In the forum post I allude to in the comic Divide By Zero, I get accused of politicizing the cosplay scene when all anyone wants to do is ‘have fun’ — but apparently everyone’s idea of fun is bashing other people while furthering their own agendas for supremacy.

Now, I like to think that cosplayers aren’t dense or stupid. (If you disagree, bear with me, I like my rose-tinted glasses.) So how can people who are deeply immersed in the backbiting and name-calling that pervades local cosplay claim that everyone is one big happy cosplaying family?

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It’s Friday night at Little Tokyo, and I’m hanging out with friends, some old, some new, all involved one way or another with the otaku scene. Cosplayers, anime and manga fans, gamers and GMs.

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Danny Choo recently stated on his blog that he was adopting the term ‘Japanese Pop Culture’ to refer to what was previously known as the Otaku Subculture. He said that this was because: (more…)

So the other day on Plurk Magnetic Rose, who always has her finger on the pulse, called my attention to the recent Anime Expo mass resignation fiasco. A couple of days later another friend of mine gave me the inside scoop into the whole Alice and Rabbit Multiply mess.

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This is Minoru’s famous tsundere rant from Lucky Channel Episode 10! Here he passionately decries what he perceives as the corruption of the definition of the term ‘tsundere‘ from its original meaning implying a function of time into a character type who is hostile on the outside but affectionate on the inside.

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I love reading Seth Godin’s blog. I’ve been a fan ever since I watched his TED talk and read Tribes. Today he wrote a post about the evolution of every medium:

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This whole blackouts thing is messing up with my posting schedule. Anyway, while I catch up with my writing, please enjoy this scene from Otaku no Video, focusing on future Otaking Kubo’s indoctrination into otakuhood by the members of the Jack-of-All-Trades Club.

In case you missed the news yesterday, Magnetic Rose is the official Philippine blog affiliate of the Anime Festival Asia ’09 in Singapore! Featuring uber-cosplayers KANAME and SHOKOTAN, the King of Anisong ICHIROU MIZUKI, Galaxy Fairy MAY’N, and Japanese pop culture authority Danny Choo, AFA ’09 once against proves its status as South East Asia’s biggest convention!

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I was finishing off my cup, watching the crowds at the Shangri-La Mall line up for photos and frozen yogurt, when I realized that this particular cosplay event wasn’t anything like a convention at all. It was a carefully choreographed, well-organized media event that appeared to be a cosplay competition. It was pure publicity for a charity tie-in with a consumer product.

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