Breaking news from ASR: kotomi has run out of icecream

Kotomi[-] (high dan) has run out of icecream. Fortunately she has marbles to play with.

In other news locals of asr have discovered the corner to be the safest terrain on the map (t19 excluded (t19 as tesuji excluded from the exclusion))

Kotomi: -eats words-
Fayt: now speak
Kotomi: -speaks
Fayt: good girl *gives ice cream*
Kotomi: YES
Kotomi: -takes and runs to corner and eats icecream o _ o
DukeDaniel: corner is safe
Kotomi: yep
Kotomi: safest place
DukeDaniel: well t19 isn't safe
DukeDaniel: but around the corner
Kotomi: ice cream all gone o _ o
DukeDaniel: o.o I better write an article about that
Kotomi: what?
DukeDaniel: on my go blog
Kotomi: oh o . o
Kotomi: ok
DukeDaniel: how do you feel about running out of icecream?
Fayt: "t19 isnt safe unless used as tesuji"  done
Kotomi: i ha\/e mar6les
Kotomi: : D
Kotomi: 110 fo them
Fayt: thats how
Kotomi: theres a green one and i call it the awesome green mar6le of doom o _ o
DukeDaniel: http://30kto1d.blogspot.com/2012/02/breaking-news-from-asr-kotomi-has-run.html
Kotomi: i also has 2 dollars in my room somewhere
Kotomi: : D
DukeDaniel: cool huh?
DukeDaniel: I have about 80 readers a day so
DukeDaniel: everyone will know now
Kotomi: my room is a messsssssssss
Kotomi: this is the first time in ......... 8 years?
Fayt: should see mine
MrEmDash: hello my friends

joeseki

Ok, so we've all heard so many different things about joseki. Joseki are like 9p moves, Joseki are bad for beginners. If you can't understand each move in the sequence then you won't proceed and will have a fatal error.
The pros don't always use Joseki. Learn joseki lose 4 stones. Don't memorize. etc etc etc.
So for the average j=Joe what do we do with joseki? I study joseki this way. Pick a point 3,4; 4,4; 5,3 etc and look at a few joseki for it. Try to figure out why each moves is played and the overall effect it has on the board. Then when you are playing  a game try attacking someones stones approaching the way they did in a Joseki. Try it out several times and get the hang of it.
This is a great way to learn how to get good at attacking corners. After that the next step is to learn how to defend your corners. Once you understand allot of the joseki for a point you get a good idea of how you can defend the corner and get a good overall advantage from your defending moves.

Here is a really interesting website of my friend's http://www.learngo.co.uk/index.html he has some cool stuff and a good joseki study page.

Improving Visualization

Basically this is very simple. In order to be able to read more, you have to read. Read far. Read allot. Read read read. I especially recommend tsumego. But you can also improve your reading in the middle of a game. Just pick a random point on the board and 'see' in your mind the consequences of it. Our minds like to make sense of things so you won't be as focused if you try practicing visualizing random sequences of moves with no goals or objectives in mind. This is why tsumego have a goal. Even if the goal isn't written and you have to decide what it is for yourself, there is at least possibility to live or kill in a tsumego. You could just visualize random problems but that isn't as engaging. In other words, tsumego have goals to make them more fun. So to practice your visualization just read out patterns with goals in mind.

Critical Thinking and Visualizing.

There are 2 main ways we determine our move on the go board. Both are very important to your success. Today I figured I'd write a brief summary of what each does and how you can improve it.
The first way is critical thinking. Critical thinking is taking a problem and simplifying it. It's gives us people the advantage over computers in go. Some examples of critical thinking are: counting liberties, determining the biggest areas, deciding if a group is weak, knowing shape, figuring out where a good cutting point is.
Critical thinking is used to find many possible good moves and ideas.
The second method Visualizing and planning is when we take a point and see everything we can do from there
by reading ahead. We take a point and find out what we could do with it and how our opponent can respond.
Reading and planning can be applied to any point.

By improving both your critical thinking and visualizing you can use them synergistically to quickly determine the condition of the board find some high quality points and then find the best ones and the strategy and tactics to be implemented after moving depending on your opponents choice of response.

Improving visualisation

Rival match: Kalin2:[8k] Vs Therookie:[8k]

A newsworthy rivalry

Kalin2 and Therookie have been rivals for a long time. Therookie however didn't acknowledge
Kalin2 until 2 days ago (february 12th) when Kalin2 beat Therookie by 13.5
Kalin has been steadily making ground. Just last month Kalin was 12k and hadn't beaten Rookie at all.
Here is a kifu of the exiting match(Kalin is black Kalin also had a 2 stone handicap and Rookie was simuling). Its exciting to see new players rising in the Go world. we have an exciting year ahead of us.

The importance of a go community.

While this may seem obvious, you can't go very far in go by yourself. If you don't have friends, teachers, competitors and other people you know who are interested in go, then you won't grow as fast as you could. This is one of the reasons I have so many friends on kgs. That, and having friends is fun and they are great people.
I suggest bringing your questions to sites like life in 19x19 their friendly forums have been a huge help to me.

A go study group is a good thing. Where would Hikaru be if he never joined Waya's study group? HnG refrence aside It's really helpful to be part of a group that meets regularly to study. As your group grows stronger you will too.

Or at least I THOUGHT a study group would be good until I tried studying with my sister.

Ikebrawler: The upcoming pro

A new face is appearing on the world of Go. On kgs under the psuedonym 'ikebrawler' a go legend is growing.
He started go a few years ago when his dad first brought him to a Go salon. since then he has been advancing quickly. big name players like MrHyphen are looking to him as their 'potential rival'
here is a kifu of one of his recent games against myself (he gave me 9 handicap stones)

He beat me by 46.5 well its always fun to be smoked by the future pros.
anyway watch out go world new players are coming your way.