Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Japan/Archive/June 2007

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
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Japan To-do:
Talk archives for WikiProject Japan
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Baseball • Cars • Districts and municipalities • Gaijin tarento • Military history • Mythology • Music • Owarai • Photo • Prefectures • Royalty and nobility • Shinto • Update Anime and manga (Dragon Ball, Yu-Gi-Oh!) • Entertainment (Hello! Project, Tokusatsu) • Games (Digimon, Final Fantasy, Nintendo, PlayStation, Pokémon/PAC, Square Enix, Zelda) • Japan (Bibliography, Trains)

Contents

Ōgon Batto → Ogon Batto → Ōgon Batto → Ogon Batto (Gold Bat)

Somebody did a cut & paste move from Ōgon Batto to Ogon Batto, and so I moved it back. Please keep an eye on it.--Endroit 20:48, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

And apparently, it's been moved to Ogon Batto (Gold Bat) without discussion. Is the parentheses thing allowable?--Endroit 15:25, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
No, they should be reserved for disambiguation. Jpatokal 05:53, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
Nominated for WP:HISTMERGE. --Samuel di Curtisi di Salvadori 14:07, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
MOved back and asked the mover to ask for a RM nom.--Samuel di Curtisi di Salvadori 14:11, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I went through and updated the macrons for that article as well.MightyAtom 06:35, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Hofus the Stonecutter

I brought this up at the J-myth project page as well, but that place has been a bit of a ghost town lately, so I figured I'd mention it here as well.

Anyway. This article is, IMO, complete rubish. Hofus? It does appear in quite some ghits, but they all seem to draw from the same source. If the article gets a Fakelore tag, then I can see the merit of keeping it, if not I'd say it needs to go. TomorrowTime 19:54, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Not familiar with this. Couldn't find anything in Japanese Wikipedia at places like ほふす、童話、おとぎ話 etc. Didn't see anything relevant on Google in Japanese. Google in English has several hits, but as TomorrowTime says, common phrases like "sixteenth-century Japanese legend" point to a common origin. Fg2 01:56, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

This legend can be found on quite a few Japanese sites, but they all list it as a Western legend. Can't find the original country, but the Japanese sites all call the story "Hans the Stonecutter", or just say 自分自身になれ.

blog.livedoor.jp/drj1966/archives/2006-09.html

http://www.hpmix.com/home/911/D10_1.htm

This site gives a similar tale, but it is a puppy that keeps changing shape, and says it is a legend from Thailand.

http://www.ne.jp/asahi/fuse/abraham/asia/thailand/ti-story/ti-story.htm

Sooo....probably not complete rubish, but rather a folklore tale with an unknown origin being attributed to "Over there...", meaning a country that isn't your own.MightyAtom 03:56, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Wow, thanks for those links. I'll update the article.
And I realize that my wording was a bit harsh, but it's just that these 'Hic Svnt Leones' stories of Japan get to me. Well, this one is still on the good side, I suppose :) TomorrowTime 07:26, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Sumo Wikiproject

I have made a proposal for a WikiProject Sumo Proposal. Yesterday I spent part of the day sourcing Akebono with a few other people. Most sumo articles are not well sourced. Though under two WikiProjects already, I think it would be to the advantage of both the articles of sumo and wikipedia as a whole if Sumo is placed under its own WikiProject. If you would like to join or have any comments, please go to the Project proposal page. Thanks! XinJeisan 17:18, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

It may work better as a task force under an existing project. Outside of WP:JA, which other WikiProject is it under? ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 03:47, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
Sorry to not wikifiy this, I am just pretty busy and want to make a comment before long. A person from WikiProject Martial Arts already said making sumo its own project was a good idea and that editor stated that he would put us as a decendent project of Martial Arts. I think we have a strong team now which to build Sumo into a longstanding Wikiproject. If you have any other comments, could you direct them to the Wikiproject Proposal page. Thanks! XinJeisan 18:16, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Second city

For anyone with a few free minutes for cleanup/fixing errors, Second city#Japan could use a look. I'm a bit busy at the moment, but I ran across the section and it made me laugh a little more than a Wikipedia section should. Dekimasuよ! 02:14, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

I'd never even heard of a "second city" until seeing this. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 04:21, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
Bah! Osaka is second to none! :P (realizes that wasn't helpful but has also never heard of the concept of a second city...) MightyAtom 04:47, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
Wow... This... is a novel concept. I never heard of second cities as a category either, nor do I see the immediate need for this article as such, but I'll take a few minutes and go through the grammar. I'll do this automatically (correcting poor English is what I do for a living :), so I'd still appreciate a second pair of eyes to go through this, to look for any factual errors. TomorrowTime 07:43, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

