Firsts in the mass media
Firsts in the mass mediaThe first newspaper game appeared in the Yubin Hochi in Japan on 1 April 1878. It was a game between Nakagawa Kamesaburo 6-dan and Takahashi Kinesaburo 5-dan (1878-03-29a in the GoGoD database). In 1879 Kiraku no Tomo (Leisure Friend) became the first magazine to feature go. The first Korean go magazine, Sin-cheong Baduk Po (Newly Compiled Go Records), appeared in 1933.
On 5 September 1878 the first-ever go book review appeared. It was for Katsugo Shinpen (Living Go, a New Edition) by Yokoo Kanekichi.
The first go newspaper was the Gokai Shuho quarterly founded by Hirotsuki Zekken in Japan in November 1915. It ceased in 1918. Fujisawa Hideyuki tried with his Igo no Kenkyu in 1948, but it did not last beyond a second issue. The Nihon Ki-in's Shukan Go began in 1987 and is still running. The first and only go newspaper in Korea was Baduk Sinmun which ran from 1992 to 2002, killed off by the internet. Chinese magazines go back to 1922, when Deng Yuanhui and his friends in Chengdu Go Club published the monthly journal Yixue Yuekan (Go Studies Monthly), but we are not aware of any newspapers. However, the first newspaper go columns in China date from around 1913 when they started printing the games of visiting Japanese pro Takabe Dohei - around 100 games of his were published.
The first game played by telegraph was in September 1899 between Iwasaki Kenzo and Izumi Shusetsu for Japan's Yomiuri Shinbun.
The first radio game featured Suzuki Tamejiro and Mitsuhara Itaro in Japan in January 1933 (a game between Suzuki and Segoe Kensaku in January 1935 is often but wrongly quoted).
The first televised game was the Honinbo, Takagawa Kaku, playing amateur Murakami Bunsho on 29 April 1961. Murakami won on two stones. TV broadcasts had started the previous July, with a series of lectures by Takagawa. It was the good response to these that encouraged a tv producer to try a full game. Takagawa also featured in the first televised pro game, in the 10th NHK Cup when he played Fujisawa Hideyuki. It was broadcast on 7 October 1962.
The first games by satellite were played in 1982 between Tokyo and Copenhagen.
The first title match game played by modem was on 30 December 1994 when Cho Hun-hyeon and Yi Ch'ang-ho each played from home to contest the final of the 2nd Paedal Wang.
The first western go book (though actually published in serial form) was Oskar Korschelt's Das Go Spiel (The game of go) of 1884. The first English primer, The Game of Go by Arthur Smith, was heavily based on this. The first go best seller was Yasunaga's Shin-Fuseki in 1934. The first "proper" go magazine in English was Go Monthly Review which the Nihon Ki-in started in December 1961.