11 June 2005

Geek ghetto

Posted by Mick (SplaTT) Stanic under: Geek Culture .

If you are a real “otaku”, a member of the “otaku-zoku” or an “akiba-kei”, you would be hanging out in “Electric Town” or as the non-otaku’s call it, Akihabara.

This article on the Washington Post site is pretty interesting and some of the lines and quotes are great.

Heres a taste:
“Maligned and shunned by mainstream society, here they stayed, their tastes and habits transforming the area also known as Electric Town into what sociologists are calling an urban first — a ghetto of geeks.”

and

“In Akihabara, we don’t need to be ashamed of who we are and what we like,” said Shunsuke Yamagata, a college student. “We can feel comfortable because here, we outnumber everyone else.”

and

“Most people think we’re weird. That’s why we come here.”

Sounds like something from the old cyberpunk days…or a William Gibson novel…cool…

Leave a Reply

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website

Anti-spam word: (Required)*
To prove you're a person (not a spam script), type the security word shown in the picture. Click on the picture to hear an audio file of the word.

831 views