List of metropolitan areas in Japan by population

The article List of metropolitan areas in Japan by population needs some loving care. I've found some references for it (so it shouldn't be deleted again), but the references don't always agree, and don't necessarily have things grouped the way the table on that page has them grouped. Any assistance in updating this page is appreciated. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 20:13, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

FA nomination

Michael Brown Okinawa assault incident passed GA review and I'll be nominating it for featured article, probably sometime today. If anyone would like to look over it and help give it a final scrub for anything that I or the GA reviewer missed, it would be greatly appreciated. CLA 00:34, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Two more FA articles

I just noticed the goal of 40 Japan FA articles by the end of this year. I can provide two more right now. Battle of Edson's Ridge and Actions along the Matanikau were promoted to FA recently, but I just added the Japan project banner to them today. CLA 00:40, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Cool. Feel free to add them to the list. (^_^) ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 00:46, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, I should have just added them to the list, but I was afraid of screwing something up like I did when I added the Michael Brown article to the peer review list. CLA 00:57, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I've added them, as well as several others I found. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 03:14, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Orca, krill, right whale?

Are these really related to Japan, or are we just trying to buff up our featured articles quotient? MightyAtom 03:49, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

All of them have decent chunks of the articles talking about Japan in some way. Japan has a huge krill industry, and they like to slay orcas and right whales for some reason. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 04:58, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I moved some of them to their own section. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 05:06, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
"and they like to slay orcas and right whales for some reason" Because they are yum-yum yummy! I do love me some whale meat! But that aside, the Whaling in Japan article gives no mention of orca or right whale, and I have never heard of either of these species being targeted for whaling in modern Japan. The orca article says "Today, no country carries out a substantial hunt." It seems the connection to this wikiproject is dubious.MightyAtom 06:08, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Hmm...looks like I misread the orca article. There is historical whaling in their case. It appears the same is true of the right whales. They are historically important, but not as much today. The main connection today is that both living in the waters surrounding Japan. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 19:09, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Category:Women of medieval Japan

Category:Women of medieval Japan needs cleanup. Many women listed are pre-medieval. I removed some; there are more. Do we have categories for other time periods? If so, the articles could be switched from one category to another. Fg2 10:35, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

The category's description is "Japanese women from the Asuka period (538) to start of the Edo period (1603). This covers Classical Japan and Feudal Japan classification periods." The women I removed from the category fall in the named time periods, but are those time periods medieval in Japan? If so, I'll gladly put them back. However, in case some or all those time periods are not medieval in Japan, it would save effort to work out the time periods before putting too many people in the category. Fg2 10:48, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I am sure there are other definitions out there, but I believe that in the most widely agreed upon system of periodization, medieval Japan covers 1185-c. 1600. 1185 marks the end of the Heian period, the rise of the samurai class at the expense of the Court and Imperial power, and thus the end of the Classical period. 1600 or 1603 or 1615 represents the beginning of the Tokugawa shogunate, i.e. the Edo period, and the beginning of the Early Modern period. We may need to figure out whether to use "medieval Japan" or "feudal Japan" to describe this period, as it seems that many of the categories right now (Category:Feudal Japan, Category:Economy of feudal Japan, Category:Kuge of Feudal Japan) currently use the other term from what is most widely used in scholarship. But, all told, if the proper categories don't exist for what you're trying to do (e.g. Category:Women of Classical Japan), go ahead and create them. LordAmeth 12:44, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Karafuto Prefecture

The page at Karafuto Prefecture was very redundant compared to Sakhalin, so I made some major edits to remove more general Sakhalin info and add a little more Karafuto Prefecture-specific info from the Japanese Wikipedia. The article could still use some help, as I'm no expert on this issue and some of the dates in the English article conflicted with dates in the Japanese article, and I was also unsure of a few WWII- and administrative-specific terms (like whether Karafuto was even a full "prefecture"). It also had a bit of a right-wing "Karafuto's still ours" type of slant to it, which I attempted to tone down, but again could still use some work. Just an FYI to people who might be interested. CES 21:02, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

The article's come a long way over the years! An early version, which was nominated for deletion, seemed to say that it's a modern prefecture of Japan, and had all the text in the infobox (check it out). It's been vastly improved. Fg2 21:24, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Wow, that's crazy ... kind of an "If-Japan-had-won-the-war alternate reality" page. I agree, it's in a lot better shape now (and hopefully less redundant re: Sakhalin) but still could use some TLC. CES 22:20, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I moved the map to commons as it was GFDL. No visible change on this end, but there you go. (^_^) ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 22:30, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Outdated articles of now-dissolved municipalities

