The Chess Journalists of America awards have been announced and I'm once again a FAAAR second banana to a very good blog. Why aren't these brilliant bloggers competing against one another? I can only stand in “wonder-ment”.

This year my competition was a blogger by the name of “Broken Pawn”. To tell the truth I didn't have the time to analyze the competition for the Best Chess Blog Award but I felt like I had a decent chance with the articles I submitted. Broken Pawn submitted his blog after I did mine and in his own words:

“I reviewed the competition and see that there have been only 13 posts on their site all year (and most of those posts are merely links to other chess sites - no original content) and just 3 of those since May 1st (It was much more active last year). It’s inconceivable to me that I could finish second to this particular blog, but I’ve seen stranger things happen.” - Broken Pawn (HankAnzis)

I think this illustrates the negative side of competition. It has never been my purpose in the chess community to outdo anyone. I am at my heart a chess promoter … not exactly a journalist. I derive more pleasure from pointing people in the direction of useful information than in the simple retelling. I was very disappointed in Broken Pawn for his comments. I would have preferred that he made his criticism constructive so that others (myself included) might learn from their mistakes.

What mistakes have I made in my blog over the past year?

1) First and foremost it is a sign of disaster to allow your blog posting to drop in frequency. Set a pace that you can maintain. Over the past year my life has made such dramatic changes I don't even know where to begin. In the past I made a point to make at least one post per day. That was unrealistic. Don't make the same mistake.

2) I've never been a very prolific writer. I have a personal issue with those who do write verbosely, “A fool is known in multitude of words”. So in my opinion there must be a happy medium. Original content IS important in blogging and is sorely lacking on Chessvine these days. Quite simply I had nothing to say that someone else hadn't already said. At least that is the excuse I'm sticking with.

Bottom line: Don't say too little and don't say too much. Think of Goldy Locks, keep it JUST RIGHT with original content.

Don't make the same mistakes that I've made here on Chessvine. We all need to lift one another up and support all efforts to spread chess throughout the world. At times that does include constructive criticism. Get out there and blog, promote chess, and all the things that make the sport great. Most importantly … keep moving those pieces around!

Check out Pogonina's new Blog Post. I've been trying to tell people in the chess community for several years now that Social Media is a necessary part to the business of promoting chess worldwide and comments like "please use tweets to contact me, not DMs" means that a few of you are listening! WOOT!

After all this time wailing to the wall I see a great many results to my efforts. Just a few years ago I could count the number of chess related social media mavens on one hand and now it seems to have exploded. I could just give all of you a big hug ... but I won't because that would be weird.

Here is a new wallpaper for chessvine fans (or chess fans in general). Click Here

Many of you are still just adding me on facebook instead of adding Chessvine.com's facebook page. To remedy this I'm adding this blog post as well as a small add at the top of every page of the blog advertising the page. You see, i'm a greedy social media neophyte and I want as many friends as I can get to like chessvine.com's page!



If this is the first time you've seen Chessvine then I encourage you to take a look around and if you think we're worth it head over to facebook and like us.

I've added yet another wallpaper to the chessvine.com collection (800x600 pixels, fits most screens).

you can see and download it here.