Just a note, but I’m not following this year’s Saimoe Tournament all that closely. Unlike previous years, I can’t participate this time around due to my being banned from posting on 2ch. I suppose I could go through the trouble of connecting via a proxy, but given how involved the voting process is to begin with, the extra complication just pushes the task into the, “Ah, screw it,” category.
It amazes me how many Japanese otaku, marginalized as they are within their own society, can be so damn xenophobic when it comes to their interaction with foreigners. Get over yourselves, already.
Oh, and if you’re still in 2ch’s good graces and would like to vote for Mugi-choco in today’s contest for me, I’d appreciate it.
Mugi may have a tough time just getting out of round 1 against Yin of DtB. Even if Mugi does get out of the first round, I think Kagami of Lucky Star is the favorite to advance as the D2 representative.
This year I’m voting in the Korean Moe Tournament instead–there’s an English page and voting is a far easier than Saimoe. You have to download a small executable to generate an authentication code each day, but voting is done an a normal web page where you pick who you want to vote for, like any other normal poll on the web:
http://moet.anizone.net/index.php?lang=eng
It’s hard to believe, sitting here in a “Web 2.0″ world in 2007, that Saimoe still makes you vote by posting to 2ch…maybe it is just a way to deter us gaijin-tachi from voting, who knows…
*sniff* I won’t let you down! =D (never knew voting was so complicated!)
I do like how Hidamari Sketch has had a strong showing so far. And that’s pretty much the only reason why I’m paying attention to this tournament. :P
Hidamari Sketch did not have as strong showing in Korean Moe Tournament. Miyako seems to be the most popular girl in Korean Tournament for some reason. Maybe you could mobilize some votes for the Korean Moe Tournament.
Even the people in the industry that HAVE to interact with foreigners (such as license dealers) are xenophobic, how can you expect the fans to be any better?
It’s hard to believe, sitting here in a “Web 2.0? world in 2007, that Saimoe still makes you vote by posting to 2ch…maybe it is just a way to deter us gaijin-tachi from voting, who knows…
Law 53 of the internet: For anything Japanese on the internet, always subtract all advancement in web technology and -design done during the past 10 years.
Yeah, I’m as puzzled as anyone else on why all too many JP pages seem to hail directly from the last centry in terms of style and usability. Are they just lazy, or is there a national ban on web tutorials and pre-made solutions in Japan, or something? :P
I always figured it had something to do with mobile phone support and the fact that older (and clunkier) versions of Internet Explorer remained the browser of choice for longer in Japan. Other than that, however, I don’t know. I have noticed that a lot of fancier Japanese webpages rely heavily on Flash and/or image-based designs as opposed to pure CSS. It’s all pretty old school.
Despite Japan being a very gadget-savvy country, they are actually not very computer literate in general. Most researches usually blames computer illiteracy on the mobile phone which took off as the defacto digital age internet communication device in Japan instead of the PC as in most other industrialised countries. And mobile phones as we all know is not really tweaking friendly (carrier lock downs etc) and not that powerful in comparison to the humble PC thus it didn’t drive a whole generation of nerdy kids hacking away on their dad’s PC and enticing them into going into doing the “web thing”. This resulted in a huge lack of talent in the IT field both at the grunt level as well as the management level. If the managers don’t know better, obviously they’ll just take what the grunts will give them, whom themselves are not quite up to date either, as you see it’s a vicious cycle…..
I don’t mind the Web 1.0 if it means the lack of bling, but what I find really irritating is how a large number of Japanese webmasters seem unable to specify the charset in the title. Full third of the pages I visit show up as a bunch of diamonds with question marks inside. Just how hard can it be? I’m not even asking them to use UTF-8, just observe elementary HTML hygiene.
When I see the disgusting nonsense being posted with apparent impunity by 2channelers in the Hirano Aya main thread, I can’t imagine what you must have done to get banned. Except be a foreigner.
I gave up on SaiMoe after following it for one year because it seemed to me that “moe” had just come to mean “turns me on,” and had no relation to anything subtler. But if Hidamari is doing okay, then maybe….
Let me clarify: my ISP’s entire IP range is banned. It wasn’t the result of any action on my part. It’s the largest ISP in the United States, however, so they’ve shut a lot of Americans out of participating in the tournament.
Your plan worked!
Echoing BigN’s comments…
Hidamari Sketch banzai!
So what you are saying is probably im banned too and its not my fault!!…
aaahhh… good to know….
Then why do you speak of xenophobia? Most likely it has nothing to do with Americans at all. It’s more-likely that some trolls, pseudo-h4×0rz or spammers from that IP range annoyed them, so they decided to block it. As Americans are hardly the main audience that’s probably acceptable from their viewpoint. In any case, it has nothing to do with xenophobia but rather a careless use of IP filters. People all over the world resort to that, especially if the affected country is far away from them. For example, most spam (of all kinds) originates from the USA. Yet many Americans are trigger happy to ban IP ranges from other countries (which they probably cannot even locate on a map) simply because it sticks out. It’s stupid but it has more to do with ignorance than xenophobia.
Hey Jeff, you do know that Hiro is up for the vote today?
Chris, given that there have been regular posts on 2ch lamenting the fact that foreigners are participating in the tournament (and not voting for the “right” characters), I believe xenophobia IS a big part of it. 2ch is notorious for not welcoming foreigners… that’s pretty common knowledge. While I agree that they’ve likely banned particular IP ranges due to abuse, I suspect they cast their net far and wide when it comes to non-Japanese IPs. It kills two birds with one stone.
Don’t get me wrong… I’ve worked in Japan. I work with Japanese nationals everyday. I have plenty of respect for their culture and way of life. But fear of and disdain for foreigners is a big problem in Japan (and is often condoned by the media and government), and it’s something to which I think a lot of non-Japanese anime fans are either oblivious or don’t want to admit. And, in today’s global society, I don’t think it’s something Japan deserves a pass on.
You really ought to give Korean Moe Tournament a chance. The head administrator of the tournament was kind enough to post in the AnimeSuki Forum, demonstrating his willingness to encourage wide international participation.
http://forums.animesuki.com/showpost.php?p=1122411&postcount=1565
In other words, you are just SPECULATING, without any proof, that 2ch may used wider range to ban trolls when it comes to non-Japanese IPs. Based on that speculation, you said;
It amazes me how many Japanese otaku, marginalized as they are within their own society, can be so damn xenophobic when it comes to their interaction with foreigners. Get over yourselves, already.
As Japanese, I admit we have fair amount of xenophobic problems. Still, preaching something like this just basing on your speculation, wouldn’t much improve the situation.
I made a general observation based on past experience. That’s all. Even if my speculation with regard to the IP banning is incorrect (partially or in full), I still stand by my statement. Many Japanese otaku (and 2ch users, in particular) have a problem with foreigners, and I think it’s silly given their position within their own society.
Well, you have to remember that USA dropped two A-bombs on them… guess they are still kinda angry.
Leaving the ban thing aside, isn’t there an occidental voting tournament like that one? I mean, if so many american people are excluded, and clearly USA provides most of the web content of the world, there should be a moe tournament like thet made in America, ne? I don’t think it’s so difficult to code a website with some clever voting system.