The EnclaveA PREMIUM ENGLISH LANGUAGE GO MAGAZINE

囲碁圍棋 바둑

碁

As the first year of The Enclave draws to a close, I find my-self looking back at some fond memories. The Enclave has turned out to be everything I wanted it to be, with some minor setbacks , and some very unexpected developments here and there. When the room started, there was just me, and sometimes my brother for moral support. In a few days, we’d managed to spread word among our friends, and it grew. Within just a few days we had doubled our numbers to four! Then, as we gained members, we started to gain volunteers. Without the help

of our volunteers, we may never have le� the proverbial ground. When it became clear that we would grow larger, I began looking for stronger teachers. The ones we eventually chose were Shygost, an excellent teacher, and Ba�ousai, also an excellent teacher. With the advent of lessons from Shygost and Ba�ousai, the room almost literally exploded. Within weeks, the Enclave was the single largest social room on KGS outside of Computer Go. As the numbers grew, so did my ambition. We had some wonderful programs going for a while, and the room gained recognition from some of the be�er known KGS users, including the admins, whom I was constantly pestering with questions. Alas, a real life change le� me with the hard decision to leave the Enclave for the real world for a while. It took a few months, but I’ve now made my return. And I’m so happy I have. Through the Enclave, I’ve met people I never would have, and made some friends that have changed the way I look at the world, politics, the internet, and life as a whole. I’ve passed on learning to people I may never get to know, and I’ve even helped people become be�er players than I am. When I first founded the Enclave, I thought I might enjoy doing it for a few months, then I could let it go and it would slowly erode and I would be forgo�en and go back to my niche in KGS and be happy. But instead of eroding, the room keeps going, instead of being just a room where people come to learn, the Enclave has turned into a kind of extended family for me, where I don’t just help people with Go, but I get to know them as people and we become friends. While my purpose in founding the Enclave hasn’t changed, the way I do it and my priorities for it have. I’ve learned that Go is not everything, even if it is an obses-sion. As someone said just yesterday, ‘I enjoy the game while I make friends.’ Remem-ber, though Go may be a deep road, it is an empty one without friends. And that’s why you, and all of your fellow Enclavers hold such a special place in my heart. I may never meet you outside of the computer screen, but your words and your actions have touched lives thousands of miles away. Thank you all for everything you have done. Here’s to another great year, for many years to come.

~Eric Dunham

A Letter from Our Founder

2 A Letter From Our Founder

4 Beginner Lessons — The Object is to Take Control

8 Beginner Life and Death

9 Amateur Life and Death

12 From Heights Above—Alexander Dinerchtein, 3p

17 Go: A Matter of Life and Death

22 Insights

28 A History of Go—Sunjang Special

31 A Picture Worth a Thousand Moves

30 Marketplace

Index

Features

Man vs. Machine:World 9x9 Go

Championships p. 16

Articles

5 Go in a Land of Ice and Snow

10 Future History

18 Man vs. Machine

37 2007 Volunteers and Contributors

Go in a Land of Ice and Snow:

The Norwegian Go Championships p. 5

4 Beginner Lessons

8 Beginner Life and Death

9 Amateur Life and Death

12 From Heights Above — Alexander Dinerchtein, 3p

17 A Matter of Life and Death

22 Insights

32 A History of Go

35 A Picture Worth a Thousand Moves

36 Marketplace

From Heights Above: Alexander Dinerchtein,

Russian 3p p. 12

Beginner Lessons

Within the first few pages of his book, Go - A Complete Introduction to the Game, Cho Chikun, 9p, makes the point: “The object of Go is to take control of terri-tory. At the end of the game, the side which controls more territory wins the game.” Many beginners do not truly understand this concept. Raised on a steady diet of Checkers and Sorry, they believe that the object of all board games is to capture their opponent’s pieces. However, in Go, captur-ing stones that do not need to be captured is like-ly to be a wasted move, lead to bad positions and even cause dead groups. Diagram 3 shows a typical case. In the last three moves, white has completely surrounded his opponent’s stones. At move 4, black has played a tenuki elsewhere, realizing his stones are dead. Many a beginner would follow up with A and kill black’s stones. However, since black cannot hope to save his surrounded stones, this move is worthless in the end. Many a beginner is excited to see his op-ponent’s stones removed from the board. But if he wants to win the game, he is best served by play-ing elsewhere and surrounding territory rather than killing stones that his opponent cannot save. To put this in harmony with Cho Chikun’s quote, white is already in control here. He does not need to prove the point. If he does, he is not only wasting a valu-able move, but he is also stealing a point from himself by moving inside of his own territory. The beginner must not focus on capturing stones, as his instinct will almost invariably lead him to do, but realize that it is territory, not stones, that win Go. His restraint will lead to greater control of the board. Such restraint can lead to the dif-ference between a major win or a minor loss.

The Object is to Take Control

Be careful what you think while playing GoThe board is a mirror of the mind of the players as the moments pass. When a master studies the record of a game he can tell at what point greed overtook the pupil, when he became tired, when he fell into stupidity, and when the maid came by with tea.

by Lamar Bishop

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Go

GoIn a Land of Ice and SnowThe Norwegian Go ChampionshipsFar north of where most of us call home, the Norwe-gians are pu�ing out record numbers of Go players for their Go championship.

It was time again for the yearly Norwegian Go Championship. So I packed my bags and got ready to go. There were about 35 participants this year, which was a new record! The event took place at the Informatics build-ing at the University of Oslo, with gobans, clocks and coffee for ev-eryone, so all was set for a successful event.

