That's really interesting... I've never heard it. Admittedly I (in turn) grew up in Australia, but I've been here quite a long time.

Linguistic drift indeed! I take back my earlier remarks. And I wonder about wartime language exchange, and many other things.

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Confucius in the Analects says "even playing go is better than eating chips in front of tv all day." -- kivi

I'd much prefer a server where everyone can say whatever they want. As long as I have the option to censor people and as long as there's some spam protection in place... I have no trouble with the openly frustrated (nor the cheerfully obscene). Maybe because I prefer honesty to ritualized formality. Your suggestion just sounds like some form of repressed sadism.

When people enjoy the freedom to act like idiots but choose to be nice, that's more satisfying to me than when people are afraid of some speech-policing admin and just play nice.

Is it stipulated anywhere that salespeople in the U.S say "have a nice day" when you leave their shop? It is not necessary for a rule to be explicitly stated for it to be the norm. It is the norm because it is what most people do.

I agree that the chat is not part of the game, but it is part of the interaction that takes place when people play a game. That chat window right next to the game board is kind of hard not to notice.


As you see, my point is that greeting and thanking is in fact already a social norm, and by not following it, one is in fact making an explicit statement which amounts to I do not want to greet you, and I do not want to thank you for the game. The fact that uttering these sentiments is a social norm in no way prohibits one from expressing one's actual sentiments. For example: Thanks, that was an interesting game!

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Patience, grasshopper.

I didn't know we decide on social behavior on the internet over here.

Shall we conclude on behavior in traffic too, while we're at it?

I used to play Go on KGS/OGS from bed using my wireless mouse, and my wireless keyboard would often remain on my desk. I could open the Windows accessibility on-screen keyboard if I needed to type, but often didn't in which case I wouldn't say hi or thanks. And there's a local player who plays a lot of blitz on KGS who never types greetings, he sees it as pointless and a waste of time, he's there to play (quick) go.

I always give greetings before and thanks after the game but it doesn't bother me if my partner in the game does not do these things. Playing on line is not a social thing for me. As the saying goes, when you are on line nobody knows you are a dog. I enjoy casual face to face go as social activity. On line is for playing go not catching up on various life events. If I have played a particular partner many times and have become somewhat friends, I might like a chat but either before or after the game.

Two responses.

1.)

If I wanted to do something negative against my opponent, I'd type something negative. If I don't type anything, and you think I mean something negative, it's reading too much into the situation. If I didn't say, "thanks" (which, in fact, I typically do), it's probably because I'm too absorbed in my own feelings on the game.



2.)

My point is, "Why is this a social norm?".

I suppose your position is answered in the first part of your reply:


So basically, many people say "thanks" to you, so you expect that behavior from everyone. I don't have that expectation.

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be immersed

This is pretty much my position. Playing online go is not a social thing for me. People typing, "t-h-a-n-k-s" is nice, but it's not that big of a deal either way to me.

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be immersed

To anyone who doesn't say hi/gg etc when playing on KGS, when you play in a go club in real life do you also sit down without saying anything, ignore your opponent when they greet you, and then walk off at the end of the game without saying anything? If not, do you feel that to do so would be rude?

1.) Doesn't necessarly mean they are rude. It depends on the expectations you have for that person. For example, if they are a shy kid and I am much older, I might feel it natural for them to be less talkative.

2.) Expectations are different online and in real life. In real life, you might expect someone to show their face, for example. I doubt many get offended when people don't do this online, even if webcams are common these days.

Bottom line: What's "rude" depends on your own personal expectations of behavior. This varies based on circumstance (online vs. offline, age gap between individuals, what you know about the other person... The list goes on).

People in this thread that don't care whether their opponent says, "thanks" (or whatever) don't have that expectation. People in this thread that care about it have that expectation.

This thread is evidence that these expectations are not universal.

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be immersed

When I play with the regulars in my real life club I probably don't actually greet them before or thank them after the game, but we talk about other things or review the game. The social interaction does not start and finish with the game, but spans it. For me saying "hello" and "thank you" is more for playing with people I am less familiar with and more formal games like tournaments. (I do usually say hi and thanks online, but not always as in my playing in bed example).

