Do we really need a chess.com for Go?

[shinuito]

@pwsiegel

I guess the question is this: if OGS started running unintrusive banner ads and used the revenue to create marketing and learning tools that grew the player base, how would you evaluate that trade? For me it would be a big positive, but to each their own.

@anoek

tl;dr - We’re going to try turning off ads. To keep them off, we need 2.5% of players to become new site supporters by the end of October.

You can read about how it used to be

I suppose it’s easy to not mind things that don’t affect you I suppose, but it will affect others. Probably it would be non site supporters getting the ads.

[Sadaharu]

OGS used to have ads? Wow I don’t remember that at all!

[pwsiegel]

I wasn’t an OGS user when that change was made, but as I said I tolerated banner ads in chesscom for years without really noticing.

But aside from that, I don’t agree with the premise that this only affects free-tier users. That premise considers only the negative consequences of showing banner ads - namely, you have to look at a possibly annoying ad while using the site.

But banner ads also have positive consequences - namely, revenue for OGS. More revenue can translate into stuff like more new features, faster bug fixes, more learning resources, better moderation, greater user growth, etc. Those positives are important to me because I like OGS’ user experience, technology, and community but I can’t really take advantage of it because there are very few active players at my level and the other resources (learning tools, tsumego, AI review, etc.) lag behind the competition.

I don’t think most of the people in this thread are even considering those positives - the argument is essentially “companies doing things = bad”. I can prove it to you: we’re spending all this space talking about banner ads, and gomagic hasn’t said anything about making changes to OGS free tier. It’s worse than that - gomagic’s pitch deck didn’t even say anything about taking over OGS, they literally just mentioned integrating with OGS’ publicly available API and later building their own servers. The rest was just evidence-free speculation and cynicism.

That’s the key point for me. People here aren’t opposed to gomagic specifically, they’re opposed to the very concept of raising money to grow the western go community. That DOES affect me, and I strongly disagree.

[Counting_Zenist]

Historically, most of the early Go servers are paid services, players have to pay monthly fees to play a game, otherwise just viewers (it was way before the freemium mode appeared). And those servers usually don’t last long and almost all of them shut down in the 2010s. Then the new business model learned from the mobile game became the new model, selling virtual goods and later on after Go AIs, selling AI analysis quota. (or like foxwq, for virtual coins, and betting, which technically isn’t gambling, since they cannot be converted back into real money through official channel). Maybe one exception is Wbaduk because it was backed up by Korea Baduk Federation (the association for Korean amateur players, not pros). One of the key reason it was the largest server in the 2010s, before AlphaGo. and foxwq took over when Chinese players flow back with new AI features and “virtual goods”.

Interestingly, none of these for profit servers use ads. One thing is that most mobile apps are for mobile games, and you don’t want ads direct players away from playing Go, so the mobile version don’t run ads. The PC version also don’t run ads, because a lot of the players in CJKT are kids, or just very young adult, and they don’t have much disposable income, hence very hard to target ads for them. And those who do have money as target audience who still plays Go regularly online tend not to be particular about spending time on Go. So, overall, it was pretty hard to find ad sponsors for Go servers in general in CJKT area, at best “marketing” for Go schools or lessons which are part of the business models and don’t require the traditional sense of “ads”.

[Groin]

@pwsiegel

they’re opposed to the very concept of raising money to grow the western go community. That DOES affect me, and I strongly disagree.

Not at all. I’m fine with raising money . You are affected because you can’t accept that we don’t want a specific way to collect money.

[pwsiegel]

To summarize, I think you’re saying “ads historically haven’t been a very good way to fund go-related projects”. Great, then there’s nothing to worry about! My argument is not “ads are amazing and everyone should use them to raise money” - my argument is “growing the go community requires investment, and that money has to come from somewhere”. Reminder: not even gomagic is talking about using ads for that, for now they’re just looking for business partners!

[pwsiegel]

OGS can do whatever it wants - this thread isn’t even about OGS! Gomagic is trying to raise money through business partnerships, and the response in this thread has been “Oh god, next they’re going to become an ad-peddling monopolist that crushes OGS as we know it!” If we’re going to panic like this every time somebody tries to do something ambitious then we’re implicitly accepting stagnation.

