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Academy at Palumbo High School senior Timmy Zheng competes in a chess tournament at the School District of Philadelphia. Photo/Mark Zimmaro

Timmy Zheng is a quiet competitor.

But dont let his soft-spoken nature fool you into thinking youve got one over on him. In fact, hes already set his trap.

Zheng is a senior at the Academy at Palumbo school, 11th and Catharine streets, and is lauded as one of the best high school chess players in the city. And hes accomplished that feat in a short amount of time after a long absence from playing the game.

I technically started playing chess when I was little but then I stopped playing, Zheng said. After my sophomore year, I started playing again.

In just two short years, Zheng has risen from a rook to a king as he currently resides in first place individually in the Philadelphia Scholastic Chess League after the fourth and final tournament of the regular season, which was held on Jan. 28 at the School District of Philadelphia.

The Academy at Palumbo also earned the top seed heading into the playoffs and will earn a free pass through the wildcard round on Feb. 11 and will compete in the semifinals on Feb. 20.

The Griffins have formed a tight group of friends that challenge each other during practices and online. Teammate Brandon Luk was responsible for bringing Zheng onto the roster and its been all chess, all the time for the Griffins.

There was really no one to play with, Zheng recalled before he joined the team. So I had less interest in it. But I had Brandon invite me to play again, and it brought the interest back. Now I have more friends that play.

Those friends also include teammates Bobby Fishburn-Spivery, Andy Nguyen, Timothy Sontono, Son Luu and Mythi Nguyen, who were all ranked highly in the league as of last week. They all get along together really well.

Theres a good camaraderie, Academy at Palumbo chess coach Ed Myers said. Generally, weve been able to field a solid team and the distribution of talent is pretty even with the exception of Timmy, who is a super player. For that reason, weve been able to remain in first place.

The PCSL is the competitive arm of After School Activities Partnership Chess, with more than 50 teams and 500 youth competing at the elementary, middle and high school levels.

There are 112 high school students listed on the league standings, with Zheng sitting at the top.

Hes very dedicated to learning the game and studying strategy and tactics, Myers said. He works at it very hard and spends a lot of time online playing chess, where a lot of students build up their knowledge base. Its really gratifying to see how the students teach each other.

Zheng has other talents as well. He takes part in robotics and coding club at school and he plans to study computer science at Drexel University next year. Hes hoping to play chess next year as a club sport for the Dragons. But right now, improving among his peers is the main focus for Zheng, who enjoys the tactical side of defeating his foes.

I like the tactics of it, Zheng said. It feels good when you figure out a tactic that helps you win. Its exciting.

Zheng carries a United States Chess Federation rating of 1654, which is also highest in the league. Players are rated and matched up against other players of a similar caliber to keep games competitive. Zheng plays against the best of the best on a daily basis.

And he quietly enjoys the challenge.

Hes very quiet and very unassuming but it didnt take long for us to recognize that he was an exceptional talent, Myers said. Hes been a great asset to our team.

Read more:
Chess master Timmy Zheng has Palumbo on top of standings - South Philly Review

Alireza Firouzja recently threatened to win the Tata Steel Mastersat the age of 16, and even though he hit the wall of Carlsen, Caruana and Anandhe still starts February with an extraordinary 2726 rating. Hes clearly one ofthe best 16-year-old chess players of all time, but in this new 2-part articleFrench FM Joachim Iglesias looks at the other contenders. In Part 1 he lookschronologically at players from Mikhail Botvinnik to Bobby Fischer, GarryKasparov, Vladimir Kramnik and Judit Polgar.

by Joachim Iglesias

In this two-part article were going to take a look at thesixteen best 16-year-old players in the history of chess. From MikhailBotvinnik to Alireza Firouzja, youll see that even if no-ones serious at 17(Rimbaud) they can be at 16 in chess!

As with any selection, there is of course an element ofsubjectivity.

Among the notable absentees are child prodigies from an erawhen there were few tournaments and they only experienced their first greatsuccesses in their twenties.

