There is a school of thought that online chess has caused a decline in numbers, both in chess clubs and week end events. The other side of the argument is that online chess actually increases the numbers that play chess, by preparing them for the next step.
Without a proper survey I'm not sure whether either point of view is entirely correct, but I am sure that the number of people online far exceed the number of face to face tournament players. On one chess server I play on, there are at least 80,000 players registered from Australia, which far exceeds the number of players on the Australian rating list. Of course some of those players are just casual/fun players, but I wonder how many consider themselves more serious than that. Is it the case that they don't have the opportunity to play club or tournament chess, or simply that they don't want to break out of their comfort zone?
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1 comment:
I agree that that are many more chess players to be found online than in chess clubs face to face...
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