Otaku Hierarchy

[Flying Scotsman 0]

First, for reference:

http://www.brunching.com/images/geekchartbig.gif

Anime fans are on there.

Let's make an Otaku Hierarchy version of this!

Let's see. At the top would be creators/producers of the great anime: Miyazaki, Takahashi, etc.

Under this would be publishers, studios, and other "industry" folks.

Then we have Otaku in general--we assume everyone below this level is an amateur--and under that we'd divide it several ways. I'm making a wild stab here for how we'd divide the categories:

*Artists

*Cosplayers

*J-Pop music fans/players

*Video gamers

*Computer/internet/online folks

*LARPers

*Manga/literature fans

From this, we get into long, involved discussions with folks that know more about this stuff than I do. For example, would AMV's fall under music fans in general or as their own category? Are Cosplayers and LARPers separate, or is one a subset of another?

Have at it, folks. I'll get the popcorn and watch from the sidelines.

And do we have some ambitious graphic artist willing to make this up into a website?

We could also take bets on the bottom box, akin to the one at Geek Hierarchy........... I'm guessing the bottom would include something involving 4chan, a Pokemon furry, Japanese bondage, terrible fanfic and fanart, and sucky J-pop with bad subtitles?

[Duelistbluerose 0]

- there's definately the elite among cosplayers. you see this very clearly on cosplay.com and other sites

- i think fanfic writers should be closer to the bottom of the chart, because anyone can write fanfics - whether they have writing skills or not

- maybe bloggers and podcasters should be on the list. this takes a lot of skill and charisma so maybe closer to the top

[jimay 0]

Alrighty. Im going to take a stab at this (but its going to focus solely on the bottom). This is of course from my own opinion and suffice to say, i am no expert on every single topic with regards to being "otaku."

In my opinion, "J-pop/j-music" in general should probably considered the least otaku-like thing to do.

Really, the only two correlations between being otaku and being a j-music fan is the country obviously and the cross-promotional marketing the advertisers for the videogame/anime industry (if even at all).

To put it into perspective, being solely a fan of j-music isn't really any different from listening to ramstein from germany, kylie minogue from australia, or any other artists from around the world.

I honestly don't think listening to this music makes anyone that much more otaku than from the bottom.

As always this is from my perspective, because there's also that person who listens to this music based solely from anime and videogames, which would obviously put the music up the hierarchy a little.

[alabaster 0]

I dunno, the idea of trying to build hierarchies around geekdom seems like you're taking the great equalizer -- You Are A Fan -- and making it about the same lame elitist crap that life is already full of. I like to think of fandom as something we share rather than something we use to exclude others.

Those sorts of things only work humor-wise, IMHO, when they are done tongue-in-cheek, by people making fun of themselves. Y'know, with one done by Otakon Staff making "staff at an anime convention" one of the most lame things to be.

[Flying Scotsman 0]

I dunno, the idea of trying to build hierarchies around geekdom seems like you're taking the great equalizer -- You Are A Fan -- and making it about the same lame elitist crap that life is already full of. I like to think of fandom as something we share rather than something we use to exclude others.

Those sorts of things only work humor-wise, IMHO, when they are done tongue-in-cheek, by people making fun of themselves. Y'know, with one done by Otakon Staff making "staff at an anime convention" one of the most lame things to be.