At the last championship there were around 30 participants, which was also a record at the time. Go in Norway is growing, which is great! Most of the growth seems to be comong from the clubs in Bergen, Stavanger and Trondheim. There hasn’t been that much activity surrounding the Go clubs in these cities be-fore, so this is really good news. It’s exciting to see that clubs are starting to form in every self-respecting city in Norway. Even though Go in has been around in Oslo for about three decades, clubs in other cities are still relatively new. There were volunteers scurrying around se�ing up the event, carrying go-bans, opening doors, bringing the coffeemaker and many other things that I had no time to keep track of. New this year were the gobans; each had an exquisitely hand drawn number, which made it easier to pair up at the start of each game. The Championships started out at 10 am on Saturday. Due to a long trip, the players from Stavanger and Bergen were slightly delayed, so we started out a bit behind schedule, but everybody was in good sprits, still. A laptop was used to keep track of the score and pair players. A�er each game was played, the players entered a win or a loss on the laptop. When all the games were played, the so�ware calculated which players should play next. The first day had one round, then lunch, another round, dinner and then the final round at the end of the day. At lunchtime most peoplejust relaxed and showed funny Go-challenges to each other. At dinner time, most of us went two subway stations away to eat at some restaurant. The tradition is to eat Indian food, but this year the restaurant we had in mind was full, so some of us ended up at a Chinese restaurant instead. Since a lot of us were involved in

Every move must be carefully considered when you are among the best players in your country

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mathematics, and computers or who liked XKCD, many a conversation circled around those topics that night. The second day we started a few minutes past 10. It’s hard to make 35 people meet up at the exact same time, but the atmosphere was relaxed, so there weren’t any nervous breakdowns. It helped that people behaved very responsi-bly and helpfully throughout the championship. At the end the top players took turns play-ing for the grand prize, which was being sent to championships in Japan and Korea. For us mere mortals there were also chinese Go books that we had a chance to win, but this was considered a bonus, since it’s not a hard rule that they are there every year. The winner of the Norwegian Champi-onship this year was Morten Ofstad. Congratulations, Morten! For anyone interested, the results of the championship can be found at: h�p://norway.european-go.org/norway/nm2008.txt

Thanks to all the participants and everyone involved, I hope to see you all again next year!

Story by Alexander Rødseth

Alexander is a 27 year old Norwegian Go player, a graduate of the Norwegian University of Science & Technology.He lives in Oslo and plays Go on KGS while discussing Linux with anybody interested.

Opening moves during a break at the Norwegian Go Championship

Photos by Andreas Oppebøen

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Life and death is a vital element of improving one’s game. Every problem requires the player to kill or save a group of stones. In each problem there is a vital point. The vital point is a brilliant play that will either save or kill the group. Take a look at these problems and see if you can solve them!

Beginner Life and Death

White to kill

White to kill White to kill

White to kill

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White to kill

White to get the best possible result

Amateur Life and DeathTsumego for amateur players. These tsumego are not as easy as the beginner life and death problems, and some will present a challenge even for fairly good amateurs. Some are relatively easy, and some are much more difficult. Either way, we hope your game gets be�er!

Black to kill Black to live

White to move White to move

White to kill Black to kill

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Future History

From November 16, 2007, when the Enclave was founded, it has been striving to up the ante and deliver improved service completely free of cost. We have certainly had our ups and downs, with some very high ups and very low downs. But overall, the Enclave has put forth its contribution to Go players worldwide, with a modest de-gree of success.And to keep that contribution going, we would like to propose a few new projects, and gauge the overall interest. Please review the proposed programs if you have time and let us know if you’d like to join or help make them a reality! The Enclave is de-pendent upon volunteers just like you who are willing to set aside some time to pro-mote Go worldwide.

Mentor Program:The mentor program was an ongoing Enclave project in late 2007 through early 2008. It enjoyed a modest degree of success, and helped quite a few beginners learn to play Go be�er.This id the first program we would like to rebuild, as it is the most effective way to reach a variety of players. Any former members would be welcome to rejoin, keeping their previous partners if they like, or ge�ing different ones if necessary.The long-term goal of the mentor program will be to establish a constant cycle of learning, as previous students may mentor new players in exchange for what they themselves were taught.

Those with comments or wishing to join as mentors or students, may write to: mentors@kgsenclave.com

Newsle�er:This is the first edition of The Enclave, the Enclave’s self-titled e-magazine. The magazine has been a long-term goal of ours, only now being realized a�er months of a�empting to start it.The magazine will provide go problems of all kinds, interviews of professionals and strong amateurs, reviews of strong games, both current and old, articles on go for beginners as well as amateurs, and more.The magazine will be published on an ‘as-ready’ basis, with the goal being a bi-monthly production schedule. There will never be a cost for this publication.Anyone with the will and the patience is welcome to write an applicable article for

A review of projects and future goals by Eric Dunham

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this publication; however, all articles submi�ed are subject to editing and/or rejec-tion. This is so we may continue the high standard which we strive to provide to the Go world.The long term goal of this project will be to provide a permanent, renewing source of teaching for Go players to learn from.

Anyone interested in submi�ing go problems, articles, interviews, quotations or any-thing else may write to: newsle�er@kgsenclave.com

Lesson Records:Lesson records have been a long-term goal of the Enclave since it was founded, but there has never been a way for them to be realized. At the moment, we are still trying to find a way to make video records of our lessons that are both high quality and eas-ily accessible to our members.When we have the ability, this program will be one of the first we implement.The goal of lesson records is to provide an easily accessible way to access all past information the Enclave has provided, so that new members may learn immediately from old lessons and current members may remember material more easily.

