Final offers from Chess Mail ... by Tim Harding

his today's mail:

From: "Chess Mail Ltd." <mailto:>
To: <mailto:>
Subject: Final offers from Chess Mail and new database CD pending

20 Aug 2006

Dear Former Chess Mail subscriber

It is now about seven months since the last issue of Chess Mail
magazine was published and about 12 months since our MegaCorr4 CD was produced.

Now is your final opportunity to buy copies of our books, CDs or
Chess Mail magazine back year sets from our website, which will close
before the end of this year. Please visit
http://www.chessmail.com where you can see
some attractive offers, and in the next few days some new articles
about correspondence chess for you to read. An order form for our new
CD will be posted shortly and we shall send out a second email to you
with details shortly.

If possible, please send us a brief email back to us to indicate
whether you are interested in the new CD and whether you already have
MegaCorr3 or 4. If you need PGN or Chess Assistant format, we
particularly need to know that as soon as possible.

If you would like your own correspondence games to be preserved for
posterity, please send them to us in ChessBase or PGN format not
later than 3 September. Game files should be emailed to
. We also accept corrections to your games on our
previous CDs.

I am aware that as yet we have not made the final issues of Chess
Mail available in PDF format because MegaCorr4 only went up to the
fourth issue of volume 9. So our new CD, to be called "Ultracorr"
will include a complete set of Chess Mail in PDF format and our
complete annotated game database.

The CD will probably be produced in two versions: standard
full-priced version with all the CM PDF files, and a cheaper version
with only the volume for people who already bought MegaCorr4. The
games on "Ultracorr" will only be in ChessBase format unless there is
sufficient demand for Chess Assistant or PGN versions, which would
cost more because of the extra work.

The exact number of games on "Ultracorr" will not be known until the
database is finalised early next month. However we are sure that
"Ultracorr" will be the first database ever produced with over
800,000 correspondence games; our present database already exceeds
that number and we are still adding more games. The new games are
mostly ones played in recent years but also include historic games,
including some from scrapbooks sent to us by the late Hermann Heemsoth.

So the new CD should have 100,000 extra games compared with MegaCorr4
and will be much better value than the current ChessBase "corr 2006"
CD which has only a few thousand games that are not on MegaCorr4.

After September I shall be concentrating entirely on completing my
chess history research and writing my doctoral dissertation. In 2007
I shall be doing no chess publishing work except for the monthly "The
Kibitzer" columns at www.chesscafe.com/.
The intention is to produce a history book on correspondence chess
for publication in 2008 or 2009 after the university work is complete.

Thank you for your support in the past. I hope that you will revisit
chessmail.com and order something from us before the end of September.
If we can achieve at least three thousand dollars of sales in the
next few weeks, this will enable us to close or suspend the
activities of Chess Mail Ltd. without leaving any debts. We do not
owe any money to anyone except ourselves, but we have some ongoing
expenses and we shall have to pay for a final audit early next year.

Any surplus will support my chess history research.

Best wishes
Tim Harding

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