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Izaak Appel

Appel was a strong Polish/Jewish player who "disappeared" while living in Lviv (or possibly Kyiv) following the 1941 Nazi invasion of Ukraine. He was almost certainly killed in 1941, but as is often the case the precise circumstances of his death are unknown. Currently we have a very unsatisfactory situation where his "disappearance" is sourced to a self-published Bill Wall page. Can we find something better? Gaige maybe? It would be better if we could say something like "Appel died in unknown circumstances following the 1941 Nazi invasion of Ukraine". MaxBrowne2 (talk) 01:32, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Unfortunately all that Gaige says on page 12 of Chess Personalia is

Appel, Izaak         POL

   *    c1905

   †    c1941

Quale (talk) 02:40, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Akira Watanabe (chess)

Would someone from WP:CHESS mind taking a look at Akira Watanabe (chess) and assessing the subject's notability (as chess player)? I'll ask something similar at WT:JAPAN given that the subject might possobily be notable for reasons other than chess, but the current focus of the article and claim of notability seem to be the subject's chess achievements. The article also appears to be a translation of the Japanese Wikipedia article ja:渡辺暁 (based on User talk:Ebefl#Ways to improve Akira Watanabe (chess)) but is lacking proper attribution per WP:TFOLWP. A lack of proper attribution cn most likely can be "fixed", but a lack of notability can't. For reference, the Japanese Wikipedia article does seem to be pretty much the same content-wise and is also basically only supported by a single WP:PRIMARY source (the other sources listed as "references" seem more like "explanatory notes").-- Marchjuly (talk) 21:51, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

I made a couple of quick searches but didn't find anything interesting. There is a book, "How to Play Chess Like Akira Watanabe", by John C. Murray, which I thought might be promising, but it is "independently published" (roughly equivalent to self-published). I also found an article in the Yale Bulletin about him, but it was from when he was a visiting scholar at Yale, and I would hesitate to call that "significant coverage". Bruce leverett (talk) 02:08, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Hi Bruce leverett. Was wondering whether you or anyone else could take another crack at assessing whether there's really anything here per WP:BEFORE. The article hasn't been improved by its creator since my original post and I haven't been able to really find anything about this player on Google either related to chess. The corresponding article on Japanese Wikipedia also hasn't been recently improved; so, there's nothing to get from there. -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:33, 18 September 2024 (UTC)

I did not find anything new.

I didn't realize, when we discussed this in June, that he had won the national championship of Japan three times; you can see this in Japanese Chess Championship. This is criterion 3 of WP:NCHESS, although, of course, one can see from the FIDE ratings that the Japanese championship is not a very strong one. The Polish version of the page has a link to the complete results of a more recent Japanese championship, from 2010, in which he finished third; it is from the FIDE website.

The Polish version of the page has a link to an article by Alex Baburin on chess in Japan, but when I click the link I get "Forbidden", and a google search for Baburin chess Japan doesn't show anything. The same Polish version also has a link to an article by Watanabe about chess in Japan, from msoworld.com (published by Mind Sports Organization Worldwide, Inc.) Of course we shouldn't routinely cite autobiographical material, but it's interesting. He mentioned at the time that he had a "weekly column" on the internet about chess, in Japanese.

He has written three beginner's books (this is clearer in the Japanese version of the page). I think that if these were successful, that is, popular, books, they would meet criterion 5 (or even 6). I do not know how to evaluate how successful those books are (were). At least one of them was not self-published. Bruce leverett (talk) 01:25, 19 September 2024 (UTC)

Should Titled Players Who Cheated Online Have it Mentioned on Their Wiki Page?

Someone added: "In 2024, Malak Ismayil’s account was banned on Chess.com under the website’s Fair Play Policy." They linked to her chess.com page, where her account is closed. I am removing it for there being no independent sources, but I'd like a second opinion. Malak Ismayil - Wikipedia Bres2 (talk) 03:11, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

Only with proper secondary sourcing. Good call. I am not ready to allow someone's career to be destroyed based solely on the actions of a chess.com admin. Marcus Markup (talk) 08:49, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Juan Manuel Bellón López

I find it incredible that anyone would consider a 5 time Spanish national champion and ten-time national representative of any sport non-notable, or allege that they're only known because of their wife or daughter, but here we are, and now we are in danger of a pile-on by clueless deletionists. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 08:58, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

Queen versus rook endgame

I thought it was a bit odd that we didn't have a standalone article on Q vs R, so I spent today procrastinating by writing one based on the first few sources I thought of looking up (Nunn, Müller and Lamprecht, Averbakh Chess Endings: Essential Knowledge – though the last one is old enough that it entertainingly says absolutely nothing about the third-rank defense, so it wasn't very helpful). Probably it could stand to have more about Q vs R+P (which is better covered in Dvoretsky), but I should stop procrastinating. :D Double sharp (talk) 15:37, 28 September 2024 (UTC)