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(If you have recently sent in your membership application or renewal, we apologize for the reminder and thank you for your support) AMERICAN GO E-JOURNAL: News from the American Go Association February 11, 2002 In This Edition: - CALENDAR OF EVENTS: Latest listings - SCOREBOARD: Chicago, IL - GAME COMMENTARY: Zhou on PA Open Game - GO NEWS: Buried Treasure: Web Sites And Books; Kerwin on Attack Plans - YOUR MOVE: Readers Write: DVDs Yield More Film Go; Games Yes, And Coordinates, Too - GO REVIEW: A Beautiful Mind - AGA OFFICER CONTACT LIST CALENDAR OF EVENTS (U.S.) February 16: Sacramento, CA Davis/Sacramento Quarterly Ratings Tournament Fred Hopkins 916-636-8758 fred.hopkins@mckesson.com February 23-24: Princeton, NJ New Jersey Open Rick Mott 609-466-1602 rickmott@alumni.princeton.edu March 2: Concord, NC Carolinas Open Go Tournament Wayne Hansen 704-536-4805 whansen319@yahoo.com March 3: Seattle, WA Monthly Ratings Tournament Jon Boley 206-545-1424 go@seattlego.org March 7-10: Gaithersburg, MD 7th Annual Winter Workshop with Yilun Yang, 7 dan Gordon Fraser 240-498-0235 gordon@wui.net March 16: Ann Arbor, MI Is It Spring Yet? Susan Weir 734-663-1675 susan@weirdolls.com March 17: Ridgefield Park, NJ Radio Seoul and KTV Andreas Hauenstein 201-398-1887 andreas@brooklyngoclub.org March 23-24: San Francisco, WA San Francisco Go Club Spring Tournament Steve Burrall 916-685-1504 sburrall@attbi.com March 23: Arlington, VA Cherry Blossom Allan Abramson 703-684-7676 mediate8@worldnet.att.net ABROAD: February 23/24, Barcelona, Spain: Torneig De Go De Barcelona - Go Seigen Tournament; toyotatour.barcelona@european-go.org or http://idd0086e.eresmas.net/gobcn/tour/angles/anunci.html 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 SCOREBOARD: Chicago, IL Chicago, IL: Don't Drive Angry Tournament February 2; 33 players Five of the thirty-three won all of their games, and a share of the prize money. Those five are: 1st (Dan): John Harriman 2d; 1st (Low Kyu): Patrick Lay 4; 1st (Mid Kyu): Craig Delery 9k; Tie 1st (High Kyu): David Rohde 23; Shawn Zhan 23k. Graduates of Yang Yilun's recent workshop were well represented in the Winner's Circle, reports Bob Barber. GAME COMMENTARY: Zhou on PA Open Game This week's game commentary is another Ejournal original, a fully-commented analysis of the recent Round 4 game in this year Pennsylvania Open in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. "An interesting opening," says Yuan Zhou, 6d, of his game with Moon Cha, 6d. "Both sides try to get sente to occupy the upper right empty corner." To view the attached game record (Cha-Zhou 02.11.02.sgf), simply save the file to your computer and then open it using an .sgf reader such as Many Faces of Go or SmartGo. Readers who need .sgf readers can get them for most platforms at Jan van der Steen's http://gobase.org/sgfeditors.html We're pleased to offer this enhanced edition of the Ejournal to our members; to get the Member's Edition with attached game records, join the AGA at http://www.usgo.org/org/application.html GO NEWS Buried Treasure: Web Sites And Books The AGA has added three substantial new resources to its Web site, which now contains a complete, objective, topic-oriented listing of go books in English; a vast new array of publications for download; and the most complete and up-to-date listing of Go-oriented Web sites that we know of. - Go Books: At http://www.usgo.org/resources/books.html, you will find a listing of over 200 English-language go books and other publications, including magazines, videos, and instructional films. There is also a link to David Carlton's site, which offers more in-depth discussion. - New Publications: At http://www.usgo.org/resources/books.html, under "AGA publications", numerous new publications have been added for download including instructional and promotional aids and essays on a variety of fascinated go-related subjects. - Web Sites: Every since Ken Warkentyne stopped updating his wonderful Go Web Site Index, there has been a need for an indexo f the hundreds of go-related Web sites on the Internet. Now the AGA has filled that gap. Go to http://www.usgo.org/resources/internet.html and we guarantee that you will find at least one cool site you didn't know about! If you know a site you think should be listed, send the URL to roylaird@nyc.rr.com. If this isn't the best go Web site index on the Internet, it will be soon! - Roy Laird Kerwin on Attack Plans "Attacking and fighting are two completely different things," Jim Kerwin 1p told attendees at last weekend's Go workshop in Gaithersburg, PA. "I see very little attacking in amateur Go: I do see a lot of fighting." Many players, Kerwin said, "are reluctant to attack because they are afraid of fighting." Instead, Kerwin said, they should be afraid of fighting but not of attacking. Superior positions entitle a player to profit from attacking, and can often yield profits without a fight from the player with a weaker position. Kerwin explained a number of different attacks, including the pushing