Edit
r/chess is lame...
Removed because we don't allow memes/jokes
God forbid they have something that colors outside the lines.
I mean, Carlsen is the biggest name in chess since maybe Kasparov or Fischer. And there's a strong argument to be made that he's the best of all time. those sorts of figures always reignite interest and get fame and money that may not be representative of the sport as a whole. It was the same in tennis with Federer and Nadal, golf with Tiger Woods, swimming with Michael Phelps, etc etc
He has been dominant for such a long time to be an anomaly, too.
I'm from the same country as him and I'll pretty regularly get youtube ads and shit with him shilling online gambling sites lol
He's a socdem too. Always a fascinating feature of the system, that people can have sort of the right general idea and still do ads for something as exploitative as gambling.
Chess is very strange when it comes to who makes money from marketing/promotion. I have no idea about the numbers are but I assume the world champion gets ~95% of the contracts, players in the top 10 get a scrap (here or there) and everybody else gets nearly nothing or nothing at all.
million dollar companies sponsoring him
It's a easy tie-in for companies who want to seem "clever" or "smart". And from their perspective - he's probably pretty damn cheap. The same is true for magazines, etc. I bet he's appeared in Vogue at least once or twice.
The WC of chess earns a good slice of the pot from the tournaments they attend, but make a lot more on their personal brand. Books, appearances, autographs etc. Not too many sponsorships in chess that I can think of, it's not nearly high profile enough like other sports.
Of late there's more money coming in for chess pros by way of streaming on Twitch and selling online course packs. YouTube videos too, there's a few chess players making good money there.
But yeah, mostly none of the money in chess comes from playing chess.
Went through a phase where I watched at least ten hours of Carlsen-related content on YouTube. Publicly, I just blame depression for this momentary lapse. But privately, I have no regrets.
I don't know if this is good or bad but you can watch GMs speed play at chess.com. Super-GMs (in the top ~50) aren't as common as they used to be but sometimes they show up. Hikaru Nakamura shows up - I dunno - a few times a week.
Nice rooks!
Do you think you can take my pawn? :wink:
You bring the horse, I'll bring the Trojans
Removed because we don’t allow memes/jokes
Lol awful. I'm pretty sure some of the most prominent GMs of the moment (Magnus included) would hate thst.
That sub can be insufferable. The mods are like humorless, self-serious Wikipedia editors who don't want anything amusing because how can serious topics ever be funny?
Really glad people like Magnus, Levy, and Hikaru are making the hobby more accessible through YouTube and twitch. Watching and learning from them is a lot more enjoyable than dealing with internet janitors.
but that policy allows /r/chessanarchy to flourish, which is an actual good gaming subreddit if you can believe it
