There is some indication in the Japanese government's latest 2010 Leisure White Paper as to what may be happening in the western go world.

The annual survey of how Japanese people (urban people of 15 years or older) spend their leisure time began in 1976 and reached a peak of 12 million who called themselves go players in 1981. However, there was doubt about the methodology in the early days, as clubs apparently used inflated figures to boost local council grants. Once that was ironed out, the figures settled into a more believable, but generally declining, pattern, from 7.1 million in 1984 to 2.5 million in 2008. However, in that period, the Hikaru no Go effect was marked, and the figures bucked the trend during the early 2000s (the comic ended in 2003 - the peak during the HnG boom was 4.8 million in 2002).

Last year, however, for the 2009 survey, the methodology changed yet again to count internet play for the first time, and the recorded go population suddenly shot up from 2.6 million to 6.4 million. In 2010 there was a slight dip to 6.1 million but this still supports the 2009 figure.

In detail by age group, the new methodology also shows that the 20s and 30s age groups, which up to 2008 were apparently almost approaching vanishing point, are in fact fairly avid players once the internet is included. Go is still an old man's game but the Grumpies also appear to have become largely iGrumpies.

Reflecting this back on the western scene, we may hypothesise that here too the apparent decline in go activity is more to do with internet players becoming relatively invisible. If the Japanese experience is being copied here, we can estimate that the go population as recorded by association/club memberships is some 60% higher in practice - or maybe much more, as we had fewer clubs to start with. This still does not bode well for our associations and clubs, however, or for the sense of community in go. Given, though, that there are probably lots of players out there somewhere in the ether, perhaps we will see the development of online communities - for example, kaya.gs may light the kindling furnished by kgs. The current torpor of L19 and the rise of me-me-me blogs are not encouraging signs, but things change fast on the internet.

Thanks for the enlighting post.

Regarding internet play I'm one of the iGrumpies. When I was a student I went to our local club two times a week. Nowadays I have more appointments and commitments and do not want to have yet another one on every wednesday (and/or sunday) evening. KGS (and hopefully kaya.gs in the future) allows to choose the time for playing myself, although I have to admit that I miss the informal chit-chat and the social stuff of real-life go clubs quite a lot.


Yes, L19 seems to be quite quiet which is a bit sad. Unfortunately I have no idea how to change this.

- Michael

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Go is easy: don't play bad moves.

The internet go community is one of the communities I am most active in, and while it is a far cry from sitting at a wooden table with other people and interacting without typing, cyberspace does manage to negate some of the real world difficulties as Mic said, and the statistics from Japan that John presented above don't seem surprising. Playing go whenever you want is hard to beat.

The social aspect of internet go however remains strange, and although in some ways it is reminiscent of earlier days when people wrote each other letters more often, in the long run, it is unsatisfying to have personal contact reduced to typed words.

Nonetheless, L19 and its predecessor have proven that there is more to talking about go than just talking about go, and while I presumably never will meet most of you, having the opportunity to discuss various common interests is something I'm grateful for. As to the lull of activity, that happens in real life too.

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Patience, grasshopper.

I think your definition of what a community is, or what "makes" it, differs from mine, because I'm not expecting that we "will see development of online communities" at some hopeful point in the future, but I see it right now, and have seen it for years.

Take KGS for example: In many ways, it is like a Go club that is open 24 hours a day. No matter what time of the day or night, you can log on and not only play the game with others, but also socially interact with them. Certainly, you don't "see" them face to face, and the chat in the KGS rooms may not always satisfy intellectual needs, but these are perfectly real people nonetheless. And you don't even have to dress properly! KGS, and other servers like it, has probably done more for the development of a Go community than those "associations" that seem frequently plagued by bureaucracy, troubled with meaningless politics, and busy with organizing and re-organizing themselves. KGS is community!

Those blogs that you often and repeatedly cite as evidence of impending doom are likewise an expression of community, a result of it, and therefore a display of it. People share thoughts with others in those blogs, signal that "hey, we share this hobby!", invite to comments and thus communication,b occasionally offer access to information, and are as much a community tool as paper-y club magazine twenty years ago may have been, except that they are far less limited and restricted.

