Demonstrating instructor legitimacy to lay-persons on a dojo website

[theozpace]

G'day all,

First time poster, long time lurker, especially in the Bad Budo section. I have a question/issue for discussion that touches on the--as far as I can see--rarely-discussed positive aspect of what E-Budo is very good at: de-bunking instructor illegitimacy. I am interested in how dojo websites can demonstrate the legitimacy of their chief instructor to lay-persons. I am not so much asking the question for my dojo (although I do manage that website and might take on board any suggestions) as I am generally interested in how people outside MA, particularly those interested in starting a MA, might make decisions about choosing a dojo. Here's the issue and how it came up.

When I'm not training in Aikido I while away some time doing my PhD, supporting myself by teaching (among other things) public speaking. One thing that a persuasive public speaker must do is be able to provide the audience with evidence supporting their claims, and if that evidence is not first hand they must provide the audience with evidence from a secondary source that the audience will find trustworthy. That secondary source must itself be trustworthy. That is where this exercise comes in. Since students these days tend to go to the web first for information, it is critical that they be able to identify a good quality web source from a poor quality web source. Wolfgram Memorial Library provides some nice checklists which help students decide what kind of source a website is, where its biases lie etc. (http://www.widener.edu/Tools_Resources/Libraries/Wolfgram_Memorial_Library/Evaluate_Web_Pages/659).
But these checklists are quite abstract tools, really, useful for getting started but not enough to sort out all the problems that students are likely to encounter, as, for example, the one that my students encountered in this exercise.

Here's the exercise. I show the students a video of some Aikido, with no explanation. They know it's a martial art and they know what it looks like, but they know nothing else. I tell them that their ultimate goal is to develop a speech to persuade students at my university to take up Aikido. However, for this exercise, they just need to do the basic research for such a speech. This means finding some Aikido websites that they think this audience will find trustworthy and then telling me why they would use these particular websites. My students have no difficulty finding websites that mention Aikido. They have no difficulty sorting out the really bogus ones from the pretty decent looking ones. But then they tend to hit a snag. Not knowing anything about Aikido, names of organizations or people involved, and not having the time to read every website, they find that they have a problem being sure of the credentials of instructors. Since anyone can write anything they like on a web page, a professional-looking lie is, for these lay-people, just as convincing as a professional-looking truth. This is especially the case here because often the bogus sites provide over-determined histories and credentials--pictures of certificates, lineages etc.--while the real sites provide only cursory histories and credentials.

For example, my dojo's website--and I claim my dojo to be legitimate--has no pictures of its official USAF dojo certificate, or my sensei's dan or shidoin certificates and it has no mention of my sensei's link back to O'Sensei. The thing is, even if it did, would these things be taken as legitimate by lay-persons, especially those who are otherwise tipped-off by these things as indicators of *illigitimacy* on the bogus sites? Interestingly, while my students always find my dojo's site and considere it reasonably trustworthy for many reasons, not just for the credentials of the sensei, I am ultimately unable to show them any place on the website itself that could constitute reasonable evidence of my sensei's credentials. They could, of course, have contacted the dojo and asked my sensei, but they did not and they clearly do not consider it an reasonable option. I wonder about that. Even assuming no time or resource restrictions, and putting aside the fact that in a real situation they absolutely should have contacted my sensei, should the website itself provide enough evidence of my sensei's credentials? If so, given the malleability of websites, what constitutes reasonable evidence? And how are lay-people, with no knowledge of a who's who of an MA, to judge? Indeed, how am I, an Aikidoka who knows virtually nothing of the Judo world, to judge the credentials of a Judo dojo's chief instructor? Of course I can look to see if the website includes links to recognized organizations etc., building up a gestalt judgement, and if I followed those conscientiously enough I could probably determine the legitimacy for myself to my satisfaction. But that would be a lot of work and I wonder if many people would bother. So that brings us back to just the single dojo website itself, and the primary problem.