Paul Morphy, born in 1837, won his first US Championship in1857, at the age of 20. It was his first major tournament

Jose-Raul Capablanca, born in 1888, won a match against theCuban Champion when he was 13, but he only gained international recognition bydefeating Frank Marshall in 1909

Samuel Reshevsky was a child star, but his career onlyreally began with his victory in the National Open in Tulsa in 1931 - he was 20 yearsold at the time

Among the players from the more recent past who dontfeature here Anatoly Karpov and Vishy Anand are the greatest champions.

And now let's look at the sixteen best 16-year-olds in chess history, inchronological order:

Misha learned to play chess at the age of 12. The man whowas to become the patriarch of Soviet chess started to be talked about at 14years old, when he beat the World Champion Jose-Raul Capablanca in a simul. Twoyears later, in 1927, Botvinnik finished 5th in the worlds strongest nationalcontest, the USSR Championship. He won a miniature with Black againsttheoretician Vladimir Makogonov:

Young Misha concentrated his pieces on the kingside, puttingmaximum pressure on White, who cracked: 23.g4??fxg4! 24.Qxe4 and here not 24...gxf3 25.Qxf3, which would prolong thecontest, but 24...gxh3! and White resigned, since 25.Bh1 h2+26.Kg2 Qh3 is mate.

Mikhail would once again finish 5th in the USSR Championshipat the age of 18 before winning it as a 20-year-old. He went on to be World Champion from 1948 to 1957, 1958to 1960 and 1961 to 1963.

Boris Vasilievich Spassky was spotted very early on by theSoviet Chess Federation, which awarded him a monthly scholarship from the ageof 11 and allowed him to play his first major tournament abroad in 1953.

The young Borya celebrated turning 16 during a tournamentin Bucharest where he finished 4th out of 20 players, behind Alexander Tolush(Spasskys coach) and future World Champions Tigran Petrosian and Vasily Smyslovand tied with GMs Laszlo Szabo and Isaac Boleslavsky. That performance madeSpassky an International Master, a title that was much harder to achieve at thetime than it is to become a grandmaster today.

The icing on the cake was that Boris won the tournamentsbeauty price thanks to his magnificent win over Smyslov, who four years laterwould become World Champion:

33.Nxg7! The mainidea is 33...Kxg7 34.Rg3+ Kf8 35.Rxf7+!! with mate-in-2. The player who wasgoing to win the famous Zurich Candidates Tournament a few months later tried 33...Rxd6 but resigned after 34.Nxe6, since after 34Rxd2 35.Rg3+ its mate next move.

Spassky dethroned Petrosian as the youngest grandmaster inhistory in 1955, at the age of 18. Petrosian had become a grandmaster at 23. Boris Spassky was World Champion from 1969 to 1972.

Robert James Fischer was only 13 when he won the Game of theCentury against Donald Byrne. He became US Champion for the first time in1957, at 14 years of age.

In 1958, at the age of 15, Bobby became the youngestgrandmaster of all time, beating Spasskys record by three years. Were so usedto seeing 13 or 14-year-old grandmasters nowadays that its hard to see whatthe fuss was about at the time. You should know, however, that if not forFischer, Spasskys record would have lasted for 25 years, until 1980, when GarryKasparov became a grandmaster at the age of 17! And Fischers record was onlybeaten 33 years later, in 1991, when Judit Polgar became a grandmaster a monthquicker than Fischer.

In 1959 Bobby Fischer competed in the Bled-Zagreb CandidatesTournament. Mikhail Tal won that 8-player quadruple round-robin, thus winningthe right to face Mikhail Botvinnik. 16-year-old Bobby tied for 5th place withSvetozar Gligoric, ahead of Fridrik Olafsson and Pal Benko. In the first roundhe beat Paul Keres, who would finish 2nd.

Keres was the favourite to win the Candidates and thegreat theoretician sacrificed his queen with 11.Bxf6!? Nxf6 12.e5! Bb7 13.exf6! the only move that couldjustify the previous two - 13...Bxf314.Bxf3 Bxf6 15.Bxa8

White has a temporary material advantage despite being aqueen down, but Bobby shut out the bishop on a8 with 15d5!?, inviting White to sacrifice: 16.Bxd5 Bxd4 17.Rxd4 exd5 18.Nxd5 Qc5 19.Re1+ Kf8 20.c3

The position is more or less equal, but the youngsterdominated his opponent and ended the game with a nice Epaulette mate:

Instead of resigning, Keres played 53.Rc4, allowing 53Qe5# mate on the board!