Anybody who can provide video, and is willing to record lessons is welcome to con-tact us at: administration@kgsenclave.com

Advertisement:The Enclave is a not-for-profit organization; all money donated to the Enclave be-comes property of its members, no individual may use it for anything other than Enclave projects. In the past, the Enclave has made ends meet through generous do-nations from many people worldwide, but this has become harder as those generous individuals have fallen upon hard times.Therefore, the Enclave proposes using advertisment as a way to help make ends meet once again. Any money made through advertisement will become property of the Enclave’s members, it will not be pocketed by anyone at any point.The long term goal of advertising is to make the Enclave self-sustainable and to help it improve general quality.

Anyone interested in advertising may contact: advertise@kgsenclave.com

If anyone has any suggestions for new projects, or if anyone is willing to volunteer to help with current projects, such as teaching, please contact: administration@kgsenclave.com

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From Heights Above

12

Alexander Dinerchtein, 3p

Alexander Dinerchtein is a Russian born professional Go player. He is also one of the most-sought a�er Go professionals in the English speaking world. A�er extensive studying in Korea, he a�ained professional status, and a�erward returned to Russia to spread the love of Go throughout his homeland. In recent years, he has founded Go4Go, a website with reviews of professional games. He has also founded Goama, a free newsle�er that includes Go news, interviews with pro-fessional players, and game reviews. He also represented Russia in the World Mind Sports Games 2008. We managed to catch him right a�er the WMSG and ask him a few questions.

The Enclave: First of all, let’s start at the beginning. It is widely known that at a young age you competed in both Chess and Go, but as you matured, you leaned more and more towards Go. Why did you make the switch?

Alexander: My father, who introduced me to both games, is a strong chess player, but he is only 10-kyu in Go. It was easier to beat him in Go, so I decided to pay more a�ention to Go. Soon I was able to beat my father and was very happy about it.

E: A�er you began taking more interest in Go, you studied in your hometown of Kazan, correct? On your website you state that at the time, Kazan was the center for Russian Go, and you were surrounded by many stronger players. Has this changed to any large degree?

A: Kazan is still the strongest Go playing city. First of all, Go is doing well here be-cause of our local Sports Commi�ee. They budget good money for the best players and teachers our city can afford.For example, our Sports Commi�ee sent seven players from Kazan to the World Mind Sports Games (WMSG) in Beijing, their support totaling about 10,000 Euros.We have 2 professionals (me and Svetlana) and 2 players of almost-pro-strength (Ilya Shikshin and Andrey Kulkov). I am sure that we can beat any European city easily on 5-10 boards.

E: By the way, how was the WMSG in Beijing?

A: Terrible event. They didn’t even allow us to watch the games played by other players! For the first time in my Go life! Game records were not available, you could not watch games yourself, you couldn’t find any tournament tables in normal for-mat… It was organized by real amateurs that had never played Go themselves.

E: I guess we’ll skip questions about WMSG in the future. In 1996, you and Svetlana Shikshina were invited to study in Korea under Chun Pungcho, 8-dan pro. What were your first impressions of Korean Go? Was it extremely different than European Go? Or was it merely, as you say on your website, at a higher level than European Go?

A: I was about 5-dan in 1996-1997. Here in Russia I was the youngest player in most of the important tournaments – the Russian Championship, for example. When I went to Korea I was surprised to find seven to eight year old Korean kids who were not only not weaker but sometimes even stronger than me. Take Kim Chiseok, 4p for example (He played for the Korean team in the last WMSG). He was 7 years old

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while we were staying at one Go club. He had about a 50-50 score with me and Svet-lana. We were probably stronger at strategy, but his reading ability was much be�er than ours. At the age of 7 he was able to solve Go problems be�er than 80 percent of the Korean pros!Another impression: My teachers spoke really badly about Go books I had studied in Russia. I was impressed by Kajiwara, 9p’s ideas, but they were laughing at him!

E: Did you study Go very differently in Korea? I have heard from many people that Asian Go players are more insistent on form and style, whereas Western Go players are more about ‘the idea’ of the game. Would you say this is true, or did you have a different impression?

A: I know of only one big difference. In Korea they don’t use computer databases at all. I don’t know why, but they keep all variations in their heads. The main reason why Koreans are stronger is because they study Go much more seriously – some top professionals never visited any schools or universities. The average level of a Korean Go lover is six to eight kyu. There are plenty of such players around the world. But the Koreans are more aggressive and they are usually be�er at reading than at strategy. That’s all. No secrets or special weapons here.

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E: How long did you study in Korea?

A: I stayed in Korea for five years in four different clubs.

E: Who were some of your teachers? Who would you choose as your best teacher?

A: I worked with over 20 pro teachers and over ten amateur teachers. Who was the best teacher? It’s hard for me to decide just one person. All of them were very kind to me.

E: Having participated in Go events in both Europe and Asia, how large would you

“...Koreans are more aggressive and they are usually be�er at reading...

That’s all. No secrets or special weapons here.”

say the skill gap between the two continents is?

A: If we played a 100 board match, the score between Asia and Europe would be 100-0 or maybe 99-1, if we were lucky.

E: In 2002, you became the first honorary Russian Go professional. How did this come about?

A: It was the special decision of the Hankuk Kiwon. Chun Pungcho, 8-dan, suggest-ed the idea of giving us 1-dan and most of the other professionals agreed with him. We were lucky, actually.

15

“If we played a 100 board match,the score between Asia and Europe

would be

100-0.”E: Would you say you are an average Go professional in Korea, or are you be�er or worse than others?

A: In my last Go club for Korean inseis I was ranked around twel�h or thriteenth place, but suddenly I became a 1-dan. I am pre�y sure that nowadays there are sev-eral hundred Korean kids who are stronger than me, but only few of them will ever have a chance to become pro. There are 240 professionals in Korea. I am in the bot-tom 40, I believe, but I’m not the last one. I played maybe 15-20 official pro games before I returned to Russia and I won about 30% of my games.

