"Courage and perseverance are important if one is to run anything resembling a news organization...the folks at theOtaku.com have demonstrated themselves to have ample quantities of both."
~ TCJ (The Comics Journal)
"A couple years of experience in the Otaku circle have taught me at least one good lesson--to trust Adam."
~ myO member
"Adam is actually a decently accomplished troll."
~ Allamorph
"The scale of Adam's cunning genius is truly frightening."
~ TimeChaser
A lot of fascinating responses to our survey though we still have a while to go to reach the goal of 1,000 respondents.
One person, under "Favorite Part of theOtaku" wrote "The Bossman" which made me smile
Another person left every field blank except, under "Least Favorite Part of theOtaku" they wrote "Adam" over and over again. Yikes, I'm glad Death Note was just a show or I'd definitely be in someone's notebook.
I think a lot of people will be surprised that so far in the survey theOtaku.com has a 91% approval rating. What's interesting is that I copy-pasted that last question from the political realm, it's the same format as the one they use to measure Presidential approval ratings. So Bush: 30ish%, theOtaku.com: 91%, not bad.
Now, how people view my "6 months of my life" relaunch is a bit more divided. Here's the break down: 24% of people say it's WAY better, 37% of people say it's better, 14% of people say it's about the same, 18% of people say it's worse, only 2% of people said it's much worse, and 8% of people say that they never visited the previous site so they don't know. That's about 80% positive or normal and 20% negative.
Digging into the comments of the people who said it was worse showed a lot of understandable reasons, divided into three categories:
(1) People with technical problems: It's definitely understandable that someone who runs into a frustrating glitch on the site or with computer settings that aren't friendly to us will be upset at the relaunch. We'll have to do a better job publicizing and listing glitches so that people can see them getting fixed, right now we do it all mostly in the background.
One thing I recommend to everyone is to use either FireFox or Internet Explorer 7. Using IE 6 messes up our layout a little bit which we're working on.
(2) People who want more: There are some limitations on the site right now that people get upset about. What's most interesting to me about this is that, if we were any other site, which updated a few times a year vs. every week, I don't think people would be that bothered because they'd accept things as they were. However, since we improve every single week, visitors wonder "why did you add THAT feature and not THIS one?", which leads to feelings of discontent and feeling like their issues are being ignored. I don't think a lot of people remember the frustrations of the old site, because it wasn't updated that often and they just got used to those frustrations.
For example if tomorrow our voting system went to the way it used to be, where it didn't go through instantly and refreshed the entire page every time you voted, forcing you to hit the back button twice to leave, I think I'd get complaints every day saying "I hate this system, it's so slow, when will you fix it" but back then no one cared because that was the standard.
This is a really difficult problem to solve. We just have to ask for patience or maybe post a public "to do" list so they see what's coming next, I'm not sure.
(3) People with nostalgia issues: A lot of people on the site are very sentimental and miss things, even small things, like one person was really outraged that we didn't have weekly DVD releases anymore. The major problem with this group is that, even if we re-introduced those old features, they'd probably become happy for a day or two and then quickly forget about it. We've seen this time and time again, where we've re-introduced old features because of member demand and then no one really pays attention to them anymore, leaving us to have to discontinue them again. That doesn't mean that old things can't be re-introduced but it's better to focus on the future and to leave the past as fond memories.
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On another note, to show the kind of absurdity I have to deal with on a daily basis, I just got an email from someone complaining that one of our WORLDS has a picture of a muffin with frosting on it (a "fruffin") and that since this was his "invention" he was going to look into legal action against us unless we took it down.
As Desbreko said: "I'm pretty sure you can't copyright putting frosting on muffins."
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Today I walked for about 8 miles total on a quest for great SomeGuy-territory food. First I went to a famous burger place and ordered an amazing chicken burger. Next, I went to a place famous for cinnamon buns and ordered this beauty:
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I want to finally give a shout out necro64x. He really wanted a new feature on WORLDS and, rather than wait for us to figure it out, he wrote the code for it himself and PMed it to me. Soon this feature will be implemented, probably months before it would otherwise have been because of his efforts.
This is similar to how Desbreko made a new comment window for myOtaku and how Sabrina took charge of adding categories. Ordinary members doing extraordinary things.
- Today at my kickboxing class, I could have SWORN that my partner said "good job, Bossman." My jaw almost dropped.
- I'm craving dark chocolate a lot these days.
- I always grew up skinny with a super fast metabolism. However, I've noticed that as I've aged, all the fat starts storing up in my stomach so I have a small belly now. I don't really drink beer, though, so it's not a beer belly. I'm hoping my constant physical activity and eating sushi will help annihilate it.
- I'm going to release a survey soon to gauge the "state of theOtaku" - most people don't realize that the vast majority of members on the site are lurkers who you've probably never seen before. But their opinions are just as important as the very vocal people so I look forward to seeing what they say in the survey
- I'm excited about the results of our theO-NYAF mascot contest but disappointed at how silly Otakuites can be. Every single time we work hard to get a major contest for the site, people find some reason to make a fuss. What's funny is that sometimes the complaints contradict each other, like:
"You're biased in some way"
"Why aren't more theOtaku long-time members in the finals?"
On the one hand they're complaining about bias and then in the same breath complaining that we're not biased ENOUGH to favor old members vs. new members.
And then there's bias toward digital vs. traditional works, failing to realize that in our last NYAF-theOtaku contest, a ton of the finalists were traditional works. And why on earth would we care?? What difference to our site, at all, would it make whether the mascot to a convention was drawn digitally or traditionally?