Bobby Fischer was World Champion from 1972 until 1975.

Alexander Nikitin, Gariks first coach, brought him tothe famous Botvinnik school when the future star was only 10 years old. Inaddition to Nikitins coaching, Garry could take advantage of lessons from theformer World Champion as well as those of Mark Dvoretsky.

Thanks to coaching from the worlds best chess school, Garikwas able to play his first major international tournament outside of the USSRat the age of only 16. Of the 16 players in Banja Luka in 1979 all weregrandmasters except for Kasparov and another talent born in 1953, GuillermoGarcia, who went on to become a grandmaster. Among the big names we find formerWorld Champion Tigran Petrosian, Ulf Andersson, Jan Smejkal, Walter Browne

Garik won the tournament with an unbeaten 11.5/15, twopoints ahead of second place!

Kasparov may not yet have had the thousand eyes thatEnglish GM Tony Miles remarked upon, but he was already a monster in tacticalpositions. Heres the end of his game against GM Slavoljub Marjanovic:

Black was counting on 26.exf6 Qc6 and, even if White has theadvantage, nothing is decided yet. Kasparov instead played with power and precision: 26.Qxh5! Qc6 27.f3 Be7 28.Bh7+! Kf8 29.Qf5+Ke8 30.Bg6+ Kd8 31.Rd1+

If 31Kc7 then 32.e6+! is decisive. The grandmasterpreferred to give up his queen with 31Qd5and resigned a few moves later.

Thanks to that tournament Kasparov obtained a first ratingof 2595, 15th place on the January 1st 1980 FIDE rating list. Garry Kasparovwas World Champion from 1985 until 2000 and the world no. 1 for over 21 years.

Jol surprised the chess world by winning the World JuniorChampionship (Under 20) when he was only 15 years old! The Frenchman finished aheadof Vassily Ivanchuk (19 years old), Boris Gelfand (20) and Gregory Serper (19),and 32 years later the record still stands. Jol became a grandmaster in 1990(nowadays he would have become a grandmaster for winning the World Juniors) andin July of that year, at the age of 17, he was no. 54 in the world, with a 2570rating.

Jol was only 15 years old when he defeated the very strongEnglish Grandmaster John Nunn in great style.

In this typical Kings Indian position the most played moves were 13.c5, 13.Rc1 and 13.b4, with White attacking at full strength on thequeenside and hoping to be quicker than Black will be on the kingside. After havingkept up with the latest theory, Lautier unleashed a move that was almost anovelty at the time and would go on to be one of the main variations - 13.g4!, with the aim of slowing downthe black initiative.

A few moves later and the kingside was perfectly blockaded.Or was it?

Black cant wait around: if White gets to play one moreprophylactic move like Kh2 hell have his hands free on the queenside. TheEnglishman sacrificed with 18...Nxg5!but Lautier didnt respond with the nave 19.hxg5?, after which Black wouldhave uncorked 19...Nxd5! with major complications, but 19.Kh2! After 19...Nh7 20.Kxh3Black didnt have enough play against the fearless white king.

The end was aesthetically pleasing:

In time trouble 39.Rxf7?? would have been a terrible mistake, sinceBlack has a perpetual on the 2nd rank! Jol instead chose the most efficientand beautiful win: 39.Qg1!!. IfBlack takes the queen with check, 39Rxg1+, hell have to give it back withcheck on the next move and transpose into a resignable ending. Nunn played 39Bf2, but after 40.Rxf7 Rxg1+ 41.Kh2 Black resigned since the checks will quicklyrun out.

Jol Lautier reached the world no. 13 spot in 1995 andobtained his peak rating of 2687 in 2002. He quit chess in 2005, no longerhaving any chance of achieving the goal hed set himself: to become WorldChampion.

