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IGOLOCAL, GROWING RAPIDLY, YET TO HIT CRITICAL MASS

Barely a month after launching, IgoLocal already has more than a thousand users. IgoLocal enables players to find and contact each other, and there are now 1131 users in 62 countries, with 449 of those in North America and 570 in Europe. The network is growing at 35 new members each day, reports founder Chuck Thomas, “and that number is trending upwards.” Users "are still figuring out how to use the system to the best benefit of their communities,” says Thomas. “1,100 users may sound like a lot of go players, but it's actually an absurdly tiny number when spread throughout the entire planet." Thomas says he can "easily envision a quarter million users on this system," and says that "At the current rate, it may be another two months before we begin to reach critical mass.  This is fine - the users who are already on the system are able to go about their business, and one day they'll receive a PM or even a game challenge from a previously-unknown rival, who is well matched to their rank." Thomas points out that "Igolocal keeps working for you even if you forget about it for a while," and admits that "Even I have only the faintest idea what the end result will be. This has never been done before.” Two hundred of the IgoLocal users are dan-level or stronger and two professionals are also registered, Jennie Shen 2p in Santa Barbara, and An Young-gil 8p in Sydney, Australia. The site supports six languages, English, French, German, Dutch, Russian and Japanese, and volunteers are now working on Italian, Polish and Chinese translations.