joshi tm: yes, it's tough sometimes, when your opponent doesn't know to play the game well.
But why don't you start capturing them? She won't have any dead pieces to mark that way...

pauloaguia: Because
A) He shouldn't have to
B) It reduces his score, which is not something that he wants to do. In this particular case, if he captured the 4 dead stones at J8, G10, F10, & A12 and faith passed on all 4 turns, then he would actually lose.

jurek: Yup,that's right. I would lose by a half point, I saw.

joshi tm: Then surely you deserve to lose? I was under the impression that ending a Go game by passing and marking dead stones was just a way to finish it quicker if it is obvious one person has won.
If you would lose by continuing on then you have lost the game fairly and should accept that, rather than trying to cheat your opponent out of a win by passing and hoping they make a mistake in your favour while marking the stones.

MTC: No, that is the incorrect impression. When both players pass, they are signalling that they are done placing stones. Any stones that are not "alive" (take a good read on http://senseis.xmp.net for what it takes to be alive) should be marked as dead, and then the score should be tallied.

jurek: I used the wrong value for komi. In that case PM Fencer and he'll make you win the game...

joshi tm: I agree with you, joshi tm!

joshi tm: Certainly this problem needs to be fixed, and having an arbitrator would be one way to fix it, assuming that someone can be found who has the knowledge and the time and wants the job.

But there is a very simple solution that doesn't require any human intervention (except for a one-time bit of coding on Fencer's part). The rules of the American Go Association specify that when both players pass, fail to agree on the status of stones, and both pass again without placing more stones, the game ends immediately and all stones on the board are counted as alive. I can't think of any reason why something similar shouldn't be implemented here.

KotDB: You left out one very important part of the AGA rules: scoring is by area (as in Chinese scoring), not territory (as in Japanese scoring)

jurek: Actually, under AGA rules, the two scoring methods are equivalent, and either can be used. Is the scoring method relevant to the current topic?

KotDB: Absolutely. You're proposing changing the scoring rules. Why wouldn't that be relevant?

jurek: No, I haven't proposed any change to the scoring rules, only to the criteria used for determining when the game ends. Nevertheless, after thinking about it some more, I've realized that the two issues are not independent. My proposal is not suitable for use with BrainKing's Japanese-style rules, as it would have made joshi tm the loser when he clearly deserves the victory. I could say more about rules and scoring, but this is the wrong board.

I withdraw my specific proposal, but I agree with joshi tm and others that this problem needs to be fixed. Arbitration is not a perfect solution, but it would be far better than nothing.