I agree with the original post. I think this bolded part was a poor choice of wording though. They are certainty allowed to exert their own opinions.
I think a lot of nuance is lost when talking to an audience especially through streaming or videos. Overconfidence is one of many reasons for that. It must appeal to many people even while turning a few off.
I actually thing pre-AI Go content was even more dogmatic though. “Move 2 lost the game” was intentionally over-the-top but not really that far from other books and game commentaries that made their way to English. I don’t know how many times I’ve read “this was the only move” without much explanation and from what I’ve seen, those comments don’t hold up that well over time.
Once i met a go player who never read a book watch a video or played with someone in contact with some go theory. He still experienced a lot the game with a friend. Two years maybe. They simply owned a go set and a piece of paper with the rules. These players were at the peak of the “doubt” experience as they had no guideline and to discover everything.
So how strong they were? I wasn’t that strong, end DDK or low SDK. He proved to me he had some good abilities in close fighting. I stayed cautiously away anf grabbed 75% of the goban.
I mean i like to teach ex chess players who are willing to find a move with their reading, explore a bit deeper the position and give me challenges that less inclined to contest through reading don’t offer me. But i still value a lot what a book a video in somewhat arrogant way is going to point me.
I see books mentioned a lot here, but I can’t see how it applies really. A book is a one-off, one-way communication with the author. It’s completely different from a two-way and/or recurring communication patterns. For instance, many people have read Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go by Kageyama and they would distinctly remember the pushing (as well as comedic) narration style. But how many of these people had a further communication with Kageyama? How many even read or heard anything of him? This is why books are allowed to be absolute, because it’s a one and done deal, not a conversation.
Most of the content you find online nowadays is either recurring (influencers, content creators) or a conversation (online discussions). My post was mostly about these two ways of consuming information about go.
I think it’s part of the issue as well. If you know japanese, korean or chinese, you probably know how bizarre professional go commentary is. I only know japanese, and the other two is just my assumption, but basically a live commentary of a professional match done by a professional can be summarized with one word “dunno”. They just keep saying they don’t know if it’s working or not, if it’s better than another move or not, and keep using onomatopoeiae for thinking like “hmmmmm hmmmmmm”. This is 70% of the commentary easily, and the rest is showing alternative variations or showing beginner-friendly stuff as guided by the co-host.
I honestly don’t know why go commentary on the west is so absolute all the time. Even redmond when commenting on the alphago vs lee sedol games live was constantly doubting every other move and saying that he can’t really tell if it’s good or not. Though maybe he’s just following the japanese tradition, being a japanese host himself as well.
I think it’s not a question of how strong they are, it’s a question of how strong have they become by doing this, and are yet to become. If you see a beginner like this who’s very cautiously approaching the game and is keeping an open mind at all times, it may be the last time you call him a beginner. Sure it’s hard to improve with no guidance, but it’s easier to find guidance and combine it with this mindset than it is to revert to a “doubting” mindset while being spoon fed absolute guidance and absolute ideas.
Indeed, some cultures would promote absolute statements and strong opinions, while other cultures would promote modesty more.
Even though there will be a great variety among subcultures and individuals within a culture, I assume the Far East and the West have different inclinations in this regard.
Assertive commentary has little to do with overconfident commentators.
It’s more about catering to an audience (or, if you prefer, maintaining/increasing the number of people in said audience). The shorter your message, the more people will hear it. For the same reason, science journalism frequently mangles the actual result in favor of a digestible (and usually attention-grabbing) tagline. You could be disseminating the absolute truth in a single sentence, but if it takes 1000 years to hear it, nobody will.
As much as I’m not interested in batt’s commentary or streams in general, it’s evident that he has found a way to communicate with his audience in a way that keeps it engaged. His streams garner and retain 10x the usual number of viewers for Go streams and I wager it’s not because of a particularly high level of nuance in his commentary.
Of course. Why did I describe their path before asking?
Doubt without some external materials furnished to you is not so efficient way, that’s all what i saw and yes a mix of doubt and acquiesment is what lead at best.
It’s more as hard. It’s completly inefficient and a waste of time. At something like 18k he was still burried building some snapback or geta tactics when he coud be like a middle sdk enjoying miai, aji, moyos and so on.
I’ve been watching BenKyo recently. One of the first things I noticed watching him play is that on virtually every move, even the ‘obvious’ ones, he considers 3 or 4 alternatives (with cursor wiggles hinting at others that he doesn’t verbalize). That habit is one thing I need to learn if I’m to progress.
I believe Dwyrin once said something like that one of his keys to improving was to doubt his opponents moves; assume they’re bad, and try to figure out why. Self-doubt is only half the story.
Japan and korea does, but I’m not sure about china.
You do have a point, but why would someone purposefully omit nuance in a topic that is ultimately comprised of nuances. And why do the mental gymnastics to average those nuances out into something more straightforward?
As you said with influencers the reason to do it is to engage with the audience, but what about other cases where this behaviour is just as prominent?
Also just a general heads up, this conversation isn’t about influencers, though I understand why people want it to be, since they’re some of the worst offenders here.
I agree.
It does sound like a great habit indeed. Maybe it is a testament to his own progression recently too. Or rather, a contributing factor.
This sounds more like an ego trip to me honestly. I’d say do the reverse, assume that every move the opponent plays is a legitimate and proper move. And then with the analysis of your own options for addressing that move you’ll arrive naturally at whether it was a bad move or not. If there’s a sequence that takes advantage of that move’s position comparing to the alternatives, then it indeed is bad. If you can’t find such a sequence, why would you assume that it’s a bad move?
Depends on what your default attitude is. If you are easliy intimidated by your opponents moves and automatically assume all of them are perfect and deadly, it might be a useful excercise to try the exact opposite.
One downside I see from some amateur go influencers ridiculing their opponent’s moves, is that many moves are maybe not optimal, but not terrible either.
Such influencers might instill the idea in their viewers’ minds that it’s easy and even obligatory to “punish” such “bad” moves right away.
In reality, that’s often easier said than done. If you try really hard to “punish” each and every of such “bad” moves, chances are that you will get a bad result yourself.
Often it is a better approach to stay calm. If you cannot find a sure way to immediately exploit their “bad” move, it’s better to just keep playing good moves yourself, instead of going into some crazy fight to “prove” that your opponent is a terrible player.
I agree. I think it also goes well with the premise that you can tenuki from anything and everything in this game and still have an even game. I think many people are sleeping on this idea. And often bad moves can be exposed by the opponent simply needing another move to accomplish the goal they wanted, meaning you get a free move elsewhere, or in other words they pass. I found it a common theme up until 3k on ogs.
I have been playing go for many years with no improvement, even when I was studying books and analyzing games (I eventually purchased and read 25 books). Currently, I often doubt what I know and read about go strategy (here, mostly), and each time I do follow my doubt I lose by much larger margins than when I at least try to remember what I know is good play. Doubt about what I know leads me to leave groups unconnected, to play risky moves, and to leave weak stones everywhere. An excellent example is my latest game, Nilll vs. david265 , where my poor moves led me to create only dead groups.
Sounds to me like you got a high quality game in from which you can learn a lot of things, including whether or not to doubt a certain idea in the future.
This is a good extension for Black and is the point that White wants to take.
In the game I played S17 automatically because I thought the two “only moves” were S17 and O16.
Good example.
It’s really a personal matter. When i was like 10k, by reading “lessons in fundamental” btw, i realized i was so abusing tenuki, and then that helped me to gain some levels…
