somewhere between yesterday and tomorrow

Well, it has been quite a while since I’ve made a post. Two to three weeks, I guess. Since Winter Break ended, I’ve had way too much work to do, what with finals and club stuff, as well as the fact that I got sick. The day before finals started. Yeah, it sucked. Ah well.

While I won’t be typing up an official post per se, I will be showing you a few ideas I have for posts which I will probably expand on in the (hopefully near) future. I typed most of these up on the fly when having a sudden idea, so they probably won’t have the best grammar or spelling or word choice in the world.

1) touhou and web 2.0

read this first: http://cardcaptor.moekaku.com/2008/09/01/riding-on-fans-energy-touhou-fan-culture-and-grassroot-entertainment/

basically, the idea of web 2.0 is very similar to that which the otaku community has been doing for many years: “foster[ing] innovation in the assembly of systems and sites composed by pulling together features from distributed, independent developers.” (quote from wikipedia. I know, not the best quote. whatever.)
the example ima use is touhou. thats when you go read the first link now.
basically, ZUN created a huge phenomenon. how? by “inspir[ing] its fans to create” (from the touhou article)
you can read more about how he did it in the article
i just want to connect the web 2.0 idea to the thing them otaku have been doing for a long time now.
yeah, thats it for now.
tl,dw.
(if you didnt get that, look up tl,dr)

I’ll probably add to this after I go to this speech on web 2.0 I’m going to sometime in Feb and learn a bit more about it.
From what I know, they at least seem similar.

2) why watch anime?

why does one watch anime?
at first, one may watch it because they are mesmerized
to avoid reality
to watch people do things you would never think of doing
to explore exciting new lands beyond one’s imagination

but, in the end
by watching anime, you learn something about yourself
think of it as human nature 101
in order for anime to be popular, one needs to be able to connect to the anime
and that connection is human nature
usually, something within the anime, usually a major theme of some sort, teaches the viewer something about themself
we can connect to that part of human nature and are attracted to it.
at least, below surface level, all the nice animation or cool explosions
there lies something which we can all connect to
that is why we watch anime.

a saying goes that we learn from our struggles
in anime, there is always struggle
if there were no struggle, there would be no story (ok, slice of life is an exception. but in slice of life, it is much easier to find something to connect to (see previous paragraph))
one could say that we learn from the characters’ struggles

or, i could stop spewing out random crap.

examples:
clannad: family (cite MOE blog)
->change vs the status quo: a theme that’s been popping up recently
–>it is almost human nature to dislike change, whether it be for better or worse (ok, dont talk to me about obama. thats simply because bush sucked SO MUCH, we needed to have change)
–>we can connect to okazaki’s dislike for change
–>i did read something in a book recently about “status quo bias”

I might put some links for this later.

other ideas:
a blog post on 5cm/sec: symbols, themes
a post on seating placement in anime (always in back, usually near window -> well, at least, never in the front.)
->does this tell us about the target audience/the characters in the anime?

ef ~desu: symbols
toradora: dig a bit deeper, look under surface level. looks stereotypical, but it aint.
->toradora really should be a visual novel. choose who you want, go with it. screw “canon endings”.
–>wait: “A visual novel based on the series will be produced by Namco Bandai Games playable on the PlayStation Portable and will be released in April 2009.” says wikipedia. sounds epic.

note: congrats to sankaku complex for its partnership with nico nico, a relationship which will be benefical to both communities, opening up nico nico to the english community and giving both sites more hits.
read more: http://www.sankakucomplex.com/2009/01/23/niconico-douga-charts-at-sankaku-complex/
http://www.sankakucomplex.com/2009/01/20/niconico-complex-niconico-douga-unlocked/