To summarize the problem: how can a dojo website, on its own, demonstrate the legitimacy of its chief instructor to lay-persons?

I hope people find this a reasonable question/issue. I apologize if it has been asked before and if so would appreciate a link to the place/s where I can find out.

Until anon,

Sean

[Joseph Svinth]

The question is, in part, how do you define legitimacy? Is it based on who begat whom, or on some other standard (trophies, use by government agencies, paying money to national ranking bodies, and so on)? For this, you may want to take a look at Tom Green's essay, "Sense in Nonsense: The Role of Folk History in the Martial Arts," in the book "Martial Arts in the Modern World." About half the essay appears online at Amazon.com. See http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0275981533/qid=1116801803/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-7382535-0382404?v=glance&s=books ; click <EXCERPT>.

Now, some thoughts for producing a plausible web site. Your mileage may vary.

* Do your research. Then, put the bottom line up front. Most folks read maybe 250 words per minute, and if you don't catch them in the first minute, they're gone. So that means you have a hundred words to hook them.

* Avoid sycophancy, as students with their noses up Sensei's a** are off-putting.

* Include citations. Use links where possible, and newspaper-style citations where not possible. Quote accurately.

* Acknowledge differing perspectives. Admit your own biases, and point readers toward alternative explanations.

* Use photos and other images that tell a story rather ones that show me standing next to [insert name of famous guy who doesn't know me from Adam].

* Use standard grammar and spelling. I mean, if I can't trust you to spell fairly well, most of the time, then how can I trust you when you say you're teaching everything *exactly* like Sensei taught? (Unless, of course, you're saying that Sensei was semiliterate in several languages, which in some cases, is the Gospel truth.)

* Keep sentences and paragraphs short.

* Use bullets and white space.

* Use standard typefaces and fonts.

* Avoid red on black.

* Avoid freeservers that load visitors with spyware and pop-ups.

* Include contact information.


***

FWIW, your web site seems fine to me. So my advice? Don't worry about it. Your web site has done what it can. After that, it's up to the student to come to class, and see if the ambiance of the dojo is to his/her liking.

[theozpace]

G'day Joseph,


The question is, in part, how do you define legitimacy? Is it based on who begat whom, or on some other standard (trophies, use by government agencies, paying money to national ranking bodies, and so on)? For this, you may want to take a look at Tom Green's essay, "Sense in Nonsense: The Role of Folk History in the Martial Arts," in the book "Martial Arts in the Modern World." About half the essay appears online at Amazon.com. See http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0275981533/qid=1116801803/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-7382535-0382404?v=glance&s=books ; click <EXCERPT>.

I agree that legitimacy is indeed a complicated question, and will investigate these resources, but I must reiterate that the issue I have raised is not really my personal understanding of legitimacy, it is lay-people's understandings of legitmacy, particularly when choosing a dojo. Not every lay person can/should be expected to read these sources.


Now, some thoughts for producing a plausible web site. Your mileage may vary.
[CUT]

I would agree with many of the points you have made on the basis of sheer professionalism and web usability rather than the question of legitimacy for lay people. Many of those points are also made in the checklists that I referenced in my original post, which, as I pointed out, go some way to helping students sort out biases etc, but do not get to the special problem of MA instructor legitimacy.

The question/issue I raising is not limited to my dojo's website. It could apply to the website of many dojos, even those of very well-known instructors in the MA world, to lay-people. For example, look at the website for Woodstock Aikido, the chief instructor of which is the very well-respected Konigsberg Sensei (http://woodstockaikido.com/). Before I discuss it, I hasten to add that I am not in any way criticising the Woodstock Aikido website or Konigsberg Shihan. I am, rather, deliberately using someone who is beyond question to make my point clearer.

