A Googly Gadget

I usually reserve discussions of web anomalies for my main blog Chess for All Ages (see link under 'Resources' in the sidebar), but this time the occurrence was so specific to chess960 that I'd like to discuss it on this blog. The image below is a screen capture that I took the last time I searched on my favorite topic (after 'chess'). That big dot near the left is a small version of my head that appears on this blog's sidebar and the text to the right of it says 'Your Site on Google'. That sits above the URL:-

https://www.mark-weeks.com/

The rest of the box says,

See how your site has been showing for this query for the past 90 days and compare to the previous 90 days:
- Clicks 0
- Impressions 100
- Average position 25,2

Each of those metrics is currently subtitled 'No prior data'. I suppose that after 90 days, some prior data will be displayed.

Google search on 'chess960'

I saw the box this week for the first time while recording my weekly look at web statistics. It's something I do to make sure that my various web resources are performing normally. If I detect an anomaly, I can act on it before it becomes a bigger problem.

The bottom of the box says, 'See ways to improve', which expands to show two pieces of advice. The first is a link to the same 'Performance' page I displayed in a blog post last month, Google Search Console; the second is to a Google page, Help people find your site on Google (support.google.com).

I don't know how many days the three metrics cover. All I know is that they weren't there a week earlier. The reason I look at chess960 search results is to track the position of this blog and of a couple of reference pages:-

• Chess960 [Fischer Random Chess] Start Positions, and
• Chess960 Castling Patterns Explained

I look at the first five pages of Google results and record the position of the resource. One curiosity I've noticed is that those two reference pages (both on mark-weeks.com) rarely show up in the search results at the same time. Sometimes one appears in the first five pages and the other does not appear at all; sometimes the other appears. There is no pattern to predict which one will show up. I occasionally scroll down more than five pages to see if the other one is buried deeper, but it's never there. Google search results often defy explanation.

Don't think I'm ungrateful. Thanks, Google! I'm sure the data will be useful in a Googly sort of way.

Kasparov Discusses the Showdown

Last month I posted about the Champions Showdown, St. Louis:-

The event was played 11-14 September, and is documented on the official site, Champions Showdown: Chess 960 (uschesschamps.com).

Here's a video from the Saint Louis Chess Club.

2018 Champions Showdown: Kasparov’s Interview - Day 4 (7:40) • 'Published on Sep 16, 2018'

The description says simply,

Grandmaster Garry Kasparov shares his thoughts after his games on Day 4. He has lost to Topalov. • 2018-09-14: USChessChamps.com

The date pegs the video to the last day of the Showdown. Before the games the players had time to analyze the start position selected for the game. GM Kasparov said,

What happened today, I still can't find the explanation. We spent 29 minutes with Peter [Svidler] analyzing a different position. [...] I don't want to spread blame, but actually Peter looked at the position. It's my fault; you just have to look at it yourself. [...] One shift and everything's different. Absolutely everything. It's not that you can reuse the patterns. Absolutely everything changes - the geometry, the structures, the way of developing the pieces. If I hadn't looked at the position at all, that would have been better.

The former World Champion donated his $20.000 prize to chess in Africa.