E: In 2008, you and Svetlana Shikshina were both promoted to 3p by the Korean Baduk Association. First of all, congratulations! However, some speculated that this was a move to a�ract a�ention to European Go, rather than to reflect upon your skill level. What would you say to this? Would you tend to agree, or do you believe your rank was earned?

A: I feel that my Go has improved since I came back. I also feel that if I stayed in Ko-rea, I could reach 3-dan myself without any help, but what is the difference? Korean 1-dan players are not weaker than most 9-dans. Dan level is not important at all in

Korea. For them, rating is more important, but here in Europe high dan Go players.get more respect, so I am glad to become 3d.

E: In recent years, you have made a lot of steps to help advance Go in Europe and the US, such as founding Go4go.net, thus giving average players access to cheap reviews of professional games, and founding Goama, the e-magazine giving profes-sional interviews and comments of exciting games. What inspired you to do these things, and who has helped you along the way? Has it been a good investment of your time, overall?

A: I learned Korean, so now I have to use it if I don’t want to forget the language. Most of the Goama articles are translated from Korean Go sites. Now you know one of the reasons I keep it up.

E: You also offer Go lessons, easily available over the internet. What has been the most satisfying thing about teaching Go?

A: I think that today I have the largest internet Go school in Europe. I can make a living from giving Go lessons and I enjoy them a lot. I learn some things from my students, too, and they make it so that I have to study a lot myself, so I can explain modern pa�erns to them.

E: Being a teacher, may I ask you what you would suggest a beginning student first study when they learn to play Go?

A: If you want to become a strong player, you must start with reading. Lots of Life and Death problems every day! It’s not necessary to study strategy at all during the first few years of playing. If you start with reading, you will easily learn strategy with playing experience. But if you start from strategy you will always have reading problems in your games.

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Alexander Dinerchtein

Alexander started playing Go and Chess as a child, but began focusing his efforts on Go as he grew older.He achieved honorary Korean 1p status in 2002, and in 2008 became the first Russian 3p. He currently live in Russia, where he spends his time promoting Go.

Some scribes are better than others. Here’s an example of a not particu-larly accurate one:

apotheosis [-]: Battousai: just be-cause you have a two space exten-sion, does not mean you are aliveapotheosis [-]: Battousai: lots of weak players think it’s trueapotheosis [-]: Battousai: they do this dumb stuff, then wonder why they diedapotheosis [-]: Battousai: well, it’s cause they were dumb

Go: A Matter of Life and Death

Have a funny Go-related story that you would like to share? A favorite Go joke? Another lame Life and Death pun that we could pretend we didn’t base this sec-tion’s name off of? Maybe you think you can outdo our bad sense of humor?If you do, send your joke to us, and if we like it, we’ll stick it in the next issue!Send all jokes to: newsletter@kgsenclave.comPlease be tasteful, all jokes can and will be viewed by children.

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Because Go players are the only ones who learn by dying

OrangeKyo [13k]: you know... the winner of a ko ba�le only gets like 1 more pt than the loser right?

We can all take comfort in this tidbit that Shygost points out:

You get strong when you learn to hate weakness.

apotheosis [-]: Battousai: SE says w is winning by 4.5, so bow on knees, okay?

classic: You know you’ve been play-ing go too much recently when you are reading a book and you are trying to trap the words with imaginary stones

We all need help winning once in a while. Maybe we could take a lesson in Sublimi-nal Messaging:Lynx: In the middle of a game, casually li� up a sheet of paper with “YOU ARE LOSING” on it in bright pink...Lynx: then pretend as if nothing is happening, and put it down a few minutes later..Mu�ley: no, I think you should say I am going to the your bar group would will you die like a drink too?

Quietp [17k]: if he’s called TheOne, why does he have TWO accounts?

In 1992,

TD Gammon, a computer program,

played at the World Cup of Backgammon, and achieved an

even record with the best players in the world. Since then, humans have never been able

to overcome backgammon programs. In 1997, Gary Kasparov, then-world chess champion, was dethroned by Deep Blue, an IBM supercomputer. That day, chess ceased to be a stronghold of human intelligence. And on other fronts, humans are losing ground to machines. Most board games are already being won by computers. Humans can still win in Scrabble, poker, bridge, and others. But computers are already starting to win those games. The only game where computers re-ally fall short is Go. That’s because Go is an incredibly complex game, hundreds and hundreds of times more complex than chess. In chess, there are 1050 possible moves, in Go 2.08x10170 possible moves on a 19x19 goban. On a chess board, each turn presents just a dozen different viable moves, but in Go, this can jump up easily to a few hundred different moves. Where chess programs can read some 500,000 moves in a second, Go programs can run only 50 moves in a second. To put it in perspective, a supercomputer as powerful as Deep Blue could calculate some 200 million chess moves in a second, but it would take a year and a half to do the exact same thing in a game of Go.

MAN vs. MACHINEby Lamar Bishop

1992—TD Gammon achieves an even score against top backgammon players at

the World Cup of Backgammon

Therefore Go presents a much greater challenge to computers and their pro-grammers. To even the playing field, computers and humans face each other on much smaller 9x9 boards. The smaller boardsize cuts down on the number of pos-sible moves, greatly decreasing the workload for the computer. On a 9x9 goban, Go programs have already beaten players as strong as 5p in official matches. Around the world, supercomputers are starting to win against strong amateur players. Soon, even Go will no longer be a game dominated by humans. As process-ing power increases, and ever more intelligent algorithms are brought to the fore, computers will begin to win even in this last board game. In Tainan, Taiwan, at the National University of Tainan (NUTN), the ba�le was brought to the front in September during the World 9x9 Computer Go Champion-ships. On September 27, MoGo, a Go program, running on the Dutch National Super-computer, known as Huygens, faced off against Zhou Junxun, 9p. The event began on the 25th, with MoGo playing against two amateurs, Professor Dong [5d], and Mr. Luoh [6d]. MoGo beat Dong in every game, but lost every game to Mr. Luoh. That same day the forum heard from many speakers, including Dr. Olivier Tey-taud, one of MoGo’s developers. This was followed on the 27th by the main a�rac-tion—MoGo facing off against Junxun in three rounds.

