Although I only began working full-time as an editor and journalist in chess in 2010, for over 25 years I have been involved in just about every aspect there is to the royal game, for which I am unapologetically passionate.
In the late 80s, living in France, as a teenager I worked for the famous Parisian chess store, “Librairie St. Germain” (later to become the “Librairie Games”) during my summer vacation, as a salesman, or at the tournaments running a stand. When I went to college in the US, appalled by the lack of chess activity in Madison, Wisconsin at the time, I undertook to give free chess classes to children every Sunday at the local bookstore/coffeehouse. The idea was met with great success, covered by the state newspaper in a feature article, and leading to classes at the local YMCA.
In the 90s I moved to Brazil, where I developed further as a player, winning the Rio de Janeiro Championship, as well as team competitions, winning the State Championship as well as coming in second in in the Brazilian National League. During this period, I achieved a peak rating of 2240 FIDE.
From 1999-2002, I worked as a software interface designer for the Russian company Convekta (now rebranded ChessOk), where I integrated online playing functionality with advanced database and analysis features for the first time. While unheard at the time of the release of Chess Assistant 6, it has since become a standard feature in online playing programs.
In 2010, after a series of emails and talks with Frederic Friedel, one of the founders of ChessBase, I was brought into the company, now as editor and writer of ChessBase News, which has been my full-time job until the present. I am also a passionate photographer with work appearing in numerous publications. For samples of my work, be sure to visit my Flickr page.
Find the right combination! ChessBase 15 program + new Mega Database 2019 with 7.6 million games and more than 70,000 master analyses. Plus ChessBase Magazine (DVD + magazine) and CB Premium membership for 1 year!
€289.90
This DVD allows you to learn from the example of one of the best players in the history of chess and from the explanations of the authors (Pelletier, Marin, Müller and Reeh) how to successfully organise your games strategically, consequently how to keep y
€29.90
Welcome to the “Bombastic Bird’s”, a revolutionary repertoire for one of the most enterprising and underrated openings in chess theory (1.f4). In this series, I uncover a number of groundbreaking theoretical novelties and new ideas that will soon have sco
€29.90
Good material on the Bird Opening is rare. So the Powerbook on its basis of just 58 000 games is welcome; the majority were played by engines.
€9.90
Bird Opening Powerbase 2019 is a database and contains a total of 3558 games from Mega 2019 or the Correspondence Database 2018, 97 of which are annotated.
€9.90
A surprise weapon against the Spanish is the Norwegian Defence arising after 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 b5 5.Bb3 Na5. Black delays his development but often gets very dynamic counterplay.
€9.90
How do you play the Queen's Gambit Acceptedt? Does White have promising variations or can Black construct a water-tight repertoire? The Powerbook provides the answers based on 195 000 games, most of them played by engines.
€9.90
The QGA PowerBase 2019 is a database and contains a total of 9,440 games, 170 of which are annotated.
€9.90
Anand, So, Gelfand, Duda, Shankland, Navara, Adams, etc. annotate the games of the WCh match. Chess Olympiad with video specials by Pelletier. Plus 11 opening articles with new repertoire ideas, e.g. 1.e4 Nc6 or a new recipe in the London System!
€19.95
Advertising |
Books, boards, sets: Chess Niggemann |