Life In 19x19

Bantari wrote:...
Bottom line:
If we all did 'Like' every other posts we run across, for whatever reason, each post would have been liked by 50 people or so. And then I ask you - would anybody care if a post was 'Liked' or not? It would be meaningless. ...

My take:

1.) When you get a "like", even if it's from someone that gives out likes freely, there's at least an indication that they didn't hate what you had to write.

2.) If you care about your "like count", then I see Bantari's point in that the number of likes you have loses its value (if it had any to begin with).

3.) I think there's another dimension, and that is who gives you a like. Getting a like from a like-happy user does show that they agreed with your post, but maybe comes to become accepted as normal. Getting a like from someone who usually hates your guts seems to indicate, "Well, this guy usually hates what I have to say, but we seem to agree on this front."

Regarding the last point, I feel that there are cliques (to a mild degree) on the forum, so it's often common that person X says something, and persons A, B, and C, who usually like what person X has to say. As is usually the case with arguments on the forum, maybe person Y disagrees with person X, and persons D, E, and F, who usually like what person Y has to say commonly like Y's points.

After endless arguments on the forum, this comes to be expected, and you can say, "Oh, X posted. Of course A, B, and C like what X has to say.", and you don't think much of it. But what's significant is when you see D and E like what X has to say, and then you can think, "Hm. That's odd."

---

Aside from likes, I feel the same phenomenon happens in the many arguments that happen around the forum. X makes an argument, A, B, and C chime in to express their agreement. Y counters, along with his cronies D, E, and F.

After awhile it all starts to lose its significance...

Back on topic: I was very surprised by this part.

MJK wrote:4. Attack or defend the bigger group.
When confronted with a choice of attacking or defending different groups, invest your stone in the bigger group. Never overlook or ignore the important weak group.

So we should put value before urgency? Or does it just mean when the groups are about the same strength?

Bantari, Wineandgolover and all other lovers:

Bantari wrote:

Kirby wrote:@MJK: Are you saying that the scenario described is not one in which it's possible that black lost control of his feelings?

Eg. "Black got carried away lost control of his feelings. Once he started to make a mistake, he continued with the same kind of mistake, trying to make two eyes where there is space for at most one eye' with a diagram partly as below."

Lol...
If a non-native-english-speaker reader can be confused by the english of a non-native-english-speaker writer, maybe a non-native-english-speaker observer can chime in...

So my verdict is: Robert's usage of 'carried away' is perfectly correct in this case, I think.

Robert's usage of carried away is fine here. In this kind of context it is usually just means someone kept on going down the same path regardless of the mistakes they were making because they got obsessed with something and lost sight of all else. E.g. "I got carried away trying to kill his group and overextended myself and ended up too thin when he made small life." It's another way of saying someone became emotionally committed to a certain path as well. Another usage is for when someone is enjoying something too much and overindulges. There is often the dictionary definition of a phrase like this in English where its actual usage is far broader than this due to language moving faster than dictionaries can keep up with.

Splatted wrote:

MJK wrote:Attack or defend the bigger group.

So we should put value before urgency? Or does it just mean when the groups are about the same strength?

For the intended readership of the book, "urgency" and "relative strengths" of groups often are still too advanced topics. For them, it can simply be a matter of group size. Among the groups to be attacked or needing to be defended, attack or defend the bigger group.

For advanced players, this idea is still valid, but one would actually bother to consider determining and comparing group sizes. For beginners and their mistakes, the simple advice "bigger" suffices. When they make such mistakes, then it is often obvious which is the bigger group, but they simply do not consider which group that is (or they would not make the related mistake).

I was advised by the auther not to continue the same manner of stating the principles and briefly explaining them, due to copyright issues. He said 'the book lives from the principles, and I need to protect my commercial interest' and that 'it is fair if you state approximately 1/3 (or less) of the book's principles'

My personal opinion is that I have never thought summarizing 20 pages in 10 lines would have problems with the copyright. However, I do not consider it appropriate to object to the auther, and I decide to stop writing in this thread, rather than writing 3 lines (or less) instead of 10 lines.

MJK wrote:I was advised by the auther not to continue the same manner of stating the principles and briefly explaining them, due to copyright issues. He said 'the book lives from the principles, and I need to protect my commercial interest' and that 'it is fair if you state approximately 1/3 (or less) of the book's principles'

My personal opinion is that I have never thought summarizing 20 pages in 10 lines would have problems with the copyright. However, I do not consider it appropriate to object to the auther, and I decide to stop writing in this thread, rather than writing 3 lines (or less) instead of 10 lines.

Please don't stop! I believe many people would be and are interested in your opinions on the teaching style, the comprehensibility, the quality of the principles presented and so on. I don't think Robert's objections are unreasonable. If you tell us each and every of Robert's principles, why would any of us buy his books? Is it not feasible for you to discuss particular subjects without summarizing all of the content? Tell us what you find good and not so good. You are one of the few strong players who has shown interest in sharing your opinion of Robert's work (John Fairbairn has also done so, for example here). Don't stop now!

daal wrote:I don't think Robert's objections are unreasonable. If you tell us each and every of Robert's principles, why would any of us buy his books?