In Conference Room B309, in Chengzheng Hall, the movers and shakers of the World 9x9 Computer Go Championships are ge�ing ready for the highlight. The first two games will be MoGo versus Junxun on a 9x9 board. As the time draws near for the first game, the participants sit and prepare for the game. In front of the computer is Dr. Olivier Teytaud, one of MoGo’s designers, who will read the moves off of the computer and place them on a physical board. Si�ing beside him is Professor Tsai, who will be the witness for the game. Across from them sits Zhou Junxun, his face drawn into a mask of concentration as he prepares for the game. Across the room, photographers watch and snap pictures as the game begins.

1997—IBM’s Deep Blue beats chess world champion Garry Kasparov in a traditional

match

August, 2008—Dutch supercomputer Huy-gens beats Kim Myungwan, 8p on a 19x19

board with a nine stone handicap

September, 2008—Huygens plays against Zhou Junxung in a three round match for

the World 9x9 Go Championships

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Photo by Brian Allen

Zhou Junxun makes a move during the second round

Junxun has a lot to think about. MoGo has been playing decently against strong amateur players, not well enough to threat-en Junxun, but in those games MoGo has been using no more than half the power Huygens will bring to bear in this match. In these rounds, MoGo will be using the full power of 800 processor cores. Just a single one of these processors is powerful enough to beat the average Go player. The tension in the room is a palpable thing for the players. MoGo will be moving first in this game. MoGo makes its first move at tengen. It is well known that tengen is the best possible move on a 9x9 board, so this is not a surprise. Junxun places a stone, Teytaud copies it on the computer screen, and the game begins.As the game goes back and forth between the liquid screen and the wooden goban, it becomes apparent that MoGo is winning. At move 11, Junxun stops and examines the game closely. His turn stretches on for a long time; over five minutes have passed since his last move. Watchers over the internet begin to speculate that Junxun has already lost this match. Nobody expects Junxun to be able to win against such a powerful computer on such a small board. However, Junxun continues the game, in spite of what people were expecting.At first his move looks desperate, almost unecessary, like the last-ditch effort of a losing team. But then, as it plays out, suddenly it becomes clear that Junxun knew exactly what he was doing. Within another few moves, onlookers have changed their mind about the game. Everyone agrees the game looks fairly even. Suddenly, a�er just eleven moves, the game doesn’t just look even, it looks like Junxun has won. By move 36, even MoGo agrees, and resigns. A�er the match, Junx-un comments, “In the first 9x9 game with MoGo, I was shocked to find a�er eleven moves that I had already lost the game. I was really very shocked. It took me five minutes to calm down and start designing a hamete that the computer could not see and could not reverse.” On the second game, Junxun takes black and makes the first move. In this sec-ond game, he is much more confident and almost immediately he begins to take the lead. Within 25 moves, the game is decided. MoGo takes another 15 moves and then resigns. Junxun says, “I took black in the second game, and it was a relatively easy game.” A�er a short break, the matches continued with the third game, a full-sized 19x19 match. Because of the enormously larger workload it will be facing, Mogo takes a seven stone handicap. But unfortunately for MoGo and its developers, seven stones is not enough. Though Mogo has been able to beat many strong players with

eight and nine stones, it seems that is not yet ready to move down to seven stones. Almost immediately MoGo makes a costly mistake and loses a corner. Mogo cannot immediately see that it has lost the corner and ends up wasting precious moves trying to save it. As it struggles to make the dead group live again, Junxun strengthens his hold on the corner. The onlookers are not too surprised. Some comment that MoGo could have kept the corner, but nobody says much else. On a 19x19 board, this is expected. A�er the first mistake, Junxun takes each corner of the goban, one by one, stripping MoGo of its lead. Less than halfway into the game, onlookers are proclaim-ing the game over. And as MoGo makes mistake a�er mistake, they are proved right. Junxun later says that he figured he had won the game by move 30. Their is an almost nonchalant air about the way that the internet watchers dismiss MoGo as unimportant. There has not yet been a computer program that can challenge a pro-fessional Go player on a 19x19 board, and this one is the same as all the others. What many of them are forge�ing is that just a few years ago, Go programs could barely compete with the average club Go player, much less a professional. But, with the advent of Monte Carlo algorithms, that has changed completely. Where computers used to barely manage an 8 kyu level of play, they now are able to aver-age low amateur dan play. As Dr. Jaap van den Herik of Maastricht University said, “This is remarkable, since around 2000 it was generally believed that the game of Go was safe to any a�ack by a computer program.” Mr. Junxun may have won the match today, and he may win in the years to come, but soon it will be much more difficult. Dr. Herik predicts, “...before 2020 a com-

puter program will defeat the best human Go player on a 19x19 Go board in a regular match under normal tournament conditions.” For now, Go players laugh at the pros-pect. But the next few years may tell a very different story.

