From: "Samuel H. Sloan (my real name)" <VanUpp <at> AOL <dot> COM>
Date: 9 feb 1996
Subject: My Ishi Press Posting

Several people have understandably questioned why I posted to this discussion
group a pleading filed in Alameda County Superior Court two days ago, or they
have asked me specific questions about it.

The Ishi Press in Japan is the publisher of "Shogi for Beginners" and of
Shogi World magazine. Ishi Press International in California has published a
computer shogi playing program by Mr. Kakinoki. Mr. Kakinoki states that he
has never received even one yen in royalties of the money he is supposed to
receive in his contract with Ishi Press International.

I feel that every member of this discussion group should be concerned about
these matters. For the past 27 years, The Ishi Press has been the world's
leading publisher of books and computer software pertaining to the games of
go and shogi. The Ishi Press never made much money doing this and often
operated at a loss. The primary purpose of The Ishi Press was not financial
gain but rather to spread the game of go to the West and to the English
speaking world.

In furtherance of this objective, separate companies, which were originally
intended to operate as branch offices of the main company in Japan, were
established in 1986 in San Jose, California and in 1991 in London, England.

Unfortunately, what has happened is that the operators of these two "branch
offices" have discovered that the credit worthy name and reputation of the
Ishi Press which has been built up over 27 years in business has enabled the
"branches" to borrow money and use the credit facilities of the original
company in Japan. These "branch offices" have now broken off and no longer
have any connection whatever with the Ishi Press in Japan. More than that,
these former branch offices are now engaging in illegal practices such as the
pirating of books and computer software and the selling of magazine
subscriptions to which they have no right. Innumerable individuals have sent
in their money to these entities, expecting to receive books and magazines in
return, only to find that their money has been lost and that they are not
getting what they paid for. They even have difficulty communicating by FAX,
e-mail or phone. They then write letters to The Ishi Press in Japan,
complaining about this, not realizing that The Ishi Press in Japan has no
connection with and no control over these entities and individuals.

To cite one example of this, there is a two volume work entitled "All About
Life and Death" by Cho Chikun, which many of you may have bought. This is a
pirated work. Not only has Cho Chikun not received royalties for the
publication of this book, but he never signed a contract and never consented
to the publication of this book by Ishi Press International of San Jose,
California.

This book was originally published in Japanese by the Nihon Ki-in in Tokyo in
1984. James W. Connelley of Ishi Press International in San Jose found out
about this book, hired someone in California to translate it into English,
and published and sold the book in America, all without consulting Mr. Cho.
This book, which was published in the Summer of 1994, is popular and has
virtually sold out.

Mr. Cho found this book while browsing in a bookstore and, on October 26,
1995, wrote a letter to Ishi Press International complaining about this. On
January 16, 1996, Hartland "Sweet" Snyder of Ishi Press International wrote
back to Mr. Cho a letter which, in part, stated: "IPJ and Bozulich entered
into an agreement granting rights to reprint all IPJ books."

This is absolutely untrue. There has never been any agreement giving Ishi
Press International in San Jose the right to publish the books of The Ishi
Press of Japan. Moreover, any such agreement would not affect this book,
because "All About Life and Death" was originally printed and published by
Ishi Press International in San Jose. The Ishi Press of Japan never published
that book.

The letter from Hartland "Sweet" Snyder (his actual legal adopted name) goes
on to state: "If you send us a contract similar to that which you have with
Bozulich we will sign it and honor it at our next printing. If you attempt to
assign your books to which we have the rights to another company such as
Kiseido with whom Bozulich is associated we will take appropriate legal
steps. ISHI-US never had a contract with you: we only had the rights to the
fruits of a contract IPJ had with you. ..... We look forward to hearing from
your attorneys and cooperating with them in every possible way so that you
can recover your money from Bozulich and IPJ."

Note that not only does Hartland Snyder refuse to pay anything at all to Mr.
Cho for the publication of his book, but he tells Mr. Cho that he, Hartland,
has the rights to that book and that Mr. Cho will get sued if he goes to
another company to have his own book published.

The reason why I am particularly interested in this is that back in October,
1994 I sued Ishi Press International for the royalties to my own book,
"Chinese Chess for Beginners," and Hartland Sweet Snyder made exactly the
same contention to the judge in that case. He contended that even though my
book had been originally published by Ishi Press International in San Jose,
California, I should be required to go Japan and sue Richard Bozulich over
there for the royalties to my book. This contention was rejected and the
judge decided the case in my favor, awarding me royalties in the amount of
$5,000. I now have the sheriffs of Alameda County and of Santa Clara County
chasing down Hartland Snyder for my money. A few weeks ago, the Alameda
County Sheriff was able to collect $2,000.

Hartland Snyder's letter also states: "Until we received your letter of
October 26, 1995 we had no knowledge of" the problem. Anybody who has been
reading the newsgroup rec.games.go will know that this is a lie. This subject
was fully aired on rec.games.go back in July, 1995 and Hartland Snyder and
Anton Dovydaitis actively participated in that discussion.

This only one example of many manifestations of this problem. Mr. Takagi, a
famous go player, was browsing in a book store last year when he discovered
that he too had a book published by Ishi Press International in San Jose in
English which he did not know about. That book is entitled "Beyond Forcing
Moves."

