10/28/2022 – In the last several weeks, the world of chess has been rocked by the accusations and allegations of cheating with the help of a computer. The idea is not new of course, but it might shock you to know the very first case of surreptitiously using a computer in a game against a grandmaster dates all the way back to 1980. You won't believe who were responsible! Here is the original video footage of the pioneers in action.

1/5/2020 – In the early 1980s, FREDERIC FRIEDEL spent a week in Moscow with Unix pioneer Ken Thompson, who was supposed to demonstrate his computer chess world champion machine Belle to the Soviet Chess Federation, and to former World Champion Mikhail Botvinnik, who was developing a rival strategy in chess programming. He takes us on a trip down memory lane. Read part 1.

1/4/2020 – In the early 1980s, FREDERIC FRIEDEL spent a week in Moscow with Unix pioneer Ken Thompson, who was supposed to demonstrate his computer chess world champion machine Belle to the Soviet Chess Federation, and to former World Champion Mikhail Botvinnik, who was developing a rival strategy in chess programming. Unfortunately Thompson's computer did not arrive with him in Moscow. But in spite of this, the trip turned out to be quite an adventure.

3/16/2018 – One of the keystones to improving our understanding of the endgame is the endgame tablebase, a sort of oracle that first came into existence over 40 years ago. This revolutionary technology, that first saw light in the chess world thanks to computer scientist and pioneer Ken Thompson, has evolved a great deal since then. Here is a look at its beginnings and what each generation brought.

1/23/2018 – In the early 1980s Ken Thompson, working at the Bell Laboratories, generated one of the world’s first chess endgame databases — king and queen vs king and rook. At the time he explained to Frederic Friedel how this revolutionary new technology worked. He did it in the form of a parable: God calculating the 32-piece endgame and playing chess. It is an amusing thought experiment that has gained interesting relevance at the current time.

1/26/2011 – It is the most prestigious award in Japan, often referred to as the "Asian Nobel Prize". It is given for outstanding achievements in science and technology, and is worth $600,000. This year it goes to two American scientists who forty years ago created the Unix operating system and the computer language C. One of them is also a computer chess pioneer who visited the London Chess Classic.