Takodori's Entrance to Shogi World

Shogi Boardlive Schedule for Week 15

Here is a web-casting board-live schedule for week 15.

Tuesday April 8, started at 9:00am(JST), (Nico Nico Live program started at 9:00am)
Meijin Moriuchi Toshiyuki vs three crown Habu Yoshiharu
Day 1, The first game of the 72nd Meijin-sen best of seven match
Niconico Live - http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv174714243 (Commentator - 9th Tanaka Torahiko, MC - Joryu Shodan Nakamura Momoko) 
Expected end time - 6:00pm(JST)

Wednesday April 9, to start at 9:00am(JST), (Nico Nico Live program will start at 9:00am)
Meijin Moriuchi Toshiyuki vs three crown Habu Yoshiharu
Day 2, The first game of the 72nd Meijin-sen best of seven match
Niconico Live - http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv174714244 (Commentator - 9th dan Tanaka Torahiko, MC - Joryu 3dan Takebe Sayuri) Only paid users may watch the program since the program is popular and they will be prioritized to watch it, though you can watch most of Nico Nico programs basically free.)
Expected end time - around 9:00pm(JST)

Saturday April 12, to start at 10:00am(JST), (Nico Nico Live program will start at 9:30am)
9th dan Yashiki Nobuyuki vs Ponanza
The fifth game of Denou-sen 3.0 (1-3 led by Machines)
Niconico Live - http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv161977239 (Commentator - 9th dan Sato Yasumitsu, 9th dan Fukaura Koichi MC - Joryu 5dan Yauchi Rieko) It is highly likely only paid users can watch the program since it's extremely popular and they will be prioritized to watch it, though you can watch most of Nico Nico programs basically free.)
Expected end time - 6:00pm(JST)

There are many other webcasting boardlives available to watch on an iPhone/iPad or Android terminal almost every weekday which is a pay service. Go to either of these two links if you are interested;
iPhone/iPad - https://itunes.apple.com/app/id389456852
Android - https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... free&hl=en

Message from Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe at Denousen media conference

This full message seems readable only on facebook, so I'm copying to paste it to here.

Message from Prime Minister Shinzo Abe:

I attended the press conference to announce the pairings for the “Shogi Denou-sen”—a battle of professional shogi players vs. computers.
I suppose some of my readers here may have watched the live Internet relay, but when I did the furigoma (a toss of five pawns to decide who plays black and white), surprisingly all five pawns landed “fu” side up. Therefore, in the first match-up, the shogi professional will be black, the side that moves first. Having emotions is one of the strengths humans enjoy, and I really wish the best of luck for the shogi professionals not to lose to the computers. 
This year, Mt.¬¬¬ Fuji was registered on the World Heritage List and washoku—Japanese cuisine—was added to UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage list. I would like to convey shogi to the world as one type of “Cool Japan.”

(Originally posted at 18:56, Tuesday, December 10, 2013 in Japanese)

If you are a facebook user, you can see the photo with the abovementioned message at https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=582600838478782&set=a.297429136995955.68423.119541591451378&type=1&theater

In addition, I'm adding the video to this entry.

Abe did furigoma there at that time. Kyodo News uploaded the video of the scene for you to watch.

 

Shogi Boardlive Schedule for Week 43

Here is a web-casting board-live schedule for week 43. 

Monday, October 21, to start at 9:00am(JST)
Ouza Habu Yoshiharu vs 6th dan Nakamura Taichi
5th(final) game of 61st Ouza-sen best of five match
Liveboard - http://live.shogi.or.jp/ouza/kifu/61/ou ... 10101.html
Nico Live - http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv147849714
Official Site(in Japanese) - http://live.shogi.or.jp/ouza/
Expected end time - sometime around 9:00pm(JST)

Tuesday, October 22, to start at 10:00am(JST)
4th Fujimori Tetsuya vs Shoreikai 3rd dan Tonari Ryuma
3rd(final) game of 44th Rookie King-sen
Liveboard - http://live.shogi.or.jp/shinjin/kifu/44 ... 20101.html
Official Site(in Japanese) - http://live.shogi.or.jp/shinjin/
Expected End Time - sometime around 5:00pm

Wednesday, October 23, to start at 10:00am(JST)
Joryu Ouza Kato Momoko vs Joryu 3rd dan Ueda Hatsumi
A challenger deciding knockout game of the 7th Mynavi Joshi Open
Liveboard - http://mynavi-open.jp/result/7/mynavi201310230101.html
Official Site - http://mynavi-open.jp/index.html
Expected End time - sometime around 5:00pm(JST)

Links to News about 2nd Deno-sen(Shogi Man vs Machine Match)

About the first game, 4-dan Abe Koru vs Shuso.

