Otaku Links: My oldtaku is showing

Otaku Links

10 years ago

It’s almost time for the Twelve Days of Anime, Scamp’s long-running meme in which bloggers write about the anime they watched this year. I’m already writing up my posts in advance. You should participate, too!

The Shirobako cast illustrates the egregious world of anime income disparities using the bright, cheerful character designs it is known for. The show itself does a great job humanizing the thankless jobs of animators, too.

Saved for posterity: one of the earliest ever mentions of anime on the Web, this UseNet post from 1985. Hat tip: @gabbomatic.

Also in Oldtaku News: Anime Web Turnpike is kaput, just shy of 20 years old. I used to use this in middle school to find Gundam Wing “shrines,” as we called fan pages back then. Anybody else remember those days?

I love when people leave their website links while commenting on Otaku Journalist, because then I get to find new blogs to read. Lately I’ve been enjoying reader Amby Felix’s cooking blog, where she makes treats inspired by her favorite anime and video games.

“It seems that when you want to make a woman into a hero, you hurt her first. When you want to make a man into a hero, you hurt… also a woman first.” Leigh Alexander on our one-step sympathetic games protagonist problem.

Other stuff I’ve written this week: a reader appreciation post on Gunpla 101, reviews of Denki-Gai, Yowamushi Pedal, and Gundam Build Fighters Try.

Art via Twitter The Comic.

Christmas present ideas for anime fans

Fandom, Figures and Toys, Japan

10 years ago

When I was in seventh grade, I spent a weekend carefully printing out pictures of the four main characters of The Slayers, cutting them out, and pasting them onto my school binder. I wish I could show my 13-year-old self how it is today, now that you can buy merchandise from T-shirts to school supplies for every possible anime.

I love that convenience, but what I don’t like is how so much anime merchandise is the same wherever I go online. So I set a precedent with last year’s Otaku Holiday Shopping Guide to showcase something other than endless Zazzle shirts featuring Pocky.

Here are twelve gift ideas fit for that special anime fan or Japanophile on your holiday shopping list. As usual, Amazon links are affiliate; all other links are not.

1. Olympus Poster. Boomslank’s indie designs that are evocative of anime, but not fan art. Their latest poster is inspired by Gundam Unicorn. $20, boomslank.com.

2. Snack Subscription. A monthly box stuffed full of Japanese treats to supplement even the most ravenous otaku diet. $10+, skoshbox.com.

3. Geek Travel Guide. Because reading A Geek in Japan is sure as heck a lot cheaper than actually making the trip. $10, amazon.com.

4. Party Game. Channel A: The Anime Pitch Party Game was invented by my friend Ewen Cluney and is crazy fun. $19, amazon.com.

5. Personalized Stamp. In Hiragana, my name is ろうれん. What’s yours? Get it on a hand-carved custom stamp. $20, StampsbySachi on Etsy.

6. Bento Book. I bought it because of anime, but I actually find myself eating healthier when I cook recipes from this book. $12, amazon.com.

7. Tentacle Nails. None will be the wiser when you wear the appendages of anime’s most infamous sea creature on your fingers. $10, espionagecosmetics.com.

8. Fullmetal Makeup. Wear your love for Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood to the office without getting in trouble with the dress code. $1 – $6, shirocosmetics.com.

9. Kawaii Shirt. Visual artist OMOCAT’s fashion forward designs take inspiration from anime, games, and glitch art. $30 – $45, omocat-shop.com.

10. Pixel Pad. Support an independent artist and write the most kawaii grocery lists ever with this “Dreamy Tokyo” notepaper. $8.50, heychickadee.com.

11. Doki Doki Print. A minimalist typographic print that any shoujo manga fan will understand. $13, vbtypography on Etsy.

12. Snowy Figure. Some Nendoroids are simply works of art, like this winter special edition of Hatsune Miku. $110, amazon.com.

Christmas gifts for anime fans, 2015

The Otaku Holiday Shopping Guide 2013

Otaku Journalist is five years old!

Uncategorized

10 years ago

Me in early 2010 and late 2014. Still blogging, still wearing funny things on my head.

