A few days ago, I participated in the regular meeting of Korean professional players. Though there were several agendas, very one subject captivated my notice. Do you know that the structure of Korean Baduk Association is analogous to that of Japan? In the core of the organization, there are professional players. Therefore, the union of pro players has such a strong power upon the administration of KBA, and often gets involved in its policy-making process. Traditionally professional players never played a match without prize money including preliminary rounds. People believed that it should be extremely tough and narrow to become a pro player, and every pro deserves respect, esteem and decent income. I do not know when and where this notion came from, but assume that it’s begun since the Hall-of-Fame period in Japan. Anyway, the agenda vigorously discussed at the meeting was that “Should we inhibit a sponsor that wants to make professional competition which offers prize money only to a certain number of top players, even if we lose the sponsor?”   

Of course, there are strict regulation and policy of KBA in making professional championship. Although I don’t know much about it, one thing is certain that a company must spend much more money than it is exposed to public. At first, it was not a big deal as the number of pro players was not high. That means, a sponsor could affordably offer decent amount of money for unnoticeable players’ matches, too. However, as time goes by, the number naturally increased. Currently 10 players become pro every year. And here, the problem pops up. Once sponsors regard the budget for a tournament outweighs the potential benefits from the advertizing effect, no one wants to keep investing on it. Thus, instead of supporting the preliminary round, they ask KBA to enlarge the prize money for the first place. As you would expect, that is the safest way to draw people’s attention and foster the effect of the advertisement.

If it was 1990’s, the subject couldn’t have even invited to the meeting, since a list of companies volunteered to support a title. Yet, in such a recession, we'd better persuade current sponsors not to leave rather than seeking after a new one. Moreover, many amateur baduk players no longer want to take baduk lessons from a pro player with relatively high tuition. They prefer an instructor who offers cheaper or free lessons.

When I was in Kent School in Connecticut, I had a chance to converse with a French teacher who knew a little about baduk. I introduced myself briefly, “I am a professional Go player.” Then he said “In America, that means you get paid when you play.” So I said, “Yes, that’s what I mean.” He didn’t seem to believe or understand me though. No one would question that professional golf players or tennis players get paid for their matches, and if they play with an amateur player, the amateur player would pay a particular amount of money for the game. Also, if one wants to get some comments from a violin master or competent artists, he will probably expect to pay some money for that. I firmly believe that no professional baduk player made less effort to reach at their strength than any of above. So, why is that so strange to get paid? If no sponsor wants to pay for the lower ranked pro players, and no general baduk player would pay a reasonable fee for lessons from pro, where are pro players supposed to stand?