I don't know how to put it, John, but I'm tempted to believe your negativity whenever the community topic comes up is more related to change and the difficulty or unwillingness to go with it and adjust to it. Then again, writing that seems wrong and inaccurate too, because you, far more than most others, have contributed to the western Go online community that you seem to feel has yet to come into existence in a satisfactory shape. You were an important contributor to RGG at a time before most people had online access or even knew that it existed, you published materials on Mindzine a decade ago, you used to be active on SL, you post genuine quality content here on L19 (the first half of your post being an example of this -- thank you!), so I'm a bit lost at what appears to me as such a contradiction. What am I missing?

Back to the topic: Generation-wise, I'm probably in curious spot. I'll turn 40 next year, but I had gotten my first modem (the type you used to stuff the phone into) when I was sixteen, so I grew up with message boards (BBS), usenet groups, CompuServe forums, Fidonet or Z-Net areas, live text chat rooms like IRC and so on. Online communities have always been as real to me as traditional venues such as clubs, if not more so because I could spend more time in them as you could at clubs that meet once a week. There have been times in my life when for various reasons, chiefly health-related ones, I could not have attended a club meeting 50 kilometers away, and the internet in its previous and current form had been the "window to the world". My appreciation and awareness of online communities may thus be higher and stronger.

And I am convinced that it is the window to the Go world for many, many people, too. If the traditional venues like clubs and associations decline or fail, it is not the end of the world: it may simply be that they have outlived their purpose and that better venues have been found that "work" for a larger number of people. It's new, but that doesn't make it bad. I don't even see them as mutually exclusive. If associations and clubs decline or fail, it may well be worth looking at their structures and formats, and improve on those, rather than blaming it all on the internet or conclude that the interest in Go is fading. Perhaps it's the interest in stiff associations and local, inbreed clubs that is fading.

But I believe it's largely a matter of convenience. After a long day of work, I'm perfectly happy to flop down on the couch and play a game on the internet rather than having to get ready and visit a club and deal with live people. The alternative would be not to play at all.



By contributing content, by posting. Forums aren't a one-way street, communities never are. It's not uncommon that special interest forums like L19 are carried and fueled by relatively few active people. If one of them takes a break, like topazg -- not only a competent but also highly personable and social person -- currently is, things will seem quieter. It's also been summer and now for many also school or college start again, so Go and talking about Go may take, or have taken, a backseat. It's normal and things will eventually pick up again.

Easier said than done. Although I often think "Yes, I asked myself the same question sometimes ago" when I read a new topic in the General/Amateur/Beginners-forum I seem to think that posting that particular kind of question is rather boring for all of you.

But, to prove me wrong, I am going to ask a question in the general go chat *now*. (edit: and here it is a question)


- mic

_________________
Go is easy: don't play bad moves.

Only you can really answer that, but your very puzzlement seems to me to provide an answer - you are puzzled by not knowing me, and you don't know me because we are not part of what I regard as a genuine community. If we were a genuine community, you would know me and I would know you. As it is, I don't even know who you are, where you live or what you do.

I think this "estrangement" or anonymity also fuels a tendency to stereotyping, which is a true negativity. At any rate, what comes over to me (from other people as well as you) is that there is a lot of stereotyping here about me: I obviously must be a grumpy old man so I must be anti-internet, resistant to change, etc, etc. You repeat that charge here (only to refute it yourself, I admit - but why raise the topic anyway, since I said nothing anti-internet in my post?). I suspect what happens is that, say, I express a distate for me-me-me blogs and this sets off a chain reaction in some people's minds: he doesn't like blogs so he mustn't like the internet so he must be a grumpy old man. In fact, I have nothing against blogs. It's the me-me-me bit I dislike, and not because the I-I-I people (or iPad people) are bad people, but mainly because it tends to go against a good community spirit.

Just to reinforce your puzzlement, I'm not a tecchie but I was programming even before you were born, and I didn't just use modems at home, but carted one round the world as a reporter for many years, having to get them to work in countries that could barely run a telephone service. I had to manage and change a large department full of people who were genuinely terrified of computers in place of typewriters. What I think my experience has given me is not technophobia, or technomania, but simply a balanced view of what technology can and should do for us. Obviously that view is coloured by my own likes and prejudices, but I still don't think you can make it fit any common stereotype.

Ultimately it may be a matter of expectations rather than different definitions of community. I can accept that kgs is a community, but it is a pale shadow of what a good community can be. I feel it is a community without community spirit. (Quick, here's a pigeon-hole opportunity: put me in it!) I was lucky to experience some of that in my go youth, but I accept that it is largely gone in that form, never to return. My hope now is simply that something will spring up to replace it. That something may well - almost certainly will - closely involve the internet. But if that something is just a bigger kgs chatstream, then I would be very sad. I therefore express some of my views or share my past experiences in a way that I hope will lead away from that. Is that really so hard to understand?

