AMERICAN GO E-JOURNAL: News from the American Go Association December 11, 2000 In This Edition: - CALENDAR OF EVENTS - GO NEWS: 5 Pros Set To Attend 9th Zhu Jiu Jiang Goe Tournament; New Ratings Posted! - YOUR TURN: READERS WRITE: Tokyo Connection?; Pro Game Source - ONLINE GO: Banned Online (Readers Respond 2) - GO CLUBS: Coral Springs, FL - SCOREBOARD: MidAtlantic Regional Championship - AGA OFFICER CONTACT LIST CALENDAR OF EVENTS (U.S.) January 6-7: Santa Clara, CA 9th Zhu Jiu Jiang Goe Tournament Ernest Brown, (415) 641-1452; Falcon@sfo.com January 13: Salem, OR Third Annual Salem Winter Go Tournament Jim Levenick, levenick@willamette.edu January 13-14: Lancaster, PA Pennsylvania Open; Held in conjunction with the Fujitsu Qualifer Chuck Robbins, (717) 203-9100; crobbins@wareunl.com January 13-16, 2001; Evanston, IL Yang Yilun 7P Workshop Mark Rubenstein, (847) 869-6020; workshop@easyaspi.com January 14; Boston, MA MGA Winter Handicap Tournament Don Wiener, (617) 734-6316; donwiener@earthlink.net January 20; Arlington, VA Winter Warmer Allan Abramson, (703) 684-7676; mediate@tryi.com January 27; Chicago, IL Winter Tournament and Kid's Go Camp Reunion Bob Barber; (773) 467-0423; igo@uic.edu UPCOMING/ABROAD (see WWW.USGO.ORG for details) - December 29-January 1: London Open geoff@kaniuk.demon.co.uk - January 20: Furze Platt (Maidenhead, UK) best@vfree.com NOTE: this listing is not all-inclusive, featuring only upcoming tournaments in the next month or events which require early registration. For a complete U.S. listings, go to http://www.usgo.org/usa/tournaments.html For the European Go Calendar see http://www.win.tue.nl/cs/fm/engels/go/tourn.html GO NEWS 5 PROS SET TO ATTEND 9TH ZHU JIU JIANG GOE TOURNAMENT "Five professional players will attend the 9th Jujo Jiang Tournament Jan 6-7 2001 in Santa Clara, CA," reports Mike Bull. "There is no restriction on who can enter the tournament. Anything is possible. Don't miss this one." The professionals: Jujo Jiang 9-Dan; Feng Yun 9-Dan; Ming Jiu Jiang 7-Dan; Janice Kim 1-Dan; Chihyung Nam 1-Dan. There will be commentary after each round, as well as a Saturday night workshop. 1st Prize Open division $1,500 (Really cool prizes in the other divisions). Sponsored by Ing's Goe Foundation; AGA Rated; Tournament Director: Reid Augustin. For more information: Ernest Brown; 415-641-1452; Falcon@sfo.com OR Michael Bull; bull@lanminds.com NEW RATINGS POSTED! New ratings are posted on the AGA's website: http://www.usgo.org/usa/ratings.html. Try the Speed Version. Tourneys rated include: Davis/Sacramento, CA, September 2000; Games Galore Go Club, Raleigh, NC, September 2000; Jack Frost Special, Lancaster, PA, September 2000 Cotsen, El Segundo, CA, October 2000; Delaware Fall Tournament, DE, October 2000; MGA Fall Handicap, MA, October 2000; Hoboken Fall Tournament, NJ, October 2000; New York Eastern, Flushing, NY, October 2000; Oregon Open, OR, October 2000; Texas Open, Houston, TX, October 2000; Pumpkin Classic, VA, October 2000; Chicago, IL, November 2000; Princeton Fall Tournament, NJ, November 2000. YOUR TURN: READERS WRITE TOKYO CONNECTION? "I am going to Tokyo next month for business," writes Mike Lash. "While I am there, I would love nothing more than to play go in the center of the go universe and possibly visit the Nihon Kin. Do you know anyone who might have some go playing friends there? I do not speak Japanese. Any local contacts would be greatly appreciated." - Mike Lash; 703-998-5508; Mhl13@aol.com PRO GAME SOURCE "Perhaps most people know this but I found a great source of .sgf professional games, both current and past, and go news on the Mind Sports zine The games play nicely in the KGS client program." - Alex http://www.msoworld.com/mindzine/news/orient/go/go.html ONLINE GO: Banned Online (Readers Respond 2) By Terri Schurter "I think that a service, like IGS, has the right to ban anyone they want," writes Ed. "Likewise, we have the choice to play on any go server we want. If enough players choose not to play on IGS, then IGS will have no choice but to change it's policy. With all this election issues today, we need to remember that every time we access a go server we are casting a vote for that server. Any server not