5 Nov 2009
Minor: Hikikomori StopGap Posterous Version Updated with Logo
Logo created via SupaLogo service.
23 Oct 2009
First “Chewables” Post
This should have been a cut and dry copy paste but I don’t consider the link thought provoking nor practical.In fact, the reason I’m even posting this is because many adult couples seem to get that they need to treat their partners as equals or at least within the boundaries of their culture but when it comes to the Hikikomori phenomenon, even the so-called experts seem to be baffled as to why a Hikikomori would commit a crime when they are disturbed.- A separate work area is critical. My husband eventually moved to another room to his own space and can close the door as needed.
- Respect privacy - knock on the door and also ask if okay to interrupt.
- Work flow patterns should be recognized. Your way isn’t the only way to work.
- Communicate about quitting times. If you expect your partner to be done and able to play at a certain time, you need to discuss it.
- If possible, take a coffee or lunch break together. Isn’t it nice to hang out with your partner in the middle of the workday?
13 Oct 2009
Is HikiCulture turning more and more into a spam forum?
This is another placeholder topic but one slightly more serious:
First off, I’ve no doubt that - for members of this forum - this could easily come off as a HikiPhpBB vs. HikiCulture vs. AnonIB /hikikomori/ thread.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t help that coincidentally I’ve made a recent return post on HikiPhpBB.
This isn’t intentional but is a result of me just being frustrated and bored so I decided to re-check the Hikikomori boards I know of (except Sankaku and HikiCulture)
Sankaku because it’s a news site and I’m too busy to add further information overload unto myself and HikiCulture because I’ve been banned.
Another major blow to my bias but I’ll let you decide how much based on this incident:
From a recent revision of the Hikikomori wikipedia page discussion board:
I’ve been a member on a few Hikikomori and recluse forums and websites for a while now. “HikiCulture” keeps being linked to here, but it generally is not a good place for information and help. It’s still fairly new and the administrator has no idea on how to run a forum correctly and generally doesn’t understand that the site is for people who need help and information. He overreacts and abuses control without thinking about his actions, and he has Asperger’s Sydrome which hinders his decisive abilities, causing harsh and uncalled-for actions which may offend. He also bans people for things which are petty and do not require action. It’s generally a place to avoid due to this. The community itself is great, but the administrator known to some as “Chair” isn’t good for the community. I’ve heard of other Hikikomori sites opening soon for giving advice and help and they’ll be linked to here once they have been created.
Also, I am not meaning to cause offense, I have been asked to write this comment by a lot of members of the community at “HikiCulture”. The way it’s ran is unfair and the staff do not care about us with mental conditions, reclusiveness, depression and social anxiety. It’s not wise to link to “HikiCulture” any further.
Now I didn’t write this and I only had a short time on HikiCulture so I have no way of verifying this but what’s worrying is that this comment was up a few days ago.
I don’t participate much in Wikipedia but the argument while not verifying to me that it was accurate, did convince me that there was ample reason to remove the HikiCulture link from the main article so I decided to do so.
What’s worrying and why I am being harsh and calling it spam is that not only was the link restored but that the above quote was also removed.
…
Now I get that there’s no proof of any persistant trolling nor is this even a rare issue for most wikipedia articles but it is kind of worrying that the Hikikomori label may be starting to be used as a marketing tactic and that’s why I’m preserving these quotes in case it never gets restored.
(I’ve no patience for wikipedia edit wars.)
I also fully accept the responsibility that I may be accused of doing the same thing with this blog and this may come off as hypocritical mud-slinging by me but since I have no way to prove my integrity, I could only give my word that I don’t have an agenda against Hiki-Culture but it would be heart breaking if future Hikikomoris gather in the wrong place due to wikipedians’ neglect of protecting the Hikikomori article from such edits.
Therefore even if the word “spam” can be interpreted as sensationalism, this would have to stay to serve as linkbait in case the issue becomes more drastic in the future.
19 Sep 2009
Posterous Version
Currently testing whether Posterous is more convenient than Tumblr.
At first, I skipped this because I’m not much of an e-mail user but eventually hearing lots of other posterous user mention the service and since I was looking for a more convenient blog editor than Tumblr’s, I eventually caved in.