What should the next big server have as community features that go beyond a chat stream? I mean, even videostreams and webcams do not bring the feeling back which I had when I played in our local go club, knowing the people by heart (more or less), etc...

Maybe it's not a problem about technology but more about size? Can a community feeling exists with 1000 of worldwide distributed individuals?

Cheers,
mic

_________________
Go is easy: don't play bad moves.

Let me begin by saying Mivo makes some nice points and makes them fairly nicely. This should be pointed out before I respond to the arguably unfairly snipped and excised comments above.

Quote 1 - I really do not think you and Mr. Fairbairn disagree, its "like" a go club. You have no difficulty in expounding the advantages of this somewhat similar animal, and I will mention another very important advantage - the ability to more quickly improve in playing strength because of greater access to opponents. What I do not think you fully appreciate is the ramifications of some of the other differences.

Quote 2 - Not only do you not have to dress properly, but you also do not have to behave properly. This goes beyond the out an out rudeness and bullying that goes on - behavior that would not be tolerated in a face to face club. There is a palpable and widespread failure to understand that we need each other to play this game - the richness and variety of opponents makes us all disposable - clicked off a list and inputted into a rank graph. I know there are exceptions - many, but I can go days before I find a person who does more than type "thx" and leave before I can type "thank you for the game" So, while I admit, online play produces better skilled players, in a real sense it does not produce better go players.

Quote 3 - This is a debatable point which I disagree with, but cannot say is definitly wrong. As a starting point without the efforts and websites of the more staid go organizations, many would not find KGS. As for your remarks about the downside of any type of organizational politics, you are right on the money - but KGS benifits from a Platonic ideal of enlightened despotism, which no "real" community can likely enjoy. Certainly the internet brings in more people to the game. I wonder, though, about its efficiency. I suspect that, though the doors to our clubs, tournaments and Congresses are smaller, a higher percentage of those who enter, stay.

Quote 4 - Forgive me, but I would ask you to turn your searching eye into Mr. Fairbairn's motivations and biases on to your own for a moment. Perhaps you will conclude that I, too, belong with Mr. Fairbairn, a fossil in the Natural History Museum - but I will reject, to my extinction - that any discourse on how to build a community should have, as its foundation, a clear distaste for having "to deal with live people".

I am not trying to say that go is some refined art of manner and mystery, to be wrapped in all the trappings of Asian history. But I do believe it is best enjoyed, not casually, but as something one does have to "get ready" for, to take seriously, and enjoy together. Internet go is not the enemy, but it is not the goal either. While undeniably an asset, I see it as far more successful in growing numbers and skill than in growing community.

I would say you can say it's wrong. KGS is great, but there would probably be no KGS, or other servers designed by people outside of Asia, if not for years of people in associations and local clubs organizing and spreading the game. You can argue that we needed those local organizations to spread the game in the days before the internet, but wouldn't have otherwise. I don't know if that's true or not. But what's obviously true is that people on the ground and outside the internet are the ones who have historically spread the game.

_________________
Occupy Babel!

I think what you define as community is something I'd call "family" or close friendships. You're right, I don't know you on a personal level, and vice versa, but the same is undoubtedly true for most people I interact with in "real life". They are people I see, work with, interact with, but I'm not close to them in the sense that I would say I genuinely know them.

This isn't different in online communities: I know of them what they share about themselves and I know the opinions they express, and how they "act". Body language is absent, granted, but on the upside, text sometimes allows for a more precise way of expressing views, so it's not by definition worse, just different. Would I know you only because we met once a week in a club to play a game of go? After 40 years, perhaps. But if we meet on online forums for 40 years, that may happen too. I might find you an interesting person to talk to, but it's no different here either. I treasure your posts, your insights, the knowledge you have to offer. But I don't feel I would know you better only because I could see your physical body rather than the written words.

So I'm back at the source of puzzlement: What makes an "in the flesh" community better and more "real" (in the way of being an actual community) than an online community? Isn't it, to a large degree, "what you see is what you get" in either case? (I'll say that I agree that the relative online anonymity sometimes leads to poor behaviour, though I partly wonder if that isn't more "genuine" than people not showing their true colours in "real life" because they are afraid of the consequences.)

