The World Chess Candidates tournament, which started on Thursday, has generated quite a lot of controversy. The organising body, Agon Limited, has tried to monetise the event by placing an embargo on the release of move-by-move scores of games. The media was initially asked not to broadcast results or release specific moves until two hours after games were finished. Video feed and live game-scores are made available only at the official website and at a few "broadcast partners". Spectators were asked to register at the official site and to commit to maintaining the embargo as part of the terms of service.
Naturally, the embargo was broken by multiple websites on the very first day. Millions of people also blogged moves live. In addition, the official website was knocked offline for a while, apparently by distributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks. Agon claims chess games are "hot news" as they are played. Hence, the aggressive attempt to monetise scores. However, it has softened its stance to agree that scores may be released at the instant that games are finished. This is unlikely to satisfy the websites breaking the embargo, or be acceptable to fans, who want live or near-live updates. The embargo-busters contend that moves (and associated information like time taken, etc) become a matter of fact the instant moves are played. Hence, anybody may discuss these, just as they would discuss cricket or tennis scores.
Jurisdiction will be complicated if this goes to court. The Candidates is being played in Moscow. Agon cited Russian law on trade secrets. Most of the websites flouting the embargo are based in Europe, or the United States, and cite free speech rulings by courts in similar cases. The winner of this event will play a world championship match in New York this November, versus the world champion, Norwegian grand master, Magnus Carlsen. The World Chess Federation (FIDE) is headquartered in Switzerland; Agon, which holds exclusive marketing rights to all world championship events, was incorporated in Jersey, the Channel Islands. The current owner and CEO, Ilya Merenzon, is a Russian citizen. He claims to have bought it from the previous owner, Andrew Poulson, for the sum of one pound sterling.
One famous example of a hot-news event occurred on June 18, 1815, at the village of Waterloo, in present-day Belgium. The French Emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte suffered decisive defeat at the hands of allied Prussian and British forces. The Rothschild clan, which used carrier pigeons, received early intimation of the battle and bought UK Treasuries to make a large profit. But that involved the shrewd exploitation of advance information rather than an embargo. Deliberate attempts to embargo news always seem to lead to controversy.
When is news "hot" and when does it become a matter of fact, and therefore open to wider dissemination? Court rulings and case law vary from nation to nation. Attempts at imposing embargoes on sporting events have usually not been very successful. When India's cricket board for example, tried to use the "hot news" principle, websites reporting on cricket delayed live coverage of matches by a maximum of one over. Courts have often ruled against allowing any embargoes at all. In the US, the National Basketball Association lost a landmark case when it attempted imposing such an embargo. Even when delays are allowed, they are of very short time-periods. When it comes to financial trading data, for example, it is placed on the public ticker with maximum delays of three to five minutes. In fact, exchanges charge high fees from algorithmic traders who wish to "co-locate" to exchange premises to reduce lag by nanoseconds. The principles involved are interesting and of great relevance to the treatment of multiple types of news, ranging from mundane financial data, to other sporting events. If this does go to court, it could spark some interesting rulings. In the meantime, eight grand masters continue to battle it out in Moscow.