The thing that annoys me most about these posts is that they don't give me any credit at all. I'm much smarter than they make me out to be--If I wanted to introduce bias, I'd have a game plan that looked something like this:
- I wouldn't have revealed how the judging took place
- I would have then judged them all myself and picked my favorite works, all of whom would be theOtaku members
- Then I'd contact the winners directly and post that the contest was concluded and that if you were in the finals then you'd hear from me
Instead, we had an expert panel, which I wasn't even a part of, with full transparency. And what people fail to also realize is that this contest is FOR NYAF, they want a new mascot so they have every right in the world to just pick the one they like best. However, being classy, they're letting attendees at another convention vote for their favorite of the top 10.
If I needed a mascot for a project and hosted an art contest, I wouldn't go the finalists route, I'd just pick the one I personally liked and finish with it.
Desbreko said it best when he asked why I don't just lock comments on such posts. I might go that route next time.
Here are some answers, silly otakuites...
1. Is there a promotion system here in V V?
Not yet.
2. Can the Quiz Manager in MyOtaku automatically save the Guru results here in V V again?
No.
what's your operating system, O Bossman?
Windows XP, but my next computer might be a Mac
Why did you create TheOtaku? Please answer this!
I just love producing things and it was just circumstance that led to this site being one of the things I produced.
Which site do you think is our biggest rival?
Have you ever been to Japan?
Are you going to create a section of theO where we can play your flashgames whenever we want?
1. To be honest I don't consider any sites our rival...there are a lot of specialized sites out there that are good, but none that have our breadth. For example AP is great for wallpapers, dA is great for fan art, but dA is TERRIBLE for wallpapers and AP doesn't have fan art, let alone Cards, Quizzes, and Fan Comics in a paginated format. We're unique. TokyoPop comes close to our breadth but their execution is really shoddy
2. Yes, Japan is great
3. That would be fun
Are you comfortable with giving people massages? Or physical touch in general.
I am VERY comfortable with receiving massages, I've spent a lot of money on them over the years, but giving them?? If it's a girl I like then yes, if it's anyone else then no...
What is your favorite part of theOtaku?
Planning, creating and launching new features/sections/sites/projects that do well.
What ever happened to Tico Art? That was a neat little gallery from a while back.
Tico was a great DragonBall Z fan artist from Puerto Rico. After we created our fan art section many people have been able to contribute great fan art.
Will there be any additional site alteration options for worlds? (New color schemes and such.)
Yeah but it seems for the moment people want other things on worlds.
Will it soon be possible to upload more than one image per post?
Yeah, we'll have those options eventually. The thing is I don't think they're deal-breakers since there are creative ways around those limits, but we'll have it. We'll even have external image support once I figure out how to automatically resize external images so they don't ruin WORLD layouts.
If you could have one wish granted, what would you wish for?
If you could change just one thing in the world, what would it be and why?
I won't touch this question in a grand, philosophical sense, for example wishing to end poverty, cure all illness, etc. In that case I'd do careful research and find the wish that would have the greatest positive and sustainable impact.
On a personal and selfish level, I'd like for the next 6 months to go a lot better than the previous 6 months, it's been an awful year overall
Which ninja village would you come from if you were a Naruto character?
Konoha, all the other villages seem like terrible places to live.
Which dance is the best- Hare Hare Yukai, Motteke! Sailor Fuku, Ultra Relax, or Caramelldansen?
Very few people know this but I'm actually very good at the Haruhi dance
1. Do you see an ultimate direction in which to take theO as far as business is concerned? You know, like licensing, importing, mass mercahndise and things like that, or will the business end basically come to just selling ad-space and the occasional subscription?
I'm more interested in traffic and submissions than business for theO now. The lifeblood of websites is its audience and content
4. Speaking of sushi, what is your favorite type? I personally enjoy eel.
Salmon by far.
2 pizza or hamburgers?
I don't eat beef, so pizza.
Bossman, do you sometimes check WORLDS and read them?
Not only that, I often Google "theotaku" and see what people on other blogs are typing about us.
Which do you think would win in a fight between a rottweiler and a rottweiler's weight in chihuahuas?
The rottweiler. It can run faster than the chihuahas, separate them, and take them out one by one. The chihuahuas would have to have a really good game plan to win, but they're not naturally pack hunting dogs so i dont think they'd have any sort of strategy.
1.If you were forced to injure one otaku user, who would it be?
2.white chocolate, milk choc.,or dark?
1. Probably Aaron from AnimeFF
2. I read that dark chocolate is actually healthy so I've been eating a lot of that
If it'd be possible to enter an anime/manga which one you would choose?And which character from it you would be?
I'm having trouble thinking of any anime/manga that wouldn't be a nightmare to enter. I'd probably choose one of those romance stories where there's one guy and like fifty girls competing for his attention. What's the alternative? Being in a world with supernatural enemies and world-ending threats?
Will you come back to Anime Expo someday? xD
Maybe...
Do you have some super computer in your basement or something that runs theOtaku? Me and my friend wonder how the Otaku works.
theO is powered by lots and lots of gerbils running on wheels. Whenever we have hiccups it means that one of the gerbils has died and I need to run to the pet store.
Feel free to ask me any question here in the comments and I'll answer a handful tomorrow...
Here is the story for my third game--no cupcakes:
You are a cloud who is thousands of miles away from home. You find out that your baby has been kidnapped by water goblins. You must race home to save it.
It might take some time for it to be released.
Lots of fun stuff coming on theO, including a new contest soon.
