According to past practice, the preliminary tournaments for the 40th Kisei should have started in June. They did not and still haven't. A couple of people that I know told me that the Nihon Kiin and the Yomiuri Shimbun have not agreed on the terms and conditions. However, no one could (or would) give more details. Does anyone know any more about it? Presumably they are in dispute because the Yomiuri wants to decrease the size/cost or otherwise significantly change the structure.

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Dave Sigaty
"Short-lived are both the praiser and the praised, and rememberer and the remembered..."
- Marcus Aurelius; Meditations, VIII 21

Sorry to hear about this. Is it just the tip of an iceberg? I guess I've been expecting to see a decline in sponsor support for go tournaments. Isn't popularity of the game decreasing in Japan. If the population of players and fans is becoming smaller then sponsors will get less exposure from their sponsorship.

Of course it could just be the first indication of a change in sponsor, as happened with the Meijin Sen.

Lower the prize so Japanese players actually try to win international tournaments?

Hmmm... That would be as opposed to raising the prizes on international tournaments?

'If the musician is poor, he will sing for small pay, as long as there is only one person who can pay him; but if there be two or three, he will sing for the one who offers him most...' - John Ruskin; The Veins of Wealth (in Unto This Last) 1862

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Dave Sigaty
"Short-lived are both the praiser and the praised, and rememberer and the remembered..."
- Marcus Aurelius; Meditations, VIII 21

But lowering the prize in Japan is much easier to do than raising international prizes.