On April 30, Beijing time, at the 2023 FIDE World Championship, Chinese chess player Ding Liren defeated Russian chess player Nepomnyaki to become the 17th chess king in human history, which is also the first time that Chinese chess players won the honor of world chess king.
According to the regulations of the competition, the total prize money of this competition is 2 million euros, originally the champion will receive 1.2 million euros, the runner-up will receive 800,000 euros, because the competition enters the fast chess playoff, the champion will eventually receive 1.1 million euros (about 8.38 million yuan) in prize money, and the runner-up will receive 900,000 euros (about 6.85 million yuan). No matter from the perspective of the gold content or influence of the chess king, Ding Liren can be called the king of kings in the chess world.
There are many professional Go world series, but the prize money is different, the current highest prize is the four-yearly Ying's Cup, the champion prize is 400,000 US dollars (about 2.76 million yuan), the runner-up prize is 100,000 US dollars. In the Chess King Challenge, the prize money for the loser, that is, the runner-up, is higher than the prize money of the winner of the Ying's Cup.
The influence of Go is currently limited to East Asia, specifically in China, South Korea and Japan, and the influence and scale of Japanese Go have declined very seriously in recent decades. According to the Free Time White Paper of the Japan Productivity Headquarters, the population of Go in Japan in the 80s was more than 10 million, but it dropped to 1.5 million in 2021. Founded in 1939, Honinbo recently announced a restructuring and reduced the prize money from the traditional 28 million yen (1.42 million yuan) to 8.5 million yen (430,000 yuan). The sequence of title battles was also dropped from third to fifth.
In fiscal 2021, the revenue of Yuta Kudan, the first player in Japanese Go, was 133.85 million yen. According to the exchange rate at that time, it was about 7.41 million yuan. That day, Shin Jin-jin, the first Korean Go player, earned 1.06 billion won (about 5.7 million yuan) a year. According to relevant public reports, the annual income of Ke Jie, the first Chinese Go player, in 2021 was only 3.65 million yuan.
Ding Liren won a world chess title in this competition, and the prize money received was higher than that of any top Go player in a year. Moreover, in many countries and regions in Europe and the United States, the influence of chess is very high, and Ding Liren won this time can be said to be the highest honor and title in chess projects.