To update I think baduk tv has helped me a little, even if most of what ive learned is just joseki/trick plays... I think seeing real top pros play and how they think and how the real baduk world is has allowed me to get stronger.

Ive gained a few stones I think, ive beat three 2k in a row by 50-75 points,

So far I have watched about half of the english library, or maybe 1/3. I like the videos and here is what I have learned:

1. A few variations of a common opening pattern
2. A few trick plays and refutations in handicap games
3. A lot of information about the pro world, who is the top/upcoming, etc.

I do feel like you learn something else, but you can't describe it. Seeing pros play and hearing the commentators think lets you get inside a pros head and you can tell something different about your own go, and watching so many pro games makes your own games better because when I play I feel like I see things I normally wouldnt.

Overall thought, I think the best bang for your buck would be to just buy a 1$ trial for a week and watch the english videos you want to watch, or a month 50$ if you need to, then only get the 7$ per week package where you can watch baduk tv live. It doesnt really matter whether you speak english, you can just watch the games and see what the pros are commentating, even in another language, and learn enough that over a month even if you only use it 3-4 times a week it would be worth it.

I love the english videos, but there simply isn't enough in the library that I would say it is worth 50$ a month, because the rate of new videos is decent, but if once you have watched the entire library you only get one 15-50 minute english video every 2-3 days.

If you really want more than just the live, you can get the entire saved library of the korean videos and the live for 20$ a month, which has 30 pages of videos, way more than the english one. So I recommend those two over the english one, simply due to the size of the library.


But, I do feel I play better if I watch 5-15 minutes of korean baduk tv or english baduk tv before playing, probably because it helps me get mentally prepared. So there are several advantages to buying these and using them. I think I have gained a few stones, usually i am beating 3k and 2k by 30-50 points, except for today which I was in a slump this morning and lost 3 in a row.

My sub runs out tommorow night, ill cancel it soon. Overall I really like baduktv and the things I learned are pretty much the same as above.

Some fuseki/joseki, trickplays, info about the go world, how pros think, new moves, and motivation.

The biggest things were the motivation to play and study, and seeing how pros think alone made me grow a stone or two which is weird if you consider it isn't really learning any topic specifically.

Even buying the 7$ a month live 24/7 one could have pretty much the same impact, but the 20$ and 50$ packages are better if you have the money.

Overall I really enjoyed watching the videos and commentaries.

To compare... I would say in a month you would get a little less knowledge with the 50$ than a book, but for the 20$ it is better than a book, and for 7$ it blows kgs+ out of the water, even if you can't see saved videos and kgs+ has english, the fact is you still learn from the livestream and its 24/7.... motivation. kgs+ lectures in my opinion aren't as well done as the baduk tv lectures, and even with the language barrier have more content for you.

So baduk tv > kgs+. Two go books > 50$ baduk tv english. Baduk tv 20$ package (live +saved korean lectures) > a go book.

That is my run down, I am planning on buying the 7$ package for the next year probably, maybe even the 20-50$ packages here and there, I would suggest buying the english once every three months if you really want the english, so that the library of videos builds up a lot.

Since tommorow will be 7 days I will cancel my sub now so they don't charge me the 50$, feels very sad cancelling it, makes me regret not watching EVERY video in the english part.

I think ill try to convince my parents to buy the 7$ a month live 24/7 .

If not, ill get it for christmas

EDIT:

I got the 7$ a month one for doing dishes and stocking beverage everyday. She said if I want the english one I can do more stuff like sweep, dust, pick up dog "presents", and such.

Maybe ill do that every few months .

Overall im happy with that arrangement.

Also I cancelled the english 50$ a month but I'm not 100% sure it worked because on paypal it says its cancelled but i can still view the english videos, maybe it takes time to shut it off so i can watch a few more tonight .

korea is 14 hrs ahead of us so for myself a note is:

Thursday and Friday and Saturday at 5PM there is a lecture not a game review like normal.

Thanks for trying it out and taking the time to tell others how you found it. I'm really happy to hear that it's helped you to learn more and improve .

NoSkill let me know about this topic. I'll just clarify some things and answer the questions I saw. If I missed a question from someone, please let me know.


You paid $1 for 7 days of access, so you have 7 days on your account regardless of whether you cancel future payments or not. The same thing happens if you cancel your subscription in the middle of a month - you still have access for the remainder of the 30 days. This is something that perhaps confuses a lot of people. It's possible to buy the $1 trial and cancel payments immediately (for people who feel more comfortable doing that), and still have 7 days left to try it out.

Make the most of the day or two you have left to catch some more English videos.


Have a look at the links at the bottom of the page for the Baduk TV Guide. It's possible to import the TV guide into a calendar and have it correct the times to your local timezone. That way you don't need to convert it yourself and, if you use the 'RSS feed for calendars' (the one that says 'best option for most people') your calendar software will automatically add the updated events whenever we update the TV guide. You can use it with something like Google Calendar (which you have if you have Gmail) or standalone software (like Outlook).

The same thing can be done with the Pro Go Calendar to get more information about pro tournaments in general and live games on Baduk TV. L19's trout is one of the awesome people who helps us keep the Pro Go Calendar up to date. Oren also helps out from time to time, so say thanks to them if you use it .