[Groin]

It’s no way to discuss if you bring panic after the “we are opposed to the growth”. Relax. I don’t see stagnation either, things are going on. Ultimately I find the publication with pitch more pretentious as ambitious with their little rocket in the air. Better smiling on all this.

[shinuito]

@pwsiegel

namely, you have to look at a possibly annoying ad while using the site.

Honestly the worst part isn’t that you have to look at them, it’s that

a) they get in the way of something useful (see news websites with too many ads)

and more importantly

b) you might accidentally click on them.

I don’t generally trust Google or whoever is vetting these ads, that they won’t take me somewhere fraudulent, especially these days. So many ads are for scam companies, even on YouTube.

[shinuito]

@pwsiegel

People here aren’t opposed to gomagic specifically, they’re opposed to the very concept of raising money to grow the western go community. That DOES affect me, and I strongly disagree.

That’s probably the biggest strawman, almost the dictionary definition if I ever read it. (And I generally hate the usage of the word strawman).

I don’t recall anyone being against people raising money to grow the western go community.

Maybe people just donate money for the sake of it, not even expecting anything in return.

[pwsiegel]

@Groin

It’s no way to discuss if you bring panic after the “we are opposed to the growth”.

Suggestion: read through the responses to this thread one more time, and try to evaluate objectively how much of the criticism is based on gomagic’s actual proposals and brand record, versus speculation and fear. I’m not throwing around ad-hominem attacks, I’m just calling out some pretty weird knee-jerk responses. (And I think I’m doing it pretty calmly and constructively.)

@Groin

x. I don’t see stagnation either, things are going on.

Like what? I guess I can think of a few smaller initiatives that have popped up over the last few years, like AI Sensei or Tsumego Dragon. These projects are great, but GoMagic is the first attempt I’ve seen to try to build something at scale.

[pwsiegel]

@shinuito

Honestly the worst part isn’t that you have to look at them, it’s that

a) they get in the way of something useful (see news websites with too many ads)

and more importantly

b) you might accidentally click on them.

Fair enough - there are probably yet more reasons to dislike ads that neither of us have mentioned. I’m genuinely not trying to relitigate some controversy from 10 years ago. My argument is: any mechanism for raising capital carries risks and downsides, but sometimes it’s worth accepting those tradeoffs in order to enable growth.

@shinuito

That’s probably the biggest strawman, almost the dictionary definition if I ever read it. (And I generally hate the usage of the word strawman).

I don’t recall anyone being against people raising money to grow the western go community.

Economists have a useful notion called “revealed preferences”. People might say that they like to watch documentaries and oscar-winning dramas, but Netflix knows that in practice they like reality TV and action comedies.

Now look what happened in this thread. Gomagic created a pitch deck aimed at trying to attract investment from business partners, and this thread is all about how it’s a nefarious scheme to crush OGS and force players to scroll through ads before they can play their next move. Nobody is explicitly saying “I don’t think anybody should invest money in go”, but in practice I suspect that at least some people are unwilling to accept any of the tradeoffs that this requires.

@shinuito

Maybe people just donate money for the sake of it, not even expecting anything in return.

As a Lichess patron, I agree. But Lichess isn’t the one running titled tuesday or the CCT, and to the best of my knowledge they aren’t paying professionals to create courses or provide live commentary for events. It’s totally fine to have a site whose mission is to serve the the core community, but it’s also fine to have a site whose mission is to grow the game.

[benjito]

@shinuito

a) they get in the way of something useful (see news websites with too many ads)

and more importantly

b) you might accidentally click on them.

Wait a sec, are we talking about ads or streamer announcements

[shinuito]

@pwsiegel

and this thread is all about how it’s a nefarious scheme to crush OGS and force players to scroll through ads before they can play their next move. Nobody is explicitly saying “I don’t think anybody should invest money in go”, but in practice I suspect that at least some people are unwilling to accept any of the tradeoffs that this requires.

I honestly would wager almost nobody has even looked at the pitch deck because the OP didn’t even link it, @Groin linked it like 20 posts down, and more so, people are responding to the actual topic of the thread “do we need a chess com for Go” as ill defined as that is.

I think you’re creating a lot of fictitious subtext that isn’t really there.

Theres maybe one cross post from Reddit and a couple of responses that explicitly talk about what Go magic might want to do with OGS, but mostly it’s about what chesscom does, what other Go servers do or don’t do, not about whether gomagic has nefarious plans for OGS.

