■Ricoh Cup First and Second Rounds

New Installation in the Hall

On this day, more than 700 fans thronged the hall. Some of them who had watched many Ricoh Cup games before expressed their impression, "There is something different about the entire atmosphere in the hall this year". One of the differences from the previous tournaments is the brochures prepared for the event, in which there are the photos of all the 32 participants. The photos were taken for this event by photographer Mr. Shigeo Ohata. Mr. Ohata has been taking a large number of photos of the pro Go world for many years. Before the camera lens directed at them by such a veteran cameraman, the pro players displayed facial expressions as shown here.

	Another difference is the large 16 TV monitors installed in the hall. Two monitors were placed in the section of each game to display the board on the large screens. The equipment turned out to be very useful.

The Ricoh Cup tournaments have been open to the public. But it is unexpectedly difficult to understand the situation of a game by just obliquely viewing the board. I hear that the TV monitors were installed to allow the spectators to closely observe the development of the game through the monitors while directly feeling the atmosphere there. This equipment enabled the spectators to enjoy the tournaments more fully.

In the next room, 9-dan Mr. Norio Kudo perspired while explaining the games using a large board. In this room, you can easily understand how each game is proceeding and which pair is on the favorable side in difficult mutual attacks. After getting information of the games, you can immediately return to the former room and continue watching the games being played there.

In addition, the recording staff members directly input the records of the games on computers, which were sent real time to 100 countries all over the world through the world's largest Internet Go salon, "Panda Net". Thanks to the cooperation of Ricoh Co., Ltd., clean copies of the printout records were handed to the spectators when they left the hall. I am impressed at the great advancement made in the services provided to the fans.