During the pandemic, the Netflix series The Queenโs Gambit famously sparked a huge increase in chess interest โ but one online play engine turned what would have been a spike into a groundswell that eclipses even esports. Jessica Lucas traces how the royal game became a digital juggernaut.
By January 2023, Chess.com reported hittingย over 10 million active players in a single dayโmore than the daily average of World of Warcraft, Grand Theft Auto, and Among Us combinedโleading the siteโs servers to crash. Itsย online scheduleย now features a whoโs who of chess grand masters who provide content for users almost 24 hours a day. A new class of chess celebrities, like sisters Alexandra and Andrea Botez, who recently surpassed 1 million Twitch subscribersย on their joint account, and international master Levy Rozman,ย who has over 3 million YouTube subscribers, regularly appear on Chess.com.
With the software tools, Apple hopes that even people who don't know computer code could tell the headset, via the Siri voice assistant, to build an AR app that could then be made available via Apple's App Store for others to download. The tool, for example, could allow users to build an app with virtual animals moving around a room and over or around real-life objects without the need to design the animal from scratch, program its animations and calculate its movement in a 3D space with obstacles.The report likens Apple's tool to Minecraft and Roblox, which allow anyone to easily create 3D tools and worlds. Apple is said to be utilizing technology that it acquired from Montreal-based startup Fabric Software in 2017, and customers would be able to distribute the AR apps they create on the App Store alongside developers.
People familiar with Apple's content strategy for the headset say Apple executives are emphasizing health and wellness including proposals for AR apps that assist with meditation and exercise. One early AR demo allowed users to sit inside a Zen garden, the four people said.Apple's headset is expected to be released later this year and will reportedly have an iOS-like interface with a grid of apps, advanced eye and hand tracking, and the ability to function as an external display for a Mac. The software tools for the headset could be revealed at Apple's annual developers conference WWDC in June, giving developers time to create AR and VR apps for the headset before it launches to customers later in the year.