receiving votes will fade away." Offering another point of view, Clay Smith says "The E-Journal articles on internet Go servers lack balance. Please, take it easy on the igs bashing articles. Likewise, lets skip the 'we are the bahamas of the Go servers (and igs is not)' articles. I do not believe the E-Journal's balance reflects the AGA community experience or sense. I interviewed a variety of igs alienated folks (and) frankly, I speculate that you receive plenty of igs negative articles because it is human nature to expend great energy deflecting humiliation of a rebuke for poor behavior on igs. And, few content igs folks care to write articles when there is go to be played." Mike writes "I wouldn't say I considered the IGS 'banning' phenomenon a "fabrication" of malcontents; more I figured it had been blown way out of proportion. That this now seems not to be the case, I find troubling -- like an opponent's dead group somehow coming back to life. I guess IGS can run their servers however they want to, and I shouldn't expect better of them simply because they are go players. Oh well, it doesn't affect me so much personally, since I'm mostly on KGS these days." "I was once threatened with banning from IGS," says Dan. "I was given a list of possible reasons why, and I was left to guess which one. My closest notion is that I was in trouble for pasting the URL of a list of go terms on the NNGS website to someone who was asking about go terminology, during a pro game, using 'say' on IGS. I think free speech on go servers is probably expected by most people in the US, but I also suspect that citizens of some countries are most likely not surprised by speech limits, especially those countries where political speech is limited." Terri Schurter has been playing Go online since 1995. Her Go club, Wings Across Calm Waters [http://www.wingsgoclub.org], is a "virtual" chapter of the AGA. Wings meets week-nights on the Zone from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm Eastern Time, and on Wednesday nights at 8P on KGS. Terri plays under the name goddess_of_go. GO CLUBS: Coral Springs, FL The Coral Springs (FL) Go Club invites you to join them Tuesday nights starting at 6:30P at 520 Ramblewood Dr. in Coral Springs Fla., between University Dr. & State Rd. 7 (441) just North of Atlantic Blvd. Brett Cooper: brett@tekgroup.com; 954-341-6724. SCOREBOARD: MIDATLANTIC REGIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP MIDATLANTIC REGIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP December 9-10; College Park, MD TD: Chuck Robbins; 19 players Dan Section: 1st: Yuan ZHOU, 6D (5-0); 2nd: Moon CHA, 6D (4-1); 3rd: Yi-Min HUANG, 3D (3-2) Kyu Section: 1st: Bill COBB, 6K (5-0); 2nd: Steve MOUNT, 6K (4-1); 3rd: Lars PETERSON, 20K (3-2). GET LISTED & BOOST TURN-OUT! Got an upcoming event? Reach over 1,300 readers coast-to-coast every week! List your Go event/news In the E-Journal: email details to us at journal@usgo.org Ratings are on the web! Check the website (www.usgo.org) for the full list. GET YOUR TOURNAMENT RATED! Send your tournament data to ratings@usgo.org AGA OFFICER CONTACT LIST: President; Roy Laird: president@usgo.org Eastern VP; ChenDao Lin: vp-eastern@usgo.org Central VP; Jeff Shaevel: vp-central@usgo.org Western VP; Larry Gross: vp-western@usgo.org Treasurer; Ulo Tamm: treasurer@usgo.org Membership Secretary; John Goon: membership@usgo.org Chapters Coordinator; Bill Cobb: chapters@usgo.org Tournament Coordinator; Mike Bull: tournaments@usgo.org Education Coordinator; None Redmond: education@usgo.org Congress Liaison Officer; Chris Kirschner: cngrsliaison@usgo.org AGA website; Gordon Fraser and Chuck Robbins: webmaster@usgo.org American Go Foundation; Terry Benson: terrybenson@eudoramail.com AGA Librarian; Craig Hutchinson: archives@usgo.org Published by the American Go Association Material published in " AMERICAN GO E-JOURNAL" may be reproduced by any recipient: please credit the AGEJ as the source. To make name or address corrections - notify us at the email address below. Story suggestions, event announcements and other material are welcome and should be directed to: Editor: Chris Garlock email: journal@usgo.org Voice: 202-289-7174 Fax: 202-371-0168