This is my 563rd post. That means I’ve been blogging about 112 days a year for five years now here on Otaku Journalist.

I try to write something on my anniversary every year. In 2010 I had a giveaway. In 2011 I did a recap. In 2013 I summed up my entire life as it grew around the blog, perhaps to make up for 2012 when I simply forgot!

I started blogging because I thought it’d be a helpful way to start my career as a writer. Now that I have one (no small thanks to this blog), I write to have somewhere to share my independent thoughts, to have a home online where I’m not indebted to any company and I don’t have to answer to anyone about what I post. I keep it up to make my mark amidst the noise of the Internet.

Various Otaku Journalist blog themes from over the years. There have been three total.

Blogs are so temporary. If you don’t keep them up it’s like they never existed. There’s so much interesting content to read on the Internet that if Otaku Journalist disappeared, nobody would miss it but me. That’s how it should be. People say the blog is dead, but it’s really only blogging for the approval of other people that’s a dead concept. I love my readers and I count myself lucky for every person I manage to drag away from Facebook or Twitter for a moment with my weird anime thoughts, but I also know it’s up to me to earn their time.

This year I’ve been experimenting with more permanent ways of making my writing last, namely in books. Otaku Journalism was completely a result of this blog, and of the back and forth I’ve been lucky to have with journalism students ever since I became a journalist.

I think the most fitting way to celebrate Otaku Journalist’s 5th birthday is to make my knowledge more accessible. So starting today, Otaku Journalism is $2.99.

Whether you’ve been reading Otaku Journalist for five years or five months or five days, thank you for taking a look. Let’s see where the next five years take us.

Otaku Links: No, it’s not Friday

Otaku Links

10 years ago

Welcome to the extra-early edition of Otaku Links! As it turns out, this Friday is Otaku Journalist’s FIVE YEAR ANNIVERSARY not that I’m excited or anything, so I want to do a special post for that. Until then, enjoy some Wednesday links.

I’ve only turned in one episode review so far this week, for Yowamushi Pedal. I compared Midousuji and Machimiya as effective villains.

More writing by me! This has nothing at all to do with anime, but I wrote an essay about my first year of being married over at Femsplain.

The simplicity of Gundam Build Fighters. Wendeego goes into depth about what makes GBF special despite starting out as a toy commercial.

Where do you buy anime figures? Confusedmuse knows, and she has a massive collection to back up her knowledge. Here are their top picks.

How Assassin’s Creed Unity weaponized review embargoes. Ubisoft put a gag order on reporters not to talk about their new game until 12 hours after it had been released to the public. Ethics in games journalism, indeed.

Is anime a genre or a medium? I’d say medium myself since it spans dozens of genres (action, fantasy, romance, etc.) but Serdar takes a close look.

Justin at Organization Anti-Social Geniuses interviewed Crunchyroll’s senior brand manager, Tiffany Chen. I was especially interested in the part that went behind the scenes of the so-so Crunchyroll Reddit AMA.

Kernel, the Daily Dot’s Sunday magazine, published an entire issue on what they’re calling the geek girl revolution, spanning every topic from girl gamers to woman inventors to geek fashion.

Photo via boredpanda

The Gundam Holiday Shopping Guide

Figures and Toys

10 years ago

Here’s something I spent a week building for my other blog, Gunpla 101, the Ultimate Gundam Holiday Shopping Guide. There are eight different gift categories for every kind of Gundam gift we could think of! John and I picked stuff like our favorite anime and manga, clothing and lifestyle gifts, and some super-deformed or SD Gunpla that I think would make awesome Christmas tree ornaments.

As long time readers know, I launched Gunpla 101 this spring after learning that an article I wrote on Gundam modeling in 2012 was (and continues to be) the most popular blog post on all of Otaku Journalist. Today, Gunpla 101 makes enough through affiliate linking so that I don’t have to worry about the costs of keeping any of my blogs online.

I keep mentioning on Twitter that I believe affiliate linking to be the most honest, least annoying way to support your sites online—especially if you have an anime, manga, or figure blog and you can link to products you already love. If you have any questions about getting started in affiliate linking, send them to me. I think it’s time I update my how-to.

Photo by Jerry Wong