I need to write some help pages about using calendar feeds and various other things when I have time. There are a lot of things I'd like to do with this if I had the time .


We've been working to add another payment method (for credit card), but we can't do anything until the bank finishes processing their precious paperwork . I've been to the bank about this 5 times to fill in various forms and have meetings. It's taking a very long time (read: months). I'm not the biggest fan of Paypal either, but you have to admit that they get stuff done more quickly.

Hopefully it'll be ready before Christmas. I'll post something on GGG and L19 when an alternative payment method's available.



No, we'd never delete any videos unless there was something really wrong with them. Customers have paid for them and too much work goes into the translations to delete them! The service is still very new, so there isn't a huge archive of English videos yet.

The $1 trial was an introductory offer that's going to be phased out once the day pass is tested and working. We lose money on the trial (and it causes a few other headaches for us), so we can't keep it going. I'll give at least one week's notice before ending it so that people who were waiting until later to try it don't miss out. If you're on the mailing list for the demo videos then you'll get an email to let you know what's happening. I'll also write something here. I wouldn't plan on there still being a $1 trial in December (though there will be other options).

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David

Go Game Guru: Learn Go | How to Get Better at Go | Go Game Shop | Go Boards | Baduk TV

Thanks again gogameguru .

gogameguru, did you already cancel the trial? I wanted to sign up but couldn't go through with the transaction. Paypal told me to choose another option from the shop...

Thank you for doing it this way. The way in which so many subscription services handle cancellations really makes me angry. XD



This is great to hear. ^^



My Christmas holiday is ruined!

Are you in Germany? We've been having problems with Paypal there and I'm working on setting up an alternative payment method (but we're stuck waiting for the bank). If you are in Germany, maybe try it again if you don't mind please? The other day I found something about German banks and Giropay buried deep in the Paypal configuration and changed the settings for it. Maybe it will work now.

Haha, oops . Hopefully the new pricing will work for you.

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David

Go Game Guru: Learn Go | How to Get Better at Go | Go Game Shop | Go Boards | Baduk TV

Yes, indeed I'm located in Germany. I tried and unfortunately it didn't work this time either. I'll keep an eye on this thread just in case.

Really liked the being 5 kyu lectures you can really see the game differently like in the first one where you get more comfortable with your opponent invading and a bit of the other tutorials although that guy (that does the "bang" tutorials) really takes a long time to get to the point which is a bit annoying. Will probably buy another week of baduk tv when there is some more being 5 k vids in english

There is a small thing I want to mention, probably most people don't even notice - so maybe not that important. But I wonder if it is something easily fixable. Videos appear to be clipped from the right side. Sometimes subtitles lose one or two letters at the end due to this. For example I am watching Kim's 007 lessons video #2, at 13:51 subtitle supposed to be "... are you?" but gets cut down to "are yo". When there is text on the edge from the original video, like player names, that also gets cut - so it is not just the subtitle. Also it is not specific to that video, I think all has it, but you need something to be on the edge to notice.

Subtitles getting affected make me think that source video during embedding do not have this flaw. May it be the JWplayer to blame? Do you guys also notice this? For example, check 007 lecture #2 at 13:51.

Ok, we can sort something else out. I'll email you about this tomorrow (it's late here now).

No, it's two separate (annoying) issues.

One is with the source files being provided to us like that. We can't fix that ourselves, but we've let Baduk TV know, so hopefully we can fix it for future files.

The second problem is with the software I use for hard subbing the files. I think it's a bug where it doesn't wrap the text if it's only 2-3 letters too long for the screen. We're looking for alternative encoding software and also thinking about switching to soft subs, if we can get them to work well on Android. That will take a little while because we have to test it first too.

@trickyness, thanks for the feedback. More 5 kyu videos are coming. It will be about one of those per week on average because we're trying to balance the different programs for different skill levels.

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David

Go Game Guru: Learn Go | How to Get Better at Go | Go Game Shop | Go Boards | Baduk TV

I like the videos, but who is this "Peggy" they are always talking about?

I asked the same question and got an answer from Kirby. It means white it is starts with a B. But the B is more explosive than we are used to so we hear a P.
I noticed that Koreans often say "Black" in english when they mean White. Black <-~~-> Beggy ??

Beggy is probably "Baeki". Baeki is "백이" which means "white is" in English.

I just checked this out. I couldn't find a link to a 1$ try, but got a demo video sent, and I must say...
It was really good!!!

I live in Japan and watch the NHK go TV programs every week. These are very informative, but sometimes lack the depth I seek because they cover an entire game over 1.5 hours. The commentator will often take a look at why a professional played something, but only offer 2 or so variations.

The video sent, on the other hand offered a ton of variations in a short time. I knew some, but feel that it really helped add to the knowledge I have. I feel more confident playing them now because I understand the slight differences related to the variations.

Also, I think a lot of westerners, especially kyu level players, tend to play a more "Japanese" style of go because most of the theory available in English is from Japanese players.
So these videos are perfect to get a look at more modern go with a slightly different style.

I wish they had something like this in Japanese because 7$ is a really bargain imo.
I think I might have to learn Korean

I know about go on NHK, but is there any 24/7 equivalent to badukTV in japan?

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"There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you. A man must constantly exceed his level." -- Bruce Lee