Sunday October 10, 2010
The go books are from Kiseido, Ishi Press and Yutopian Enterprise. All kinds of go equipment including antique go boards and stones, magnetic sets and huge display boards are for sale. Also classic life and death, Maeda’s joseki books and others in Japanese are available. Please contact Sangit Chatterjee at s.chatterjee@neu.edu or call 617-230-9942.
Sunday October 10, 2010
New Moves, Not Trick Moves: “In his September 20 New In Print 2010 round-up, Roy Laird suggests that Alexander Dinerchtein’s New Moves (Slate and Shell) is about trick plays,” writes Slate and Shell publisher Bill Cobb. “This is not an accurate description of most of the moves in New Moves. In most cases, Alex and Younggil An agree that the moves are perfectly legitimate, not ‘swindles’. That is, the player of the new move does not think that there is a “refutation” that would make the move a bad one. Just the opposite; they think that most of the moves are good, solid new ideas and that there is a legitimate and even response. The advantage the player may get is that if the opponent is unfamiliar with the move, he may make a mistake. However, if he is familiar with the move, or a strong player, the ‘instigator’ of the move does not suffer a loss. As Sensei’s Library points out, ‘A trick play, or attempted swindle, attempts to entice the opponent into playing an ‘obvious’ response which yields a poor result for her. If answered correctly, the result will typically be worse for the instigator of the trick than if he had played correctly.’”
Slow Games from Germany: Responding to a recent EJ classified looking for slow games on KGS (KGS Slow Games Wanted 9/13 EJ), our old friend Martin Stiassny, President of the European Go Federation, suggests “Ask players in Germany, we play very serious games once a month on KGS in Germany in the ‘Bundesliga’, about 600 players, all ranks, thinking time 60 minutes and 15/5 Canadian byoyomi. Look at ‘Deutsche Ecke’ on KGS; if you enter the chat and ask for players who want serious slow games I’m sure you will get some positive answers. More information at www.dgob.de and then ‘”bundesliga’ on the left.”
Sunday October 10, 2010
New York’s Central Park, the most-visited city park in the U.S., seems to have everything — meadows, ball fields, tennis courts, three 
theaters, two lakes, a reservoir, a skating rink, a carousel, a zoo, even a castle. Frederick Law Olmsted called his creation “a democratic development of the highest significance” because it had something for everyone. As a longtime New Yorker, after decades of exploring the park, I thought I had seen everything. 
But recently I happened upon The Chess and Checkers House, a gaming pavilion donated in 1952 by Bernard Baruch. It stands atop a rock outcropping known as the Kinderberg, near the southeast corner of the park. Walk north from 59th street or south from 72nd street along the eastern park drive and you will see signs. With indoor and outdoor seating and views of the rink, the carousel and the dairy, it’s an ideal place to while away a pleasant afternoon. I was disappointed to learn that only one go set was available, a small, poorly-made item that they kept in the store room. When I found that manager Catherine King is eager to promote any game, I returned with two full-sized sets, leftovers from early shipments of Ing equipment. King immediately set up a prominent display in the main playing area, along with a handout I provided, directing interested players to The New York Go Center and various online go resources, as well as several copies of The Way To Go. The Chess and Checkers House is open Wed-Sun from 10a to 5p. Anyone can use the equipment inside, or take it outside by leaving a $20 deposit or form of ID. No permit is required. At this point, to be sure of a game, it’s BYOO (Bring Your Own Opponent), but it’s the perfect place to take a break while exploring, or to meet a friend for a lunchtime game.
– Roy Laird
Saturday October 9, 2010
Tuttle, the mainstream publisher of three books on go by Peter Shotwell, has added another title, but this time, he is only the 
co-author, while the principal author is none other than Richard Bozulich, the architect of the Kiseido catalog. Winning Go, like his Kisedo publications, is a problem book. But whereas other problem books usually focus on a a single subject — joseki, tesuji, life-and-death — Winning Go gives us a little of everything. Problems from all aspects of the game are organized into one book, designed to help kyu-level players discover their strengths and weaknesses, with suggestions for further study. Personally, I prefer the Kiseido format, where several problems appear on one page, and you turn the page to see the answers. Here the answers appear below the problems–cheaters beware! If you have made it solidly into the SDK range, you should easily solve most of the problems; but it’s a unique resource for advanced beginners. I’ve been playing a friend some nine-stone games, and I’m putting it on his Christmas list. — reported by Roy Laird
Monday October 4, 2010
Xie He wins the Quzhou-Lanke Cup. On September 30, Xie He 7P (r in photo) defeated Jiang Weijie 5P by resignation to become the new Quzhou-Lanke Cup 
Champion. The tournament, which started in 2006, is held in alternating years, with total prize money at one million Yuan. The winner receives 500,000 Yuan (approximately $75,000) and the runner-up 150,000 ($23,000). In 2006 and 2008, the Quzhou-Lanke Cup champions were Yu Bin 9P and Gu Li 9P, respectively. In the semifinals, held on September 28, Xie defeated Zhou Ruiyang 5P by resignation, while Jiang had a 2.5 point victory over Yang Dingxin 2P. Lee Changho stays alive in Myeongin. In the Myeongin semifinals, Lee Changho 9P evened the series at 1-1 by defeating Park Yeonghun 9P by resignation on September 30. The first game of the match was won by Park by resignation on September 28. The final game to decide who will play Won Sungjin 9P for the Myeongin title will be played on October 5.
