The North American Chess Association offers online group lessons with top talent in North America 6-February 2007
More information is available by visiting www.nachess.org/grouplessons
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
North American Chess Association
I see Ben Finegold is on there. Awesome!
Wow, that site is nice looking. I can see the North American Chess Assosiation really taking off.
Susan,
What happen to your idea of offering an online chess course? I was looking forward to it. Of course this site looks great and has some well know names teaching, so it will be awesome as well. I did find that our local (21 miles away) chess club offered lessons. However, everyone is getting their information from one source, and I found myself going along with the club point of view until I was exposed to other ideas. I am now looking to expand my chess horizons.
Todd,
I am partnering up with ICC to do the online lesson. They are finalizing the software now.
Best wishes,
Susan Polgar
http://www.PolgarChess.com
Susan, Thank you ever so much!
Susan, I’m glad to hear that your online lessons are going to happen. I do hope that you keep the rates reasonable so that more people can benefit. Thanks!
Intereting how GM lessons cost the same as others
Things are coming about slower than I wanted but things are being chipped away little by little.
Yes anon all of the courses are the same price. A graduated or scaled pricing schema is not going to created.
The idea is to keep processes simple so the organization is not bogged down.
The prices for the “North American Chess Association” courses seem VERY high. $20/person for a group lesson would be fine with a live, in-person instructor and a small group, but that is not what this is. Susan, don’t take this rate as an inspiration for what you are planning!
One can also compare it to a DVD, of which there are quite a lot available. Susan’s recently introduced DVD, “Winning Chess the Easy Way”, for example, costs $23. With a DVD, I can watch it multiple times, and when I’ve gotten everything out of it, I can pass it to a friend. Chessbase has many DVD’s in that price range. Kasparov has done a DVD on the Queen’s Gambit, which you can buy for $24 from Amazon.
Being able to get them over the web is convenient, but if they can only be watched once and not even at a time of your own convenience, then the price has to be a lot lower — like under $5.00. At least, not more expensive than a Pay-Per-View movie on cable. A group of people can watch a recent top-flight movie on demand on cable for about $5-$6. And that is sitting comfortably on a couch.
The ability to ask questions via a microphone doesn’t make it a $20 value proposition. I can’t imagine that the production values are going to even start to be in the same league as a Hollywood production. Local community cable TV, if we are lucky.
Or another value comparison. You can go to chesslecture.com, and for $13 per month, you can watch chess videos by masters from their library. They already have a library of about 400 videos, and they add a new one per day. For your subscription, you can watch every video in the library if you want. It is true that the videos are short, about ten minutes each. Also the “video” is just a graphical chess board with some arrows, highlighted squares, etc, and voice-over. But we haven’t seen the NACA lectures yet; they may be the same. And indeed, it is hard to imagine what else a chess lecture video could have, apart from a talking head.
In summary, not having a library of lectures to choose from, not being able to watch them over again, and not being able to watch them at a time of your own choosing: it seems like they are throwing away every single advantage of web distribution, at a very unfavorable price.
Are they nuts? I hope they aren’t throwing away an opportunity because they are too greedy.
I’ve been thinking of getting private lessons for my daughter and somebody told me that the going rate in the Boston area for a private lesson from a Chess Expert or Master is about $60 per hour. I also ran into a local expert at a scholastic tournament who said his fee was $35 for a one hour lesson, and he would come to our house.
Apparently, the people doing this web-site want you to compare it to a live private lesson. Maybe they are only planning for very small groups, and a lot of personal interaction via that microphone.
Still it is hard to compare something like this to an in-person lesson, where the trainer interacts personally with a small group.
I think it is inevitably going to fall into the “broadcast” or “program” frame rather than the “private lesson” frame, and as a “program”, it is going to be compared to other methods for obtaining “program” content, which are all more convenient and less expensive.
Thank you to everyone for the responses that you have provided. Everyone’s feedback is taken into consideration.
I will not make comparisons with other avenues for electronic training. Each one has its pros and cons.
I will also not state that this is 1-on-1 training since these are group environments. So please do not compare this with having someone come into your home or to your school.
These are not broadcasts and interaction will be possible with the instructor via voice.
We are actually testing also the recording capabilities so sessions can be replayed.
Again thank you for your comments.
You say you “will not” get involved in comparing NACA group lessons to other forms of training. But, why not? It seems like some valid points have been made, and that it would behoove you to address them.
The basic objection to your sales pitch on the site is that this web service is on the one hand too expensive when compared to other video web sites or DVD’s, or cable video-on-demand services, and on the other hand, not likely to be personalized enough to be make it comparable to expensive private group lessons, which are in the same price ballpark.
So, the sales model is: when people have objections, you (a) say that’s a good point, thanks for the feedback; and (b) you overcome the objection.
You’ve done (a). So where is (b). Don’t you have any answer to these objections? What is the basis for the $20 price? How did you arrive at that price.
I am one of the instructors for the NACA and thought I would chime in. I was testing out the software to see what kind of experience it would be before agreeing to be a lecturer. I know Sevan experimented with a lot of different formats and I think he found a successful one that allows for real-time interaction between student and teacher while not sacrificing too mucch of the “live” environment. The broadcast feel is still there- because of the simple nature of the beast- you will have streaming audio and video- but the “conference” feel of the software is something different than what I’ve seen on regular servers. It’s hard as someone who teaches online to work with students effectively, but I think Sevan and the NACA found a way to extend a “live” lesson into your computer room. Also, as Sevan mentioned, there will be a “library” of replayable lectures, along with live interaction. I was impressed, maybe you will be, too.
I plan to sit in on a couple of the GM lectures… I think it was maybe Karpov (?) who said, “The more I learn about chess the more I realize I don’t know.” Or maybe I am mixing up that quote with his, “Everyone can be a grand master, most people just don’t live long enough.”
Cheers all. Thanks Susan, keep up the good work.
-Pete
Thanks for posting Pete. I agree. Let’s give Sevan a chance to try things out. He’s always on the ball for new ideas.
“You’re not going to get to second base unless you take your foot off first base!”
Best wishes,
Susan Polgar
http://www.PolgarChess.com
To the author of the anonymous post that I just deleted, your attack is unwarranted, especially as an anonymous. If a company decides to sell hamburgers for $20, it is their rights. If you think it is too expensive then do not buy it. Who are you to attack them?
I have never said $20 is cheap or expensive. I just do not allow unwarranted attacks from anonymous. I also said to give them a chance. They are trying to do something positive. The NACA people have not done anything to deserve this.
I do not get a penny for posting their news. I like to help out the chess community, especially for good people. Sevan puts his own money to help chess by sponsoring events among other things. Let’s give him the proper respect.
Best wishes,
Susan Polgar
http://www.PolgarChess.com
Very astute of you anon to find that Sevan is rated 1478. Combine that with knowing how to communicate to people and explain concepts is well more than sufficient for someone under 1000.
Anon – do you have any useful comments to add? Why don’t you come out and identify yourself instead hiding behind an anon posting?
I can show you multiple teachers in the Chicagoland area that are Class D players teaching in many schools successfully. You don’t need to be a master to teach the basics.