Xiao Tong on his win in 6th FICGS Go WCH

  

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Thibault de Vassal    (2012-05-09)
Xiao Tong on his win in 6th FICGS Go WCH

Xiao Tong, winner of the 6th FICGS Go championship, kindly accepted to answer a few questions, here is the first part:


FICGS - Hello Xiao, congratulations once again for winning this nice match. Svante Carl von Erichsen was FICGS champion from the start of the site, after winning 5 championships. What did you think about his play & yours in these games?

Xiao Tong - Mr. Svante Carl von Erichsen is the strongest player I have met on this site. The games are so tough. In the middle of this match I thought I would lose in at least two games. At last I am lucky to have a 4-1 winning.

FICGS - Would you like to tell us a few words about you (where you live, other games you play, Go servers you play on...) so that we know you better?

Xiao Tong - I live in China but when I started to play Go on this site I was visiting France. In China when we play Go face to face, generally it takes 2 or 3 hours. But when we play on the ineternet, we always choose 30sec/move. I always play on TYGEM site, which is a China/Korea cooperated site. Before playing we need to install a client software. You can visit this address http://www.tygembaduk.com

FICGS - Unfortunately you are one of the rare chinese players at FICGS, but obviously they do very well. We all know many chinese Go champions names, could you tell us your opinion on the state of Go in China and in the world nowadays?

Xiao Tong - The past 10 years can be called Korea decade. They won more world championships than Chinese players, because before 1990 few Chinese children studied Go. But when China won several matches between China and Japan in late 1980s, more and more children started to study and play go. And then these millions of Go children grew up. Now Chinese players can get more world champions than Korea. I think besides the several world champions there are 30 young players in China who may win world championships in the future. They aged from 16-25.

FICGS - The best Go engines would now reach a level of 4 or 5 dan, is computer Go something that helps in such a correspondence Go championship according to you (and without revealing your secrets of course)? Do you think it is becoming a danger as it is for chess?

Xiao Tong - I don’t think computer Go engines can do anything. They are too weak.

FICGS - Do you watch other games played by your opponents before starting your games? Do you think that preparation is really important like it is in Correspondence chess?

Xiao Tong - I don’t take much time to analyze my opponents. But I will watch their games to get a first evaluation. World champions need to prepare before the game, because preparation can save their time in game. For me, preparation mean nothing.

FICGS - This FICGS Go championship is still young, what did you think about it? Would you change something, any rule, to improve it?

Xiao Tong - 1, Encourage players to play live games. One game can be finished in 2 hours when they play at 30sec/move. The more they play, the higher the site level will be. 2, when the world champion match is live on net, encourage player watch the games through your site. Let the watcher can bet on the live games. It will be more funny.


Many thanks to Xiao for these instructive answers, to be continued...


Don Groves    (2012-05-09 17:04:38)
Xiao Tong on his win in 6th FICGS Go WCH

I think his suggestion of FICGS carrying live games is excellent. I don't know if this might be too much work for Thib though ;-)


Thibault de Vassal    (2012-05-09 21:54:16)
Xiao Tong on his win in 6th FICGS Go WCH

I agree also... Well, I should add some words on that when new players login for the first times. But many are quickly discouraged as they do not find any opponent. But maybe we just need (much) more players.

As for me I'd like to play more live Go games, I only need more time mainly because of my correspondence tournaments :/

Any other ideas are welcome...