I'm finding a lot of outdated articles of now-dissolved municipalities. I've tagged some as per List of mergers and dissolutions of municipalities in Japan, but it's becoming too daunting. Additionally, some new municipalities such as Misaki, Okayama and Akaiwa, Okayama still lack articles. Am I the only one checking these articles? Ranma9617 01:59, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I've been working through all the prefectures updating articles due to gappei, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Japan/Gappei. Because of the sheer number of articles involved and because it cannot be automated (I've been thinking more about this lately - it may be possible to automate at least parts of this), it is an immense project. I've been working on this (somewhat sporadically) for more than a year. Please help! -- Rick Block (talk) 13:41, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
I'm also working on this. I've been updating articles of dissolved municipalities as such, creating articles for new municipalities, and adding geodata to articles of current municipalities. I've finished all of Shikoku and Kyūshū, and will be making my way up Honshū eventually. Amake 14:12, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Haniwa

Hello all. I would love some reaction to my comments on the "popular culture" section of the Haniwa article. Please could anybody interested add their comments to Talk:Haniwa. --Auximines 20:54, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Go-kon

Somebody prodded the article, stating that it was OR and not a suitable subject for an encyclopedia. As all of you who have been to Japan or are there now know, gōkon are a widespread and thoroughly present phenomenon, and would deserve a better article then they have now. I didn't want to simply remove the prod as I cannot guarantee that I can work on the article and improve it, so I'm bringing this up here, in case somebody might care to adopt the article. TomorrowTime 07:33, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

I've fiddled with it to the best of my extremely underinformed ability. Others are most welcome to take over. -- Hoary 08:09, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm afraid I have nothing to add, but it's definitely an interesting and worthwhile article, not worthy of deletion. Thanks guys. LordAmeth 08:28, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
Ah...the gōkon...all I would have to add is personal experience, unfortunately. But no original research, eh?MightyAtom 03:34, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
As for the word, 合 is a shortened form of 合同/goudou. コンパ is also a shortened form;company, kompanie, compagnie. http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%B3%E3%83%B3%E3%83%91 might help for the article expansion. --Oda Mari 05:55, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Edo Expansion

I'm never sure where to place things on the front page of this Project... do we even still have a Collaboration of the Fortnight/Week/Month/Whatever? In any case, I do not know why I never noticed earlier that Edo is a stub! Geez. This article could be massive and dense with fascinating, interesting, and important information. I have nominated it for Article Creation and Improvement Drive, and am mentioning it here again. This is definitely the kind of thing that could benefit from some intense collaboration - I have neither the time nor the resources nor the inclination to do this all on my own. Please help! (While I'm here, I'd like to mention that there are a great many Edo-culture related topics that are likewise in serious need of help, such as Yoshiwara, sharebon, and Ichimura-za.) LordAmeth 08:25, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Is it a stub, or does it deserve start class? Regardless, it deserves better. Alas, the collaboration of the <time period of your choice> is quite dead. Let's hope the ACID brings in fresh blood, and let's give them something to work with. Great idea! Fg2 10:50, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Japanese muncipalities

The Japanese Wikipedia has a ton of high-quality SVG maps of each municipality (or at the very least for the Tohoku and Hokkaido regions, which were the only ones I checked). Look here for an example. I think these would make great additions to this Wikipedia (along with much of the other information on their municipality articles, though to be fair, they have their own WikiProject devoted to Japanese municipalities). If someone can come up with a way to efficiently move these to Wikimedia Commons, that'd be awesome.

Also, I've started lists of municipalities on my user page (click link in signature and follow the two links at the top of the page). The first is just a list while the second is a sortable list that I'm trying to get to the standards of List of municipalities of Portugal, a featured list. If all goes well, we can make it into an actual list, though it's possible we'd have to split them up (but it'd be nice if we didn't have to).

Finally, the city symbols have been a project of mine for the last few months (I'm still nowhere near completing any prefecture completely) and I came up with some criteria that might allow us to standardize the images (similar to the crests in the above Portugal article, although those were apparently all created by the same person). If anyone's interested in helping out, please let me know (here would work).

-Nameneko 18:14, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Lincun's maps are used throughout Japanese Wikipedia. The prefecture maps already exist in Commons, and I already went through and added them to the prefecture pages here. Some other maps are also in the commons, for instance all of the Ehime Prefecture municipality maps, which I also already added to the articles. However, the ones outside of Ehime are spotty at best, and are often not named consistently. I'm also interested in getting Lincun's maps into Commons, but I don't want to sit around uploading them one-by-one. Amake 22:58, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Japanese people and Yamato people

