The image of chess in the public eye is that chess players use analogue clocks. The advertising media and the movies ignore that digital clocks are used. The tossing out of tradition has made it more difficult to market the game. Analogue clocks were simpler to understand, explain, and use. Many clocks had a pleasing aesthetic look. People watching the games thought of chess as a high class game. Many of the digital clocks are cheap looking, overpriced, and require reading manuals with 2 point type to figure out how they work. The resistance to the digital clocks and the speeded up play that they influenced was well founded. Rather than buy a $100 digital clock, many analogue clock users dropped out of the game. You may think, “Good riddance,” but their loss was difficult to make up. Only when digitals dropped to around $50 did we see an increase in tournament players.
One of the important elements in tournament chess is time management. With analogue clocks you only had a finite time to use, just like in life. This guided the opening you used, what you emphasized in study, and when to initiate complications. Good technique was important. Now players focus on the openings considering endgame technique superfluous as in fast games you often do not get the ending or play only trivial positions. This has a bad effect in the development of young players as learning the endgame requires time and persistence. The last thing you learn is the easiest to fall apart.
Did players bash clocks? Yes. That was part of the drama of the game in the last few minutes of play. Clock bashing is one of the main arguments used against analogue clocks. But today’s players bash digital clocks all of the time. If you bang a digital hard enough it can reset. Analogue clocks do not reset. If you drop one, the sturdy things may end up with a cracked plastic face, but you can still use them. Players always complain to me that their digital clocks are broken and are reluctant to spend the money to buy a new one. The cheaper digitals do not last that long; many do not have delay or increment timing.
While batteries on digital clocks last a long time, you still have to replace them. Do you recycle the batteries or do you toss them in the garbage? The long term effects on the environment of us tossing batteries and electronic equipment are clear. Analogue clocks do not have the same environmental problems. They can be handed down to new generations as usable antiques that are not difficult to set.
We were sold a bill of goods by electronic clock manufacturers and federations that thought they would make a killing on sanctioning and selling clocks. Rules were rushed through did not take into consideration what the players liked and preferred. We got stuck with every faster time controls and fewer events that allowed for more serious study of positions. The fact is that lousier chess is being played now and we are ignoring it because profits drive the organizing of events in both the scholastic and open tournament environments. When you pop in your old games with slower time controls into a computer program you find that the games were of higher quality than the Game 30 games you are forced to play now because increasingly that is all there is. So, I really don’t care whether we place colons or periods between hours, minutes, and seconds. The Koolaid of using digital clocks and fast time controls has hurt the game. If we would have tournaments that allowed us to use our old Jergers, Insas, Heuers, and even the BHB (which is still sold as a standard tournament clock) I would be happy to play in one. I would then use my digital clock only in “baby” tournaments.
BTW, I have shown kids how to write algebraic and descriptive notation on their scoresheets. The majority prefer descriptive notation. Why? They prefer to write “P” for a pawn move and do not like to look at the letters and numbers along the side of the board as they are distracting. They also like to write in capitals rather than small letters. Even when told that writing algebraic is easier and that new books are written in algebraic, they still balk and prefer descriptive notation. There is something comforting in the fact that when given the choice, kids will often prefer tradition over a faster paced digital world of AI and Terminators.
