Picture Perfect Paranoia

Halloween stirs imagination in costume-loving Japan - Yahoo! News

You know, sometimes I wonder if there is a similar occurence of associating Halloween with childhood escapism. Well it would seem that my thoughts were heard.

Funny how costumes became a symbol of freedom from restriction of attire.

I decided to kill time by going to one of my favorite bookstores here in Manila. At first, my intended priority in going was to check up on that book I inquired about just last month. While waiting for the request to be processed, I then turned my gaze towards the “Graphic Novels” section, which just happens to be facing the counter and being covered by the opaque wall , displaying the book-of-the-week opposite it.

Taking a peek on the shelves of mangas, a few of them in tankoubon form, I noticed the demography of buyers as they browse through the huge selection of titles, from the obscure to the more familiar ones. I then noticed a small sign plastered in the middle dividing shelf. It read, “Do Not Open or Browse Through“.

It is then that I recalled a similar discussion surrounding bookstore policies being revised for the benefit of customer service and book quality. As it seems, the issue isn’t just relevant to those in the other side of the Pacific, but seem to be in occurence here as well. Imagine that.

And to think that this is merely a coincidence. Or that the bookstore I went through is just a local branch of an international chain of bookstores.

Twins Sent to Jail for Extorting from Akihabara Otaku - ANN

Haha. And they thought we could be entrapped by money. We not stupid.

Typical law students.

You know, if there is some issues that I cannot fathom in the anime fandomverse, it’s the point and intentions of those nitpicking “fans”. (I’m looking at a particular elitist with a JLPT1 under the belt)

Why do they do this?

What do they expect to gain in return for their actions?

What are their reasons behind their decision (and consequent action) to pounce upon those within the lower ranking of understanding Japanese (or better yet, foreign) culture?

We look into this “dorama” here at PPP.

Read the rest of this entry »

Me thinks I’ve just (though at a really late time) realized why the delay in page refreses during my comment moderation sessions.

And it’s sort of a server hiccup.

Things have been moving along slowly than I expected. As you can see, I’ve been posting albeit at a slower pace. And this is not due to my thesis experiment, which is by the way going along smoothly. It’s just that I have too much on my mind lately, with exams going left and right my way, so I haven’t got enough time to think about what to post on a given day, on a daily preset basis.

Apologies. ^^;;

Family Honors Anime Fan Killed While Serving in Iraq - ANN

19-year-old Private First Class Christian Neff was killed in action in Baghdad on September 19. Because Neff was an anime fan, his family hung one of his figures from the newly dedicated tree.

Here’s something that I think is worthy of a tribute, albeit on a war as pointless as where it’s been fought.

Lately I’ve been experiencing connection time-outs as I was moderating comments as spam and I have no idea at the moment as to the cause, and as such I’ve planned to telling Maestro about it.

Has anybody been experiencing these brief intermittent time-outs as well?

Heisei Democracy - Modern Visual Culture Digest » Protoculture News: “moe” propaganda book goes on sale

Seriously, wtf?

…

the book’s content includes such themes as “the reason Japan hasn’t been invaded until now is the presence of the JSDF and the US military”, “there are other righteous wars that should be fought beyond wars of self-protection”, “in order to be accepted as a trusted, normal member of the international community, we must amend the constitution”, “rational countries such as Japan should possess nuclear weapons”, “are there any other countries beyond China, North Korea and South Korea who object to devotional shrine visits honoring our war dead?”, and “sexy miko in lingerie”.

…

Frankly this concept is bound to get trashed. It may not be tomorrow, or even next season, who knows. I mean, seriously, moe as propaganda? I bet the guys who thought of this stuff don’t have a clue as to how they could represent the overall concept of moe in “sexy miko in lingerie”, for instance.

Cheap propaganda. :V

9rules’ New Rules at BasuGasuBakuhatsu Anime Blog

You know, looking at the slew of comments left by ex-members, as well as those who have “jumped ship”, I’m having mixed feelings on where 9Rules is heading.

At one point, when they announced the whole “you have been invited to join the 9rules network” invitation, I was post haste interested in joining, as I’ve never been in a “community” as big as 9rules is (or was, I mean). Looking at my partipiation rate at the Animeblogger Forums and the Anime Nano forums made me that interested. I really want in.

Then again, some community do “devolve” into elitist orgs when they list down additional “rules”, such as this:

If you feel you are contributing by your entries being shown only, 9rules is no longer a good fit for you, decline the agreement (or do not respond), please remove the leaf from your site and we will remove your site from displaying on 9rules.

