The first step, to use your analogy is to ascertain the state of the forest. Today that can be done remotely using satellite telemetry and similar methods.

Of course specific points have to be addressed, but if the forest is not healthy and can be seen to be shrinking and dying off but people want to say that it is fine, how can anything be discussed?

There has to be agreement that something needs to be done in an overall sense and scope before a discussion of specific steps or means can occur.

So are well ALL pretty much in agreement that the AGA needs an overall "refurbishment" to gain vitality and strength?

_-_-bear

No.

Ok, so those participating here all agree that the AGA is ok with some specific fixes to certain things, basically healthy and good? Not much to do differently at all.

_-_-bear

I think a significant number of people join a national Go organisation because they want to be part of the community. I'm sure there are some who only join because they can get some economic benefit from it. This latter type will always be essentially fickle, barring some change in essence.

From my point of view, I like to see a national organisation doing some of the following:
1 - promoting the game to the general public
2 - helping develop talent, particularly among the youth
3 - telling the wider membership what it is doing
4 - organising sensible events, tournaments, social etc
5 - supporting the game (for example, helping clubs)

If they aren't bothering with these, i'd probably leave.

If I was in the USA, I'd probably be a member.

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North Lecale

The discussion, dear javaness2, is revolving exactly on this matter.
Are they or are they not doing the job well enough, or how good a job are they
doing?

did you not happen to follow this line of discussion?


_-_-bearzbear

Now I can't make up my mind whether bear is trolling, or seriously bad at communication...

If everyone writing in this thread instead spent the time working in McDonalds you could have raised enough money to do all sorts of wonderful things for the AGA!

I'm not your dear javaness2

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North Lecale

Charmed, I am sure.
The pleasure is all mine.

Thank you so much for your participation.

Regards,

_-_-

Well, folks...

It seems to me that at least on this topic the participants that post the most have their minds made up regardless of what is said.

There are other readers... good thing.

I may not be the best communicator or writer, but others who I have asked to look at the thread surely do understand what I have written. It's not that complicated.

The only conclusion is that what is coming back is deliberate.

Having been on the internet probably from before the vast majority of you even knew it was coming, I've seen this before. Many times. It's not new. Not clever.

I have no problem being dead wrong about something. Happy to apologize and correct myself and my views.

Bottom line is that the bottom feeders here more or less have achieved their aims. Oddly enough I am reasonably certain it's the same sort of obstacle and roadblock mentality that is strangling and restricting the AGA, and has for decades.

The tactics can be summarized: attack the poster by various means, change the topic away from anything constructive, post false statements or conclusions, rinse, repeat...

So, cheer and jump for joy.

Think I will try very hard to not read this thread for a week or more.
Will try to forget about it entirely if I can put it out of my mind.
Probably I can.

You folks, and you know who you are, can all pat each other on the back and say things like "boy that bearzbear was quite a troll". Give urselves high-fives for that.

I'd like to say some other things, but they're inappropriate for this sort of public forum.

It's just boring and tiring to keep trying to move the focus back to where it belongs. It's pretty much like the same waste of valuable time that trying to influence the AGA is, and the same reason that so many people just give up and walk away. It leaves everything to the bottom feeder, lowest common denominator types.

Think that sums it up.

Thanks for your time and humoring me by permitting me to post on this topic.

_-_-bearzbear

I think you are just bad at communicating. You have some valid points but don't present them well and don't listen and respond to criticism. Not everyone will agree with you and when they do disagree, your posts starts rambling and losing meaning.

Actually, i thought he communicated well. the thing is, he wanted to try to lead people to the right decisions. maybe with knowledge he has, it was best to not post all the issues, but to try to be generic and get people to realize there is an issue and a fundamental change was needed.

These are problems that if there was proper leadership at the time could and should have been resolved. I think during the 90s and into the 2000s the aga received a lot of money from the ing foundation to promote go. Especially in the schools. Where has that gotten us? If my memory is right, regional VPs (what they were called before being called board members) also received extra money to hand out in their regions.

What have we gotten for this? I just see the status quo.

Well you cannot buy Go players

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North Lecale

no you can not, but you can make it so there are people who want to stay

Of course, it is nice to think this. That the dollar can create an addiction or a love from which the children would never wish to escape. Reality is different. You can teach children Go, provide events, structures, dreams, you can do so many things, but you cannot stop people from changing. For a time a person may relish the game, but as they grow older, new circumstances and desires will come, and with them the game may pass from the forefront of their minds.

Still, you can judge how well, or how wisely the money was spent. Indeed, it is a good to do this.

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North Lecale

Excellent point. Good to see some self-criticism from your side.

But here's an idea. Since the AGA is obviously too inflexible and immune to criticism to undergo the necessary changes, perhaps we should just start a new and better national go organization? Who said that there only has to be one? Even Japan has two. Clearly, there are throngs of dissatisfied AGA members who are just waiting to defect to an organization that does what everybody wants and not just the same old same old that a few stiff-minded board members prefer. Once people have the chance to see what a new, sleek, well-oiled national go organization is truly capable of, the AGA can wither up and die a natural death. Wouldn't that be better than asking an old lady to undergo a brain transplant with some cosmetic surgery thrown in for good measure? I personally don't have the time to do much of the work, but where there is thirst, the cup shall be filled.

_________________
Patience, grasshopper.

That would be great, two rival organisations, fiercely competing against each other!

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North Lecale

Rants like this are on the contrary prime examples of communication. They achieve so many things at once. This one

# reinforces group identity by having a good laugh on the expense of someone else,
# avoids taking the voiced complaints seriously,
# makes you look totally clever in front of your peers,
# will ensure that direwolf, bearzbear and similar minded persons won't voice complaints on this forum again.

Congratulations!

Tapir, in this thread, bearzbear has said we need to focus on the big picture, that we just need to work on executing well on things like email, that he can't identify the people he tried to communicate with because it's such a big problem that fixing any channel of communication won't be helpful, that the AGA needs a professional volunteer coordinator, that the AGA needs to cancel every non-essential function immediately while it reorganizes, that the AGA needs to produce professional quality content, a web server, forums, etc.

This is quite an inconsistent set of demands. How do you even respond to that? He'll just change what he's demanding when you respond to any single point.

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Occupy Babel!