Of course, this discussion is a bit artificial because an online community doesn't have to be strictly virtual or cannot by force of some natural law cross the boundaries of cyberspace. I've met quite a few of (previous-ly?) online friends in real life, and with even more I regularly voice-chat with. So for me, the distinction between a "real" community and "online" (not so real?) community isn't crystal clear, and that's probably even less so for the mobile phones generation.



Online is no different from real life: Unlike you're very close to someone, "let them in" and have known them for quite some time, the image they have of you is necessarily based on what you allow them to see. Online, you have a little more control over that, but in essence the difference seems marginal. If you express your hope that at some point there will be a Go community online, I'll think you don't consider what we have (and had for years) a genuine community. If you frequently point out the decay of the western Go community, refer to two cancellations of tournaments (when one of them was because of bad weather and possibly the other one as well) as indication of declining interest, and generally seem to focus more on the actually or subjectively bad aspects, then yes, I'll be struck by the thought that you may be overly pessimistic or miss the "old days".

It doesn't help that you and Mark like to portray yourself as "grumpy old men" -- which always conjures mental images of Statler and Waldorf -- but that's tongue in cheek and quite adorable, particularly since I deal with 12-25 year olds most of my work days and I very often see myself in pretty much that place, too, so I can actually relate to that.

Okay, let's be more specific and allow for constructive ideas: You mentioned a "community without community spirit". What defines this spirit? What exactly is it? I get a vague, but very foggy idea based on what you write, but it reminds me more of the experiences I had as a kid when I spent the summer in a children vacation park, something like the boy scouts, not of anything you commonly experience as an adult, or even frequently. Or living in an alternative-living village somewhere far away from large towns where people live and work and play together all day like in rural areas in times past. The internet doesn't usually offer this kind of experience (I experienced glimpses of it in 1995 as part of the community management team of Fujitsu Cultural Technologies' virtual world project), but neither does every day "in the flesh" real life. Online, to me, isn't very different from the Waking World.

Is it just mundane aspects such as the use of real names? That was pretty common back in the days of CompuServe. It made finding people later on much easier. But did it help the community spirit? What it helped was having people show up at you doorsteps or writing to your employer if they had a disagreement with you.

So, what, precisely, are you hoping that will emerge and develop that KGS, L19, RGG, and so on don't or can't provide?

Mivo: I do hope that was a joke. It reminds me of Woody Allen's Orgasmotron to replace the fun of the chase.

As to what is good about human-contact community spirit (and I'm glad to see Horibe refer to it, so I know I'm not alone) is the effort required, the commitment, the getting ready, the fun of the chase. It applies in families, too. If a mother makes an apple pie at home for the family when she could more easily and more cheaply buy one at the baker's, she is signalling something precious to her family about how she cares, how far she's prepared to go for them. It's a kind of meta-effort. Same as when dad rigs up a swing in the garden instead of buying a plastic contraption at the hardware store.

In go, when I started, many players were willing to make this sort of meta-effort on a regular basis. For absolutely no reward. Some people - the ones I admired most - would spend days organising a tournament and experience a full day or weekend of stress just so that people like me could turn up late and play other humans. There was always plenty of teaching available. People lent books to each other, visited each others' homes, offered accommodation to total strangers, went on holiday together - sometimes married each other. In my case I, as an impecunious student, visited many countries by taking up offers of free board. I didn't just meet other go players, but their grandparents, babies, wives and toddlers - and got home cooking. It was a very enriching experience.

This sort of thing does still happen in go, but - like hitchhiking - it seems on the wane, and I find that sad. The internet certainly offers great features of its own, but it doesn't seem conducive to that sort of behaviour. You might try to concoct a scenario where it still happens through the internet, but I'd still retort that it's much rarer and less spontaneous, and I'd be sniffing for pork pies. In fact, what struck me most of all about Santa Barbara was the sheer delight several previously online people felt at meeting a fellow human go player for almost the first time.

I have no idea what, if anything, will evolve that might be called a good online community. However, it's not impossible. We at GoGoD often benefit from a kind of online community spirit, with many people offering us practical help and encouragement - such as the loan of valuable collections. We tend to know these people first as "humans", but they are distant from us and our posting on L19 and so on keeps us in their thoughts. What this tells me is that the old style of community may be on the wane, but human kindness certainly is not. Holding that thought for a moment, you might even say that community is a way of enabling people to give and take with each other. The internet can also facilitate that, but so far it's been a very patchy experience, and I believe it will remain so so long as anonymity is cultivated.