Hi.

Enjoy the discussion.

Thank you for your comment.

I would like to illustrate this excellent post by Kirby (as always) by the moderating policy at StackOverflow, a questions & answers website. They are removing any "hello"s, "thank you"s and anything considered "filler" from the questions. The idea being that, whether the question is of good or bad quality, such filler makes everybody lose time.

http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions ... from-posts



Now I am not saying that a go server is the same as a Q&A website. Still wicket's comment above would apply, and indeed many first time users are surprised when their "hello" and "thank you" are removed from their post, feeling as if they are rude - but they end up understanding and conforming to the social expectations of the network.

This being said, I feel like in KGS, the current social expectation is to say "Hi gg" and "tx" (or a variation). But comparing the situation to a physical go club is not necessarily relevant.

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La victoire est un hasard, la défaite une nécessité.

Indeed, opinions vary. Coincidentally, the other day I was looking at one of Kaz's blog posts is which he discusses chatting during a game. (He doesn't recommend it and think it is rude to do so.) Now, I think it would be stretch to suggest that this attitude would also apply to the greeting and closing parts.

ok so thanks for the replies to my rather pointed question I realize of course there may be all kinds of reasons why someone might not reply to a greeting in a game, whether it's that they don't speak the language, whether they're a shy kid, or whether they're playing in bed or on a phone or all kinds of other reasons. As such I don't assume the worst if someone doesn't reply to me, I give them the benefit of the doubt and don't take offense.

However as I am personally able to reply to someone who greets me, I always do so, and were I to not do so I'd feel as if I were snubbing them. To me it doesn't make any difference what the social convention is, even if 99% of the games on KGS were played in silence, if 1% of people made an effort to communicate with me, then I would reply to that 1%. It doesn't make any difference to me that they're talking to me over a computer instead of across the board in person, as I'd not ignore someone in real life in that situation I don't ignore them on KGS (or any other game I play) either. From that perspective it's hard to understand why someone would argue in favor of ignoring people, so it's interesting to see the reasons!

A true rebel is someone who says hi, have a good game, then play his/her first move in the bottom left corner of the goban !

It is an interesting side note that the convention of playing first in the top right corner was derived from a Japanese tradition in which the first stone being placed in the opponent's corner was considered a sign of respect (please correct me if I'm wrong!). From descriptions of Japanese contests that I've read, it seems that Japanese culture places quite a bit of value on maintaining proper (social) form, and it appears that this has had a big influence on how Westerners view the game. In online games however, my experience is that Japanese opponents are far less likely than other players to greet and thank their opponents. if my opponent is not using an English client, not thanking doesn't bother me, as I assume that it might not be so common in their culture to do so, but it does make me curious whether it is mostly a language thing, or something else having to do with a Japanese view of online go.

39!

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Patience, grasshopper.

Marcel's comment here is aligned with my opinion.

wicket, I'm not arguing that ignoring people is better than greeting them. My argument is as stated earlier: Expectations are not universal.

You feel inclined to say hello to someone? Go ahead! But let's say that you're that shy kid laying in bed that you refer to in your post. You might not feel the same inclination. And that's fine!

When I play a game on a Go server, I'm there to play Go. Not to test my opponent's social interaction.

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be immersed

I suppose I shouldn't complain too much. I am currently playing a ladder game on DGS. The opponent took days to play his first move and when he did his comment was "Well I can not procrastinate anymore, so.. Have a 'long' (actually I hope very very long and slow) game!!"

I missed answering the comment because, as those of you who play on DGS will know, it is easy to click on submit before typing a response. I would have replied on the next move. But before I got the chance his next comment was "Oh, what a warm welcome... Thank you!"

This time I did reply. But after such a comment I was not inclined to talk like I am in my other DGS games, so I just said "Cynicism is not endearing. When I have over 20 games which require moves I sometimes forget to reply to a comment."

So now he is playing as slowly as he can.

In this case I would have preferred he not say anything at all.

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

So, it is not only a matter of perception and (personal) expectations, but also the question of how easily you are offended?