Putting aside that I know and you and most readers of this forum probably know or could reasonably easily find out Konigsberg Sensei's legitimacy, how is a lay person to judge this legitimacy from the site itself? The text in the instructor's section reads:

"Harvey Konigsberg Sensei is a 7th degree black belt in Aikido. One of the original students of Yoshimitsu Yamada Shihan, Konigsberg Sensei has been practicing Aikido for over 35 years. In addition to teaching in Woodstock, he also instructs at the New York Aikikai in Manhattan. Konigsberg Sensei teaches seminars across the U.S. and abroad as well.

All classes at Woodstock Aikido are taught by either Konigsberg Sensei or senior practitioners holding the rank of at least 1st degree black belt."

This, along with a picture of Konigsberg Sensei, is the entirety of the instructor's page. How is a lay-person to judge, from this page alone, the legitimacy of Konigsberg Sensei? The narrative provided here is every bit as thin, in some cases thinner, than cases described in the Baffling Budo section of this site. When E-budo folks go out to try and determine the legitimacy of instructors named in Baffling Budo, they do research, make calls etc., but I suspect that lay-people both would not and could not do so. Of course students could contact Konigsberg Sensei and talk to him, visit the dojo etc. but I think that many lay-people now make judgements about whether they will even do those things *based on the website alone*. Your point that it is up to lay-people to go to the dojo and decide for themselves is valid to a certain degree, but my question pre-empts that action. So I wonder how lay-people are deciding, for themselves, what is going to count as legitimacy, when they are faced only with, e.g. brief narratives.

Maybe lay-people are deciding legitimacy using principles similar to the ones you have suggested for making a website look professional. One would hope so, but of course the continued flourishing of fraudulent dojos means that this is not necessarily the case. Further, I put it to you that anyone fraudlent but really determined to look professional in the ways you have shown can do so regardless of their legitimacy. If that happens, what then is the lay-person to use to decide legitmacy?

So what I am proposing is that MA instructor legitimacy for lay-people is special problem that many websites are contending with--even if they do not know it--that goes beyond the suggestions you have made (although I reiterate that I agree with them for websites in general). I wrote this question not to just ease my anxiety about my dojo's website, but rather as an issue for MA websites in general.

Until anon,

Sean

[Joseph Svinth]

My guess is that the average beginner doing online research is not especially interested in legitimacy. Propinquity, sure. Have to travel more than a couple miles from home, school, or work? No way. Ethical stances may be of interest, too. Some folks want an instructor who is trying for sainthood, whereas others are looking for Chester the Molester's meaner sibling -- the late Mama Dearest, the flaming queen of 52s, comes to mind. But stylistic integrity? Please. That's of interest mostly to Internet flame warriors and the occasional antiquarian or amateur sociologist.

But, since you're concerned about it, then why not include a section in which you discuss legitimacy to your heart's content? If readers are interested, they'll read it, and if they aren't, well, they're never more than a couple clicks away from their favorite porn site, now are they?

[Mitch Saret]

The thing is, how does a lay person, with no knowledge of the martial arts anyway, judge the legitimacy of an instructor, or art, at all? He really cannot. Thus, it becomes difficult. I actually had a phone call once asking me if I could tech him to fight like Jackie Chan! I asked all the questions you would think of, did he know about Peking Opera? Does he want to movie fight or real defense? Things like that. I don't think he realized that it was entertainment. I obviously did not meet his needs. In his mind,I was probably not legitamate. I just celebrated my 30th year in the arts...boy, when did I get old? I have had a variety of instructors, most were legit, some were not.

The bottom line is this, in my opinion; Have the site look professional, Like Joe Svinth suggests. List the basics, but essentially drive the potential student to visit or call. Unless they want to do tons of research first, they won't be able to make a determination until they are actually involved.

Think about someone asking a mechanic for advice, but not knowing a thing about cars. Reminds me of a MAD Magazine bit...Then and Now...
Then; Mechanic tells a guy his thelman wire was corroded, so I had to replace it. That'll be 10 cents. Now; Your thelman wire was corroded, so I had to replace the engine. That'll be $642.45.

