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V·T·E

Pre-Meiji coinage in Japan

See corollary thread at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Numismatics#Pre-Meiji coinage in Japan.

An exchange of views at Talk:Japanese yen/Archives/2012#Etymology is developing. Attention is focused on two sentences only:

En literally means "round object" in Japanese, as yuan does in Chinese, referring to the ancient Chinese coins that were circular in shape and widely used in Japan up to the Tokugawa Period. In 1695, the character 元 (ghen), signifying "round or rounded") was placed on the obverse of copper coins.
The reference source for this fact is:

As I understand it, other editors are incredulous, suggesting that this data is likely to be spurious because confirmation is not readily found in conventional numismatic reference books which concern themselves with coins in general circulation during the Edo period Tokugawa shogunate in Japan.

I wonder whether constructive comments or other helpful contributions are better solicited here in this venue. --Ooperhoofd (talk) 19:09, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

End of thread: The two questionable sentences were removed from Japanese yen in the absence of further, specific corroborating reference material. --Ooperhoofd (talk) 19:27, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Missing Kagoshima articles

I made a neat battle image a while back, Image:Battle of Okinawa.svg. As an experiment, I put in a bunch of the islands named in the map. I found a number of them do not have articles:

(The blue links go to the wrong article or a disambig page without a correct entry or with a red one). I think these need to be created Raul654 (talk) 16:30, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I partially translated the article in the Japanese Wikipedia as Yoronjima. Fg2 (talk) 04:51, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Kanji for Yuki Karthaus?

I found this http://www.debito.org/otarumayor101299.jpg - It is a letter from the mayor of Otaru to Yuki Karthaus, the wife of Olaf Karthaus.

To make the link work copy the URL into the address bar and hit enter.

With that done, what is the kanji used for Yuki Karthaus's name? (I know katakana is used to represent "Karthaus," but I do not know which kanji is used to represent Yuki) WhisperToMe (talk) 01:39, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

由希, I believe. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:47, 1 January 2008 (UTC)
What Nihonjoe said. The top line of the letter is the name. TomorrowTime (talk) 04:32, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you :) WhisperToMe (talk) 04:41, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Kazemake

Does anyone know this "uncommon Japanese feminine given name"?--Jjok (talk) 02:04, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Never heard of it. And the one anime article it links to doesn't even seem to feature any main characters by that name. ... LordAmeth (talk) 02:50, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
I haven't heard of it, either. I did complete your AfD nomination, though. Please make sure to follow all the steps when nominating an article. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 03:01, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Haven't heard of it. Fg2 (talk) 04:54, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
I've never heard of it. It looks like the adjective, kazemakase/風まかせ/carried by the wind from the linked anime article. Oda Mari (talk) 09:19, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Never heard. Someone may have misunderstood. Until anyone gives a reliable source, I think such indication should be removed.--Aphaia (talk) 16:02, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Never heard either. Suspect that it is either a mistake, or an obscure anime charactor. Should be deleted. --MChew (talk) 15:16, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. --ざくら木 15:36, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Very true, but still... the burden of proof shouldn't be to prove it doesn't exist, but rather on those who wish to assert that it does (and is notable). LordAmeth (talk) 00:56, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
I just have one question. Is this an "uncommon name", or is it a "unique name"? Bear in mind, a lot of Japanese names these days can be unique i.e. made up by the parents. If this is the case here, than the article can stay only if the bearer of the name is notable, and in that case, it should be an article about the bearer of the name, not the name itself. (Also, joining in with the crowd that's never heard of this name ;) TomorrowTime (talk) 00:54, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
Thank you! This would be more correct, I haven't misheard despite what everyone wants to claim. This is her name, and it is possible that it is a unique name. Thank you for the clarification/definition! Chris (クリス) (talk) 05:21, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Template: Female adult bio

When viewing Mami Yamasaki today, I noticed that the infobox for her page and most idols uses this template. But is this really appropriate for someone who's not a porn star? For one thing, if someone goes to the talk page for the template to discuss an issue with it, it's a given that there is going to be a bias towards fields that seem important to fans of pornography/porn-stars, but not those that apply specifically to Japanese idols (leg length, blood type). I also noticed that some Japanese actress pages don't even have an infobox, but put bulleted lists of information like that in the main text. (under Profile usually) Japanese actresses who are also singers or jpop idols frequently use the Musical Artist template.