Gata didnt wait until the Banter Blitz Cup in order tobecome a Famous F*ckingLegend. On the July 1990 rating list, at the age of 16 years and one month,Gata was already the world no. 8. It was therefore no surprise when he won theTilburg 1990 supertournament, tying for first place with Vassily Ivanchuk aheadof Boris Gelfand, Nigel Short, Jan Timman, Ulf Andersson, Predrag Nikolic andYasser Seirawan.

The following year he gave a real positional lesson to noneother than Anatoly Karpov:

The position after 12.Kxd2should have been perfect for the former World Champion. Facing a kid, Karpovwas playing for two results, right?

Karpov went on to play the imprecise 19.Bc3? and Kamsky brilliantly punished him with 19...Na7! threatening Ba4. After 20.Bd2, Gata didnt repeat moves butplayed 20...Nb5! provoking the weakening21.e5. The following moves by Black wouldhave pleased Nimzowitsch and Petrosian: Gata went on to play Bc6, Na7, Bd5 andNc6, with a perfect blockade on the light squares.

On move 48 Gata sacrificed a pawn in order to create apassed pawn:

48...g5!! 49.hxg5 h4+with an advantage despite being a pawn down.

It all ended with a little combination la Capablanca:

56...Rg2+ 57.Kf1Rxe2! 58.Kxe2 Bc4 59.d5!? exd5 60.Kd2 Bxd3 61.Kxd3 d4! with an easily wonending.

In 1996 Anatoly Karpov took revenge by beating Gata Kamskyin the FIDE World Championship match. After that defeat Gata didnt play againuntil 2004, but would still go on to win the 2007 World Cup.

Kramnik won the Dortmund Open (not the closed grandmastertournament) in 1992. Garry Kasparov said in an interview in New in Chess:

The most talented of all the players I have seen here isVladimir Kramnik. In terms of talent he is definitely No. 1. I have never saidthis before, but I think he is the only one who plays as well as I did at thesame age. I have always smiled regarding the talent of Judit Polgar, andlaughed regarding Gata Kamsky, and I do not believe the other players of theDortmund Festival. But 16-year-old Kramnik is already playing big-time chess. Hisis a genuine chess talent. There are many players, but they don't play chess,they move the pieces. Whereas Kramnik plays chess. (Quoted in the book Kramnik,My Life and Games)

Kramnik made real chess history at the Manila Olympiad inJune 1992. Russia owed its first victory since the collapse of the USSR inlarge part to the young Vladimir, who achieved the best result of thetournament, with 8.5/9 and a 2958 performance. The competition ended on the dayof Vovas 17th birthday.

During that Olympiad he easily converted his advantage in anending against the formidable GM Yasser Seirawan:

With Black Kramnik played 27...Kf8! since the exchange of knights doesnt allow an easy draw.For example: 28.Nxc5 Rxc5 29.Rd6 Ra5!. Seirawan played 28.Rd6 and Kramnik responded precisely with 28...Ne4! 29.Rxa6 Rxc4 30.Kf1 Rc2! with a clear advantage. Whitewas helpless until the end:

59...f4! 60.Ra1 g2!61. Kf2 Kh2 White resigns.

Vladimir Kramnik was World Champion from 2000 to 2007.

Known as the Queen of Chess and the best female player of alltime, Judit Polgar for a long time and even still could claim to be the greatesttalent in the history of chess! (even if she would challenge the word talent).On January 1st 1989, at 12 and a half, she was 57th in the world with a 2555rating, a record that will probably never be broken. In 1991 she finallydethroned Bobby Fischer as the youngest grandmaster of all time, 33 years afterthat record was set! Judit was 15 years and 4 months old.

At 16 years old, she was the joint winner of the Hastingssupertournament, tied with Evgeny Bareev and above the strong grandmasters JonSpeelman, Matthew Sadler, John Nunn, Mikhail Gurevich and Lev Polugaevsky.

Heres how she destroyed the very strong GrandmasterAlexander Chernin when she was only 14 years old, in 1990:

22...Rxg2+! 23.Rxg2Bxh3 24.Ne4 Ne5!! The point, and the only move that doesnt lose! 25.Nxe5 Bxe5 and White is helpless.

