I have a question that I didn't see answered here, so I figured I'd go ahead and ask since I'm considering contributing. If this project becomes defunct, do you intend to reimburse those who made a cash contribution?

Of course, if you will, I will have no hesitation about helping out.

By the way, another thing I was wondering, you said it would support things like tournaments and whatnot, but what about support for clubs? KGS has it to where you can make rooms all you want, but it's sort of pointless if you can't attract players. Will there be any public support for clubs that try to establish themselves on the server or will it be done in the way KGS does it?

I ask because, as I stated in the club discussions section, I've been trying to establish my own club, E2L, but it's hard to attract new members if there's no sponsor or exposure.

_________________
Slava Ukraini!

Hello Hailthorn.

Originally we launched in a platform called idea.me which is similar to kickstarter. We couldnt be on the latter because we are not american and dont have the necesary papers.

What those networks have is that the funding required is not reached, money is returned by the deadline.

Unfortunately people outside had many issues with MercadoPago( the 'local' paypal) so we dropped it and made the site you see now.
If we were to drop our plans, we would return the money no doubt, but that scenario is as likely as getting hit by 2 meteorites and thunder in the same minute. We are in it 100%, we already sent our resignation notices.

Yes, i talked about this on yesterdays teaching game for ASR. There will be a room organization that is pretty much "sponsored" by the server. That is, they are very visible and users will really know about them.
The criteria to be on that group is to be formed, but basically is about making sure the new rooms provides a novel and/or high quality service. And above all, all room services must have excellent customer relations, doing their best to keep everyone happy.

To just gather around and talk and do small things, the channel system will be enough, which is how kgs rooms are being used, only it will be even more open, you can make a permanent channel without asking for any permission.

Of course this could change after we see how the community reacts to the scheme, we have a very flexible mindset, and we want to adapt to the community as well as shaping it.

_________________
Founder of Kaya.gs

One suggestion might be to do a video recording and put it on youtube.

KGS doesn't allow or support third party clients. I shifted most of my Go activities to my iPad, which limits me to servers with communities that aren't very accessible or social, or to a server I don't want to play on (IGS). I would agree that KGS is the best server around, by a long shot, with a well-featured client and a fantastic community, but wms' stance on third-party clients and unshakable loyalty to Java make it a non-option if you can't (or don't want to) use Java.

WMS doesn't have an unshakeable loyalty to Java; he just doesn't have the time to make his planned port to a web app. That's a big reason that kaya can do better than KGS, as KGS is very obviously the side project of a man with a full time job and a family.

As a person who fights his desires to buy Apple products every day I find the lack of java support on IOS to be much bigger problem.

Java was an extreme pain in the behind when I ran Linux for a few years. Heck, I try to avoid it on my Windows boxes as well, as it's slow, hogs resources and the UI doesn't look native. I understand why Apple doesn't want to support it and deal with issues like decreased battery life. (This isn't to say that I don't feel that iOS is far too closed.)

If not for KGS, I wouldn't have Java installed. There is no other software that I use frequently that requires it.

Same here. I would probably have java installed, but now that you mentione it I realize that I don't use it for anything else!

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

Ouch. Cut wms some slack. KGS is still more than awesome enough to compete with existing servers.

It's not that he hasn't done some great work, but development is very slow. Also, the one man nature of the project means that many very useful features (like fischer time) are not implemented because of wms' personal tastes.

I've used it for shogi dojo before.

Also for puzzle pirates and an electronic router.

Hey pel. I could show what we currently have, but it has absolutely no styling or structure its only the working widgets with chats and else.

I have talked to Polly about demoing and we kind of agree that working towards that goal is a little impractical being so close to a functional version. Plus there is something that i consider important about all the people that have been supporting us so far, specially those with founder accounts.

When the server is up and running its already in another phase, one that requires a much smaller leap of faith. And i want to reward those that dare today, knowing the dream and a limited amount of information. When the server launches we will surely keep the crowd-sourcing model but eliminate founder accounts , board of fame and/or backstage documentary (which is being filmed btw!).



Just so you know, we have passed the 1300 dollars mark today! we are very happy .

I remind people about the Feedback tab at the page. There are already over 12 suggestions voted by many people on things about the server! Really active.

I am thinking of opening up a special thread to discuss the rating system, as there are many varied opinions about it.

Once more, we really appreciate all the people that have supported us, the board of fame is growing. If you cant support us, tell other people. The more funds we get, the faster we can launch the first version, and faster we can grow. It is amazing how much time and thought goes over dealing with the finantial details. Some time would give us great strength to develop a rock-solid kickass first version.

_________________
Founder of Kaya.gs

Ok, best of luck to you then!
Your developing model is a bit to closed up for my tastes but I hope I can support you in some fashion later on. I really like some of your ideas.

We have added a meter on the site. Check it out in the candy section http://kaya.gs

Most people are interested in the founder accounts! something that gives us great joy.

I have written the next website sections and we will be uploading them this week, including the geek section .

I havent documented every single donation yet, i am missing some 100's, but you guys can already see the supporter list on each of the rewards.


The feedback tab is also very active, there are many suggestions and lots of voting in them. We are really psyched .
I will make a a further post in the announcement section, we need more exposure to get to our goal (which is around 4k dollars, we will write about it soon).

_________________
Founder of Kaya.gs

How good would it be if there was a ranking in that server using the point-difference system. In other words, the result of a game is not win/lose but the difference of scores.

How many points a resign would be can be fixed (e.g. 60 points) or negotiated before the game.

How the result of a game affects the rank, I have no answer but should not be too difficult to come up with a reasonable algorithm.

This rank could be an alternative to the normal win/lose rank of course.

Just a small (!) wish.

_________________
If you say no, Elwood and I will come here for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day of the week.

Winning by greater than 0.5 is overplaying. Why reward that?

Yeah, it's a staple of pro commentary to say "white is a greedy bastard" when he wins by 1.5.

_________________
Occupy Babel!

Only if my positional judgement was that sharp...

Seriously, the reason why I would like such a system is because I believe it would reduce the importance of counting and positional judgement, which I find the most (or only) boring aspect of Go.

_________________
If you say no, Elwood and I will come here for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day of the week.

I wish. But positional judgment is still key for ko's and stuff.

I hear there's lots of old guys in Korea that will play exactly that (bangneki) with you, although that might be expensive. But I suspect you'd find it doesn't actually reduce the necessity of counting or positional judgment, just change the ways you use them. (Do I go for an almost certain 10 point win? or try for a 40 point win that might end in disaster? Conversely: Do I try to stay at a 10 point loss? Or do I try this crazy thing that might let me win, or might turn my 10 point loss into a 50 point loss?)

_________________
That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.
--
My (sadly neglected, but not forgotten) project: http://dailyjoseki.com