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        Arimaa >> Arimaa Buzz >> Tips for promoting Arimaa
        
(Message started by: megajester on Jun 5^th, 2010, 3:16am)

Title: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by megajester on Jun 5^th, 2010, 3:16am

I hope this is the right section...

I've made a couple of carefully-worded posts in Turkish chess forums (off-topic sections of course) about the Arimaa site, and also the wikipedia page and rules video I translated into Turkish. We may have a spike in interest from Turkish players in the next few days. :)

Do you think this is this a good way to promote Arimaa? I'm thinking we've just made a rockin' tutorial video, how can we get chess players to watch it? It'd be great if we could make it go viral in the abstract strategy gaming world, though I'm not sure how we'd do that...

Just in general, do you have any ideas about how people like me can help to promote Arimaa? I know Omar's been doing this for years and Fritz and others have tried different things. I wonder if those who've already been promoting Arimaa would have any specific pointers for people who'd like to help out...

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Fritzlein on Jun 5^th, 2010, 6:46am

You basically know my thinking on this score. I tried to pitch Arimaa to attendees of the Board Game Geek conference. I found that most were uninterested, and those that were interested almost all happened also to like chess.

My experience with chess players is that they are receptive to Arimaa, but they are unimpressed with rules and mechanics. Many chess players are obsessed with ratings, so the range of Arimaa ratings (roughly 1000-2600) is important to them, especially if you can convince them that we know what we are doing with our rating system. In particular, we can assure them that it is on the same mathematical model and same scale as chess ratings.

Also chess players are used to studying chess. They would expect a good game to have lots of books to read and commented games to replay. We can't compete with chess on this score, for obvious reasons, but it helps to marshal the material we do have: one book and a second in the pipeline, the commentary videos linked from the game room, the recordings of live commentary, the wikibook, Adanac's write-ups of World Championship games, scattered strategy discussion in the chat room, forum and game comments. We can't (yet) say that Arimaa is easy to study, but we can make a strong case that it is the type of game that people are naturally inclined to study, and that those who do study Arimaa show long, steady learning curves.

As for Arimaa's advantages over chess, a very light touch is sufficient. Chess players who dislike draws will notice with little prodding that Arimaa is drawless. Chess players who dislike memorizing openings will have the thought themselves that the variable setup might invalidate opening theory. Chess players are, for the most part, not blind to the flaws of their game; trying to convince them that their game has flaws is wholly counter-productive.

Arimaa's computer-resistance is a very hit-or-miss point; some chess players are impressed by it while others are irritated if you emphasize it too much. Perhaps the latter feel indirectly threatened, as if you are saying chess is a bad game because computers can play it well.

Thus my shtick is mainly variations on the theme of Arimaa's depth. The ratings prove we have already discovered a bunch of depth. It needs to be added that we are still discovering more depth every year. A 2100 rating five years ago was a World Championship contender, and now is Jean-fodder. Since 2004 the rating of the top player has increased by approximately 100 points per year. The reality of increasing depth can be reinforced by talking about different playing styles that are all successful, different evaluations from the top players (e.g. chessandgo and I disagree about whether a camel hostage is worth more or less than a cat), strategic tradeoffs such as a material for a goal attack or material for a horse frame, etc.

I will be curious how other promoters of Arimaa are received, and whether their experiences jibe with mine.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by megajester on Jun 5^th, 2010, 1:30pm

Thanks Fritz for crystallizing your thoughts on this, though I'm sure it feels like you keep saying the same thing over and over...

I was really asking about practicalities, more "where" to stick my poster than "what" it should say, if you get my drift...