Chernin couldnt find anything better than 26.Ng5, but after 26...Bxg2+ 27.Kxg2 Qxg5+ Black was attacking with a material advantage.White resigned two moves later.

Judit Polgar reached world no. 8, with a peak rating of2735.

More:
The 16 best 16-year-olds of all time | Part 1 - chess24

2/6/2020 The European Chess Union (ECU) invites all National Chess Federations of ECU to participate in the European Youth Team Championships 2020, organised from July 9th (arrivals) to 17th (departures). It takes place in the incredibly beautiful Greek sea-side hotel Lazart. It is a seven-round Swiss, with two open sections and two sections for the girls teams. Don't miss it: the registration deadline is May 9th 2020.

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The European Youth Team Championship shall be held according to Swiss system in seven rounds, with two open sections and two sections for the girls teams, considered as separate competitions in categories U12 and U18. According to ECU tournament rules, the time control will be 90 min for 40 moves + 30 min for the rest of the game + 30 sec increment for every move played starting from move 1. Players may only agree to a draw after Blacks 30th move.

Each national federation member of the European Chess Union has the right to enter unlimited number of teams of four players and one reserve in the open competitions and unlimited number of teams of two female players and one (1) reserve in the girls competitions. These teams may represent the national federation, a region, a city, a club or a school.

The winning team of competition receives the title European Youth Champion Team 2020 in its respective category. The first three teams in each competition will receive trophies and medals.

The registration deadline is 9th May 2020.

The event will be held in the Conference Hall of the five-star Lazart Hotel in Thessaloniki, Greece.

January 2020 edition of the ECU E-Magazine. The ECU Magazine January 2020 can be read online together with interactive links here, or can be downloaded from the ECU Website.

I have always a slight feeling of pity for the man who has no knowledge of chess, just as I would pity the man who has remained ignorant of love. Chess, like love, like music, has the power to make man happy.

It is not enough to be a good player... You must also play well.

It cannot be too greatly emphasized that the most important role in pawn endings is played by the king.

When you see a good move, sit on your hands and see if you can find a better one.

When you don't know what to do, wait for your opponent to get an idea; it is sure to be bad.

You can move pieces on the above diagrams Black will try to defend, and stop doing so when it is mate.

See the rest here:
Youth Team Championship in Thessaloniki, Greece - Chessbase News

In its 23 years of service, Netflix has removed only nine pieces of content due to government censorship.

In a new report titledEnvironmental Social Governance, the streaming giant revealed that over the years it has received takedown requests from the governments of New Zealand, Vietnam, Germany, Singapore, and Saudi Arabia. The first ever takedown notice came from New Zealand in 2015, but Singapore is by far the most active.

[Read: How to opt out of Netflixs autoplay previews]

Here are the nine titles Netflix removed over the years:

For what its worth, Netflix aims to make as much content as possible available on its platform, but it says itll ultimately comply with removal notices if a country has forbidden the distribution of certain titles.

This is the first time Netflix has revealed the list of titles that have been removed following government pressure, but the company intends to continue disclosing such information in the future. Beginning next year, we will report these takedowns annually, the company writes in the report.

via Axios

Read next: Every c-suite leader needs to be a Chief Empathy Officer

Continue reading here:
Here are the 9 titles Netflix purged due to government censorship - The Next Web

Mobile apps for Big Tech giants are featured. (Photo credit: DENIS CHARLET/AFP via Getty Images)

Theres a divide on the political right concerning whether Google and the social media companies are suppressing or censoring their views, and, indeed, promote values antithetical to free markets and a free society. Many social conservatives argue they do and demand government action.

The more libertarian-leaning argue that the charge of bias is not clear and, in any case, using government against these companies infringes on economic liberty and will be used by the left when it has power.

Both sides have legitimate points, but a nuanced understanding of the situation points to an opportunity for friends of freedom.

The leadership of the aforementioned companies and a good portion of employees are certainly more liberal, if not hardcore left. In the current primary season, high-salaried engineers and programmershave been big donors to socialists Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT).