I've added a merge tag to Yamato people suggesting that any relevant information be added into Japanese people and redirected there. The introduction for Japanese people currently links the Yamato article without any semblance of an explanation as to how the two are different. While recognizing that they are different to the extent that we recognize "the Japanese people" to consist of multiple ethnic groups, and that we have separate articles for the Ainu and Ryukyu peoples, I think it would make more sense to explain "Yamato" within Japanese people. I'm not confident of my analysis here, though. If there's a good reason for them to stay separate, please provide input.... Dekimasuよ! 06:22, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Whether we merge them or not, I think there definitely needs to be some explanation of the differences between "Japanese people" which includes Ainu, Ryukyuans, and perhaps other groups which were assimilated into the Japanese nation during the Meiji-Taisho-early Showa process of nation-building, and the "Yamato people", those who are ethnically 和人, descended from Japanese and not from one of these other groups. This is like the difference between Chinese people and Han Chinese, and should be explained. LordAmeth 11:35, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
Agreed. Especially since the non-Yamato groups have separate (and substantial) articles, the situation to avoid is simply writing "main article: Ainu people" and having the "Japanese people" article treat only the Yamato majority. A well-written, concise summary of the separate articles, together with the "main" template, can place the people in context, clarify the distinctions, provide due weight, and introduce the reader to the specialized articles. Fg2 12:11, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
Ryukyuan people make a distinction between themselves and the Yamato people.
This is evident in the language(s) they speak. See the Japanese article ja:ウチナーヤマトグチ. Yamato-guchi (ヤマトグチ?) means Japanese language. Uchinaa-guchi (ウチナーグチ?) means Okinawan language. And Uchinaa-Yamato-guchi (ウチナーヤマトグチ?) is the Japanese dialect in Okinawa. Note how the Ryukyuans use the word "Yamato" here.
And so extreme caution is required.--Endroit 14:39, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
なんくるないさ... Dekimasuよ! 06:17, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure that our usage of "Japanese people" includes the Ainu and Ryukyuans either. If it does, that's certainly not clear from the current state of the article. I'd note that links I had added to Ainu language and similar things about Okinawa were removed from the infobox on the grounds that Ainu people and Ryukyuans are separate from "Japanese people". The current page is really an attempt to deal with the "Yamato" ethnic group according to the term which is most commonly used (Japanese people), and doesn't concern nationality (Nikkei are included), so the fact that Ainu people are Japanese citizens in and of itself doesn't seem to make them "Japanese people" for the purposes of this article. And since "Yamato" is a term that is mostly interesting for its historiographic connotations rather than its denonative value, incorporating the other ethnic groups would mean that there isn't really any article at all on "Wajin". On another note, the chances of a well-written, concise summary materializing are slim unless someone here is willing to hash one out, and I can't do it because I'm unclear on what we're looking for. The article has had "add a section on the burakumin" in its to-do section for several months, but no action has occurred on that front. I'd be willing to work with someone else's attempt to rectify the deficiencies, though. Dekimasuよ! 06:15, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
I agree with LordAmeth and Fg2. I think 日本人 is 日本国籍を持っている人. I understand Ainu and Ryukyuans make a distinction between themselves and Yamato people, but they have to use Japanese passport when they go abroad. Oda Mari 06:33, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
On a more basic level than the level on which the article deals with 日本人, it deals with the English term "Japanese". When referring to an individual or an ethnic group, the usage of the English term includes people who aren't citizens of Japan - e.g. Japanese Americans and the other groups dealt with at Japanese diaspora. When ambiguous "Japanese" links refer to nationality, I repair them by changing the link to [[Japan]]ese, and when they refer to culture or ancestry, I link them as [[Japanese people|Japanese]]. I have to disagree that we are talking about something political here - the article that deals with those aspects of the population is Demography of Japan. Dekimasuよ! 06:43, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
I think it is important to have articles for both Japanese people and Yamato people (or Wajin, whatever we want to call it I guess). It's not purely a political thing, and while Japanese may be moving towards recognizing Ryukyuans and Ainu as separate ethnic groups with their own independent cultural heritage, etc, the movements were very different just a little over a century ago in the Meiji period. The nation-building process included extensive ideological and systematic/administrative changes, not only by the government, but on a popular and private level as well, incorporating of Ryukyuans and Ainu (and regional differences within Japan) into a new "Japanese" identity. Carol Gluck has written extensively on this. LordAmeth 09:59, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
The article Japanese people/日本民族 was merged into the article Yamato people/大和民族 in jp.wiki. They say the word Japanese peopele is sometimes taken as the Japanese. Well, I was confused too. But what shall we do? Remember there are lots of individuals in the world who still think Japan is a part of China. Oda Mari 15:16, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Need a little help

