Last Update: Jan 10, 1998 (but still under construction...)
First of all, English is not my own mother tongue, all texts herein this page are written by me, but since I'm a native, pure Japanese born and raised in Japan, some paragraphs are not understandable for you due to my bad (and wrong) English. I'm sorry for that...Note that here's NO link for the Japanese adult sites or the ones which contain illegal stuffs.
You need to be able to read/write/speak, or understand Japanese language unless you get or find a friendly, kind-hearted Japanese person who speaks your language. Most Japanese persons who live abroad speak English, but it's not enough for you, IMO. Because they have been away from Japan for some time, don't know some recent things about Japan. Though they can be found at #japan or some other Japan related channels on IRC very easily. But be aware, many of those guys who always hang around at Japan related IRC channels are not so friendly. If you're lucky enough, you may be able to find a nice one who will be willing to help you out.Anyway, there are some ways or places you can find a one (or some) friendly Japanese will help you out:
- IRC
- PowWow
- WWW page and WWW based bulletin board
- Usenet Newsgroups
- ICQ
IRC
IRC stands for "Internet Relay Chat." IRC is the place where people addicted to chat always hangs around. There are some IRC networks now, and each of them are not connected to the other IRC networks. I think the most current popular IRC networks are DALnet, Undernet, EFnet and IRCnet. Which is the best one for you? I recommend you to connect and look for friendly ones on IRCnet, because all IRC servers reside in Japan are connected only to IRCnet.Once you connect to the IRCnet server, try to locate the channels where some Japanse users are. Some Japanese users creat the channel which name is in Japanese, you may not see the channel name in that case. Like other IRC networks, there's #japan channel also on IRCnet.
Note that all IRCnet servers in Japan don't allow the connection from non .jp domain hosts. Although I've heard that the admins of those servers put that restriction/blocking to avoid unnecessary network load, but what a narrow minded attitude! But don't worry of course you can still connect IRCnet thru many servers located outside of Japan. irc.stealth.net and irc.webbernet.net are some of the examples.
You better not to ask someone about what you wanna know about your favorite manga, Japanese idols or something like that right after you join the channel. Most Japanese IRC users have gotten sick with those non-Japanese people on IRC, they're often asked about such things from strangers. Go straight to #manga or #anime channels (or to others) if/when you wanna ask only for it. Besides, according to my own knowledge and experience, there are only few Japanese users at those channels always, such as at #manga or #anime.
Also, don't try to pick up some Japanese chicks at IRC. Japanese users also got tired of such things, and you'll get kicked (and/or banned) if you ask that in the channel. You can give it a try to getting kicked or banned by yourself once of course, however. :)
PowWow
(not yet)
WWW page and WWW based bulletin board
(not yet)
Usenet Newsgroups
(not yet)
ICQ
(not yet)
There's a lot of good, useful and interesting pages on the Web. I recommend you the following pages, more to come...
- Japanese Information has links for other good resources on the Web about Japanese learning.
Since I've met sooo many Westerners and non-Japanese people on the Net, interested in Japanese culture including anime, manga, Japanese female idols, etc, and some of those often asked me how to find the stuff they like.The following Japanese keywords seem to be useful especially for the ones interested and want to search for web pages written in Japanese. Just copy the keyword below which you wanna search with, then use it with the Japanese web search engines listed below. You should not include trailing dashes (---) and the description in English when you copy it.
By the way, Namie Amuro is the one of most recent famous and popular female stars in Japan. She has a Filipino heritage but no one especially mass mediums such as papers and magazines never mentioned about it since sad to say there's still kinda racial discrmination widely spreaded among Japanese people towards non-White people.
- 安室 --- Amuro
- "安室奈美恵" --- Namie Amuro
- "酒井法子" --- Noriko Sakai
- "セーラームーン" --- Sailor Moon
Noriko Sakai has made her debut as a singer at first, but she acts a role in TV dramas mostly, never sing/release a hit song in Japan anymore. She's been continue her carrier as an actress. And I think it's better for herself too...
Both of Namie Amuro and Noriko Sakai are very famous still in Japan, anybody in Japan knows about them.
On the other hand, you may like, or may be a fan of "Chiasa" or someone whose nude pics are easily found at some usenet newsgroups and WWW pages. She's not famous in Japan at all, only Japanese male Otakus know and love her. She's just a nude model here, virtually no Japanese female knows about her.
Use the web search engines below for .jp domain sites with the keywords above.
- Yahoo JAPAN
- Goo
- ODIN - Open Documentary Information Navigator
- Titan
- "Senri-gan" (means "clairvoyant") at Waseda University, Tokyo
Personally I'm not interested in collecting or viewing "some kind of" graphics files/pictures on my side. Besides, I've been seriously concerning about that some enforcements, restrictions, limitation or controlling the net by the government/authorities about such things in Japan. I would say "No!!!" for it, that's my position.By the way, the author of FLmask, a masking/de-masking utility program for graphics files has arrested by the Japanese police, because he's suspected to violate the Japanese anti-pornography law. He is forced to stay in the police still, but no one can say "he's guilty" or something like that at this point. However, most of the admins of ftp sites in Japan have removed his program from their servers already. They are lamers, always think about something only to protect themselves.
To protest for such foolish attitudes or actions of administrators, I am presenting you the link for the another program which is functionally equivalent to FLmask.
GMask is also a masking/de-masking program, and is Freeware compared to FLmask which is distributed as a shareware. You can use GMask without any cost, and can distribute it freely, any notification to the author is not needed. (according to its document written by the author himself)Click to download GMask 1.40 (gmask014.zip: 136KB) (contains no English document in this archive) here, or you can check the latest version at following sites:
GMask Home Page
The Chinese version of Gmask seems to be also available now, check out the author's web page.
GMask, Yun-Young Hur's Korean version
Gmask Updates
The Author of Gmask has released its newer version, Gmask 1.60 on Dec 17, 1997. Luckily, the English version is now available at the author's own web page. Although you can visit his web page still, the page is totally written in Japanese, you can obtain the English version of Gmask 1.60e from here.
The author of FLmask has sentenced as guilty in Japan at the end of 1997. He decided to throw away his all rights about his program FLmask, passed them to the US software company AdvanceTrend. You can read some info and annoucements about FLmask, also obtain/purchase online the program itself at that page. Check out: http://www.advancetrend.com/flmask/ for more information.
Comments, opinions and criticisms are always welcome. Send them to Coconut.