This made me want to spit in their faces and tell them, “Screw you. I suggest you step in our shoes, or better yet, ask yourselves if you have lives.”

Kinda harsh, but really, we have two kinds of personas: the virtual persona you see on the Internet, and the “real persona” wherever you look around.

This is somehow funny or amusing, depending on your perspective, but I seem to recall how “my epenis got deflated” (which is what I said in this post) got hit 3 times. I thought I was the only one living under the rock for some time.

So, as a final word, “A community isn’t measured by standards, but by organic interaction,” (to quip Hung)

Apparently for some reason, other than the fact that today is Moé Day, here’s the finalized list of what I will watch for this Fall Season thing:

• D.C. II (Da Capo II) Genre: Drama, Romance, Harem, Fantasy, Comedy
• Shakugan no Shana II - Second Genre: Fantasy, Action, Romance
• Clannad Genre: School, Romance
• Genshiken - Second Season
• Kodomo no Jikan Genre: Moe, Comedy, Romance, Ecchi

Oh shi-

If it weren’t for me randomly browsing through Anime Nano, I would never have known of a very important occasion. At least for anime devoutees of the voice of the Goddess of Haruhiism herself, Aya Hirano.

Otanjobu omedetou, Aya-sama!

From time to time, I look up my top search queries, seeing what keywords people use that lead to this blog. Unfortunately, most of them are irrelevant that I sometimes find myself laughing out loud at what they are thinking when they typed those queries.

Here’s a partial list, based on “average top position” ¹:

07. loliporn                          (03)
13. doijinshi                        (03)
14. anime p                         (03)
06. fictionpress                    (04)
15. picture perfect torrent      (04)
17. wtflmao                         (04)
08. hinamizawa                    (06)
12. male anime pictures        (06)
03. “d addicts”                     (08)
04. animenano                     (08)
05. anime nano                    (08)
18. anime chronicles             (08)
01. tokyotosho                     (10)
02. sagubooru                      (10)

… which, by the way, are on the Top 10.

And here’s what they kept clicking, again based on the same “criterion”:

05. loliporn                         (02)
11. intercourse demo           (03)
12. shakugan no shana chibi (04)
13. bros and babes              (05)
04. hare hare yukai              (06)
07. hinamizawa                   (06)
16. communist anime           (06)

Noticed some similarities? I bet you do.

• Both lists “loliporn” at the top (#03 for the first; #02 for the second). What am I, a desk for lolicon and pornography?
• Also wtf is “intercourse demo” doing in the second list? I remember not ever writing about it. Must be the result of pairing two words not related to each other, creating a new search query, which I personally have no direct control in. o.O
• What’s up with “picture perfect torrent” and “wtflmao” tying for 4^th position? I have no idea. XD
• Hinamizawa appeared on both partial lists, which might show how popular my post about real life locations in Hinamizawa (the setting for the now infamous Higurashi series) was… I think.

¹Average top position is the highest position any page from your site ranked for that query. Since the index is dynamic, this may not be the same as the current position of your site for this query.

This almost escaped my radar if it weren’t for this handy-dandy counter at my dashboard.

Blog Stats

---

There are currently 189 posts and 504 comments, contained within 17 categories.

Congrats to my 500th commenter, Mr Uriel of Liminality, who commented on my article about the imminent demise of the loli and under-15 genre in Akihabara.

I don’t have the merchandise award for you mate, but to give me your voice on matters I blog about is a contribution worth commending.

Arrested school vice principal says he is a ’superstar’ among pedophiles - Mainichi Shimbun

So not only do pedophiles satiate their desire for young children (mostly girls), but this one is even boasting of his pride as one, even “profited” from what this person has done. This pales in comparison to, say, pedophiles residiing in America who just stalk, assault, abuse and leave their victims with a threat.

Toddler uncovers box cutter in sandpit in Osaka - Mainichi Shimbun

Well, what do we have here? At least the toddler didn’t get stabbed when the item in question was unearthened.

I think this guy says it best regarding the latest string of killings:

Between the ax murder that cause Higurashi Kai preempted and this new situation. You can not say that TV do not affect real life choices. Some people can not not determine what is fiction and what is real. To just says that these people is ruining for the fans is immature. These people have real life mental issues that should be take lightly. (emphasis mine) The brain is a very complex thing that we can not infer that TV or any media do not puts thoughts that cause radical thinking.

naruto fan 09812