: Develop your pieces ! . You have to move 1-2 pawns to do so (usually d,e) and that's enough. Any position you will arrive at after having moved your pieces is 100% a "theoretical positon". So, no need to learn - just move the pieces ^^
If you want to take a look at openings you can just browse wikipedia to get a nice overview, and then pick / try out whatever appeals to you ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_opening ).

Thanks for the advice GW. Old as I feel eh? Well, today I'm feeling older than usual. I crashed my Harley FLH ElectraGlide a year or so ago and two days ago had the metal plates and screws removed from my ankle. I fractured it in two place. So, I have my leg propped up on my work desk (home/office/studio). The incisions on both side of my ankle are probably about 8" each and is stitched up with 30 or more staples.

I agree with your concept of sharing chat and tipping a few while playing. I have a friend (riding buddy) who has expressed an interest. I'll see if I can get him involved. We shoot pool together quite often.

Again, thanks.

JJ