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The Ten Most Important Events in 20th Century Baduk
 
2. The beginning of the Honinbo competition
 
  "It is our job to maintain the prestige of the name Honinbo, with its 400 years of history and honor," Shusai announced in June, 1939, heavy with the sorrow of being the last hereditary Honinbo. It was a historic moment: the name Honinbo, the symbol of 400 years of Japanese Baduk, transformed into the top rank of a new meritocracy.
There were many reasons for his decision. His appointed successor, Kokishi, had died, and state support for Baduk professionals was on the wane. His most important reason, however, was his recognition that the time had come for the top place in Japanese Baduk to be awarded as the result of a fair competition. The winds of change were already blowing: since 1934 there had been championship competitions, although these were still organized around the different ranking systems of the prevailing groups within the Baduk community.
The Mainichi (daily) papers of Tokyo and Osaka, which later merged to become one paper, understood Shusai's intent quite well.
 
Baduk players who participated in Honinbo competition. The right end of the front row is Wu Qingyuan, his left is Kitani, and Segoi 9-dan who is the teacher of Cho Hoon-hyun 9-dan is also sitting at the third of the front row.

※ The starting point of Modern Baduk

In 1938, Shusai played his last game as a professional, against Kitani, with the support of those two newspaper companies. The following year, Shusai announced his retirement, and the end of the House Honinbo. This announcement was signed by his students.
The name of Honinbo was ceded to the Japanese Go Association, and the two newspaper companies gave a financial premium to Shusai for the sole rights to publish accounts of the Honinbo competition.
The rules for the competition also created a sensation. First of all, the ranks of players according to the existing systems, which had also determined social rank within the community, were ignored, and Dum was given to white. [Dum (Japanese: komi) is a small, fixed number of points added to white's final score to compensate for the disadvantage of playing second. See section 7-- editor]
There was significant dissatisfaction voiced concerning Dum. Since Baduk games between unequal players are always played with handicaps, many people at that time thought that it was proper that black should have the advantage that came from moving first, which can be thought of as a small handicap. Kato 7-dan, especially, objected strongly to the idea of Dum.

-- by Lee Hong-ryul, Baduk critic
 
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