Excellent points Harley. I want to clarify one thing because I don't want people to pounce on you over a small detail.

The point I want to clarify is a brief history of pente matters, in chronological order:

1) IYT adds pente to their site (sometime in 1998 I believe). In doing so, they used an incorrect board (13 X 13) and they did not have the opening move restriction, which shows they researched the matter poorly.

2) A full 2 years later around May of 2000, IYT FINALLY implements the game properly, with a 19 X 19 board and the restriction on the opening move. But since the other game was already called pente, they called this "Pro pente." This was the beginning of the confusion. TO new players, that made it appear as if "Pro-pente" was some difficult variant only for experts, and thus people started to play using the reules without the restriction.

That caused two things: they were hindered in their development of the correct way to play and people became confused about the opening rules.

3) Brain King comes into existence. Pioneer54 introduces the site to me, and I immediately love it. I see that it does not have pente.

4) Gary Barnes and I write to Fencer about pente, and within a week, he has the game ready to go with the corrrect board and rules.

5) Web TV users complain that they cannot play on the 19 by 19 board, so Fencer creates a 13 X 13 board to enable them to play.

6) I understood the reason for the small board, but I did not understand why the restriction was removed, after all, what did Web TV have to do with that?

7) Gary and I wrote lengthy and thorough explanations to Fencer for why the restriction was necessary even on the small board.

8) Fencer, hearing our explanation, agreed and implemented the restriction on the small boards as well.

9) then the argument began.

So, regarding what Harley said, she is 100% correct! -- Had IYT never created the game improperly, this would be a non-issue, just like the kid who never saw the ice cream truck.

I should add that at Dweebo's stone games at www.pente.org, the restriction is almost always if not always in place, and no one seems bothered by this. Dozens and dozens of people play pente there every day. PBeM, where the world championships are played, simply calls the game "pente" even though it has the restriction, just as Brain King does. There is no need to call it "Pro pente," it is understood by most pente players that the restriction is a part of the game, not a variant.