How about chess software instructors?

Wesley So may have all the reason for not having a personal and proper human instructor these days. Human instructor vs chess software as personal trainer? According to one of the world's leading chess instructor, Bruce Pandolfini, (yes, he even admitted to himself) the advantages of having an excellent chess software as a personal trainer over the traditional face-to-face human instructor is limitless. Here's some of his points, excerpt taken from chesscafe.com:

...a face-to-face human instructor, regardless of his or her ability, can’t take the place of excellent software. The software is faster. It’s more organized. It generally has larger databases to draw upon. It doesn’t make trivial mistakes based on oversight or forgetting. It’s tireless, and never shows up late, inebriated, or with the flu. It’s willing to help you at any time of day or night. It doesn’t mind doing the same things over and over, till you get it right or for your satisfaction. Its feelings are never hurt no matter what you say or how badly you act. You don’t have to pay for it again and again. You buy it and you own it. There are no human instructors like that.

But again, I say it all boils down on the capacity and ability of an individual to not only properly operate a computer chess softwares manually, but on how skillful and well versed he or she is on the programs to make the most out of these chess software. Now how about start introducing chess software instructors?

The Strongest chess tournament in history

Computers indeed is taking over the world. A Category 29 tournament? Sounds crazy. But it is actually happening! Arbiter Hans Secelle calculated that the average rating of participating software Rybka, Shredder, Naum and Deep Sjeng adds up to (3052 + 2970 + 2956 + 2947) = 2981. Heck, even if you put all the strongest chess player in history, Fisher, Kasparov, Alekhine, Capablanca Kramnik, Anand etc, in one tournament they won't surpassed the average rating or even come closed to the chess960 computer chess world championship in Mainz this July. So to what computer program you are rooting for? I keep two German computer programs in my hard drives, Fritz 10 and Shredder though it was Fritz 10 I regularly spar with and Shredder makes a good game analyst more than Fritz, I presume. Anyway I'd like to see Rybka keep her (yes, it's a she) title. We need Kasparov too in chess computers to draw more interest in the public and make this amazing world of computer chess far more and more exciting. Anyway do cheating, by the help of other computer programs or world class chess players, is also disallowed in such tournaments? Just asking. Lol.

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