AMERICAN GO E-JOURNAL: News from the American Go Association April 22, 2002 In This Edition: - CALENDAR OF EVENTS: Latest listings - SCOREBOARD: Houston, TX - GAME COMMENTARY: Even Pros Are Reluctant to Resign a Lost Game - GO NEWS: Fun Coast Go Club Visits Pensacola; Go in the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens; Tales of Shale & Quartz; Converting Russell Crowe; And Speaking of Down Under... - GO REVIEW: AIGO 1.3.0 - AGA OFFICER CONTACT LIST CALENDAR OF EVENTS (U.S.) April 27-28: Los Angeles, CA 2002 Cotsen Go Tournament Lawrence Gross 310-235-7415 le144@earthlink.net May 4: Lancaster, PA Self Paired Tournament Sam Zimmerman 717-892-1249 szimmerman@wareunl.com May 4: Corvallis, OR Corvallis Spring Go Tournament Robert O'Malley 541-738-1690 omalley@coas.oregonstate.edu May 5: Seattle, WA Monthly Ratings Tournament Jon Boley 206-545-1424 go@seattlego.org May 5: Hoboken, NJ Hoboken Spring Tournament Larry Russ 201-216-5379 lruss@stevens-tech.edu May 10-12: Raleigh, NC 2nd North Carolina Kerwin Go Workshop Attack Plans & How to Win Without Fighting Brad Jones 919-466-7084 Bradley.Jones@sas.com May 17-19: Ann Arbor, MI Yilun Yang Workshop Susan Weir 734-663-1675 susan@weirdolls.com May 25-26: Baltimore, MD 29th Maryland Open (AGTC EVENT) Keith L. Arnold 410-788-3520 hlime@earthlink.net 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: Houston, TX April 13-14: Houston, TX Houston 10th Anniversary 2002 Spring tournament 44 players; 7 rounds TD: George Wang Handicap section I: (11 Players): Moon Chong Kim 7d (6-1); Tina Zhang 2d (5-2); Shuma Mizusawa 6d (6-1) Handicap section II: (11 Players): Charlie Zhang 1d (6-1); Ryan Meek 3k (6-1); Clay Smith 2k (5-2) Handicap section III: (12 Players): Terry McGovern 13k (6-1); Adam Gabbert 11k (5-2); Jim Conyngham 7k (5-2) Handicap section IV: (10 Players): Jack Royal 21k (6-1); Chelsea Dinhofer 34k (5-2); Stanley Sun 32k (4-3) GAME COMMENTARY: Even Pros Are Reluctant to Resign a Lost Game "Like amateurs, professionals too are sometimes reluctant to resign a game despite the fact that it is quite clearly lost." This is Maeda Nobuaki 9P's comment on today's exciting game between Kato Masao, 5P and Hashimoto Utaro 9P. Another one from the vaults, the game originally appeared in Go Review VIII, 5 (May 1968) and is from the 1968 Honinbo League match to choose the challenger for the Honinbo Title. Although Kato and Hashimoto play a deadly serious game of chicken, leaving groups to fend for themselves willy-nilly, the game winds up being countable after all. To receive the Member's Edition of the E-Journal, complete with weekly game commentaries, join the AGA today at www.usgo.org GO NEWS Fun Coast Go Club Visits Pensacola Over the Memorial Day holiday weekend, May 24-27, the Fun Coast Go club of Daytona Beach will be visiting the Pensacola, Florida area, reports Fred Ungewitter. "We want to invite anyone interested in playing or learning Go to contact us at g.u@juno.com and we will make arrangements to meet for lessons or gaming," invites Fred & Ginnie. Go in the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens The Brooklyn Go Club will be playing and demonstrating Go at the 2002 Sakura Matsuri festival at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens, April 27 and Sunday, April 28. For details go to http://www.brooklyngoclub.org click on "Member Homepages & Topics" and then click on "2002 Sakura Matsuri." Tales of Shale & Quartz "I have lived in Alaska all my life and am now in my middle 50's," writes Jon Deisher. "In about 1960 my brother learned to play Go in Oregon and brought it home and taught it to me and my father. We lived on a remote homestead with a nearby beach. We drew 19 lines each way on an old wooden table, gathered pieces of shale and quartz from the beach and voila, a board and Go pieces. I was about 12 years old at the time. We played everyday." Look for the rest of Deisher's story in the Spring issue of the American Go Journal, in the mail now (subscribe today by joining the AGA at www.usgo.org). Converting Russell Crowe "Everyone knows the movie 'A Beautiful Mind' was filmed in Princeton and involves a Go scene early on," writes Rick Mott of the Princeton Go Club. "What most people don't know is that Russell Crowe is a chess player, and bought sets for some of the supporting cast during the shoot. They would play during breaks in the filming." "Not to be outdone (well, only slightly to be outdone, since Crowe has more money than we do), the Princeton club has sent the first volume of Janice Kim's Learn to Play Go series to the cast members in that scene for whom we could find contact addresses. We sent the first three volumes to Crowe himself. Will we see photos of Russell Crowe in the Sydney Go club soon? Time will tell..." And Speaking of Down Under... Colin