Basic pros (for newbie bloggers like me) are that the commenting system is more anonymous but e-mail centric.
Cons are that I don’t know how to import those Disqus comments on Tumblr into all the topics and the tags basically disappeared unless I put them in one by one.
On the plus side, posterous has auto-posting which hopefully can offset that issue even if the comments are now basically halved.
Oh btw the link is: http://hiki.posterous.com
27 Aug 2009
A major criticism of Hikikomori PHPBB and HikiCulture
This is actually nothing new but I’m posting this anyway to highlight the problem.
While finally deciding to re-register to Hiki-Culture, I was met with these two questions:
Will you be sure to create AT LEAST one post/thread within a week of completing this registration form to prevent your HikiCulture account from getting deleted?: *
Please be honest when answering this. If you select ‘No’, staff will delete your account.
After posting your intial mandatory first post within a week of joining up to this site, will you be sure to create one post or thread per month and log in AT LEAST once a month to prevent your HikiCulture account from getting deleted?: *
Please be honest when answering this. If you select ‘No’, staff will delete your account.
Of course, I knew this because my account was purged due to inactivity. I didn’t know the exact timeline though because as far as I can remember, the questions were new. Not that it should surprise me, but it did.
I guess there’s something about seeing the numbers in perspective but I just can’t help but think of the comparison of posting once a month vs. a general private torrent site without a strict rule.
Sites that create this rule just seem so… anti-Hikkikomori. Compare this with your average private torrent ratio rule and despite a longer headstart to get the right ratio so that you can comfortably leave your account alone, I would say a good estimate for causing your account to get deleted is leaving it for 6 months. Even then you can say there’s a much more valid reason for the deadline and that 6 months is enough even for the most avid of lurkers to post in a forum (without feeling forced).
“A month” though…
That’s the sad thing separating English Hikkimori communities. There’s just no “moderate” community right now. It’s either all anonymous or private “post-a-lots” outside of topics in general boards.
Of course I’m not saying don’t join either forums especially since I’m going to join anyway and I don’t know of any other place outside of the three boards. However consider this a warning or even an advise saying “don’t bother” if you’re new to forums and thought to work it through. A month is shorter than it would normally seem over the internet. Maybe one day there’s a better platform for “silent” Hikis to get information and support without needing to join such frisky communities. (Still no idea what the ideal model for this is though. Even the Hiki IRC failed to attract a large enough group to support 24/7 discussions.)
Edit: Speaking of new sites, I just saw this linked in Hiki-Culture.
http://www.experienceproject.com/group_stories.php?g=142181&s=d
6 Aug 2009
Why did I create this micro-blog?
Author’s Note: I originally intended this to be part of an About Me section but as I would soon find out, this is too long and most themes don’t support long info sections. The theme I originally preferred, Heather River’s Box Factory, allowed for this but as a blogger with little technical know how, I didn’t really know how to copy-paste basic widgets like tag clouds into it since there wasn’t any sidebar on the theme.
Once upon a time, rumors started of AnonIB shutting down.
One topic spoke of developing a script to back-up the contents. Another person suggested moving to imageboard4free.
On my part, my decision to scrape the contents of the entire board was suddenly put on a strict deadline.
Not soon after that, accusations of trolling started against me.
My replies to random topics became the focus of the threads and soon topics I randomly posted in ended up becoming hijacked.
Eventually these little things added up and convinced me to pursue a different way of online communication.
My first choice, however, wasn’t Tumblr but forums.
Several things made me reconsider my choice however:
1.
I wanted a place to discuss things but I didn’t want the baggage that comes with an admin. Certainly not one where I totally screw up a community if I left without saying anything.
2.
Around this same time, there was a minor but deep-seated issue keeping the English-speaking Hikkikomoris apart. One minority had a misguided idea that usernames were a form of namefaggery by default and thus resented those who joined the Hikkikomori forum. The other side was very privy and in order to view topics, you had to register. There were much more shallower insults besides this but this was the main core issue separating both communities. Still some of us did join both discussion boards but it made me worry that if something as minor as this could be a communication barrier, then I’d rather opt for a different way of presenting things, especially in addition to my first issue.