But the real issue is not just about political views, but rather the legality of tech giants actions. Under Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act, social media companies are treated as platforms that third parties can use for posting content or communicating with others. Those companies are not treated as publishers like newspapers, meaning they are not subject to lawsuits for materials posted on their platforms in the same way a newspaper or a television news outlet would be.

However, in order for platforms to enjoy the protections of Section 230, they must not prohibit political and other kinds of legal speech. If they do, then they are essentially publishers who must be held to the same standards applied to other media outlets.

Although platforms like Facebook deny that they pick and choose the material they permit on their sites, theres evidence that many tech giants, often in subtle ways, do just that. For example, PragerU has fought ongoing battles with YouTube because the video platform has taken down numerous videos posted by PragerU, despite the fact they are not obscene, advocate for violence, or harass others. Twitter has been accused of shadow banning conservatives, that is, not suspending their accounts but using certain techniques to prevent their posts from being widely viewed.

Theres also no question that leaders of numerous tech giants have been caught advocating for left-wing causes or admitting that they desire to use their companies to aid left-leaning politicians. For instance, a Project Veritashidden camera video caught Jen Gennai, Googles head of responsible innovation, taking exception to Warrens call to break up Big Tech companies like hers because the resulting smaller companies who dont have the same resources we do will be charged with preventing the next Trump situation and thus presumably be in a weaker position to do so. Gennai also spoke of Google manipulating its search engine to weed out algorithmic unfairness.

Numerous other examples offer prima facie evidence for examining whether these companies are really publishers and should be treated as such.

Some lawmakers on the right would go even further. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) promotes legislation that would require such companies to conform to best business practices with periodic government reviews. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) would remove Section 230 protection for companies that cannot demonstrate to federal regulators that they are politically neutral.

If social media companies are frightened by the prospect of being beholden to government regulators with their liberty limited, they should be! And now they know how the rest of us feel about the policies of the leftist candidates that they support would unleash on us all!

Attacks on these companies also come from the left, with critics calling for changes in Section 230 to force them to engage in more censorship of what they call hate speech and fake news. Conservatives should be concerned about this since they are the prime voices the left would silence.

Some conservatives say demanding platforms act in a more balanced manner is not enough. They say antitrust laws should be used against these companies and that they should be broken up into smaller businesses, a view many on the left agree with.

Although its understandable why some would take this approach, using antitrust laws is generally against free-market principles and should be avoided whenever possible, a position the political right has rightly espoused since the days of Ronald Reagan. Putting that sort of power in the hands of the national government would be far too dangerous over the long term.

Instead of attempting to use government to punish businesses the right fearshowever reasonable that fear might beit should embrace free-market values while demanding that tech giants act as truly open platforms if they wish to enjoy legal protections that publishers are not eligible for.

Conservatives and libertarians should also encourage these companies and their talented professionals to realize that they have prospered because of the free market, not in spite of it. Its Americas market economy that allowed companies such as Google and Facebook to innovate, create a valuable, highly desired product, and to revolutionize the world we live in and the way we all communicate.

Keeping government from controlling tech giants is going to be especially important in the years and decades to come, as many of these businesses and their subsidiaries are investing in cutting-edge exponential technologies like AI, robots, biohacking, and nanotech, which have the potential to cure diseases and raise living standards for all.

Those on the right should call out Big Tech for their bias, yes, but they should also praise them for their remarkable achievements and appeal to them to use their resources and talented staffs to continue making the world a better, more prosperous place for everyone using technology and the free market and by rejecting the socialist principles that caused unprecedented chaos, destruction, and misery throughout the twentieth century.

Tech companies should stand up for an open society and open exchange of ideas, not censorship and the centralization of power. Its not only in their own best interests but also in the best interests of the entire world.

Edward Hudgins, Ph.D., is research director at The Heartland Institute and an expert on technology policy. He can be reached at ehudgins@heartland.org.

See the article here:
The Right Should Challenge Tech Giants to Side with Liberty and Reject Censorship - CNSNews.com