Like others, I'm grateful for the role AikiWeb's played in furthering my growth as a martial artist by facilitating connections to people with a passion to teach and study the internal aspects of the martial arts, and I'm happy this online community has offered this and other value to me for approximately a decade (I recall reading
this article, for example, awhile ago, and it helped fuel my interest in exploring and understanding the Daito-ryu roots of my own art).
Ultimately, this is Jun's site, and I wish him well in taking whatever measures he feels are needed to steer this site in the direction he feels it needs to go. It's his baby, and as a parent, I can relate -- and I'm sure many others can as well for the same reason.
That said, specific to the issue of IP/IS discussions contributing to a tone that Jun and others seek to have toned down, if not eliminated: IP/IS is about being elite, about being better than everyone else through developing and using a body different than others have, and there's no sugar-coating that -- so I, for one, don't expect everyone to congenially discuss this topic, ever.
People have, and will continue to search out a venue where the IP/IS/aiki wars can be zealously waged, whether here or elsewhere, because the topic is inherently that compelling, polarizing and significant. Maybe, in due time, a public forum catering to IP/IS proponents, regardless of style/system affiliation, will surface where cyber-bloodletting is expected and could find its natural equilibrium point relative to what the members of that community could tolerate. Regardless, these discussions, on AikiWeb as the current venue of choice, provide a means of introduction to the most valuable work being done in the martial arts, at the individual and group level, worldwide today. It will be fun reading these archived threads a decade from now. . . .