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Photo provided by the National University of Tainan, Taiwan (h�p://go.nutn.edu.tw/)

Junxun has a lot to think about. MoGo has been playing decently against strong amateur players, not well enough to threat-en Junxun, but in those games MoGo has been using no more than half the power Huygens will bring to bear in this match. In these rounds, MoGo will be using the full power of 800 processor cores. Just a single one of these processors is powerful enough to beat the average Go player. The tension in the room is a palpable thing for the players. MoGo will be moving first in this game. MoGo makes its first move at tengen. It is well known that tengen is the best possible move on a 9x9 board, so this is not a surprise. Junxun places a stone, Teytaud copies it on the computer screen, and the game begins.As the game goes back and forth between the liquid screen and the wooden goban, it becomes apparent that MoGo is winning. At move 11, Junxun stops and examines the game closely. His turn stretches on for a long time; over five minutes have passed since his last move. Watchers over the internet begin to speculate that Junxun has already lost this match. Nobody expects Junxun to be able to win against such a powerful computer on such a small board. However, Junxun continues the game, in spite of what people were expecting.At first his move looks desperate, almost unecessary, like the last-ditch effort of a losing team. But then, as it plays out, suddenly it becomes clear that Junxun knew exactly what he was doing. Within another few moves, onlookers have changed their mind about the game. Everyone agrees the game looks fairly even. Suddenly, a�er just eleven moves, the game doesn’t just look even, it looks like Junxun has won. By move 36, even MoGo agrees, and resigns. A�er the match, Junx-un comments, “In the first 9x9 game with MoGo, I was shocked to find a�er eleven moves that I had already lost the game. I was really very shocked. It took me five minutes to calm down and start designing a hamete that the computer could not see and could not reverse.” On the second game, Junxun takes black and makes the first move. In this sec-ond game, he is much more confident and almost immediately he begins to take the lead. Within 25 moves, the game is decided. MoGo takes another 15 moves and then resigns. Junxun says, “I took black in the second game, and it was a relatively easy game.” A�er a short break, the matches continued with the third game, a full-sized 19x19 match. Because of the enormously larger workload it will be facing, Mogo takes a seven stone handicap. But unfortunately for MoGo and its developers, seven stones is not enough. Though Mogo has been able to beat many strong players with

eight and nine stones, it seems that is not yet ready to move down to seven stones. Almost immediately MoGo makes a costly mistake and loses a corner. Mogo cannot immediately see that it has lost the corner and ends up wasting precious moves trying to save it. As it struggles to make the dead group live again, Junxun strengthens his hold on the corner. The onlookers are not too surprised. Some comment that MoGo could have kept the corner, but nobody says much else. On a 19x19 board, this is expected. A�er the first mistake, Junxun takes each corner of the goban, one by one, stripping MoGo of its lead. Less than halfway into the game, onlookers are proclaim-ing the game over. And as MoGo makes mistake a�er mistake, they are proved right. Junxun later says that he figured he had won the game by move 30. Their is an almost nonchalant air about the way that the internet watchers dismiss MoGo as unimportant. There has not yet been a computer program that can challenge a pro-fessional Go player on a 19x19 board, and this one is the same as all the others. What many of them are forge�ing is that just a few years ago, Go programs could barely compete with the average club Go player, much less a professional. But, with the advent of Monte Carlo algorithms, that has changed completely. Where computers used to barely manage an 8 kyu level of play, they now are able to aver-age low amateur dan play. As Dr. Jaap van den Herik of Maastricht University said, “This is remarkable, since around 2000 it was generally believed that the game of Go was safe to any a�ack by a computer program.” Mr. Junxun may have won the match today, and he may win in the years to come, but soon it will be much more difficult. Dr. Herik predicts, “...before 2020 a com-

puter program will defeat the best human Go player on a 19x19 Go board in a regular match under normal tournament conditions.” For now, Go players laugh at the pros-pect. But the next few years may tell a very different story.

MoGo TiTan vs. Zhou JunxungSeven handicap. Result: Junxung by resign

MoGo TiTan vs. Zhou JunxungResult: Junxung by resign

MoGo TiTan vs. Zhou Junxung Result: Junxung by resign

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Many thanks to Dr. Chang-Shing of the National Uni-versity of Tainan for his help in writing this article!

InsightsKoram [7d KGS] vs. Aguilar [7d KGS]

contributed by Joshua Allen

Game Kifu

This is a review of a game played on October 16, 2008 between Koram and Aguilar, both KGS 7 dans. White won the game by resignation. Our reviewer for this issue is Joshua Allen, Ba�ousai on KGS, 5d AGA.

B3 @ q4 B37 @ q11 B151 @ p10 B197 @ r3 B203 @ q11 B209 @ q11 B229 @ r3 B235 @ r3 B241 @ r3 B245 @ g11 B247 @ r3 W76 @ p11 W186 @ q3 W200 @ p11 W206 @ p11 W224 @ q3 W232 @ q3 W238 @ q3 W244 @ q3

Interesting approach. Some of us might take a look at this low approach, glance across the board at the 4-4 stones, and say to ourselves ‘this feels wrong’. If you were a�empting to play this game with a more influence oriented strategy in mind, that would be correct.

We can see in Diagram 3 that if white moves at A, we see a common varia-tion. I recommend, if you don’t already know this variation, to memorize it, especially since its so short. It gains black a base without being denied access to the center. It’s one way to se�le nicely if you’re unsure of what to do.

White now has a few choices. Some com-mon ones would be A and B, as shown in Diagram 2. Let’s take a closer look at the results of these moves.

Diagram 1

Diagram 2

Diagram 3

Game Notes:

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The move at B is also possible, however, as you’re glancing at the sequence to come, ask yourself, why would it be inappropriate here?If you answered, ‘Because white lacks a stone at K16 in order to effectively use the newly gained wall he has created, you would be quite correct!If we look at Diagram 4, we can see an example of the result.

Diagram 4

In the game, the players choose standard joseki. Both white and black get some territory, a tiny bit of influence, while keeping some lingering aji (the cut at f14 and the a�achment at f17) for later.