Yes, Sankaku Complex was also a blog but their Hikkikomori content was in a whole nother league. Not only do they translate Japanese Hikkikomori-related news (something I can’t do since I don’t know how to read Japanese nor have any practical knowledge in critical research) but the information was much more news worthy despite the presentation. Something less introverted compared to most of the topics we English speaking Hikkikomoris talk about based on what I read from the 2 sites. (At this point, I wasn’t aware of the existence of HikiCulture yet.)
3.
Finally it was the submission feature combined with the typical features of tag-filtering and Tumblr’s reputation as a micro-blog that convinced me to decide on settling for Tumblr. Personally I haven’t tested these features yet and even while writing this, I don’t know if there’s any major bug about it but I thought the system created a different form of filtered anonymous posting in theory. Not really a selling point feature for a newbie blogger like me but I liked the concept for allowing a discussion to take place in a different form.
With regards to micro-blogging, I just didn’t want to give the impression that my thoughts were anything but casually written. My main priority is still to reply to topics I like and to motivate myself to read all the AnonIB threads by copy-pasting the contents and addressing it here and if AnonIB does go down before the script fully backs up the content, then the content here being a temporary back-up is just a plus to that. Also if someone wanted to hijack and insult my arguments and long writing style, they at least have to do it here and leave the topic alone preventing it from being hijacked.
Update: Turns out the script was done and is located in this site: http://anonarchive.hikiculture.com/
Guess there’s not much need for this blog anymore. I’m basically just putting the topics here anyway as a personal motivation task.
6 Aug 2009
Links to English Hikkikomori Discussion Boards
These are the only ones I know of as of this writing:
New AnonIB Board:
http://www.anonib.com/hikikomori/
AnonIB Hikkikomori Board: (Dead)
Hikkikomori Forum:
http://hikikomori.getphpbb.com/
HikiCulture: (Warning: Admin is a spammer)
http://hikiculture.prophpbb.com/forum25.html
I am a Hikikomori
http://www.experienceproject.com/group_stories.php?g=142181&s=d
Edit: (Sept. 17, 2009)
Ok, I was banned for the second time in HikiCulture (I don’t know the reason why. It could have something to do with that announcement that something changed in their profiles but since I never put any data in there, I never bothered tweaking it but soon I saw my account/posts disappear despite remaining active.
In fact, my account was deleted around the same time I wrote a reply. It wasn’t a controversial one and it was attributing the fact that despite the admin’s criticisms with the HikiPhpBB forum, the member base growth remained the same and in fact, the previous forum probably had more Hikikomori related topics although it wasn’t the fault of the forum design as there were certain key members that stopped being active at around the time the forum required these members to stay active.
This is why I’m not attributing it to a case of breaking some obscure rule but treat this as a warning if you plan to join that forum.
I normally don’t like re-joining forums so I won’t be signing up for another account there. I did sign up a 2nd time because at the time, my first trial was so short I wasn’t able to preview most of the forum’s contents.)
Also, this reply was related to the fact that the Hikikomori PhpBB board has been particularly inactive to the point that there are days where new posts don’t even appear. (Previously you could spot 1 or 2 active members)
The Experience Project link also seems to have been a footnote since I haven’t seen any new topic there.
AnonIB still remains dead.
Basically you can pretty much treat all these links as either dead or highly inactive.
For those looking for a board to talk about Hikikomori issues, as much as I’m ashamed that an attention whore thread got this high in Reddit, that’s probably where we are left with right now judging by this topic:
http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/9k7kk/i_was_a_hikikomori_and_didnt_leave_the_house_for/
Note that despite having a Reddit account, it’s been awhile since I participated and that I never was ever part of any core during those days so I don’t know how to guarantee getting the right amount of attention to any topic you make. I do know that at a time I used it, the site while superior to Digg was still very hard to penetrate through and the members while smart, were also already sinking to Digg level of audience.
Unfortunately that is pretty much the current option available right now as far as I know.
Edit:
My bad. After reading this comment: http://hikkikomori.tumblr.com/post/180526740#comment-16642104 it looks like the AnonIB Board is up with a new link.