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by omar on Jun 12^th, 2010, 9:44am

on 06/05/10 at 03:16:05, megajester wrote:

In the past I've done press releases relating to Arimaa (you can find them on the News page). For example announcing the results of the Arimaa challenge. I've used services like send2press.com to have them distribute the release to their list of media contacts. I've found that these don't really generate as much publicity as I thought they would. Other times someone unexpectedly mentions Arimaa in a popular forum and it generates way more traffic than I would have ever expected. I think the dynamics of how people get news that is relevant to them has changed quite a bit due to the Internet. Though I would like to do more press releases about the yearly challenge match or other important events relating to Arimaa, I haven't been because distributing the news through conventional channels just doesn't seem to be very effective. But posting Arimaa news to the off-topic section of related forums sounds like a good idea. I think if we combine a good press release with a small postings linking to the press release in the off-topic section of relevant forums it might actually be a good way to promote Arimaa without it being considered spam or abusive. To do it effectively we would probably have to coordinate a bit. For example if the Arimaa video wins the contest, I could write up a news blurb about it and make it available on the site. Then we would have to coordinate posting it to various forums. We should make a list of forums to post to and who would be posting to each. It would make sure we don't double post and that the posting is done hopefully by someone who already has an account on the forum and has posted to that forum before. Also it would make sure that we aren't posting too often and that what we are posting is news worthy.

Quote:

Just in general, do you have any ideas about how people like me can help to promote Arimaa? I know Omar's been doing this for years and Fritz and others have tried different things. I wonder if those who've already been promoting Arimaa would have any specific pointers for people who'd like to help out...

Although I've focused more on trying to increase the awareness of the challenge, Karl, Jean and others have done much more than me in trying to promote Arimaa. I think promoting Arimaa is too big a task for any one individual. It can be done up to a certain level, but a coordinated effort when there is something news worthy I think would be much more effective.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Arimabuff on Jun 12^th, 2010, 9:52am

Any ink is good ink, even when it's not actual ink. ;D

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by leo on Jun 14^th, 2010, 2:51pm

I generally target gamers of any background, but the results don't seem to obey any obvious pattern that could generate good tips. Many people look interested in the beginning but finally prefer sticking to their old favorites. Now that I have an Arimaa set I think I'll be able to be more convincing though.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by chessandgo on Jun 17^th, 2010, 11:46pm

I've spend a few minutes presenting arimaa in one of my poker coaching videos on french community poker-academie.com sometime in april (iirc?), but I'm not sure if it resulted into more new french players at all. If it's hard to interest chess players then poker players must be a nightmare :) (edit: come to think of it at least one player gave me a positive feedback on arimaa ^^)

Looking at the recent new players, I see

Guest13149 1291 1 France - May 26 10:29 pm jean daligault told me !

haha :)

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by toby1kenobi on Jun 20^th, 2010, 5:55pm

I think if it got onto Slashdot there would be a lot of traffic coming through - hopefully not too much though (A regular occurrence is that websites go down, because the traffic is too heavy, immediately after they are linked from a Slashdot article. This is called being "slashdotted")

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Janzert on Jun 20^th, 2010, 8:20pm

While I no longer read slashdot, that's how I first learned of Arimaa.

Janzert

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Fritzlein on Jun 20^th, 2010, 11:29pm

Unfortunately, Arimaa is not likely to be slashdotted again unless the computers win. The fact that humans win year after year is boring. So we won't get that kind of publicity unless the Arimaa Challenge falls and it is too late.

Supposing the Arimaa Challenge stands firm, I'm not sure what could give us a big bang. Maybe the conversion of a chess grandmaster to Arimaa? Maybe sponsorship by Google? Probably we just have to settle for the slow, steady growth of the community that we have seen until now. Success breeds success, even in the absence of booms.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by megajester on Jun 21^st, 2010, 2:04am

What about the festival?

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Fritzlein on Jun 21^st, 2010, 10:30am

on 06/21/10 at 02:04:27, megajester wrote:

What about the festival?

I hope the festival is a big success, but to me it sounds more like the type of thing to increase Arimaa's retention rather than draw in lots of players who have never heard of it before. There are lots of borderline members of the community that might not show up regularly, but would turn out for a special event. That's good and important for building up Arimaa, but a rather different type of promotion than a major news mention that draws in brand new people. If we try to spread the word about the Arimaa festival, my hunch is that the events it has to offer wouldn't sound super-cool to folks who have never played Arimaa even once, but will be a big draw for casual fans who have already played a few times.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by megajester on Jun 21^st, 2010, 10:55am

on 06/21/10 at 10:30:14, Fritzlein wrote:

You're basically right, but I still think that if we publicise the schedule, there still might be some who would be intrigued, and poke their heads around the door to see what's going on. Much like if you're walking somewhere on a weekend and you see an exhibition in a market square or a park.