The consumer has to educate himself if he wants to know it all before hand.

[pgsmith]

My guess is that the average beginner doing online research is not especially interested in legitimacy. Propinquity, sure. Have to travel more than a couple miles from home, school, or work? No way. Ethical stances may be of interest, too.
I have to totally agree with Joseph and Mitch here. While it is an interesting class exercise, it isn't very well grounded in reality. People don't start worrying about legitimacy until they have been training for a while and become curious about roots, or they don't like something and begin to look deeper into a particular school. Your average lay-person would have no clue, and much more than likely no interest, in legitimacy. For that matter, they probably wouldn't even be aware of legitimacy issues in the martial arts.

Just my thoughts on it.

[seanrintel]

G'day all,

These are interesting replies, not quite what I expected for two reasons. Let me address those reasons then see if I can take the issue in a bit of a different direction.

First, I raised the issue initially here, using the exercise as stimulus, as an attempt to generate discussion about the flip-side of what is done in the Bad Budo section, especially the funny budo links thread. It got me thinking that if that's how illegitimate instructors present themselves (rather than the professionalism of the site itself) looks like, what might legitimate instructors do to present themselves. Perhaps that's a simpler way to ask the question, and people should feel free to respond, particularly with examples of sites that they think are particularly good at demonstrating legitimacy.

Second, I'm surprised that the respondents to this thread so far are claiming that lay-people have no interest in legitimacy without some trigger (e.g. some time training, a bad event) or pre-existing tendency (internet flame warrior, amateur sociologist). I'm quite ready to be persuaded of this claim with evidence. However, without evidence, I wonder if that is an assumption. Further, I'd be somewhat surprised that people--even those who are somewhat 'deluded' about the nature of MA--had no interest in legitimacy at all. After all, at some point they need to make the decision that X dojo will be able to teach them Y skills, and they need to make that decision on some form of evidence. If the website is all they look at, how are they making that decision? I'd invite comment on that too.

To change the direction of the discussion somewhat, let us assume that evidence could be found that bears out that lay-people are not, at least not at first, interested in legitimacy. Should we, as a responsible MA community, do something about that, especially for potential students, on dojo websites? Either morally, or perhaps just out of sense of getting our side of the story straight, perhaps we should consider that action and education about legitimacy should not be one-sided affairs? I'm not suggesting taking to the streets, or pushing this information to inboxes etc., or that potential students should not take some of the responsibility on themselves, but perhaps it might be a responsible position to help novices make informed decisions? If that is the case, then how could that be achieved?

Until anon,

Sean

[Blackwood]

I agree with the basic tenents:

The site should be neat and clean, avoiding flash and music and nasty color schemes. Look professional.

But to establish credibility? Tough one!

My thoughts:

State facts. Not overwhelming ones, but the basic facts. I like the description of Harvey Konigsberg Sensei.

I like to take advantage of the power of the web and create links on names, terms and other items that people, particularly the 'layman' might not be familiar with. This shows an understanding of the audience without talking down to them. And providing cross references is always good.

I think a person that visits a web site on martial arts is typically looking for one of two things. They want to know about the martial art, and/or they want to know about attending or participating in that art. And if I have to dig through a ridiculous resume, flash icons and bragging, I'm not going to stick around.

Establishing credibility starts with that first impression.

[Mitch Saret]

Sean,
I can only reply this way. From personal experience, a lay person doesn't know there is a problem with legitimacy, so why ask. I only sa this about people I know, who have no interest in the arts. Now, assuming that a person knows nothing except he wants to be able to defend himself, lose weight, improve self discipline, whatever, he goes into the local "karate" school that has been in the neighborhood for ages.

He sees an impressive wall of photos, trophies, certificates, and the like. Including what looks like some very fancy diplomas in very pretty oriental writing. To this person, everything looks legit. It's the same on a website. To the person who knows nothing, there is nothing wrong.