Turning to the argument that people always present a front, so knowing them in real life is no better than talking to them online - that's sheer borrocks, to use the Japanese phrase. Never heard of body language? Meeting someone in their home or with their friends/families is likewise revealing. Talking to them after a few pints could give a different picture. You might not get to know them perfectly, but you can get to know them well enough to lend them your car, invite them to be godfather to your son, give them a reference, etc. etc. You wouldn't do that with somebody on the internet hiding behind a handle.

It wasn't a joke, but you quoted it out of context. The cited line referred to the common type of social experiences in every day life and that they are equally shallow online and offline (as in: not offering the deep community spirit experience that the paragraph was about and that you may desire).



As I pointed out, your definition of "community" is, to me, closer to what I'd call "friendship" and "family". Knowing people online (I'll include voice chat here) for years, engaging in shared activities over a longer period of time (be it "raiding" in MMOs, playing Go on KGS, exchanging dozens of PMs, talking for endless hours on TeamSpeak, Ventrilo or Skype, etc gives you a darn good idea of who they are. I have spent more literal nights talking to "online friends" than to real life ones, because often that is when people open up (and I don't tend to pick up the phone at 1am, but do check my mail and messenger before bed). This isn't to say that I haven't done the same in real life, but you see a much larger difference in quality between the two (talking to someone face-to-face or through a voice program) than I do.

It is true that people online frequently hide behind pseudonyms, and that their is less accountability(*), but this just isn't different from people hiding behind "intact families" or whatever mask they decide to wear. If someone wants to re-invent themselves online, it's easier than in real life. But in the long run, the true self always shines through eventually. Every time. But then we compare friendships to friendships, when the original exchange was about online community vs. offline community, which I understand to be on a larger scale.



Community, let alone a "good community", isn't something that I believe can be easily quantified or objectively described. I believe it is something that is subjectively experienced and felt. I guess it's like "love", it too is something that isn't the same for everyone. I, for one, consider L19 and KGS to be communities and I like you guys, reading from you and discussing with you. To me, it doesn't matter whether the people I exchange ideas and views with are named "David Miller", "DaveM" or even "Bumblebee", because the thoughts are the person's, regardless of the label. (If anything an online pseudonym may say more about the person than their real name, because the former was deliberately chosen by themselves.)

(*) About accountability: The lack of it really only applies to short-term interactions. In online communities that exist for years, it's very present and relevant. Someone can change their nickname every few weeks, but that way they'll never become a more integral part of an online community. And, as pointed out previously, I've never experienced an online community that didn't extend into "real life", such as f2f meetings, phone calls, and so forth.

Anyway, we probably strayed a little from the original discussion. Like you, I look forward to the continued growth of the Go online community, the planned projects and the refining of present venues. And at least I have every bit of faith and belief that they will continue to succeed in bringing together people who enjoy or are interested in Go.

Right now in the US there might be a dip in activity because students are back in school. I typically see that change at the end of the summer both online and in clubs and tournaments.

But I think AGA membership peaked a few years ago even when you average over a year. (I saw a chart but can't find it now.) I know players who play only in clubs and some who play only online even though they are near clubs. The latter category is a concern, but I don't understand all the reasons for it. Maybe some people only have time to play go late at night and are not going to be able to find a club for that.

John, I'm pretty sure this kind of behavior has nothing to do with online vs. real-life, and everything with the size of the community. Specifically, it only happens when the community is very, very small, very fragile, every contact is important, the feeling of exclusivity and of personal responsibility for the future of the community is high. Western Go has outgrown that stage and will never go back to it. If that's what you want, you should take up another hobby with hardly any adherents.

(Consider: would you experience anything like that if you were an ordinary Japanese guy learning to play go in Japan?)

I'm pretty sure you are wrong here, although the last remark might serve to support your argument, in a sense.

I believe it is not the size of the community that is key here, it is the availablity of options.

Take local go clubs for example. In a country the size of the US, even if we count internet players, we have not reached the size where clubs would be swamped, or profitable enterprises or be able to succeed without the type of devotion that John talks about. Before the internet, this work was essential, and there was always a volunteer to replace the outgoing leader - because it was the only game in town. Now, while people still do the kind of work John admires - it is much more of a gamble to find someone new to replace them, because the ubiquity of the internet makes it no longer the only way to get play.

Now, there is not question that the internet has swelled our numbers - but if we had the numbers we have, without an internet - clubs and tournaments would be thriving and the call for volunteers would easily answered.