There has been an edit war between users at Talk:Culture of Taiwan over whether it should be included as a part of WikiProject Japan; I was wondering if any project member would be willing to help out this issue. Thanks! - Penwhale | Blast him / Follow his steps 02:48, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Comment made. To me, including Taiwan in WPJ seems to be reaching outside of the Project's domain. CES 03:14, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't understand why people get so worked up over whether or not an article falls under a specific project or not. To me, if more people want to help out with an article, more power to them. Taiwan has definitely been greatly influenced by Japan for hundreds of years, so I think it would be fine to include that article under the project as long as someone from this project is willing and able to work on that article. All these stupid cultural pissing matches are really getting dumb, IMHO. We have wingnut editors from Japan, Korea, China, and Taiwan all arguing over various articles, edit warring, ripping on each other, and so on, rather than just working on the articles and putting aside their petty differences in order to make the encyclopedia better. Sure, Japan (and China and Korea, and probably Taiwan, too) has done some stupid things in their history, but people need to learn to quit dwelling on the past and harboring generation-spanning grudges. It's very unlikely that most of the people working on Wikipedia were even alive during WWII, and most of their parents were either not born or very young then. It makes me want to break out the whiffle bat and start whacking some heads. </rant> ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 06:10, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
True, but there are some POV warriors, as you know... - Penwhale | Blast him / Follow his steps 13:04, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

武将

I have a question. What is a ja:武将? Is it a leader of samurai? Thanks, Cattus 18:53, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

It means simply "military commander" in the very general sense, applying both (I believe) to samurai and to modern-day national military types, and does not denote any particular rank. 「武」is the "mu" in "musha" (武者, "warrior") or the "bu" in "bushi" (武士, essentially a synonym for samurai); 「将」is the "shō" in "taishō" (大将, General) or in Shogun (将軍). LordAmeth 23:11, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks! Cattus 17:41, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Flag of Japan

Me, along with others, are expanding the article, hoping to eventually get it to featured status. I welcome your assistance on this expansion. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 09:24, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Formal date-of-event practices

It is my understanding that official documents in Japan are still dated in terms of the reign; viz., events from 1927 to 1989 dated in a manner where AD 1927 is counted as the first full year of Shōwa (昭和) and post-1989 dated where 1990 is counted as the first year of Heisei (平成). Does this Project have any procedures for accomodating the formal Japanese date procedure? - B.C.Schmerker 16:54, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Have you seen the pages on Showa, Heisei, Japanese era name, etc.? CES 18:20, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the procedural clarification. I stand corrected on both start years. - B.C.Schmerker 22:51, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Picture of Naruhito

The above post got me browsing through pages of emperors past, present, and future ... can we come up with a better picture of Naruhito? The current one is a little odd. CES 18:20, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

I had a good laugh at that one. There's some better pictures here, but the site explicitly disallows reproduction. http://www.kunaicho.go.jp/e03/ed03-03.html All the other articles use the same image, sadly. Is there someone familiar with asking for permission to use images that could email the Imperial Household site? -- Exitmoose 07:07, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
I tried Flickr, I tried google and many others. I will see if others work. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 07:41, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
I think it's the best I have. On that day I was able to photograph some nice groups, but that seems to be the best one of him. Regrets Fg2 11:12, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
It's ok, don't blame yourself. There are other photos I found, but they seem to be from the AP, Japanese Government or under Crown copyright. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 18:06, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Virtual Idol

I notice the page "Japanese Idol" is under this project so I thought I'd ask here: is anyone interested in helping me make a page for "Virtual Idols", as used as a reoccurring theme in various literature, anime, et cetera? I'm familiar mostly with their description in BESM 3rd edition and with the American book Aidoru (by William Gibson) and sequals, but I know they're treated in I think Macross, and if they're popular enough to be mentioned in BESM there have to be other works with the concept. Oh yeah, and there was that disney movie.

(If you don't know what I mean, I'm talking about the concept of programming a computer to act like a Japanese "Idol" singer and, usually with holographic technology, using them as the newest pop sensation). Kuronue 04:43, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Can't really help out with the article (you already give more info then I knew in the first place), but you might want to check out this article as well: Max Headroom... Not quite a Japanese idol, but it is one of the first instances of the "virtual TV persona" concept in a show, aired on TV, if I'm not wrong. TomorrowTime 05:55, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I remember something like that from Macross Plus. I haven't seen any of the other Macross stuff. Dekimasuよ! 10:14, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Michael Brown FAC non-promotion

The Michael Brown Okinawa assault incident failed FAC review. The chief opposer said that it needed more copyediting. I've reread the article several times and can't see where further copyediting is needed and the chief opposer didn't provide many examples. I guess I'm too close to the article since I wrote most of it. If someone could please look at the article and make any necessary changes, I'll then renominate for FAC. CLA 23:12, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Japanese Movie Database

I just created Japanese Movie Database. It's just like the IMDB, but for Japan. Please use this when looking up references for Japanese films. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 04:30, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, this is a very useful site for Japanese cinema. If anyone else can use it, here's a template I've been using for citing this database:
{{cite web |url= |title= |accessdate=2008-06-09|language=Japanese|work=[[Japanese Movie Database]]}} Dekkappai 22:15, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Japanese magazine category