• NHK World News aired on March 25 (video news)
• My posting to 81 Universe Square Forum

About the second game, 4-dan Sato Shinichi vs Ponanza

• Computer beats current professional shogi player for 1st time－ 毎日ｊｐ(毎日新聞)
• Computer beats active 'shogi' pro for first time - The Japan Times
• Computer program claims first victory over shogi professional - AJW by The Asahi Shimbun
• Professional shogi player defeated for first time by computer program - The Japan Daily Press
  
• My posting to 81 Universe Square Forum

2nd Denou-sen(human vs machine) details released

Here is the details.

The parings, allotted thinking time, schedule are revealed yesterday. And which turn to play first was decided by Furigoma during the media conference. The details are as below;

March 23, 2013 4-dan Abe Koru vs Shuso(5th place in last WCSC)

Nico Live - http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv118753162

March 30 ponanza(4th place in last WCSC) vs 4-dan Sato Shinichi
Nico Live - http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv118754300

April 6 5-dan Funae Kohei vs Tsutsukana(3rd place in last WCSC)
http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv118755562

April 13 Puella α(2nd place in last WCSC vs 9-dan Tsukada Yasuaki
http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv118757229

April 20 8-dan Miura Hiroyuki vs GPS Shogi(the winner of last WCSC)
http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv118757933

The allotted thinking time per player is 4 hours and ,after consuming it, each have to make a move less than 60 seconds per move.
The start time of each game will be at 10:00am(JST)
The first player of each game will be Sente(Black).
The venue is at JSA building

22nd World Computer Shogi Championship Results and Kifu

From May 3 to 5, the 22nd World Computer Shogi Championship was held in Tokyo.  The followings are the tables of the tournaments.

• Day 1
• Day 2
• Day 3 

The top five software such as GPS Shogi,  Tsutsukana, Puella α, ponanza and Shuso will compete with professional players in Dennou-sen later this year or early next year.

I posted the links to the Kifus of Day 3 here.

Hoki, the developer of Bonanza, to have a Seminar at Alberta University

Today I found the following announcement in the website of Alberta University in Canada. Hoki-sen will provide a seminar about the recent advance of computer shogi and Bonanza there. I think he will fly to the venue from Japan. The date of it will be February 3.

• Recent advances in computer shogi and the Bonanza program | Department of Comput...

February 3, 2012 - 12:00pm - 1:00pm

CSC 3-33

Shogi is one of the major variants of chess. The material balance is less important and the branching factor is greater than in Western chess. Because of these properties, creating a decent computer shogi player was a difficult challenge. When Deep Blue defeated the World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov in 1997, the most advanced Shogi program at that time was no better than an ordinary amateur player. Recently, computer shogi programs have started to defeat human experts. The program Akara2010 defeated one of the top female shogi professionals in 2010, another program, Ponanza, achieved the highest rating in blitz games among all players in the most popular online shogi server, Shogi Club 24, in 2011, and most recently Bonkras defeated a retired top professional player, Yonenaga, in 2012. In this talk, two main features of the computer shogi program Bonanza, one of the strongest shogi programs, will be presented. One main feature is the optimization method used to train the full evaluation function with more than ten million parameters. The other is a game tree search method which is more brute-force and less selective than other popular approaches. We close with some comparisons of the algorithmic differences between chess programs and Bonanza.

Fujitsu Laboratory's News Release about Bonkras beating former Meijin Yonenaga

I found the release today. This seems to be the translation into English of the source article in Japanese released on January 16.

• Fujitsu’s Shogi Software Tops Former Shogi Champion Kunio Yonenaga | Vadvert - UK Paid Press Release Distribution Service

<Addition>

Several hours after I uploaded the above, I found the Business Wire India distributed the same story.

• Fujitsu's Shogi Software Tops Former Shogi Champion Kunio Yonenaga

Articles about Machine's victory I found today

I found the following article in English today about Bonkaras's victory against retired and former Meijin Yonenaga.

• Shogi program 'Bonkras' defeats expert player Yonenaga in first official match - The Mainichi Daily News
• Asiajin » The First Top-Pro-vs-Computer Shogi(Japanese Chess) Match Was Won By Computer
• Man vs Machine - fuckedgaijin
• Computer program defeats professional shogi player

Bonkras beat Yonenaga in 113 moves

The computer software Bankras beat retired and former Meijin Yonenaga Kunio in 113 moves yesterday. The allotted thinking time per move was three hours per player. You can replay the game through the link below;

• Bankras vs Yonenaga