Grierson in New Zealand invites anyone in the neighborhood to drop by the Auckland Go Championships on May 4 & 5. Get more details at Colin Grierson coling@ihug.co.nz GO REVIEW: AIGO 1.3.0 by A. lizuka Shareware. Available for download at www08.u-page.so-net.ne.jp/rf6/iizuka. License US $8 Reviewed by Stephen Charest, 23k As a beginner whose real life gives me far less time to play Go online or in person than I'd like, I searched for software that would run on my trusty Handspring Visor so that I could use the time on airplanes, in hotels, waiting for judges, and so forth. I didn't just want a game recording program, either, but something that could play at least as well as I play now (not a difficult feat for a 23k!). AIGO seemed to fit the bill, the only actual Palm OS software I found that will play the game, even if it's at a fairly basic level. The technical aspects of AIGO are pretty good. The software isn't huge (151k), so it doesn't take up a lot of space. The program will play 9x9, 13x13, or 19x19 games, with the player selecting whether the computer plays white or black. You can also set your own handicap level, up to 9 stones. There's also a game recording mode, where you (or you and another human) use the software to play each other. Finally, you can set the software to play itself. The biggest advantage AIGO has is its convenience as a PalmOS system. It really is handy to be able to whip out your Palm Pilot and zip through a 13x13 game while killing time. It's much easier than doing so on a laptop. The display, especially at the 9x9 and 13x13 level is pretty good and is quite readable at night, using your PalmPilot's illumination. Display at the 19x19 level is a little small, and you must be very careful where you put your stylus to make your move (unless you're in the 2-step move mode). This is one place where the take-back (an improvement in the 1.3.0 version) comes in handy. The program will count your score on request or at the end of two passes (Japanese counting), and gives you an opportunity to cross-check its counting. The SGF save function is handy, if a bit cumbersome. To save a game, you tap the "Save" function in the menu, which then saves the game in the "Memo Pad" function of the Palm Pilot. You must then hotsync your PalmPilot to your desktop or laptop, then rename the saved game (the name AIGO gives it is the full text of the game!) and use an SGF editor to open the game. The real question is "How well does it play?" The answer is, well enough to break you of basic bad habits like closing up your own eyes. If you make such a silly mistake, the program (like most other players) will jump on it. On the other hand, if you're looking for a palm-sized I ng-Cup contender, this ain't it. Quite honestly, I'm not sure there ever will be one -- PalmOS does have its limitations. It isn't difficult to fool the software into letting me get away with building eyes under circumstances that a human player of 15K or higher would thrash me over. Oddly enough, the game seems to be best (or perhaps I am worst) at 9x9 games. Still, I have a winning record against it. With a 23k rating on KGS, that tells me that this program probably plays about the 20k level. (As a reference, I've read that programs such as ManyFaces or WuLu, both past winners of the Ing Computer Go Cup, play around the 15-10k level). The program does seem to have a limited self-teaching function: it doesn't often make the same mistake twice. However, I've discovered certain patterns (again, especially in 9x9 games) which will almost always result in a pass by the computer. On the other hand, it seems to be learning how to invade open territory in areas that, when I first started using it, it would have treated as my territory. If nothing else, AIGO is fun and a good way to pass time. It's also great if you meet someone while traveling and don't have a board handy. And for beginners like me, it's not bad to help break us of bad habits. However, like any other computer software, it still can't replace a human player. I'd like to see some joseki patterns or maybe some life or death problems to load and solve using AIGO; then it would be a much better teaching tool. Still, if you keep in mind that humans won't act as predictably as the software, AIGO is worth the eight bucks just to practice some basic functions. GET LISTED & BOOST TURN-OUT! Got an upcoming event? Reach nearly 4,000 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.orgi Recording Secretary: Susan Weir: susan@weirdolls.com Chapters Coordinator; Bill Cobb: chapters@usgo.org Tournament Coordinator; Mike Bull: tournaments@usgo.org Youth Coordinator; None Redmond: education@usgo.org Congress Liaison Officer; Chris Kirschner: cngrsliaison@usgo.org AGA website; 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