[shinuito]

@benjito

Wait a sec, are we talking about ads or streamer announcements

A valid point XD

[pwsiegel]

I’m gonna go ahead and source a few quotes from the thread, to respond to your “fictitious subtext” remark. Not trying to call anyone out, everyone is entitled to their opinion!

@4-Polytope

I have the same suspicion with GoMagic as I have whenever I see Microsoft get involved in a Linux or Open Source project. The “Embrace, Extend, Extinguish” approach

@Counting_Zenist

For one thing, running ads, and excessive ads, so “free players” would have an incentive to transition to paid customers.

@PRHG

“Watch this 30 second ad to unlock your next 10 moves”

@BadukAlpha

The website would be ‘Pay to Win’ since its so distracting.

[JethOrensin]

@pwsiegel

The difference with this thread is that it’s about a company that is trying to initiate the virtuous cycle by actually raising money to grow the game.

Well, the other topics were not “theoretical” either. They mostly explored the idea of EGF doing the actual work and a lot of funding ideas were presented by various people (from trying to find rich/famous sponsors and companies, to aggressively pursuing national/EU subsidies and knocking doors on embassies and presenting Go as a cultural embassador of the East).

@pwsiegel

IMO we should meet this with support and excitement, not cynicism.

No argument there. The more people trying to promote Go, the better.

@pwsiegel

But banner ads also have positive consequences - namely, revenue for OGS.

If I am not mistaken the paying members of OGS are covering the cost/revenue of the removed ads.
It could be argued that the non-paying members could still be getting banner ads, but that was not the premise of the subscription idea at the time. I am not sure that every paying member would like the idea that other, non-paying members, would get banner ads. The altruism that “you are paying to make OGS ad-free for everyone” was a main selling point at the time, if my memory serves correctly.

@pwsiegel

I don’t think most of the people in this thread are even considering those positives - the argument is essentially “companies doing things = bad”.

Again, I think that the original premise of the subscription model was that the owners of the website didn’t desire to pour in the time/money that such scaling and enhancement would entail.

@pwsiegel

I can prove it to you: we’re spending all this space talking about banner ads, and

I’d like to make it clear that I am only discussing it because it was brought up. Other than that, I do not know/see its pertinence to the discussion.

@pwsiegel

People here aren’t opposed to gomagic specifically, they’re opposed to the very concept of raising money to grow the western go community.

Well, that would be most unusual and I can assure you that I’ve not seen anyone be averse to money or growth for the western Go community. The ways to get there are usually open for debate, though.

@pwsiegel

and this thread is all about how it’s a nefarious scheme to crush OGS

I am sorry, but someone mentioning that slight posibility does not make “this thread” “all about that”. I’d be more keen to say that this was mostly a comment that would have “just happened” and would have been left far behind and mostly unnoticed, if you didn’t pick it up and make it the main point of discussion.

@pwsiegel

Nobody is explicitly saying “I don’t think anybody should invest money in go”, but in practice I suspect that at least some people are unwilling to accept any of the tradeoffs that this requires.

Hmm… are people really being called to alleviate your suspicions/assumptions?
And even if we accept that some do have that unwillingness, what do you care or mind?
There is no project that ever has 100% support of any group.

@pwsiegel

but it’s also fine to have a site whose mission is to grow the game.

I think that this might be the main difference with the chess analogy.
Chess dot com might be considered by some as a site whose mission is to grow revenue and that the game of chess just happens to be what they sell.

@shinuito

I honestly would wager almost nobody has even looked at the pitch deck because the OP didn’t even link it, @Groin linked it like 20 posts down

I did, after it was linked, and I am not very impressed, to be honest, but I thought I’d keep quiet.

Since the issue of unwarranted worries is coming up by @pwsiegel , I’d like to point out a few slides:

First slide:

This would probably make me stop taking anything else seriously, if the topic was not one of my hobbies.
A totally arbitrary graph, about an “average” computer game, in a completely different market. Meanwhile there are games like this:

Will Rimworld outlast Go? Probably not.
Does that really mean anything? Probably not.
So we have a slide “just for impressions”… not good.

Second slide:

Why on earth are the “real data” full of Xs, but somehow the projection is with fixed numbers?

