The Dojo has died.
Again.
If it gets back up I`m going to have stake it down.
But The Dojo lives on. The Dojo created modern magic. The Dojo transformed Magic from a game that you played with the three people who you started playing with and turned it into a game with a global community. I`ve had the opportunity, in my life, to travel the world (both with the Pro Tour and on personal trips) and play Magic in cool places and make lots of new friends who, without an international Magic community, I would never have known from Adam, or occasionally from Eve.
The Dojo wasn`t just the netdeck home, it was the rogue home. Without The Dojo there would be nobody like Kai Budde or Jon Finkel and people would still be playing with Mesa Pegasus in white weenie decks. But without The Dojo there would be nobody like Jamie Wakefield or Anthony Alongi, and we`d have all stopped playing Magic four years ago because it would have been boring. Pro, wannabe Pro, Scrub, even the lowly wannabe Scrub - The Dojo served all with equal time and space to say what they wanted to say.
The Dojo Is Dead...
Long Live The Dojo!
Because The Dojo is not dead, like a Salmon that has fought upstream to reach it`s birthpoint it can now lay down to die in peace, safe in the knowledge that it`s job has been done. It`s children will carry the job forwards, and they are many and they are strong: Starcity, NewWave, Meridian, Mindripper, CPA, CCGPrime, Neutral Ground, Brainburst, Yavapai, and no doubt a great many others too legion to mention (such as Team Legion).
thedojo.com is dead, but The Dojo lives on.
We should be thankful that the immense Dojo archives will remain accessible for there is the very history of our hobby, written by the people who made it as it happened. If you`ve never used them, then I suggest you do so because there is everything in there you could possibly want. The Dojo archives will teach you how to play Magic, they will teach you how to build decks, they will teach you how to write articles about small plastic dinosaurs and even smaller dogs.
The Dojo was never purely about tournaments. It was about whatever you put into it. But I would feel very strongly about anybody who is gleefully celebrating it`s demise - I feel very sorry for somebody who`s view of reality is so warped by their own petty grievances that they cannot recognise the demise of a truly great institution with a degree of respect.
I feel very sorry that the same gleeful reveller doesn`t actually realise that The Dojo is not dead, but that it has lived a very successful life and achieved goals far beyond those with which Frank Kusumoto must have begun.
Open your eyes. The Dojo built Magic, it singlehandedly created a global community of likeminded people who shared the same interests. The Dojo was a personification of everything which the internet stood for.
"You can`t win, Darth. If you strike me down I will become more powerful than you could possibly imagine."
- Obi Wan Kenobi
As much as I am scared by the concept of a glowing Frank Kusumoto appearing over my shoulder mid-match and whispering "Use the Force Of Will, Luke", I think the above quote sums it up quite nicely. The Dojo fought for the good guys, because it fought for all of us.