I've revamped and organized Category:Japanese magazines a bit, so please make yourselves familiar with the new organization. There wasn't really any organization before. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 10:26, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Gyoza & Jiaoji

Hey guys, I'm not in WP:J, but I want to let you guys know that some CPOV idiot tried to fulfill his nationalist duties by merging Jiaoji with Gyoza (also with Korean Mandu) - they're all dumplings. So, I reworked everything out to their original stats. Keep an eye on them. Thanks! : ) (Wikimachine 05:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC))

I see no evidence that 2 articles (Gyoza & Jiaozi) ever existed in parallel until you came along, Wikimachine. However, there appears to have been a cut & paste move back in June 2004, and a "histmerge" may be in order.--Endroit 05:29, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
In Japan gyōza are not recognized to be "Japanese dumplings", as the article now suggests. They are considered Chinese food. Thus, it might make sense for Gyoza to become a section in the other article. Dekimasuよ! 05:34, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Dekimasu that the merged article should be at Jiaozi, like it has always been for 3 years. Just follow the procedure at Wikipedia:How to fix cut and paste moves to merge them again.--Endroit 05:39, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Ok, well, how the article was trying to say Mandu was also Jiaoji is contrary to Mandu's status in Korea as an indigenous food. That's quite interesting. You guys should put that info. (Wikimachine 15:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC))
Hey, I have come too late? As Japanese, I think "Gyoza" is just a Japanese pronounceation for Jiaozi ... as well as you call foreign names in English localized ones (Muenchen -> Munich, Koeln -> Cologne ...). While Japanese standard Gyoza has been localized and get its particularity, in Japan no one think two as different dish. --Aphaia 11:47, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Film credits glossary

Since the glossary rarely gets used (at least by me as I never go over there) or updated over on Wiktionary, I've set it up at Wikipedia:WikiProject Japan/Film credits glossary as I think it will be much more useful to this project and its descendants. Feel free to update the list. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 07:41, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Regarding addresses in Japanese for Template:Infobox City Japan

For the first time, at least for me, I have put the city hall address in the template in Western format in Kitaakita, Akita which, according to this site, is essentially the Japanese address backwards:


{Street Address} {Subarea}

{City / Town, District}, {Prefecture} {Postal Code}

JAPAN


I'm not sure how well this would work, given that it is very possible for the second line to be very lengthy whereas the first line might not be. In addition, I don't know how it's supposed to work for Hokkaido with its subprefectures, the postal code symbol is still left in the template but there is no number with it in Kitaakita, Akita, and "JAPAN" would technically have to follow every address.

The plus side to all of this would be, though, that the address is in a format that is usable to the readers of the English Wikipedia articles.

Comments appreciated.

-Nameneko 08:04, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

I've been doing essentially the same, but without putting in manual linebreaks. That way you don't have to worry about line length, and there's really no harm in putting something on the "wrong" line. My current address is in a town, and I've always had people write my address
banchi neighborhood, town
district, prefecture postal code
JAPAN
The source you link to doesn't even address the case of a town in a district; I doubt there's an official, preferred format. Amake 12:18, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the information. I noticed that you uploaded the symbol for Ikata, Ehime. The copyright information the image makes sense and I think it'd be hard to dispute it. I've been uploading a few myself (most of them can be seen here) but the copyright information is PD-user and Insignia. I'm not familiar with copyright law in Japan but with the lack of such images in the ja.wikipedia, I'm guessing there are restrictions for these. I'd appreciate any information you might have on this. -Nameneko 19:41, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't know much more about the municipality symbol issue than you do--
  1. There were symbols on ja:
  2. They were removed due to copyright issues
  3. I have no idea who it was that had a problem (the municipalities themselves? the central government?)
I assumed that asking permission in my case was good enough, and so far it has been (I doubt anyone in my town even knows what Wikipedia is, much less would care about infringement on the town symbol). Of course it's not feasible to ask each and every municipality. My guess is that you may be committing some no-no's, but no one cares enough to do anything about it. Amake 12:29, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

The endless "In Popular Culture" sections

A user (Auximines) has embarked on a single-handed crusade to eliminate the countless "In Popular Culture" sections of Japan-related articles. He has my full-hearted support, but his actions also got me to thinking, especially since one of his deletions has already been reverted. In view of the enormous ammount of these, in most cases completely useless sections, shouldn't there be a rule or something? Is this the right place to discuss a possible setting of rules regarding these sections? If not, where should I turn to?