Also, if I am reading that correctly, the projection is that they’ll have 5000 paying users, with 12 dollars average monthly payment, ergo 60000 dollars monthly, which means 720000 dollars per year.

On a later slide though:

We get to a few millions. How?
And it is not a small difference… it is almost 7 times more than the positive potential projection of a previous slide!

Last slide

The whole point of the pitch is to scale up. In this slide (and a previous one - slide 10) we are presented that the advantage is that the scale is small, teamwise.

Are we scaling up or staying where we are? It is a bit unclear…
It is also very important, because most business plans fail (or succeed) based on exactly that… on whether the scaling out of “small passionate teams” into “bigger corporate ones” is successful or not.

@pwsiegel

I’m gonna go ahead and source a few quotes from the thread

Yes, since it was brought up, people discussed about it. That’s the main functionality of a forum.

[shinuito]

We’re now 56 posts deep, and yes

@shinuito

Theres maybe one cross post from Reddit and a couple of responses that explicitly talk about what Go magic might want to do with OGS

which is the one you quoted.

Then the other quotes are people responding to your comments about how chesscom can manage to have free and paid content, and they do run ads.

It’s very self centered (not quite the right word, but the content of the thread doesn’t revolve around those replies to you I would argue) then to claim that one post and a couple of replies to your post define the entire content of the thread, when you say

@pwsiegel

and this thread is all about how it’s a nefarious scheme to crush OGS and force players to scroll through ads before they can play their next move. Nobody is explicitly saying “I don’t think anybody should invest money in go”, but in practice I suspect that at least some people are unwilling to accept any of the tradeoffs that this requires.

[Groin]

@JethOrensin

Well, the other topics were not “theoretical” either. They mostly explored the idea of EGF doing the actual work and a lot of funding ideas were presented by various people (from trying to find rich/famous sponsors and companies, to aggressively pursuing national/EU subsidies and knocking doors on embassies and presenting Go as a cultural embassador of the East).

I will say that EGF is even not the right level. Something should come from the world amateur organization.

I expect something will happen with go servers and there are various ways. A CJK major go server may develop it’s approach of the western world. Some private like Go magic but not only may come in. A federation may put some efforts. OGS may get a substantial sponsoring. Who knows?

It’s a complicated subject. Like relationship between professionals and amateur. For one side it’s in the interest of the pros to develop the ama world. On the other side they want to live and collect the most of the benefits.

We got a new pro scene in EU and in America. We lost go centers offered by Iwamoto K. all around the world. Give and takes. We got the Hikaru wave. We got AI. There are still some initiative, like toward the youth here and there.

I haven’t seen so much changes in the global quantity of go players in my opinion. Go is following his way through centuries without major impact from the various policies.

[shinuito]

If we’re properly on the topic of ads, and funding for the betterment of Go, look at the motivations for removing ads originally from OGS:

@anoek

tl;dr - OGS is slow outside of the United States. We want to make it faster, but it’s going to cost money. We want your opinion on placing an optional ad on the game page to improve better serve those regions. (And like all ads on the site, it would not be present for site supporters)

→ should we run ads to better the site

→ general consensus was sure go for it

@anoek

So we put forth the proposal, the general consensus was “Go for it”, and we did. Then we used our site, like we do every day, slept on it, and re-realized we really hate ads. They’ve been a “necessary evil”, but we got to thinking about it, and their necessity is shrinking.

→ the plan, get more supporters to remove ads

@anoek

The new plan is as follows: We’re going to try and turn off ads site wide for everyone until the end of October. We will be able to keep them off if we can get 2.5% of our non-site supporters to become supporters in that time frame. Once we hit that target, we can bring up servers in Asia, Europe, and elsewhere for a 1% increase for each location.

If you think about what the community came together to do there was to increase their support so we could get better servers up and running, and remove ads for everyone, even though the site supporters themselves wouldn’t get ads.

Sure they get a few benefits here and there from it, but they didn’t just do it for themselves on the whole. I think this predates the AI reviews even.

---

It’s quite hard to believe given that that

@pwsiegel

People here aren’t opposed to gomagic specifically, they’re opposed to the very concept of raising money to grow the western go community. That DOES affect me, and I strongly disagree.

This seems like a very bad inference, and it’s not clear at all what it is being based on.