Expert Interview

Story and backstory in the age of metadata - A conversation with Sikii-san

With Sikii-san (id:sikii_j) we were able to interview another highly prominent Imas-blogger. Sikii-san is based in Kyoto, but Takashiro-san originally met him in Tokyo, where the members of Nico Nico Bu organised an offline meeting to meet…

Beyond Sklavenmoral - Kanamaru Toshiyuki and Harry Graf Kessler

Kanamaru-san (id:kana0355) is a pragmatic linguist based in the languages department of Kyoto University. The same Kanamaru-san is also a deep Nico Chuu, who has not one, but two Nico Nico Douga premium accounts, so that both he and his wi…

Secret Nico Nico Douga: Meeting Arimura Yuu san and three of his junior fellows

Arimura-san is new. He is new in many respects. He is new on Nico Nico Bu, the community of Nico Nico Douga bloggers on Hatena. His popular blog, which existed before he entered Nico Noco Bu, provides a new take on anime: Faster, and more …

Nico Politics in a Cosplay Cafe: A conversation with Midouoka-san

Midouoka-san is a much debated figure on the Japanese Internet. He has gained his fame on 2channel. Though 2channel is usually a place for anonymous posting, Midouoka-san became a known figure (don’t ask me, how he did that). He says he li…

Life and death on Nico Nico Douga – a conversation with Hikawa Ryusuke san

Hikawa-san is probably the most prominent Anime critic of Japan. You can find his articles in prominent magazines, he has written several books and you can also see him often on TV. His writing is known for having a high analytical depth: …

Swinging Tags: A conversation with Koizuka Akihiko san

Koizuka-san is a programmer. No. This gives you the wrong idea. Better might be: Koizuka-san is the programmer. He created the original version of Nico Nico Douga in the course of 3 days, and has been the key person in its development ever…

Kuuki dissected: A conversation with Kishino Yusuke san

I met Kishino-san in our first focus group. On his Mixi diary he described afterwards his experiences in this group (which is what many of our participants do). There, Kishino-san made some suggestions, how “kuuki” could have been analysed…

Greasemonkey for tags? A conversation with Noriaki-san

Ginza is a different world from Ikebukuro, where I stay and hang out most of the time: While Ikebukuro is becoming the “real Akihabara” (Akihabra got so famous that Otakus tend to evade it more and more), Ginza is full of suits, lots of sk…

Tag-Wars: A conversation with Hamano Satoshi san

(We transferred this entry from another blog, originally it was written May 10th) Hamano-san, the media theorist of Nico Nico Douga!Hamano-san is a researcher at Nihon Gigei Inc, and one of the few, who has started to write the media theor…