When you go to the Dr.'s office you see his diploma, several usually. Now, of course the odds are you will have heard of the school on the diploma, but what if you didn't. What if it just sounded good. You assume all is well. There are ways to check on the doc, of course, but will you?

Same with a mechanic, lawyer, or other profession with certifications. A lay person assumes legitimacy.

Did you know there is another option for a lawyer besides joining the local bar? There is in Illinois. I didn't know that until I found this out from a friend in town who is a lawyer. He had his certificate on the wall and I had to ask him about it. He explained. A so called "master" can do the same.

This is getting long winded, but a layperson who wants to know will find out. One who isn't concerned will eventually find out.

[seanrintel]

G'day Mitch,


Sean,
I can only reply this way. From personal experience, a lay person doesn't know there is a problem with legitimacy, so why ask.
<CUT>

I agree with your basic point that many laypeople assume legitimacy, and your Dr/Lawyer examples are very good. But in response to your question "why ask?" I would reiterate my previous response. If the MA community gets up in arms about "Bad Budo" and "Baffling Budo", and this comes largely from looking at the websites of fraudlent instructors, then it might be nice/useful/responsible for the MA community to think about ways of *demonstrating* legitmacy. At the moment the implication seems to be that MA is largely a "buyer beware" situation, but that doesn't seem very fair on prospective students. Why not think about how legitimacy can be demonstrated on a website so that laypeople *do* see it as an issue and *can* start to judge for themselves?

Until anon,

Sean

[Trevor Johnson]

In my case, I run a very fast first check. I basically have a scale of supposed legitimacy that runs as an inverse of the number of titles possessed by the teacher. I then check age, and divide my legitimacy scale by the age of the teacher, which means that the younger he/she/it is, with the more ranks/titles, the lower a score they get. So, yes, less is more. After that, I start more in-depth investigation.

Now, a picture of the teacher is a good thing in establishing legitimacy. In my mind, they should be doing as little posturing as possible. You need to see age vs ranks, and if they're looking like fools then they probably are illegitimate, or just lousy, no? That's how we get tons of fools who don't know their swords from their baseball bats, is they try to pose with them to demonstrate expertise. Also, calm and lack of ferocity might help. If the teacher's strutting and trying to look like a badass, probably's not good.

One thing that would be nice, and probably very difficult to do, is a lineage tree. I'm a molecular biologist and sometime geneticist, and I love looking at pedigrees. So, some more centralized site with that information that they can link to might help. A nice large map that can zoom in on the person of interest and out to see the larger lineage might help. Also, a definitive "how long have you been training" would be good.
One other thing is that this wishful site would do well to have lists of criteria to look for in a teacher and of real organizations that they link to.

One problem I've seen is that a lot of good organizations have lousy web presences, and a lot of crap orgs have great web pages. I don't know how to fix this.

Just some thoughts. Not sure how valuable they are.

[Trevor Johnson]

Hey, I just had an idea. Post a link to e-budo on the webpage with a comment that you're fairly well-known here and if they want to check you out, they can.

Or we could do an E-budo seal of quality, if we REEEEAAAALY want to go overboard...

[seanrintel]

G'day all,

Interesting replies with some good ideas. It would be neat to take a poll of/do interviews with interested novices to see what they think, particularly to see if--as seems to be the general concensus here--basic and quite web-design principles are of more use than specific content per se. I might ask my students this Summer and report back at some point.

Until anon,

Sean

[NathanH]

...People don't start worrying about legitimacy until they have been training for a while and become curious about roots, or they don't like something and begin to look deeper into a particular school. Your average lay-person would have no clue, and much more than likely no interest, in legitimacy. For that matter, they probably wouldn't even be aware of legitimacy issues in the martial arts.Legitimacy, I just want to know if the place's instructor should be in an asylum or not... ;)

Here's a still new person's thoughts. I've been shopping for some type budo for my sons to join for about 3 years. I finally decided on Kendo about 3 months ago (the stars aligned properly). It was something I wanted to do, but then so are things like Jujitsu, Aikido, Judo and other arts. I had some meager knowledge but not much going before I started shopping. I had heard about belt fee traps, bad instructors, and plenty of crazy things along with the good things.

