Wu Tang Clan producer launches pay-to-play chess, and Michael Arrington can't get money off his mind
WuChess, a site where you can hone your knowledge of the mysteries of chessboxing chess against other players, has launched. On the site, a partnership between RZA, the producer behind hip-hop legends the Wu Tang Clan, and ChessPark, a chess-centric social network, membership costs $48 a year. That has caused fee-hating Michael Arrington to suggest on TechCrunch that the site's headed straight for the deadpool. I agree that it would probably be a lot more marketable as a widget, especially on MySpace, considering the success of Scrabulous on Facebook and MySpace's music-centric audience. But at that price, it could achieve profitability with a relatively small audience. Just check out the crowds at a tournament hosted by the Hip Hop Chess Federation in San Francisco last fall in a video by Geek Entertainment TV after the jump.