It'd be cool if there were a go resource that...

[jts]

My own hope is that the go community will militantly bring go into preschools, kindergartens, and elementary schools. How an online resource could help with that, I don't know.

[xed_over]

L19 having a quiet week isn't a good indicator of Go popularity dropping off.

No, you've read it backwards.

I agree with you, that a slow week for L19 doesn't mean there's a drop in Western Go activity. But with a drop in Western Go activity we might see a slow week at L19.

So, the point is -- some (Phil, et al) think that overall Go activity is declining, while others (Kirby, et al) feel its still increasing. Clearly it can't be both.

[oso]

Hey I have a question. I'm fairly good at paintings. Do you think it might help raise interest in the game if I were to make a series of paintings featuring, say famous rappers or other pop culture icons playing go? I could distribute them on deviantART to get exposure, and maybe go from there.

[pwaldron]

Hey I have a question. I'm fairly good at paintings. Do you think it might help raise interest in the game if I were to make a series of paintings featuring, say famous rappers or other pop culture icons playing go? I could distribute them on deviantART to get exposure, and maybe go from there.

You'd probably get a nice note from a lawyer if you actually had famous people playing go. On the other hand, if you have an artistic flair you could make a great contribution by designing a dozen or so poster for advertising go clubs. Go clubs always seem to want to advertise but don't have a good template to work from. Some nice artwork and a few sample posters would go a long way.

[pwaldron]

So, the point is -- some (Phil, et al) think that overall Go activity is declining, while others (Kirby, et al) feel its still increasing. Clearly it can't be both.

As usual, we need numbers.

The AGA membership database says there are 2260 current members of the AGA. This includes complementary memberships to foreign go associations and other goodwill gestures, but it's probably not too far off and is a good benchmark. The number is down by about 10% from its high a few years ago, and that's factoring in the much cheaper introductory membership that was designed to boost membership.

Let's look at tournament activity from the AGAGD:

Year ending 2011-03-06: 118 tournaments
Year ending 2010-03-01: 120
Year ending 2009-03-01: 178
Year ending 2008-03-01: 168
Year ending 2007-03-01: 118
Year ending 2006-03-01: 142

Tournament activity is down almost 30% from its peak two years ago.

I think it's clear that organized activity is declining. To me the real question is why. The Ing foundation stopped funding Western go organizations in 2010, so that no doubt has something to do with it.

[HermanHiddema]

I don't think statistics over just the period 2006-2011 are really fair, lets put that in perspective a little:



Over the last 10-15 years, there has been a general upward trend. Sure, 2010 was not as good as 2008, but I think the long term trend is good.

[Tsuyoku]

What started the consistent rise from 1999 to 2008? What caused the decline before then?

Any similarities to the present?

Also, any European graph that's similar? Maybe the other side is doing better (or worse!) for related reasons.

I just hope it doesn't all boil down to [sponsor needed] because that's a difficult request to deal with in this time of receeding budgets.

[xed_over]

What started the consistent rise from 1999 to 2008?

I think its been the Hikaru No Go boom

[jts]

The financial crisis/stagnation started in 2009. Is it so surprising that tournament participation is down since then? That doesn't mean that interest in go is down.

[daal]

As usual, we need numbers.

Some go-server user stats would also be useful to help determine if interest is waning.

[Li Kao]

The problem with go servers is that there is also migration between the servers which influences the user numbers.

For example I recently got the impression that the number Japanese players on KGS is increasing. But I wouldn't attribute that to an increase of the playerbase.

And before that there might have been a migration from IGS. When I tried learning go a few years back(and failed) the recommended server was IGS. Today most of us play on KGS(except the high dans).

Still the development of player numbers on KGS would be interesting. But I'm not sure if there are any logs that contain the country of a player(from geo-ip for example). Unfortunately the interface language doesn't allow us to distinguish between Europeans and Americans.

[kirkmc]

The problem with go servers is that there is also migration between the servers which influences the user numbers.

For example I recently got the impression that the number Japanese players on KGS is increasing. But I wouldn't attribute that to an increase of the playerbase.

And before that there might have been a migration from IGS. When I tried learning go a few years back(and failed) the recommended server was IGS. Today most of us play on KGS(except the high dans).

Still the development of player numbers on KGS would be interesting. But I'm not sure if there are any logs that contain the country of a player(from geo-ip for example). Unfortunately the interface language doesn't allow us to distinguish between Europeans and Americans.

Yes, and more users are, perhaps, going to Tygem. They now have an iPad client, which I've used a bit, and I think they're planning to release an English language client for computers soon.

I have, though, encountered more Japanese players on KGS in the past year or so than ever before.

[kirkmc]

I don't think statistics over just the period 2006-2011 are really fair, lets put that in perspective a little:

I don't know how reliable those figures are, but the plummet is quite astounding. (I could suggest that it corresponds to the release of the iPhone, and the huge adoption of smartphones in general outside of the enterprise sector, and the huge number of games available on those devices...)

The fact that the latest numbers are well below any of the older lows seems very surprising indeed. On KGS, for example, it doesn't seem that there are, say, 1/3 the number of players that there were 3 years ago. Does the financial crisis mean people aren't going to clubs? Or are these numbers strictly dues-paying players? Could that mean that they're still playing but not paying?

[Li Kao]

@Kirk
I think you need to ignore the 2011 number. It probably just doesn't compensate for the fact that it only counts the first few months of 2011. If you multiply it by 12/3 you're around 1600, which seems normal. The 2009 drop isn't that big.

I'd guess the graph contains the number of distinct players who took part in a tournament. But while I found the graph on the aga db website, I found no explanation of how they define an active player.

[HermanHiddema]

@Kirk
I think you need to ignore the 2011 number. It probably just doesn't compensate for the fact that it only counts the first few months of 2011. If you multiply it by 12/3 you're around 1600, which seems normal. The 2009 drop isn't that big.

Yes, of course you need to ignore the 2011 number. I thought that was abvious, but apparently I should have added a note

I'd guess the graph contains the number of distinct players who took part in a tournament. But while I found the graph on the aga db website, I found no explanation of how they define an active player.

In the context of this graph, it's simply a player that took part in at least one event submitted to the AGADB. In addition to this number, there are of couyrse players who did play at their club, but never visited any event, and there are those who played only on the internet.

In fact, given that internet go was pretty much in its infancy in the 90s, I think it is safe to say that there is an additional rise in player numbers in the last decade, which is not recorded in this graph.