7 ms·

Having not played in years and like everyone else I guess I went to chess.com after watching the Queen's Gambit, which they mention was an even bigger peak than

Having not played in years and like everyone else I guess I went to chess.com after watching the Queen's Gambit, which they mention was an even bigger peak than lockdown, and I was impressed by the site: you can play immediately without registering and the user interface is nice and intuitive. It's very refreshing.

Buttons840 6y ago
https://lichess.org/ https://lichess.org/ is also very good. You can play without registering, all features are available to everyone for free, and the site is open source. It's a good clean website without ads or tracking. (I used to be bitter about chess.com, thinking they're just cashing in on their domain name and charging for features because they can. And that may be, I don't know. But I have seen them organize some good chess events, so they might not be all bad. I think they pay streamers to use their site though, a practice I'm not too happy about.)
- conradfr 6y ago
  I think you mean .org and yeah that seems alright and the open-sourcing is interesting (resisting trolling on node ;). It's all about SEO, chess.com is the first result on Google and DDG for "chess".
  - Buttons840 6y ago
    Thanks for the correction: https://lichess.org/ https://lichess.org/
- ptudan 6y ago
  What's so bad about influencer marketing? It is the norm these days. Inevitably competition will do it if you don't.
  - oli5679 6y ago
    As an online chess player I find it a bit shady. Lichess.org has a better UX and featureset for free than a premium chess.com subscription, but many of my friends watch steamers --> sign up to chess.com and get a worse expereince.
    - Kranar 6y ago
      Very subjective opinion about the UX. I much prefer chess.com's UX. They allow multiple pre-moves vs. lichess that only allows 1 premove, has much better cheat detection and overall much better handling of players who engage in bad behavior (abandoning lost games) by segregating repeat offenders into a pool of their own so they don't affect well behaved players, and lichess has a very quirky and unnecessary 300 move limit, which one can argue is more than enough for regular chess, but for speed chess is just a nuisance.
      - dilyevsky 6y ago
        How does lichess handle abandoned games? About half the time I don’t even get to claim the early win and i can see the other player is already playing another game
        distortedsignal 6y ago
        If a player leaves your game, lichess gives like a 20 second timer and then lets you claim victory. I believe there are also "offer draw" options, but I'm not sure.
        Buttons840 6y ago
        You can claim victory or a draw in that situation.
        dilyevsky 6y ago
        Oh is it not a thing on chess.com? Ime lichess abandoned game detector is not super reliable but i guess better than nothing
  - chmod775 6y ago
    Marketing is antithetical to a free market, because it makes consumers prefer brands with the better marketing to brands with better value at a given price point. This is why advertising is so heavily regulated - though not even close to regulated enough. Marketing via 'influencers' is even worse than other forms of marketing because it is one of the least regulated spaces, especially when graphed against its relative effectiveness.
- __s 6y ago
  I was bitter towards chess.com after they sent me my password through the forgot password process That was a decade ago though. Maybe they've improved
  - benatkin 6y ago
    They certainly have. Now not only are their user accounts secure, they are on the bleeding edge of detecting and kicking off cheaters.
    - the_arun 6y ago
      How do they make money?
      - amw-zero 6y ago
        By charging their users money.
      - me_me_me 6y ago
        Premium features. You can pay to get an extra move or a take-back (only joking). Actually thinking about it, there probably is a cheap chess clonelike app on mobile market that does that.
        DobryMorozov 6y ago
        There is! "Chess Online"
        me_me_me 6y ago
        Oh no. You shattered my remaining slither of hope in mobile app market.
        chaorace 6y ago
        If you think that's bad, check out this GDC Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8Lhqri8tZk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8Lhqri8tZk They procedurally generated 1,500+ different iterations on top of the same Unity-based slots shovelware using noun/adjective pairs. The general success they enjoyed is as sad as it is hilarious. For the record, the most enticing descriptor categories were: "3D", "Luxury", "Casino/Gambling", and "Sexy".
- winrid 6y ago
  Back in 2014 the lichess app would send your username/password in clear text :) will have to see if that's still the case...
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- zests 6y ago
  Paying people to play chess can't be a bad thing. I prefer chess.com to lichess specifically because I support chess players by using chess.com. Streamers, tournaments, article writers...
- rtpg 6y ago
  I bit the bullet and got a subscription. The game analysis feature is really good (I guess you can just run that client-side in theory? I don't know), and the lesson content feels worth it for me. And stuff like 4-player chess is fun. The main homepage is a huge mess though...
  - freewilly1040 6y ago
    > The game analysis feature is really good (I guess you can just run that client-side in theory? I don't know) Indeed, this is how Lichess (optionally) does it (for free).
    - maxfan8 6y ago
      They also offer server-side rendering as well (provided by volunteers through fishnet): https://github.com/niklasf/fishnet https://github.com/niklasf/fishnet
- amw-zero 6y ago
  I’m quite happy that they are able to make money off of a game like chess. I don’t see a problem with “cashing in on their domain name.” They provide value to people, and people are willing to pay. You generally have to pay to be a member of a chess club for example. For a fraction of the price, you can play with anyone in the world. Seems valuable to me.
onecommentman 6y ago
You can find a list of other chess websites at https://www.chessstrategyonline.com/play-chess-online https://www.chessstrategyonline.com/play-chess-online Chess24 has Jan Gustafsson and Peter Svidler as commentators. Amazingly good English banter from a German and Russian. In general, the individual personalities of Nations comes through really well in chess commentary, since commentators are from all over the place, are quite sharp, and everyone is talking about the same thing in usually the same language (English). I didn’t even know Germans and Russians had a sense of humor... ICC is an old (in Internet terms) established website.
awb 6y ago
Their live commentary is surprisingly entertaining as well. And they have a bunch of chess variants to mix things up. All around impressive site.
ehnto 6y ago
I wish more sites would let you begin using the service before trying to hoover up user accounts. I understand why it's not always possible, but it sure is nice.