The regular Actor template doesn't include fields for measurements, does it? Is there an infobox specifically for Japanese actresses? I can see that if there isn't, people just decided to use the one that matched the closest to what we needed. --70.128.116.146 (talk) 09:25, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

She's not an actress, she's a bikini model, and as such the template and its measurements are perfectly appropriate. Jpatokal (talk) 01:25, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Kent Derricott

Please note that there is a AfD for Kent Derricott, a well known gaijin tarento. The complaint is "No evidence of notability. Reference provides no substantial information" which I attribute to the relative lack of coverage in English, as well as that the era of Derricott's highest visibility around 20 years ago, though he is still well known in Japan. It might be useful for people to weigh in the AfD that actually know about the subject of gaijin tarento. -- 208.81.184.4 (talk) 00:27, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

The Articles for deletion discussion has been closed and the article has been kept. More information about deletion discussions is available at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Japan. Fg2 (talk) 01:01, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

legends and folktales

Sakata no Kintoki was recently changed to a redirect to Kintarō. In practice, I think we should be keeping fictional characters separate from their real-life basis... But, as history is not my strong suit, I don't know how much there is to distinguish between the historic legend, and the folk hero which was based on the legend. Are there any other viewpoints? Neier (talk) 07:04, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I also must admit I don't know enough about this figure to know how much there may be to say about the historical figure as separate from the folk legend. But in any case, I tend to personally go by the practice of describing the two subjects separately, within one article. Since "Kintarō" and "Sakata no Kintoki" are separate names, it invites the possibility for separate articles - but since most legendary heroes (e.g. Benkei, Minamoto no Yoshitsune, Sugawara no Michizane) are pretty much known by one name, and since they are essentially the same topic (the historical figure and the legends which have grown up around him), I think it best to keep it in one article. LordAmeth (talk) 00:15, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Talk:Hirohito#RFC:_Appropriate_Emperor_Name

An RFC on an article covered by this project has been opened, comments are welcome. MBisanz talk 01:34, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Jōyō kanji and List of jōyō kanji

The article Jōyō kanji has been on Wikipedia since 2004, and List of jōyō kanji was added today. Both contain extensive tables. I'm not sure what the best division of material between them might be.

Separately, both have all kanji linked to Wiktionary, and therefore underlined. Is there a way to get Wikipedia not to underline them, yet keep the links? Or is there a way to display the unlinked kanji and adjacent to it a link? It must be really confusing for someone who doesn't know kanji to learn that 一 is the kanji for one, 二 is two, and 三 is three. Those who already know these kanji realize that the underline is not part of the character, but since the desired audience is people who don't know them, underlining them is confusing. Fg2 (talk) 11:42, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Jōyō kanji has some interesting info beyond the list itself. I think both are worth keeping, but the list section on Jōyō kanji could be deleted in favor of a link to List of jōyō kanji. The table in the latter is nicer anyway.
Regarding underlines, links on Wikipedia aren't underlined for me until I mouseover (Firefox 2.0.0.11 Mac/Intel). I thought there was a preference for this, but I couldn't find it. If it's only underlined on mouseover, I think people will probably understand that the underline isn't part of the character.
-Amake (talk) 12:27, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
If you go to the Misc tab of the Special:Preferences page, you can select whether links are underlined. I believe the default is to not underline them. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 20:10, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Good points about the contents of the table. I don't think we need the big table in two places, but separating it from the article might be beneficial because it's so long. On the other hand, the article doesn't have much text accompanying the table so it could be convenient having the text and table together. As you can see, I don't have a strong preference.
Good points about setting Wikipedia preferences too. My concern here, though, is for the reader, not the writer. Setting preferences doesn't work with casual visitors, people who access Wikipedia through mirror sites, and of course people who don't know about the feature. We spend our days putting information into Wikipedia, but the people who use that information won't ordinarily be Wikipedia veterans.
If your browser doesn't underline kanji, try turning it on to see what it looks like to people who have underlining turned on. I think publicly available computers I've used underline links. So not underlining them should be something we do on the article side, not the user side. One method of doing it would be to add a Wiktionary column to the table:
Kanji Meaning Wiktionary
一 One Look it up
二 Two Look it up
and so forth. (I only showed three columns of the table to convey the general idea.) The disadvantage is that this adds a column to the table but the advantage is that it does not present different appearances to users whose browsers underline/don't underline links.
Maybe this is overkill; I don't know. I don't think we need a policy like "don't link kanji"; on the other hand, in articles that in some sense teach kanji perhaps we should pay closer attention to the on-screen appearance. Fg2 (talk) 21:16, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Well the author of the list article just tried to do basically what I suggested, but it got mistakenly reverted by an anti-vandalism bot. Shall we greenlight this? The only problem I have with the new table is that readings like テイ are macronned ("tē") when they shouldn't be (talk).
Re: underlines again, the default setting is "browser default", which on Firefox seems to be not underlining (I haven't modified my prefs). Can anyone confirm that other browsers show underlines by default? -Amake (talk) 07:38, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