As a parent and lay-person, my thoughts were:
- Is it accessible (location/time)
- Is it affordable
- Is it a scam
- Are the instructors/class appropriate
- Will my kids benefit from it
- Can we participate together
- How can I check up on it

I finally determined that I would simply have to visit and observe any location myself to determine if it would be acceptable. To that end, accurate information and good contact information are the most helpful.

Links to other dojos and federations to demonstrate references, with links back demonstrate community that can be identified. Those are excellent, especially when active forums are involved. It clearly shows that a given site isn't isolated doing their own thing. The group may still be bad, but it does help provide a bit of a sanity check.

As as mentioned before, even not so pretty websites are ok. Clean and professional looking is good. Good presentation with updated content is better. I've seen several sites that I really couldn't tell if they were worthwhile or not. So, it come down to visits to determine--for most the schedules never aligned.

So, I would agree that legitimacy isn't really an issue for a lay-person. Judging legitimacy requires far more knowledge about a topic than one can have before they start. The first step for lay-people is to make sure the people aren't obviously crazy and are presenting something near decent instruction. Later they can be interested in tracing roots. It will come up, but until you have enough knowledge there's no way to judge legitimacy other than again looking for those links (international/national/regional organizations) and simply trusting they're real.

-Nathan

[seanrintel]

G'day Nathan,

Thanks for weighing in. Your relative novice experience is very valuable. It's good to have some evidence that lay-people may not look for legitimacy and may instead look for what would actually pass as good web design in any context.



I've seen several sites that I really couldn't tell if they were worthwhile or not. So, it come down to visits to determine--for most the schedules never aligned.

These would be interesting cases. Could you tell us about them, and why you were dubious?

Until anon,

Sean

[gendzwil]

I finally decided on Kendo about 3 months ago
Clearly, a man of distinction and taste.

[NathanH]

Thanks for weighing in. Your relative novice experience is very valuable. It's good to have some evidence that lay-people may not look for legitimacy and may instead look for what would actually pass as good web design in any context.*cough* No background images over text *cough* ;) No insult intended there... It's just that readability really suffers. Some people like it, other impatient people like me just want information fast.

These would be interesting cases. Could you tell us about them, and why you were dubious?Recognizing that I know nothing more than that 4 paragraph introduction for a martial arts compendium, means that I can't possibly recognize pedigree. I'm pretty lost when it comes to martial arts, but not nearly as lost as most. Yes, I can recognize various names like Shotokan, Muay Thai, Tang Soo Do, Bujinkan, and Choi Kwan Do; but I couldn't tell you how to tell a charlatan with fake credentials and his cohorts framing an organization from a real player. Given that, I would have to go by personal recommendations and trial and error. I did ask around quite a bit. I have some distant friends who've studied in Japan. I was told repeatedly, nothing really good around here. Again, guys who are interested in budo--not entertainment, competition, or simple self-defense.

Consider the goals of the person searching. I was looking specifically for a budo type school. Tae Kwon Do in the competition form was already off the list. For others, building confidence, self-defense, "martial arts" or "karate" may be the only thing on the list. If you're looking purely at marketing to build a dojo, those may the real target audience you're looking to reach.