Buttons840 6y ago

https://lichess.org/ https://lichess.org/ is also very good. You can play without registering, all features are available to everyone for free, and the site is open source. It's a good clean website without ads or tracking. (I used to be bitter about chess.com, thinking they're just cashing in on their domain name and charging for features because they can. And that may be, I don't know. But I have seen them organize some good chess events, so they might not be all bad. I think they pay streamers to use their site though, a practice I'm not too happy about.)

conradfr 6y ago
I think you mean .org and yeah that seems alright and the open-sourcing is interesting (resisting trolling on node ;). It's all about SEO, chess.com is the first result on Google and DDG for "chess".
- Buttons840 6y ago
  Thanks for the correction: https://lichess.org/ https://lichess.org/
ptudan 6y ago
What's so bad about influencer marketing? It is the norm these days. Inevitably competition will do it if you don't.
- oli5679 6y ago
  As an online chess player I find it a bit shady. Lichess.org has a better UX and featureset for free than a premium chess.com subscription, but many of my friends watch steamers --> sign up to chess.com and get a worse expereince.
  - Kranar 6y ago
    Very subjective opinion about the UX. I much prefer chess.com's UX. They allow multiple pre-moves vs. lichess that only allows 1 premove, has much better cheat detection and overall much better handling of players who engage in bad behavior (abandoning lost games) by segregating repeat offenders into a pool of their own so they don't affect well behaved players, and lichess has a very quirky and unnecessary 300 move limit, which one can argue is more than enough for regular chess, but for speed chess is just a nuisance.
    - dilyevsky 6y ago
      How does lichess handle abandoned games? About half the time I don’t even get to claim the early win and i can see the other player is already playing another game
      - distortedsignal 6y ago
        If a player leaves your game, lichess gives like a 20 second timer and then lets you claim victory. I believe there are also "offer draw" options, but I'm not sure.
        Buttons840 6y ago
        You can claim victory or a draw in that situation.
        dilyevsky 6y ago
        Oh is it not a thing on chess.com? Ime lichess abandoned game detector is not super reliable but i guess better than nothing
- chmod775 6y ago
  Marketing is antithetical to a free market, because it makes consumers prefer brands with the better marketing to brands with better value at a given price point. This is why advertising is so heavily regulated - though not even close to regulated enough. Marketing via 'influencers' is even worse than other forms of marketing because it is one of the least regulated spaces, especially when graphed against its relative effectiveness.
__s 6y ago
I was bitter towards chess.com after they sent me my password through the forgot password process That was a decade ago though. Maybe they've improved
- benatkin 6y ago
  They certainly have. Now not only are their user accounts secure, they are on the bleeding edge of detecting and kicking off cheaters.
  - the_arun 6y ago
    How do they make money?
    - amw-zero 6y ago
      By charging their users money.
    - me_me_me 6y ago
      Premium features. You can pay to get an extra move or a take-back (only joking). Actually thinking about it, there probably is a cheap chess clonelike app on mobile market that does that.
      - DobryMorozov 6y ago
        There is! "Chess Online"
        me_me_me 6y ago
        Oh no. You shattered my remaining slither of hope in mobile app market.
        chaorace 6y ago
        If you think that's bad, check out this GDC Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8Lhqri8tZk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8Lhqri8tZk They procedurally generated 1,500+ different iterations on top of the same Unity-based slots shovelware using noun/adjective pairs. The general success they enjoyed is as sad as it is hilarious. For the record, the most enticing descriptor categories were: "3D", "Luxury", "Casino/Gambling", and "Sexy".
winrid 6y ago
Back in 2014 the lichess app would send your username/password in clear text :) will have to see if that's still the case...
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
zests 6y ago
Paying people to play chess can't be a bad thing. I prefer chess.com to lichess specifically because I support chess players by using chess.com. Streamers, tournaments, article writers...
rtpg 6y ago
I bit the bullet and got a subscription. The game analysis feature is really good (I guess you can just run that client-side in theory? I don't know), and the lesson content feels worth it for me. And stuff like 4-player chess is fun. The main homepage is a huge mess though...
- freewilly1040 6y ago
  > The game analysis feature is really good (I guess you can just run that client-side in theory? I don't know) Indeed, this is how Lichess (optionally) does it (for free).
  - maxfan8 6y ago
    They also offer server-side rendering as well (provided by volunteers through fishnet): https://github.com/niklasf/fishnet https://github.com/niklasf/fishnet
amw-zero 6y ago
I’m quite happy that they are able to make money off of a game like chess. I don’t see a problem with “cashing in on their domain name.” They provide value to people, and people are willing to pay. You generally have to pay to be a member of a chess club for example. For a fraction of the price, you can play with anyone in the world. Seems valuable to me.

onecommentman 6y ago

You can find a list of other chess websites at https://www.chessstrategyonline.com/play-chess-online https://www.chessstrategyonline.com/play-chess-online Chess24 has Jan Gustafsson and Peter Svidler as commentators. Amazingly good English banter from a German and Russian. In general, the individual personalities of Nations comes through really well in chess commentary, since commentators are from all over the place, are quite sharp, and everyone is talking about the same thing in usually the same language (English). I didn’t even know Germans and Russians had a sense of humor... ICC is an old (in Internet terms) established website.

awb 6y ago

Their live commentary is surprisingly entertaining as well. And they have a bunch of chess variants to mix things up. All around impressive site.

ehnto 6y ago

I wish more sites would let you begin using the service before trying to hoover up user accounts. I understand why it's not always possible, but it sure is nice.