– JustPlayGo; edited by Jake Edge
Monday October 4, 2010
Game Link Problem: “Due to the broken Eidogo ‘Download SGF’ link I can’t get any of the commentaries or game records except to view them on the website in the pitifully small Eidogo viewer,” writes Ethan Baldridge. There was a glitch in last week’s EJ with the sgf links, but it’s been fixed now and Member’s Edition readers should be able to either view the sgf files online or download them for review in your sgf reader. REMEMBER that you must click on the word “link” to go to the sgf file.
Monday October 4, 2010
Former U.S. Champion John Lee is looking for participants in a survey of go players. “I am currently conducting a study about the relationship of go with other mind sports,” Lee tells the E-Journal. Lee was an active US go player “until changes in life took me away from the scene. I learned go in Chicago when I was 12 and became the US Champion when I was 16. I represented the US in many international tournaments including the World Amateurs, World Pairs tournaments, the Fujitsu cup and was invited to the European Ing Cup as the US Ing Cup Champion.” Lee’s survey takes about 2~3 minutes to complete, “and I’m hoping to collect completed surveys from 1,000 go players,” so he urges go players to also pass it out to their go-playing friends. “Thank you very much and I hope to see you all again back in the go scene sometime soon.”
Monday October 4, 2010
The International Conference on Computers and Games (ICGA) Computer Game Olympics, which included a computer go championship, 
were just held in Kanazawa, Japan. There were 9×9, 13×13, and 19×19 tournaments, with professional commentary and an exhibition match against a pro on Saturday, the last day of the conference. Many Faces of Go won the 13×13 tournament; stay tuned for results of the 9×9 and 19×19.
Monday October 4, 2010
Neil Moffatt reports that he’s developed an “HTML5 canvas based go game viewer and rudimentary editor.” Says Moffat, Secretary of the
Cardiff Go Club in Wales, UK, “It embraces ideas such as access to key moments in games via a list of clickable position descriptions, and a list of alternative move sequences by description.” The site includes games for beginners, josekis, “guess the next move” and game commentaries. In most games, a list of key game positions is presented. Click on ‘Black has now created a large moyo’, for example, and you will be taken you to that exact board position. Moffatt adds that “The site as it stands is in essence a kind of go blog, but it may develop beyond this” and notes that it does not work with Internet Explorer. “It may or may not be palatable to a large audience,” he says, “The user testing to date seem to be relatively happy with it.” Click here to check it out and let Moffatt know what you think at moffatt.neil@gmail.com
Monday October 4, 2010
Perennial champion Changlong Wu 7d was joined on the Triangle Memorial Tournament’s winner’s podium by Jeff 
Kuang 5d and Jimmy Yang 4d as co-winners of the Triangle’s Open section. The tenth annual edition of the Triangle Memorial Tournament was held in Umstead State Park in Cary, North Carolina September 25. A total of 32 players from North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia and Maryland spent a summery day playing in the park until sunset, with a picnic lunch provided by the Triangle Go Group. Following tradition, all the entry fees were returned to the players as prizes, which were augmented by a generous donation of books and certificates for Chinese language and cultural lessons from the Confucius Institute at North Carolina State University. Winner’s Report: Section A (1-2D) was topped by Joseph Contarino and Craig Garrett, both 3-1. The only perfect score of the day was recorded by Andrew Zalesak in Section B (3-6k), followed by Alex Panaccione at 3-1. Steven Mabe at 3-1 won Section C, and perseverance awards went to Danielle Ward and Alvin Chen in Section D.
– report/photo by Charles Alden, Tournament Director