Diagram 5

A�er finishing up the top for now, black chooses an aggressive approach towards the bo�om, as shown in Diagram 6.

If he had chosen a more peaceful variation at B, as shown in Diagram 7, both players would be able to develop frameworks/moyo. However, this is a variation

that black has decided to reject.

Diagram 6

Diagram 7

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Modern (at least to me) joseki.

To some, the a�achment at e8 looks strange. Why go through all that trouble if you’re just going to turn around and dive into the 3-3? Surely your moves are wasted at that point?

If that is your reasoning, I must say its sound. However, you might notice that white is now flat on the bo�om. Sure, the 2 marked stones are deep in enemy territory (and I use the term ter-ritory here loosely), but they aren’t off the board yet! Now the question is raised, how does one

deal with all that aji lingering from them?

White answers most simply by burying them even deeper, Diagram 9.

Diagram 8

Diagram 9

This is a very telling move. White could have dove into the corner and gained himself some ter-ritory.

Looking at the board, we see that white is com-pletely without a corner at the moment. So why doesnt he?

Diagram 10

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A variation like Diagram 11 is why.

If white had chosen this, for example, black gets influence and doesnt really have many other con-siderations besides reducing the le�

Diagram 11

Now a loose plan is formed.

Black has two weak groups that white can a�ack, as shown in Diagram 12.

Diagram 12

Seeing the double threat, black chooses to aid the original group, abandoning the second.

Diagram 13

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Aggressive.

Diagram 14

Now this group is in ko, thanks to the aggressive playing.

Diagram 15

This may not be obvious to newer players, but what white is doing here is seeking threats for the ko.

Diagram 16

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Here we see the value of the ko. But, did white lose out here? Lets examine more closely.

White had influence towards the center of the board and still does.

Black had weak groups toward the center which could be taken advantage of and those groups are still there.

Black gains points but loses development along the top.

Diagram 17

Some might wonder, why not respond to white’s a�achment? The reason is simple; he would have 2 weak groups.

As it stands, he still needs to be wary of k17 being cut off, because of the a�achment that lingers at f17.

Diagram 18

This is the best result that white could hope for. Once again he has 2 weak groups to assault.

Diagram 19

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Vital.

O�entimes while we are playing our game we like to play instinctively. For some of us that would mean responding to p12 immediately.

To do so, however, would mean that black would get to connect his two weak groups and not have to worry about living, just reducing and taking profit.

I cannot stress enough just how many points would be thrown away by allowing that.Diagram 20

Again, do we respond?

This is the point in our fighting that we must force ourselves to stop and constantly assess what is go-ing on in the game.

Here, it seems that one of black’s groups is on its way to being alive. White’s group on the right is in no immediate danger.

Diagram 21

My feeling here is that black cannot live without a miracle and thus the game is already over.

Diagram 22

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Black now agrees with me and changes ideas.

Instead of uselessly trying to live, perhaps he can take enough on the bo�om to compensate.

Diagram 23

This is a nice defense.

Diagram 24

This is a shape point.

Remember: don’t get greedy when you are trying to live!

Diagram 25

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Diagram 26 is an example of greed when trying to take the corner.

Diagram 26

If we follow that greedy path the whole way through, we get to here.

Now what?

This time, white has two different groups that need to live.

Diagram 27

Diagram 28

This is an odd move. White doesnt have to worry about life anymore.

Diagram 29

I think perhaps this is the variation black wanted.

This would have been great for him. However, as we’ll see, that’s not what happened.

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Diagram 30

Looking at white’s move in Diagram 30, we notice immediately that this has to die for black to hope to win.

Diagram 31So, as we see in Diagram 31, black totally ignores it.

Very interesting.

A bit further down the road, and we are back to a ko.

Diagram 32

Diagram 33

Black could take this, but then white would live and he knows that he cannot allow that.

A few moves later, and game over.

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Screenshots used by permission of William Shubert

Special thanks to William Shubert, creator of KGS, for permission to use screenshots.

A History of Go:

Go is an ancient game. In fact, it’s the oldest game known to man that is still played as it was in ancient times. It’s been known by many different names, been played by royalty in various countries, and decided the result of real-life ba�les. Along with all of that, Go has aquired quite a few variations in rules and structure. In this issue we’ll be focusing on one of these variants: Sunjang. Sunjang Baduk (Hangul: 순장 바둑) is an old Korean variant of Go, or Baduk (바둑) as it is known in Korea. Sunjang enjoyed a Golden Age in Ko-rea from the 16th to mid-20th centuries, during which it was almost the exclusive variant of Go played in Korea. There is evidence that Koreans also played ‘open board’ games during this time as well, but Sunjang was a much more popular version. During the early 20th century, modern Go spread to Korea from Japan. Korean play-ers accepted the new rules as an improvement over old rules, and for a while played both ver-sions alongside each other, but as time went on, Sunjang became less and less popular as players began to think of the Japanese rules as the prod-uct of a ‘superior’ modern culture. In 1945, Cho Namchul (조남철), the ‘Pio-neer and Father’ of Korean Go, returned to Korea from studying Go in Japan, and immediately went about founding the first private Go school in Korea, the Hansung Kiwon (한성 기원). In his new school, Cho taught the Japanese ver-sion of the game, which cemented Japanese rules as the accepted version in Korea. The main difference between Sunjang and modern Go is in the very

Cho Namchul, ‘Pioneer and Father’ of Korean Go, helped solidify the end of Sunjang Baduk