Takagi and Cho Chikun share exactly the same problem. These are world famous
go players, among the top players in the world. They have big incomes in the
half million dollar range from appearance fees and exhibitions and from
writing articles and teaching go. They cannot afford to drop what they are
doing and come to America, fight a long and protracted court case against
Hartland Sweet Snyder and then to hire the sheriff as I have done to chase
him around and collect whatever few dollars he can find.

You say that these are criminal charges and that these people should be
arrested. However, here in California, juries let men off scott free who kill
their wives. No district attorney is going to bother with a little case of
petty white collar thievery. Of course, if the tables were turned and a
Japanese, Chinese or Korean company pirated an American work, they would get
really excited about that.

The end result is that Hartland Sweet Snyder is continuing to print and sell
books to which he has no right, with no intention of paying the authors
anything, and there is nothing which can be done about it, except possibly to
post this information on a discussion group on the Internet.

Hartland Sweet Snyder is known to be insolvent, with a mountain of debts from
scams which he has pulled in the past. He is a former securities and
commodities broker whose former employers say that they want nothing to do
with him. It is apparent that for precisely this reason he has been selected
as the front man for Elwyn Berlekamp, a world famous mathematician with an
impeccable reputation. I and almost everybody else would prefer to believe
that Professor Berlekamp is not really involved and simply does not know what
Hartland Snyder has been doing. However, it has now become abundantly clear
that Professor Berlekamp does know and indeed is directing his activities on
a day to day basis.

Several readers have asked about the reference to "my distributor in
Holland."

The Ishi Press distributor in Holland is:

Schaak en Gowinkel het Paard
Haarlemmerdijk 147
1013 KH Amsterdam, Netherlands
Tel: +31-20-624-1171
FAX: +31-20-627-0885

I believe you will find that they have a full line of Ishi Press products.
All of these products are authorized by the real Ishi Press. This is the
company which received a threatening letter from Graeme Bruce of Ishi
International in London demanding that they cease and desist from all
distribution of Go World Magazine. They have taken the courageous stand of
continuing to distribute the magazine in the face of these threats (although
not very courageous since there seems to be no legal way that Mr. Bruce could
carry out his threats) and everyone is encouraged to patronize Schaak en
Gowinkel het Paard.

A problem which continues to affect many people concerns Go World magazine.
Previously, Ishi Press in California and Ishi International in London acted
as distributors of Go World, although they were never the publisher of that
magazine. Subscribers sent their money directly to them and they ordered the
requisite number of copies from The Ishi Press in Japan.

However, when Ishi Press International stopped paying for the magazine, The
Ishi Press in Japan naturally stopped supplying them. When legitimate
subscribers to Go World Magazine started complaining about not receiving
their magazine, The Ishi Press in Japan supplied free of charge copies of Go
World to these subscribers, both to preserve the name and reputation of Go
World magazine and because these subscribers had done nothing wrong.

This practice continued throughout most of 1995. However, now The Ishi Press
has been forced to stop this practice, because Ishi Press International in
San Jose and Ishi International in London have continued to solicit new
subscriptions, ever though they have no connection with the magazine and no
capability of supplying the magazine. They take money from new subscribers on
a fraudulent basis by claiming to be the publishers of Go World magazine when
they are not. Then, when the subscriber finds out the true situation and
demands a refund of his or her money, they refuse to pay. Obviously, the
actual publisher of Go World magazine cannot afford to keep giving away free
copies of the magazine under these circumstances.

I hope that you can now understand how serious this situation really is and
that this is not just a case of petty bickering. This situation will not go
away. It will get worse. However, Hartland Snyder and his other backer,
Nathaniel Berkowitz, have no permanent connection with the game of go. They
have never played a game of go in their lives and do not even really know the
rules. After they have burned out all the lines of credit of Ishi Press
International, they will move on to some other scam in some other field.
However, we will still be here and will have to spend the next many years
trying to pick up the pieces and explain what really happened here.

I also want to add that we welcome the entry of Yutopian Enterprises into the
go and computer go markets. It is important to remember that the primary
purpose of the Ishi Press in Japan is to promote the spread of the game of
go. It is readily apparent that Yutopian Enterprises has a similar goal and
that Mr. Sidney Yuan will still be here and will be actively promoting the
game of go five, ten or even twenty years from now.

The reason I mention this is that Hartland Snyder has been circulating a
libelous letter, which perhaps some of you may have seen, implying that there
are serious differences between Yutopian and The Ishi Press of Japan. This is
another fabrication of Hartland Snyder. Hartland Snyder is trying to turn
what he perceives to be his two main competitors against each other. However,
not only is The Ishi Press of Japan on good terms with Yutopian, but The Ishi
Press of Japan has started to distribute Yutopian books on a small scale,
something which Ishi Press International refuses to do.

Finally, many will say that this does comment not belong here and should be
posted on rec.games.go. However, unfortunately from my point of view, this
letter contains sensitive material which cannot and will not be posted on
such a public place as rec.games.go. Those who read that newsgroup will have
noticed that within the past two weeks I have been attacked by Anton
Dovydaitis and by a Mr. Harry Fearnley (a person unknown to me). I have not
responded and will not respond to those attacks. What you are reading here
you will not see there.

I hope that this letter better explains my posting.

Sam Sloan