Especially the promise of an all-day live webcast, and an interview with Omar and/or Arimaa champions should get some passing interest. Methinks...

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by qswanger on Sep 2^nd, 2010, 3:15pm

on 06/20/10 at 23:29:45, Fritzlein wrote:

... I'm not sure what could give us a big bang. Maybe the conversion of a chess grandmaster to Arimaa? ...

Well, I hear that Kasparov has retired from competitive chess! Perhaps he's looking for a new challenge.
:o

Someone could always take a chance, suck up the cost of a set and/or book (book would likely be better), find his mailing address and fire it off to him. Who knows, perhaps this one-in-a-million shot in the dark could at least produce a positive blurb from him. ;D

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Fritzlein on Sep 2^nd, 2010, 11:24pm

Do you have a current mailing address for Kasparov? I have sent several books out to chess grandmasters / chess promoters such as Susan Polgar and Maxim Dlugy, but so far no response. Ah, well, I can write it off as a business expense; I didn't publish to make money anyway.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by qswanger on Sep 3^rd, 2010, 6:28am

on 09/02/10 at 23:24:48, Fritzlein wrote:

Wow, I had no idea that you had already done this. At least I don't recall seeing anything on the forums about it ... (But then again humility might prevent one from announcing such a thing). I think that's awesome. Certainly no one can deny your status as Arimaa's top evangelist. :D And sorry, no ... I have no idea how to reach Mr. Kasparov.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Fritzlein on Sep 3^rd, 2010, 9:38am

Heh, it's no big deal about sending out a few promotional copies of Beginning Arimaa. That's what your book purchases are funding! :)

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by clojure on Sep 30^th, 2010, 2:58pm

I have contacted a Finnish board game site's project leader, and he said they can publish a review on Arimaa since I proposed to write it.

I intend to play more games before reviewing, this time a bit more seriously. Lately my games have been only fooling around, since the bot ladder offers mostly fast games.

The review should be quite compact and have clear subsections with titles so I cannot write a detailed chapters. I think I'm going to shortly introduce rules, of course. Additionally: how the game feels like, how it is suited for long term play, its thin theme but intuitive mechanism.

What I'm concerned is that should I mention that its origins are in chess and there is a strong desire for AI progress.

I was confirmed of my belief that it might be bad idea to introduce it as AI-resistant when I told about my Arimaa related programming to a friend. He said that he had ignored the game since his impression (without playing, I think) was that it was meant to be hard for computers, not necessarily fun to play.

Another point I'd like to make is the following.

Usually game reviews start with history but I wouldn't like to introduce Arimaa as it is in Arimaa.com main site:

* Playable with a standard chess set.
* Easy to learn.
* Difficult for computers.
* Fun and interesting for humans.

The first item might make people think it's a chess variant. Moreover the top-to-bottom order gives impression that it's more about being difficult for computers but also incidentally fun and interesting for humans. I think it's a mistake to have a label "human" at all.

The above mentioned attributes are what Arimaa was designed to be, but rather should it be what Arimaa is that matters?

So an alternative would be:

* Intuitive rules with fun and dramatic game play
* Provides long term challenge with smooth learning curve (I'm not sure how to say this properly in English)
* Bonus: not a chess variant but playable with chess set

I find it also a bit odd that the main site first goes through the reasons why it's hard for computers and after that why it's interesting. This is problematic if we are wanting to get more human players!

Thanks for listening. ::)

edit: Of course, if the main purpose is to promote AI researching, the current main site is fine. Sorry for not realizing that.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by omar on Oct 1^st, 2010, 12:46am

I agree my ordering of the points is probably not good for an article on a gaming site. Feel free to change the order.

In the beginning the front page of the Arimaa site was just this article:
http://arimaa.com/arimaa/introArticle/

It was really intended to be of interest to AI researches and bot developers.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Belteshazzar on Jun 12^th, 2011, 10:55pm

I don't suppose there's been any progress in getting the interest of a chess grandmaster? It occurred to me that it might be helpful if someone here knew someone who knows a chess gm personally. I was just asking a relative who is a Mensa member whether he knows any chess grandmasters, and he does not.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Fritzlein on Jun 12^th, 2011, 11:39pm

on 06/12/11 at 22:55:50, Belteshazzar wrote:

I don't suppose there's been any progress in getting the interest of a chess grandmaster?