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beginning of the game, before any players have made a move. Both players set eight stones on prescribed points of the board. This is called poseok (布石), a word now equivalent to fuseki. A�er the stones have been placed for poseok, the move virtually pre-scribed for black is cheonweon (천원)—tengen. Though the black player is not required to play at tengen, it is widely considered to be the best move he can play. Diagram 1 shows the poseok and first move of Sunjang. Because of the placement of the stones, once the players have finished poseok, the

game leads immediately into a fierce jungban (중반)—chu-ban, or middlegame. The vio-lent middlegame is impossible to avoid, every single move made builds tension with the pre-placed stones. In Diagram 2 we can see an example of this from the ‘Last Game’ between Ch’ae Keuk-mun (채 극문) and No Sach’o (노 사초). Within just a few moves, both players must take the defensive, while si-multaneously keeping up an offensive so that their oppo-nent does not gain an advantage. Note that none of the groups appear to be alive right away, and that major threats are ignored for bigger ones. In just a few moves, this game has turned into the passive player’s nightmare. As the game progresses, it gets even more ferocious and difficult. Weak groups are abandoned in favor of large points. While neither player is willing to lose a large group, they are also unwill-ing to give up even larger areas to defend them.

Diagram 1: Poseok and black’s first move at cheonweon

Diagram 2: Sunjang openings cannot help but be violent

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The scoring method is a cross between modern Japanese scoring, where no stone has any point value, and modern Chinese scor-ing, where all stones are worth a point. Though stones are not worth points, placing stones in your ter-ritory will not take away points.

Sunjang is a great op-tion for players who would like to strengthen their chu-ban, or an exciting game without the option of being calm or, let’s face it, boring.

Such playing is typical of Sunjang games, it is in the nature of the game. From the moment that the poseok has been laid, the board is set for a fight.

The second way that Sunjang differs from modern Go is in scoring. Dia-gram 3 shows the end position of the ‘Last Game.’ In modern Go, dead stones are removed and territory is then counted up. If the ‘Last Game’ were scored like this, we would see a position like Diagram 4. But in Sunjang, all unecessary stones are removed from the territory be-fore scoring. If the stone doesn’t hold territory in, it is removed before scoring. An example of this can be found in Diagram 5.

B45 at n1 B47 at q2 B157 at s15 B173 at q2B177 at l3 B185 at q2B191 at q2B197 at q2B203 at q2B225 at s10 B231 at s10 B233 at t4 B241 at s10 W60 at p2 W182 at p2 W188 at p2 W194 at p2 W200 at p2 W228 at r10W238 at r10W244 at r10

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Diagram 3 Diagram 4 Diagram 5

Ch’ae Keuk-mun (채 극문) and No Sach’o (노 사초)Result: No Sach’o (노 사초) +.5

A Picture Worth a Thousand MovesA Graphic Celebration of Go

This issue’s photo was submi�ed by Vance Dunham.

Do you have a photo that captures your love of Go? A drawing that expresses the depth of the game? Artwork that you think should be shared? If so, send it to us at: newlse�er@kgsenclave.com!The best piece of art recieved by the next issue will be featured here!A few quick requirements:Please make certain the picture is high-resolution. It’s not that we don’t like small pictures, they just aren’t magazine friendly.All pictures need to be family friendly, nothing you wouldn’t want your children or grandmother to see.And finally, make sure that it’s a picture that the whole world needs to see!

Those interested in impressing others with their intelligence play chess. Those who would se�le for being chic play backgammon. Those who wish to become individuals of quality take up Go.

What your game says about you

35

The MarketplaceLessons

Offers online teaching on both KGS and IGS for a small, negotiable fee.Ba�ousai has been teaching for five years, and is the Enclave’s premier teacher.Highly recommended by Enclave staff and students!‘Ba�ousai is our oldest teacher, and I have never been displeased with him. His sharp tongue and fun sense of hu-mor lend a memorability to his lessons not paralleled by any other teacher I know. He is also very affordable and extremely reasonable in dealing with students.’ —Eric Dunham, Owner and Founder, the KGS Enclave

Contact:icarii@zoominternet.net

for pricing, questions, comments, or to set up a lesson.

Offers online teaching on KGS for a small fee.GeorgeW has been teaching for two years, and highly recom-mended!He is also fluent in Chinese, for anyone wishing to study with a Chinese speaker‘GeorgeW has been volunteering les-sons for the Enclave for the past few months and has done an excellent job every time. I guarantee, personally that he is worth his weight in gold, not to mention the paltry price he asks.’ —Eric Dunham, Owner and Founder, the KGS Enclave

Contact: georgew@kgsenclave.com

with any questions or comments, or to set up a lesson.

GeorgeW, Chinese 2dBattousai, AGA 5d

Would you like to advertise here? The Enclave will post a free classified ad for anyone, including businesses. We can advertise lessons, Go equipment, wanted ads, or anything else that reasonably fits the spot!

If you’re interested in advertising anything Go-related, please send an e-mail to:advertise@kgsenclave.com

If you have a problem with, or a question about any of the ads here, please contact: newsletter@kgsenclave.com

36

2007 Volunteers and ContributorsIn our first year, we have had some wonderful volunteers, and some dedicated

contributors. It is thanks to the contributions of people like these that the Enclave has been able to continue providing its services to the Go community, so we would

like to publicly thank them for their help.

Enclave Administration: $383.86

Nathan Wall $50.00Magnus Jensen $50.00

Felix Ufer: $38.38Shishinn Sun: $20.00

Chedo�: $20.00Uberness: $19.87

Jonathan Nyquist: $10.00David Boss Jr.: $5.00

Monetary Contributors

Volunteer TeachersGeorgeW [4d]

TCHATTE [2d]Krayle [1d]

acid [1k]hikarujr [1k]

Iink ~[1k]Meepy ~[1k]

backpack [2k]xioshe [2k]Dice [3k]

Special ThanksVance Dunham

Alexander RødsethNqua XiongHu of KGS

NoKno�Zachary Dunham

CheddotJoshua Allen

37