As far as it goes, we still have Learning kanji hanging around after an AfD keep that I was mystified by about a year ago. I think I proposed some content changes at Talk:Learning kanji that might be related to this. I'm not sure we need to have separate lists for the joyo and kyoiku kanji (too lazy to find the macrons right now). Dekimasuよ! 08:31, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Users who have List of jōyō kanji on their watchlist already know that User:N.Mori has put my suggestions into effect. Thank you! (Conversely, I've turned off underlining of links in my preferences.) Fg2 (talk) 12:40, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

The War, nr 2

I would like to know if there are any people intrested in Japan intrested in expanding some war related articles? I'm afraid that as it is now probably only U.S. British and Australian "military history buffs" (no offense intended) even know they exist.

I started it a while back, after reading this article, that shows that in recent literature there is presented a far more balansed vision of the Japanese and the Allies, I especially liked this one:

"One young officer praises America and its ideas of democracy and modernity, while on another occasion a Japanese soldier voices out loud his envy of some Germans who had set up a sort of peacenik camp on New Guinea to get away from the war," Prof Aldrich said."

After that I did some reading and I pretty much started the section Allied_war_crimes_during_World_War_II#Treatment_of_POWs_and_civilians, and it has grown well since then. I've just a few says ago started this article American Mutilation of Japanese War Dead, which is a bit rough for now. Just to let you know In case anyone is intrested in that dark era just some 60 years ago. There for example probably is scope for an article on how ready for democrazy the Japanese actually might have been. --Stor stark7 Talk 01:03, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your contributions on the subject. There are at least a couple of ways to study the Pacific War: 1) military history events, like the Guadalcanal campaign, and 2) socio-cultural topics, like the two that you mention you're working on above. Greater efforts have been made recently to provide a more balanced view of the Pacific War in Western sources, but still lag behind other areas like the European theater of World War II. The official Japanese Defense ministry history of the war was translated into English only about 15 years ago and is apparently still not widely available. Also, many diaries and personal memoirs of the Japanese military and civilian leaders from that time still don't appear to be widely available, even in Japanese. So, some of the recent English history books on Pacific War battles and issues still don't have much on the Japanese side, although they are more likely to be more honest about some of the mistakes and not-so-respectable actions committed by the western allies in their conduct of the war. I think many of us are aware of the need to provide a balanced perspective on the 19th and 20th century conflict between Japan and the West and appreciate any efforts to help with that goal such as what you're doing. Cla68 (talk) 01:35, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
I think a separate article is warranted for Forced labor of Japanese in the Soviet Union, similar to Forced labor of Germans in the Soviet Union. 20:26, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Category:Chinese chess players

This category name is highly confusing, since Chinese chess is the common English name for a different board game, and one would naturally expect it to be filled with players of Chinese chess. Any suggestions on renaming it? 70.51.9.174 (talk) 07:47, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

How would "Chinese players of chess" be? Fg2 (talk) 04:13, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2008_January_5#Category:Chinese_chess_players for discussion. 70.55.87.75 (talk) 05:19, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Notification: discussion for rename of category Wikipedians_in_x_prefecture

There is an easy to miss discussion at Wikipedia:User_categories_for_discussion #Wikipedians_in_x_prefecture. Arthena(talk) 19:03, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Top importance → FA goal for 2008

Well, I think we did reasonably well for 2007 given how many were added during last year. What kinds of goals do we want to set for FA and GA for 2008? ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 03:01, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Towel-Headed Man at AfD