My proposed rule would be something to this extent: "For Japan-related articles, an "In Popular Culture" section should be limited to noteworthy instances of the article subject in anime, manga, dorama and other Japanese media. This includes main heroes or villains, important story line objects and similar. This excludes lesser heroes or vilains, less important story-line objects, references in ending songs, brief appearances and similar. Furher, the mention should be brief and to the point - story arcs belong in the articles on the respective anime, manga, dorama or other."

I realize this rule is not nearly clear-cut enough to be fully useful in all instances, but it could work to reduce clutter such as this:

  • An item on the anime-roleplaying forum website Gaia Online released in October 2006 enables a member's avatar to be surrounded by flames resembling Hitodama.
  • In the Sailor Moon R series, episode 53 "Mamoru and Usagi's Babysitter Mayhem", the monster of the day is 'Amaterasu', based on the sun tarot card as well as the shinto religion.
  • In xxxHolic, a student teacher wishes on a monkey's paw to gain possession of the Yata No Kagami.
  • In the anime Eureka Seven, the main character, Renton, sees haniwa representations of himself and his classmates during a dream.
  • In episode 9 of Demashita! Powerpuff Girls Z, Yuki-Onna appears when Fuzzy Lumpkins mistakes her for Ms. Bellum (he grabs her breasts, then Yuki-Onna uses her magic to freeze him in ice).

And on and on. What say ye? TomorrowTime 04:24, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

We should be at least as restrictive as TomorrowTime suggests. We should further eliminate "resemblances," which are original opinions (not even worthy of the term "original research," but we can of course remove them as OR without apology), whether the resemblance is in the appearance, the name, or the characteristics. We should also avoid cluttering articles on real life with analyses of differences between the item in popular culture and the real thing. Those analyses can be relevant to the pop culture and might be important in the article on the anime etc. but they are irrelevant to Tokugawa Ieyasu, kitsune, etc. Fg2 05:09, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
I am always of two minds on these sections...on the one hand, they can help put something in context, and provide a way for people interested in that topic get more information. It is something that wikipedia can offer over and above a paper encyclopedia. On the other hand, They are often just a big garbage list of a few seconds of screen time that don't add to the article at all.
Take the Yuki-onna article for example:
  1. The 1990 movie Dreams, directed by Akira Kurosawa, features a yuki-onna in the story The Blizzard
  2. The 1965 movie Kwaidan, directed by Masaki Kobayashi, features a yuki-onna in the story The Woman of the Snow.
I would say these are both valid. People interested in the yuki onna can watch these movies, and gain a greater appreciation in the subject. However...
  1. In the Bandai-Namco video game Tales of the Abyss (2005), when the party reaches a snow-covered mountain, Jade Curtiss tells a story of yuki-onna to frighten the party.
Just seems to be clutter. I like the rules you established, and would support them. But I am against the wholesale demolition of these sections.MightyAtom 05:13, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
I'd strongly recommend looking at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Japan/Archive/December 2006#Trivia sections (continued) as well. When it reached that point, though, I wasn't sure that the WikiProject has the ability to "make a rule", which is why I suggested going over to the guideline page. Dekimasuよ! 05:16, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
Context is important here. If a single episode of an anime mentions Tokukawa Ieyasu, whose name resembles that of Tokugawa Ieyasu, we should not consider that fact important to the real person, and should not not mention it in the context of the article on him. But it might merit mention in the article on the anime, or on the episode (if the episode has an article), especially if it's crucial to understanding the events that take place. Using episode 9 of Demashita! Powerpuff Girls Z (which TomorrowTime mentioned), the article on Demashita! Powerpuff Girls Z might benefit from mention of yuki onna, but the article on yuki onna would not benefit from mention of Demashita! Powerpuff Girls Z. Nor should the articles on War (Bellum), Breast, Freezing, or Ice mention Demashita! Powerpuff Girls Z.
Also, I agree with Dekimasu that we should discuss this at the Manual of Style page. Fg2 05:33, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Here is the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (Japan-related articles).

Thanks for moving this discussion to a more apropriate place. I'm just sorry I brought this up now, when I have to leave the computer for a while and won't be able to see how the discussion develops. TomorrowTime 05:55, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Iwo Jima

There's a debate on this page, concerning weither it should remain at Iwo Jima or be moved to Iwo To. Contentious issue - Is Iwo To the new English version of the island's name? GoodDay 21:07, 23 June 2007 (UTC)


New article

I just created Senjafuda. It's a sub-stub currently, though a decent-sized article exists in Japanese if anyone feels like translating. Exploding Boy 23:13, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I've listed it on Template:Newest Japan-related articles for you. Fg2 20:08, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Arigato-san. I've translated the first 1 or 2 sections from the Japanese, but it still needs plenty of work. Exploding Boy 06:39, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

The National Qualifier for Manchukuo-related Articles

Due to the dispute on where Bank of Manchukuo should be moved to Talk:Bank of Manchukuo#Requested move, I started pondering about how the kanji national qualifier for Manchukuo, 満州(Manshū), should be translated.

