Wu Tang Clan’s RZA launches chess social network

Yesterday, world famous hip-hop star and Wu Tang Clan member RZA launched a chess social network. What? Hiphop and chess? Yeah.

Wu Tan Clan’s latest release isn’t a record or movie project but an online chess platform, called WuChess, “the world’s first online chess and urban social network” as they call it themselves. They continue describing it “a unique hip-hop gaming, subscription-based community featuring tournaments, celebrity exhibitions, personal profiles, ratings, rankings and clans.”

WuChess.com was inspired by the Hip-Hop Chess Federation (HHCF), a non-profit fusing music, chess and martial arts to promote unity, strategy and non-violence. The HHCF hosts celebrity chess benefits where underserved youth play chess for educational scholarships and engage cultural icons from various backgrounds. WuChess.com will donate a portion of revenues to HHCF to fund scholarships.

For founding Wu Tang Clan-member RZA, also known as Robert Diggs, chess has long been a passion. “Chess is a very important element of Wu-Tang. It’s an important element of life. It teaches you how to exist in the world. It teaches you how to think multiple moves ahead, to strategize. It teaches you how to attack, how to defend,” RZA wrote in the Wu-Tang Manual. WuChess.com, he says, continues this tradition as, “a place to have fun and to learn as you go.”

Warning: it’s not for free: a one-year subscription costs $48. But for this you get to play live games, create a profile, compete in tournaments and socialize with other Wu fans. So all ‘ya hiphop fans out there, got get them and take those f*cking f*cking rooks! (And do inform us about those vibes out there!)