What to begin with - a point of view
Difficulty: Beginner
The question was what was the best course of action a beginner who learned the rules by himself, feels weak and does not know any good player in the vicinity.
Playing on any of the internet servers is an obvious thing.
- lavalyn - the Internet servers are great, but I strongly discourage using
IGS - if the median rank is in the dans, and the mean rank in the 2-3k range, you're not going to find opponents that you can learn from. KGS has people that will happily give teaching games and reviews.
But I would advise you to study a little before rushing into the fray.
Before playing you have to develop some understanding of
- what to do in the the stages of the game: opening, middle game and endgame;
- two basic tactical ideas: ladders and nets;
- some simple tesuji;
- notions about territory and thickness;
- solve some simple life and death and capturing race problems;
- typical endgame technique.
I think that some theoretical knowledge in the very beginning is better than learning everything from your own experience of heavy losses.
So, I'd recommend to start with reading a book.
Marco (the one who asked) : Thanks a lot, Sensei :)
Stefan: See also BeginnerStudySection.
lavalyn: See also Hikaru no Go and watch those Go Go Igo sessions!