Monday, June 06, 2005

CJA Entry Sent

I sent off my application to the Chess Journalists of America's annual competition for the best print and web-based chess publications, and they already have The Kenilworth Chess Club website listed as an entry:
http://chessjournalism.org/2005entries/entries.htm

I had to submit under Category 20, "Best General Chess Website," since it was the only category we could fit. I imagine it will be a competitive category, especially judging by the entries of previous years. I wrote the following e-mail message when sending in our URL to their webmaster:

"If the category were available, I would have submitted my site for 'BestChess Club website.' I hope you don't mind me suggesting that you include that category in the future as a way of encouraging more clubs to start up websites and use them to publish more than the most basic information about their clubs. While it's great that you include 'Best Chess Club Bulletin' as a print category, I think there is more value for the larger chess community in web publications, which not only help document the goings on at the club for attending members but also provide information for members who are unable to attend (or who move) and for the larger community of people interested in local chess."

I received a nice note back from J. Franklin Campbell:

"I agree with your suggestions to include 'Best Chess Club website' in future competitions. That's an excellent idea. Your club web site appears to be excellent and would certainly compete well in such a category. "

So, if we don't win this year, you never know--we might be able to compete again under a different category... Meanwhile, the link from the CJA site can only help our page ranking.

I also think Mike Wojcio should submit his History of the Kenilworth Chess Club next year for best history article. Though I'm sure the competition would be especially fierce there, I also think he'd have a shot. You'll be able to judge for yourself by the end of this week when I finally have that project up. The games are now in PGN, the pictures are all ready to go, now all I need is time to put the whole thing together.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Good luck with the entry - I used to go to Chessbase all the time, but now I find that I'm spending more time on the club website..

I'll send a copy of my game against Javier - he played extremely well in a tense game, unfortunately it got to a time scramble so I didn't get the last part of the endgame which included both of us promoting pawns. That was my first loss to anyone sub-1800 since the Team tournament in February