I’ll go ahead and contribute my answer idea I guess.
I think the future lies in making Go ‘fun’ and not boring for non Go players. I find that our community is usually only hard core players. We need to be more welcoming, like say, tic-tac-toe. In regards to this, I fully believe we need to focus more on making 9x9 mainstream. I think 9x9 is just a better game.
When I say game, I don’t want you to think of Go. I want you to think of Candy Crush, video games, and sports in general. Watching 2 people stare at pebbles for an hour or more is just boring. Also, 19x19 to a beginner’s eyes is just confusing. A 9x9 is much more reasonable to understand.
In addition to this, the very thing that people hate makes it a better game. You can LOSE more! You can lose to someone 6 ranks weaker than you. This is much more fun than I can’t bead x rank because they are 2 or 3 levels above me. This creates a more unexpected result. More competition, and more engagement.
Another fact, 9x9 is MUCH faster to play. I know many people who just can’t make time for 19x19. They wait until they have a dedicated 2 hours to play a top quality game. This is terrible from a game’s perspective. A game should be played! It should be played over and over! So being able to hop in a game and play it in 10 minutes has some serious benefits. Faster games also means, faster turnover which can mean, faster pairings which means, more games overall which means, less wait time for more games!
Another opinion I have is that we should exclusively use Chinese rules for rated play. Focusing on the beginners again, it doesn’t punish you for trying things in your own area. Telling someone to remove the dead stones is terrible for a beginner. Most of the time they don’t know if something is dead or not. We should encourage them to play it out! But if they lose points when they play it out, then why would we recommend it? I’ve seen many reddit post about players asking how to score, or why is something marked as dead. If it is explained that any area surrounded by your color is your area, and explain that if you don’t know then play it out, they will naturally figure out how to score.
Continuing on with my opinions, I think we should be using the super Ko rule. Or basically, the board position can never repeat. This is very easily achieved on computers unlike in real life. This makes explaining the Ko rule super easy. The board cannot repeat. The end.
I also believe we should do away with Japanese terms. This is not welcoming to English speakers. If it was just one or two, like Atari and Joseki, it would be easier. But watching commentaries as a beginner is just impossible. It’s like they are speaking another language.
I’ve been trying this on my app. So far I have…
Joseki = Pattern
Tesuji = Tactic
Ko = Loop
Komi = Bonus Points
Atari = Threat, you could also say Capture Threat.
Double Atari = Double Threat
Liberty = Life Line
Seki = Mutual Life
Yose = End Game
and probably some more but there are a lot of terms.
My point here is, a non Go player needs to be able to have some idea of what the words and commentary means. Using English words, they can slowly and naturally derive their meanings.
Another issue is how Go is introduced. I think many people have noticed how Go players go nuts trying to explain to a new player about Go. They get excited and try to tell them everything that they know. I am of the opinion that you should use the least amount of words possible to get them to start playing. Lectures are not fun. Playing games are. So get them playing! Personally I’ve gotten it down to under 1 minute when I’m on a script. If I go over 5 minutes, I’ve gone horribly wrong.
To counter this, I am actually trying to build my Tsumego Dragon app with the idea of teaching the rules of Go with no words at all. These are the beginner problems. They need to be able to solve it intuitively without the need for a long explanation. Here are some examples…
Capture
Connect/Cut
Endgame
Also, lose 100 games as fast as possible. What kind of game makes you lose 100 times before you can achieve anything? They need to play against other beginners. Maybe play a beginner bot. They shouldn’t lose more than a couple times at most. They need a WIN! They need to feel joy and accomplishment! They also need to feel improvement. Start them at 40 kyu! Let them rank up super fast and slowly make the ranks harder. The more effort they put in the more patience they will have for the next reward or milestone.
I think we need to get away from ‘really hard to master’ and make it ‘play in 1 minute!’ 10 Kyu needs to be STRONG!! 10 Kyu is better than HALF of the community! Why are we calling it weak??
In conclusion, my opinion is basically this. Go needs to become a game. It needs to be fun. And the community needs to stop caring so much about culture and ‘best’ practices. If we make a place easier for the average person to pick up Go and play, then the community as a whole will grow. Thus getting us more players on OGS and a better system in general.
That was longer than I expected 
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