I was away from blogging for a week (my father passed away), so I have a backlog of news posts to churn out. Here you go:

Chess

Bobby Fischer’s body was exhumed from his grave to prove that a 9 year old Philippines girl was not, in fact, his daughter. (source)

Felony charges against Gregory Alexander, accused of breaking into the email accounts of a former FIDE board member, have been dismissed (misdemeanor charges remain). (source)

Anatoly Karpov, in his attempt to secure the presidency of FIDE, filed a lawsuit to disqualify his opponent, the incumbent Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. Arbitration will be in September. (source)

Electric Chess with light bulbs. Pieces are distinguished by color.  (source)

Scrabble

Dubai Scrabble players are among the top in the world, but they have no official organization or place to practice. (source)

A little article about how the actors in a production of Peter Pan hang out backstage playing Scrabble. (source)

A New Zealander living in Malaysia won the recent 2010 U.S. National Scrabble championship in Dallas (don’t ask me how that works). (source)

Other

MGA Entertainment accuses Mattel of spying on them and Hasbro, as well as stealing trade secrets. (source)

Someone pumped over $600,000 into the Guyana national Dominoes competition. (source)

Gamasutra reviews 20 tabletop games and their histories: Go, Chess, Parcheesi, Backgammon, Monopoly, Scrabble, Pente, The Settlers of Catan, Puerto Rico, Ticket to Ride, Carcassonne, Catan: The Card Game, Munchkin, Contract Bridge, Arkham Horror, Nuclear War (by Flying Buffalo), Paranoia (the RPG), Call of Cthulhu, The Logic Puzzles of Nikoli, Crossword Puzzles. (source)

Joystick Division pimps analog games, including Euros and American. (source)

Monopoly, social media edition. (source)