Let's see how good the memory is... I started with basic web searches like "martial arts michigan" and such. How about I run the search again and walk through my thought process.. of course I'm out of time, but I'll try for a bit.. If you're related to any of these places, feel free to solicit me to visit... ;)

Wading past lots of lists of lists..

http://a2amas.com/ It looks like a nice community type site. Right up front they have a kids program and seem very organized. Very straightforward with times, costs and locations. Only complaint, no e-mail contact--what's a website without an e-mail contact. Actually, these guys were on the top of the list.

http://hv-aikido.com/ I see one young guy with one other older person and a staged B&W photo. Times are not simple but findable. Costs aren't real straightforward, found via the "Special Offer" link. Looks like their in an industrial park at the moment (hey, it's cost effective space). A couple links, but nothing I could make heads or tails of quickly. Some pictures of confident classes of normal looking people would be very reassuring. Goes into the visit, may not be good category.

http://www.aikidoyoshokai.org/dojos.htm comes up next with references to other local places, and a link to Genyokan (I didn't see this months ago). I see an address, class dates, directions. Looks as reputable as any of the others at this point.

I see a couple of university groups, but no idea how those will be, especially for elementary/middle schoolers. YMCA may work out, but I've not had the best experiences with some the YMCA locations, so no bonuses for being YMCA.

Picking up the phone book and driving down the street, I see a Choi Kwon Do franchise, and then there's Bollard's Tang Soo Do down the road a bit. (I may have misspelled the name.) Lot of trophies in Bollard's window, a phone number and it's always closed. Friends say it's heavy on competition emphasis. I even found a Muay Thai gym in Detroit.

So, from this nothing really excites me. I'll have to call, get the machine, leave messages, and arrange to visit each of them. I have no idea what the quality of any of them are, or really how to tell what it's going to be like without showing up a couple of times.

I happened to know a guy who did kendo out in Troy, so I had a reference there. That sounded interesting. I was in the SCA back in college, and sword stuff is always cool, right? It was esoteric enough that mom wouldn't complain much, and the kids would find it exciting. I never found any website for that or even a phone book listing, and the coworker had retired a few years ago. I did find the Midwest Kendo Federation and Eastern Michigan's site. Then links to Detroit Kendo, Eastern (EMU) and U-Mich. I tried to e-mail the contact person on the Midwest Kendo dojo listing for Detroit Kendo in Troy but received no response...

I decided to just show up at EMU's practice since site encouraged it. I tried to find time to visit EMU as it's not too far from home, but the job schedule made it impossible midweek. For anything, we'd have to be able to get home, get the kids, get ready, and drive across town regularly and on time. That was a big deal.

The kendo links were very straightforward from organization to organization, pictures of participants and direct discussion about it. The times weren't always correct though. I found EMU's gym empty on a Sunday afternoon for the listed beginner's practice. A few month's later, after a job change, I had the option to truly pick. I dropped Charlie at EMU an e-mail, and he replied with lightning speed. I stopped by alone to see how things went... They threw me right in to shuffling my feet and getting blistered. I'm hooked despite the fact I tear my feet up from bad footwork every week, and my oldest son joined his brother and me this last week.

Dang, I was supposed to leave about 5 minutes after I started typing. Sorry for the book, I don't have time to edit it down... I'm here too late now, must flee!!! :(

[aikidoc1]

Sean:

I was involved in a heavily viewed thread on Fraud in Aikido on the Aiki-web some time back. The result was a set of criteria we came up with to check for Aikido frauds based on input from the audience. Over 13,000 viewings came up. There are a lot of frauds starting to pop up in the aikido world now and this was a frustration with that bastardization of the art and ranks.

I used my website to set the example and have included the following:
1. My credentials and dates awarded, by whom and the Aikikai registration and certificate numbers so anyone can check my legitimacy via contacting the Aikikai.
2. I also put a link on the bottom of the page that displays results from the fraud discussion on how to chose an aikido school as well as my lineage in a matrix.

My site has the credentials of all my instructors as well as mine which are all easily verifiable.

Here is the site: http://members.cox.net/aikidoc1. Go to the instructor section and you'll see my and my instructors listed with our information in detail where avaible (one new shodan and we don't have his numbers yet). Scroll down to the bottom of the page and the link will take you to the fraud check document and my lineage matrix.