Last year I sat next to a chess grandmaster on an airplane flight, and I talked his ear off about Arimaa. He listened very politely, but I don't think he came to play on arimaa.com after that. He supports himself by playing chess, so Arimaa can only be a curiosity to him.

I sent out several more books to grandmasters besides the ones I mentioned in this thread, but I became discouraged by the complete lack of response. For me it would indeed be more comfortable to approach someone I knew personally, or even was referred to by a mutual acquaintance. When I make "cold calls" I not only feel the sting of rejection, I also feel I am being annoying rather than providing a service.

I still have high hopes that Arimaa will make a big splash some day. Some high-profile person will endorse it, which will bring us a flood of new players. It doesn't even have to be a famous chess player; it could be a movie star or businessman. I wish I could help on that score, but everyone I know already knows about Arimaa, and none of them are famous. :'(

In the mean time, I love how Arimaa is growing organically, by word of mouth and through many other channels of recommendation. I love that our retention rate remains high. We don't just get people in the door; we get them hooked. I love that we have events like the World Championship and Arimaa World League and the Postal Mixer and (hopefully) Mob vs. Mob game where we not only play each other but transmit strategic knowledge and raise the general level of understanding. One thing we do to promote Arimaa (although it isn't normally what is called promotion) is to have a community of depth and substance that goes along with the game per se.

All that said, however, if you personally know any chess grandmaster, and you are willing to write a cover letter to him, just e-mail that letter to me and I will be delighted send it along with a complimentary copy of Beginning Arimaa to your acquaintance the GM.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Nazgand on Jun 13^th, 2011, 12:17am

For a free book, I'm a Grandmaster(self-proclaimed). :P So long as I don't play chess, who would know the difference? ;)
In all seriousness, I doubt any Grandmaster would switch games, even if it were solved as completely as tic-tac-toe. Do you know of the Concorde Fallacy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunk_costs#Loss_aversion_and_the_sunk_cost_fallacy)?

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by jsiehler on Jun 14^th, 2011, 3:58pm

I think Emanuel Lasker would have been attracted to Arimaa. And surely there are some Laskers among the current generation.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by Boo on Jul 25^th, 2011, 8:53am

I cant imagine a Chess grandmaster being interested in arimaa. I ask myself- who is grandmaster? A person, who has put tremendous amount of time and effort to master the game. What for? To get reward. What kind of? Money. Arimaa is zero-money game.

What is arimaa? Just another variant of chess. There are thousands of them. E.g. take a look at http://www.chessvariants.com/Gindex.html
Why should GM choose arimaa, but not something else?

Hard for computers? Ok, but there are other variants, that are popular, and also hard for computers (e.g. bughouse).

Different starting setups? There is fisher-random variant, that is also slowly gaining its popularity.

No draws? Any GM has been in a situation, when a draw guarantees a profit for both. And if one wins, the winner gets the same amount as if he had drawn, and the loser gets much less. (typically the last round swiss tournament situation when 1st and 2nd places are playing between themselves, and draw guarantees they wont drop to 3rd place). Why should they play, if they dont want to? I dont think this feature will be attractive for GMs. Oh well, when the money gets involved, the things get different.

Something else?

Thus GMs are not interested.

Title: Re: Tips for promoting Arimaa
Post by The_Jeh on Jul 25^th, 2011, 12:53pm

There really isn't that much money in chess. There are far easier and more sure ways to make the kind of tournament money an average GM does than putting a ton of time into studying chess. You don't become a GM unless you really love the game.

Bughouse is not a 2-player game, and hence not in the same theoretical category as chess or Arimaa.

In terms of perfect-information, Fischer random chess is not one game, but many, as each separate opening setup corresponds to a different perfect-information game. Arimaa has different opening setups, but it is one game, because the players select the setups.

And they would play in the last round even if they don't want to because draw offers are forbidden and there is no means to collusively force a draw. They aren't going to not play just because they don't have the option of drawing in the last round of a Swiss or round-robin.