attack, the seal attack, the squeeze, freeze and tenuki attacks and of course the leaning attack. Opponents of newly-emboldened workshop attendees can expect to see some or all of these on the board soon. An exciting development was the debut of new instructional technology, as Kerwin reviewed games and positions using a laptop computer projecting Go software on a large screen. This enabled much faster and thorough review of games, which players recorded on PDAs and hotsynched to the laptop. The projector was purchased by the AGA for use in workshops and at the annual Congress. For info on how to book the projector, email Bill Cobb at wmscobb@rcn.com Gordon Fraser, who organized the Kerwin workshop, is currently accepting a limited number of reservations for the March 7-10 Yilun Yang workshop: gordon@wui.net - Chris Garlock YOUR MOVE: Readers Write DVDs Yield More Film Go "DVDs may open up a new realm of Go in films," writes Anderson Mills. "I had finished watching the beautiful film 'Mishima' directed by Paul Schrader and decided to watch the deleted scene in the "Special Features" section of the DVD. The scene shows the main character of Yukio Mishima's 'Temple of the Golden Pavillion' talking with his meditation master while the master is studying a Go board. One shot in the scene is of nothing but the board. In order to exagerate the sense of perspective, the Go board appears to be trapezoidally shaped and different sized stones are used across the board (larger stones are nearer). Since this portion of the film is purportedly lifted from Yukio Mishima's novel, I am led to believe that the scene is propobably written in the novel, but I can't verify that. The director's comments suggest that he regretted cutting the scene, but it caused some introductory material in the film to be "disproportionately long." Games Yes, And Coordinates, Too "Every week, I eagerly anticipate the arrival of your email to catch up on the latest GO news and treats," writes Zee Nazif. "The addition of the commented game is very welcome indeed. In the latest attached game (Feb 4), the comments mention point 'a' on several occasions, but this point does not show on my SGF editor. Any ideas how to see it? In the future, maybe it will help to include the board coordinates such as D7, etc." Editor's Note: In some .sgf readers, the next move is indicated by an 'a'; we apologize for the confusion and henceforth will only use coordinates for consistent reference. GO REVIEW: A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nazar $16, Simon & Shuster Reviewed by Chris Garlock Any book with no less than six references to Go in the index is a must-have for the serious player. When the book in question is also the basis for a major motion picture with not one but two scenes featuring the game, it becomes required reading. Sylvia Nasar's "A Beautiful Mind" is a riveting story of genius, madness, love, and, ultimately, the incredible fragility and strength of our very humanity. The true story of the life of math genius John Nash is considerably more complicated than the film version now playing in a theater near you, and the book makes for rewarding post-film reading. Of special interest to Go players, of course, are Nash's encounters with the game of Go, which began in his first year at Princeton in 1949. "There was a small clique of go players led by Ralph Fox, the genial topologist who had imported it after the war," writes Nasar. Fox got strong enough to be invited to Japan to play and invited Fukuda to play him at Princeton. Fukuda, naturally "obliterated Fox" as well as another local player by the name of Albert Einstein. Go figures in the tale of Nash's descent into madness, as well. At one point, "he imagined he was a go board whose four sides were labeled Los Angeles, Boston, Seattle and Bluefield," writes Nassar. "He was covered with white stones representing Confucious and black stones representing Muhammadans." Later, Nash "was thinking of another go board whose four sides were labeled with cars we had owned: Studebaker, Olds, Mercedes, Plymouth, Belvedere. He thought it might be possible to construct 'An elaborate oscilloscope display...a repentingness function.'" And the game theory that won Nash the 1994 Nobel speaks as much to the game of Go as to other applications: the possibility of mutual gain rather than zero-sum games where one player's gain is another's loss. Nash's insight, writes Nasar, "was that the game would be solved when every player independently chose his best response to every other player's best strategies." GET LISTED & BOOST TURN-OUT! Got an upcoming event? Reach over 3,000 readers 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; Mike Peng: 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 Recording Secretary: Susan Weir: weirdoll@provide.net 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, Letters to the Editor and other material are welcome - subject to editing for clarity and space -- and should be directed to: Editor: Chris Garlock email: journal@usgo.org Voice: 202-857-3410 Fax: 202-857-3420