Do you talk about go with your "normal" friends?

[xela]

Just stumbled across this: https://xkcd.com/1222/

[Gomoto]

If it does not play go, it is not a friend

[Joaz Banbeck]

Normal friends? What are those?

[ez4u]

My normal friends are all Go players, aren't yours?

[bogiesan]

I do not discuss go with non-go people. They look at me the same way I look at them when they bring up their own insanely boring hobbies or weirdly esoteric obsessions.

[Knotwilg]

AlphaGo has done a lot.

- I have presented the AI breakthrough in a "brownbag session" at work. Many of our software engineers are aware of the breakthrough. They were pretty interested in the application of Monte Carlo. All were impressed with "seeing" AI at work through Lizzie.
- I have discussed it with other peers too, more in the realm of business strategy, understanding how China works. There's a great book, written by compatriot Pascal Coppens "China's new normal". Its preface has a picture of Ke Jie losing to AlphaGo, which had made such an impression on Xi Jinping that he urged all (tech) companies to devote 30% of their budget to AI, and has fostered AI programs throughout universities and spin-offs.

Before that, I rarely discussed it, being just a game.

[gennan]

Most of the people that I consider friends are go players. My non go-player friends, relatives and direct coworkers are aware that I play go and they know that it's a mind sport. Sometimes I talk a bit to my co-workers about some go activity when we discuss weekends or vacations. But that's about it. I didn't teach them go (they never asked me to).
I did teach go to my son, my younger sister and a couple of her children. But there are few opportunities to play with them.

[hyperpape]

Relatively few of my friends play go. Perhaps four or five have played more than a half dozen games. Usually it comes up at some point with non go-playing friends--they'll see me playing on my phone, or I'll mention that I played a tournament the past week. If they're curious, I often end up saying a bit about what the game is like, or they might mention AlphaGo.

My wife has no interest in the game, but we'll talk about my games from time to time--we text back and forth about how it's going when I'm at a tournament. It's all at a high level. I might say "the game was non-stop fighting", or if we're sitting next to each other, I might show a board and comment on how one big group is under attack. It's the same with a few of her hobbies that I don't strongly relate to--we'll have moments of curiousity, even if it's not something we'd spend our own time on.

[xela]

I do not discuss go with non-go people. They look at me the same way I look at them when they bring up their own insanely boring hobbies or weirdly esoteric obsessions.

This.

And yet I still encounter people who will tell me at length about their fishing trip, home renovations, etc, undeterred by a complete lack of positive response or any look I might give them.

[John Fairbairn]

I don't think many go players discuss go with other go players.

If you exclude totally one-sided conversations of the type "If only I'd played this hane I would have won," you will have eliminated 95% of the "discussions," with the same inability to see the hane being evident in the inability to see the glassy-eyed look in the other person's eyes.

At least that's better than in chess, where the proportion seems to be about 99%. I think the difference lies only in the fact that go moves are a bit harder to describe than chess moves.

[jlt]

Almost very go player has a smartphone with a go program, so it's not difficult to discuss games at lunch. Otherwise, at least two people (viewtopic.php?f=37&t=17059) can hold a conversation like "If T-17 then S-18 Q-19 T-18 N-19" for 150+ moves.

Back to the original question, people I know belong to distinct groups with very little overlapping, although many non-go players have at least heard about go and/or know the rules.

[Uberdude]

John, sorry to hear that you experience or observe less interesting go conversations than I have.

[Kirby]

If you exclude totally one-sided conversations of the type "If only I'd played this hane I would have won," you will have eliminated 95% of the "discussions," with the same inability to see the hane being evident in the inability to see the glassy-eyed look in the other person's eyes.

This isn't limited to non-go players. Sometimes, at in-person tournaments, I'll have a really exciting game. There was some sequence that I think was really awesome. Maybe it was the thing that decided the game - made me win or lose.

After the game, I'll chat with folks about the thing that happened in my game. The interest I see from other parties is non-zero, however, usually other people are much less interested in hearing about the game that *I* played than they are in remembering the game that *they* played. After all, they're at the tournament, too, and they care about their own result more than mine.

My opponent and I both really enjoyed the adventure and remember it. But other folks are more into what happened in their own games.

The exception to this may be when there is really a unique or awesome tesuji or situation that came about - or something really intense. Maybe a huge capturing race, or a deep invasion into a big moyo where the life or death of the group was at stake.

In extreme situations like those, I'll find that other go players are generally interested in listening to me talk about my game, even if it is *my* game.

[xela]

Conversations about go don't have be conversations about specific moves in a specific game.

• "Are you playing in the tournament next month?"
• "Did you hear about that ten year old girl who just turned pro?"
• "Fairbairn has just finished a new book. Have you ordered your copy yet?"

and so on.

[sybob]

Seldomly, but perhaps once in a while.