Manchukuo, or in kanji 満州国, literally meant "State of Manchuria" and hence translating 満州 as "Manchukuo" is linguistically incorrect. However, if we use "Manchuria" confusion would result; Dekimasu has mentioned, I think there's a large number of talk pages wholly dedicated to determining how to represent historical distinctions between the region and the Japanese puppet state on Wikipedia, and those tend to support using Manchukuo in this sort of situation.

I wonder if we should have a fixed guideline about this-- even currently the number of articles affected is limited; besides Bank of Manchukuo there's only Manchukuo National Airlines.--Samuel di Curtisi di Salvadori 14:02, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I've always thought that strange, since (a) manshūkoku is not pronounced as Manchukuo in Japanese, so why is this Chinese-pronunciation name used for the Japanese puppet state to begin with, and (b) as you point out, it simply means "Manchu country" or "State of Manchuria" and thus it would seem to not really be a "new" placename imposed by the Japanese. (Similarly, the Japanese colony of Chōsen is simply the Japanese name for Joseon, a Japanese pronunciation of the same term Koreans likely used to refer to themselves, and thus also not a new and different placename.) In any case, despite the above reasons, I think Manchukuo is by far the most common, and most recognized, term to refer to this puppet state, and so "Manchukuo National Airlines" and "Bank of Manchukuo" should, I suppose, stay; the national/ethnic adjective for things not relating to the puppet state is of course still "Manchu", though, as in "the Manchu invaders took over China and began a Manchu dynasty, forcing the people of China to dress in Manchu fashion and wear their hair in a Manchu manner." LordAmeth 17:16, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Manchukuo, after all, is nominally an independent state which has a Han Chinese majority, hence the use of a Chinese name (Chinese-- called manshū-go-- and Japanese are both official languages).--Samuel di Curtisi di Salvadori 17:35, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Japanese music artists (specific)

Hi there. I've recently tried to build my own Wiki about Japanese music artists and realized that this can not be carried out by just one person. The magnitude of work involved is mind-boggling! So I have turned to Wikipedia, to look for like-minded individuals who may share a common interest to build a central information depositry for anyone looking for any information regarding Japanese artists.

If anyone is interested please post a message on my User:jmlz87 page and I will get back to you.

Thanks! Jmlz87 06:38, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Two articles needing attention

Fact checking from Diet of Japan

Hello, I was wondering if this sentence is true and, if so, has a source: "In 1994, a representative bloc was also introduced for the House of Representatives, at first at an even split of 250:250. When the LDP regained power in 1996, this was changed into the current numbers." Thanks. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 02:10, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Sorry without source, but Japanese Wikipedia article ja:小選挙区比例代表並立制 says 250:250 was the proposal from the cabinet, which didn't realize. In January 1994 the Law about Diet reform passed, but at that time, the proportion was 300:200 (200 for bloc). In 1996 the general election was held and then the legally determined proportion was realized ... I have no good reason to combine with "when the LDP regained" ... it seems to reverse the logical consequence. And ja:衆議院 (House of Representatives) says the proportion was changed into 300:180 (180 for bloc) in 2000, not 1996. You may find good sources in English. --Aphaia 12:01, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Unassessed WP:JA articles

I've been working through these articles and doing a quick assessment (FA, A, GA, B, Start, Stub, etc.) in order to try to empty out the unassessed category. Anyone who wants to help is welcome. I've done from Numbers through to most of the way through the H section. Just post here which section you are working on (pick a letter) so others don't try to do the same one. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 03:49, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

I got some time. I will go backwards from ŌMightyAtom 04:40, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
On those articles with macrons in the title, please make sure the main article page is using {{DEFAULTSORT:}} without the macron so they sort correctly. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 07:23, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
I found a few stray talk pages, where it looks like the article was deleted but not the talk page. Can anyone take care of this? Talk:Zakoba_Katsura, Talk:Zodiac (gang). —The preceding unsigned comment was added by MightyAtom (talk • contribs).
Done. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 07:23, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Imadate

Is there a difference between Imadate, Imadate, Fukui and Imadate, Fukui? If not, they should likely be merged. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 23:41, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

The description of the town's location, population, and washi specialty on Imadate, Imadate, Fukui, and the merger information on Imadate, Fukui all match 今立町. I think it's a safe bet that they're the same. -Amake 05:11, 28 June 2007 (UTC)
The jp.wiki article mentions that Imadate used to be part of Imadategun before it was merged into Echizen. That would explain the odd title of the first article. I'd say the two articles in question are about the same thing. TomorrowTime 07:35, 28 June 2007 (UTC)