Slopfest #71 · 1997 · Vienna
Checkmate, Eventually
A computer beat the world chess champion. Ours beat the coat check attendant, twice.
#71Filed under "Q" for "quality". We never look there.
Museum status: In storage: Basement B, next to the Christmas decorations.
- Venue
- Café Central, the chess tables
- Attendance
- 12,300
- Also spotted
- Five Backstreet Boys cardboard cutouts, seated at the chess tables as spectators
- Fun fact
- 212 games played, 2 won, 2 press releases
What happened
The committee's chess machine was a laptop running a program downloaded from a bulletin board. It lost to most guests, to the waiters and at one point to itself. It did beat the coat check attendant twice, and the committee issued a press release declaring that 'man's reign is over', which was picked up by one newspaper, the committee's own.
“As soon as it works, no one calls it AI anymore.”
Elsewhere in 1997
IBM's Deep Blue beats the reigning world chess champion in a six-game match, the first computer to do so.
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