Why? To understand what Robert means by the principle. Are they truly so simple that they need no explanation? I once bought a book about proverbs, despite the fact that I'd heard every one of them before. Why? To better understand their meaning.

This is a truly impressive case of an author shooting himself in the foot. Robert incessantly discusses how great his books are, which of course lacks objectivity and credibility. So finally (!) a third party comes along and begins a detailed analysis, which could support the author's claim of supremacy. And the author swiftly shuts it down.

Seriously, this discussion was free publicity, which should have been embraced.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

It's one thing - as daal pointed out - to write down your personal experience with the principles and another thing to give away the whole key-principles, which presumably make the book what it is.

I really like to hear more about how applicable or understandable the principles in general are after the first reading. And in the end if it is beneficial to buy and read this book. All on a personal level with maybe some anecdotes about how one progressed while reading this book and if there were some real eye-openers.

So, please write a review not a summary =)

wineandgolover wrote:

daal wrote:I don't think Robert's objections are unreasonable. If you tell us each and every of Robert's principles, why would any of us buy his books?

Why? To understand what Robert means by the principle. Are they truly so simple that they need no explanation?

See post 21. MJK presents excellent and concise explanations which may in fact be easier to digest than the original presentations.

wineandgolover wrote:This is a truly impressive case of an author shooting himself in the foot.

It is possible to discuss the quality of the principles by discussing a representative selection of 1/3 (or less) of them. Likewise it is possible to summarize everything by citing a representative selection of the principles; it is not necessary to cite all the principles for this purpose. It is also possible for readers of summaries or a representative selection of principles to form a more profound opinion on the book or the quality of my teaching in it. 1/3 suffices - one need not see all to judge. It is also possible to ask questions.

If you cannot judge the simplicity, quality and power of, e.g., just the first principle "Avoid premature endgame.", then you could not judge better if you saw all the principles of the book. Not the amount of freely copied contents matters, but a proper appreciation of what you see cited. A player disregarding this principle can lose dozens of points per game. A player doing so in every game can improve several ranks by applying just this one principle. And you speak of "shooting himself in the foot"? Isn't what you have already seen enough? I am generous to allow 1/3, i.e., much more of what has already been cited. But do you really need to see more to judge about quality? You need to understand deeply what you see.

Robert,you misunderstand me.

You wrote a book. Maybe it's good, maybe not.

Somebody decides to review it in a unique way. You are concerned that maybe they are revealing too much. I guess that's fine. At this point you have a choice to make.

A) let him continue the review hoping it will help drive sales.
B) demand he stop, to protect your proprietary ideas.
C) try to persuade him to modify his behavior, and hope not to offend him, thus losing your free publicity.

Option C is a gamble. In the professional world, artists don't tell reviewers how to do their job. They risk a negative outcome, whether it be a bad review or no review at all. I guess the same is true here. You requested a change in review presentation, which I guess is your right. He decided to stop reviewing, which is certainly his right.

Who wins? Nobody. Potential buyers still have nothing but your biased opinion about your book, and like me, probably shy away. Readers of this forum lose an interesting thread, and you lose sales.

Well played, sir. Well played.

wineandgolover wrote:Somebody decides to review

The citation of all the principles together with summaries of the contents would be exactly this, but not a review.

A) let him continue the review hoping it will help drive sales.

If he continues like this and stops after 1/3 of the chapters, it will increase sales. If he continued like this for all the book, then its essential contents would already be free, and sales would drop dramatically. This would affect not only me, but also the retailers.

In the professional world, artists don't tell reviewers how to do their job.

Usually, they also don't agree to complete citations of all important parts.

You requested a change in review presentation,

Not even this. What I have requested is to respect a CITATION limit of ca. 1/3 of all principles in the book.

MJK wrote:I was advised by the auther not to continue the same manner of stating the principles and briefly explaining them, due to copyright issues. He said 'the book lives from the principles, and I need to protect my commercial interest' and that 'it is fair if you state approximately 1/3 (or less) of the book's principles'

My personal opinion is that I have never thought summarizing 20 pages in 10 lines would have problems with the copyright. However, I do not consider it appropriate to object to the auther, and I decide to stop writing in this thread, rather than writing 3 lines (or less) instead of 10 lines.

Obviously MJK can quote the TOC and give his own thoughts without giving away the whole structure of RJ's sub-principles. Or MJK can reword the sub-principles in his own words. Copyright protects only the actual wording not the ideas.

As a target customer (~5/6k KGS looking to improve) every time I read a review about Robert's books (like John's review linked above) I'm tempted to buy one of them (Joseki 2 or the positional judgement book,) but almost every time I read one of his posts (which sooner or later derive in a defense of his own points of view/work) I'm completely put back by it. Just as a minor example of audience here.