Japan, despite shrinkage, has so much go that it can be a commercial enterprise, which, as you say, is a different experience - again, not because of numbers but because of the options that result from numbers in a far smaller geographic place.

We're both right The community I'm talking about, the one the size of which is important for determining the attitude of the participants, is the entire collection of people interested in the same hobby and who can feasibly interact. It is not a local club, it's the entire "Western go community", which was tiny a few decades ago, and which is now quite big and mostly online. When you say "availability of options", that is what you mean - the ability to participate in this larger community, as opposed to restricting yourself to a local club.

Sure, playing face-to-face in a local club is nice, but it's obviously not essential. What's essential is interacting with somebody somehow. It's this - the possibility of any kind of interaction at all - that's rare and valuable when a community is genuinely small. And it's this rarity and value that leads to phenomena John described.

Is Go in decline in Europe? From a quick look at the EGD I am not convinced. Seems like a mixture of stagnation and growth. In the past I imagine players who became too busy to play in real life simply vanished, now they may moonlight on the internet. I imagine there are a few antisocial ones, who simply decide they prefer the internet.

NAT 2000 2005 2008 2009 2010

DE 0789 1359 1245 1295 1219
FR 0714 0722 0880 1047 1210
UK 0342 0405 0434 0372 0377
NL 0255 0330 0322 0348 0350

FI 0075 0218 0215 0223 0224
SE 0054 0139 0149 0130 0136

RO 0277 0276 0345 0462 0574
CZ 0225 0257 0271 0270 0253
PL 0205 0436 0319 0273 0238

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North Lecale

The internet makes it possible for people who do not live in major urban areas in the USA to play. For many years there were poor forlorn folks living in such remote central areas as North Dakota who simply couldn't find anyone to play with at all within, say, a two-hour drive of their home. The internet solved that problem. Even in areas where there are (or were) players some small clubs didn't/don't thrive because there isn't enough diversity of strengths in the members. On the internet it is easy to find even-game opponents or someone two or three stones stronger than you are so you can improve. I might be mistaken but my impression is that attendance at go congresses is stable or increasing, so people do value over-the-board go. Don't forget the nickname "hand talk" (shudan for go. I take that nickname to mean that you can get a sense of someone's personality, emotional stability, and ways of approaching the world just by playing go with him or her.

Existence or not and state of health of go clubs is a difficult thing to understand. Even in large cosmopolitan cities it may be difficult for a self-sustaining club to form and continue. I have always been surprised that New York City has for many years had only a tenuously existing club. In the LA area the Rafu Ki-in has closed. Chicago has not been known for the existence of a large, active go club. When a charismatic energetic organizer exists then clubs form and thrive but without one ... So we are still in an era of precarious existence for clubs and organizations and, as has been mentioned above, the internet can have a negative effect on clubs.

Older, long-time players often burn out and retreat to a condition of playing only with a few friends. Such people might not show up in censuses of go players.

The french numbers are in part an artifact, explainable by the recent innovation of "club tournaments". There you can send in your club games to the EGD (sth. very much used by the French), although that should be a reminder that EGD captures only the tip of the iceberg. In any case there are many other countries where the development of Go looks much more encouraging than in the English speaking world, in some of them Go pretty much didn't exist ten years ago (Turkey, Israel, Spain) and even others show constantly increasing populations if it is correct to conclude this from the tournament database (Romania, Russia, Ukraine). UK and Poland are just the sad counter-examples. I strongly doubt online play reduces club attendance (at least in countries that manage to maintain a proper list of active clubs), you just see faster progress and a playing venue for otherwise isolated players, who don't have or didn't like the local club. And to console JF a little, when I opened KGS yesterday I found a marriage invitation advertised in one of the rooms. I assume these players did meet outside KGS as well.

This is the sort of thing that indicates to me that people come to questions of playing go, go clubs, and community from very different perspectives. If you live in Chicago and have a CTA card you can play Go, face-to-face, two nights a week; if you have a car, you have even more options. It's true that the clubs don't own real estate, they don't have clever names, they aren't presided over by dashing statesmen for the game, and (afaik) they don't have quirky customs that would make for cool entries on a wiki. How much does it matter?

Does this reflect different ecclesiologies? Does nature contrive to make every go fanatic born alive either a little bit of a Laud, or a little bit of a Prynne? Some of us seem to think that community among go players must be centralized, hierarchical, ritualistic, and sumptuous, while others are satisfied with - or even prefer - something more decentralized, uncharismatic, improvised, and spartan.