Towel-Headed Man is up for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Towel-Headed Man 132.205.44.5 (talk) 22:49, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I've listed it at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Japan. That's our centralized place for deletion discussions. Fg2 (talk) 07:06, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Japanophile → Japanophilia

Somebody unilaterally moved the article, without any discussion. And I would appreciate if anybody can give their opinions at: Talk:Japanophilia#Dubious. I believe "Japanophile" is a much more common term, more appropriate per our naming conventions. I thank you all in advance, for your opinions.--Endroit (talk) 23:37, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Well I don't know that the issue should be of frequency of use. This seems to be a grammatical problem to me. Do we name the article after the "condition" (Japanophilia), or the people who fall into that category (Japanophiles)? Looking at other articles in Category:Cultural Enthusiasm it seems to be a mixed bag, but Category:Phobias lists only the condition. Since a "philia" is the opposite of a phobia, and the phobia articles are named consistently, I think that all of the Cultural Enthusiasm articles should be named "-philia" as well (with redirects from "phile"). -Amake (talk) 23:48, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
I just cross-posted the above at the talk page. -Amake (talk) 23:50, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Category:Gaijin tarento proposed renaming

There's a proposal to rename Category:Gaijin tarento. The proposed new name is Category:Gaikokujin tarento, following up on a similar renaming of the article. See Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2008 January 5#Category:Gaijin tarento. Fg2 (talk) 07:02, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

It's now been moved. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 02:39, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
It should not have been, because both article and category should be at the most common name, "gaijin tarento". Please see Talk:Gaikokujin tarento. Jpatokal (talk) 04:05, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Japanese addressing system

Article(s): Japanese addressing system

Request: Lighten area of sign on right as focus -- Chris (クリス) (talk) 15:36, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Graphist opinion: Lightening only on the right makes it look like two unrelated images side by side. To me lightening both sides and the original tend to look that way anyway. To show the address sign, I think one doesn't need much of the buildings, hence the cropped version. Sagredo⊙☿♀♁♂♃♄ 21:42, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I think either of the two rightmost ones would be great. I understand there's a value in having readability. Great article to have btw. -Theanphibian (talk • contribs) 18:56, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Similar WikiProject

I have a WikiPrpject similar to this one. If you haven't already got a IUser box, could I suggest using this:

this user is part of the WP:JAPAN!

for the code it is: 

{{Userbox-r |side-box colour |main box colour |[[Image:Torii of Itsukushima.png]] |this user is part of the [[WP:JAPAN]]!}}

hope you agree, Akira-otomo (talk) 18:24, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm confused. The userbox you made links to this project. Additionally, the project you created has all of its goals in common with this project, so I don't see why another project needs to be made. You're welcome to join this project by adding yourself to the participants list. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:48, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Now, I have deleted the old MY PROJECT thing. sio I would likr to know if we could use this user box (actually, the one I suggested be fore) and put it on the project page as a template! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Akira-otomo (talk • contribs) 19:22, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
There's already a similar template: {{User WPJapan}}. -Amake (talk) 22:21, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
okay. Akira-otomo (talk) 10:53, 13 January 2008 (UTC) XD

NARUTO!!!!

Akira-otomoCan I suggest that we include Naruto and all Naruto related articles to WikiProject Japan as Anime/Manga is Japanese - this goes for any other Manga or Anime related Articles too. Thnx! PS. I like using User Boxes!!!! as you can see!

Akira-otomo (talk) 15:48, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

It's fine that you like userboxes, but please don't post notes in them, especially if you use background colors that make it impossible to read half the text. I've changed the background color so the contents are legible.
As for your question about Naruto articles, I'm not sure what you're asking. They are all already part of WP:ANIME. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 20:18, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

sorry - its just fun! any way, I think it should be part of WP:JP. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Akira-otomo (talk • contribs) 21:19, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

It' great that you're enthusiastic, but I recommend you hang back and just observe things before posting willy-nilly about silly crap like this. There's a certain culture at Wikipedia, and its goals and interests may not align with an 11-year-old anime freak's. People may be more interested in your ideas at WP:ANIME. -Amake (talk) 01:15, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
The good news is that WP:ANIME is already part of the Japan project. Japan is the parent project and anime is a descendant project. Fg2 (talk) 01:37, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Isn't there some policy against posting your age if you are under 18? ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 06:33, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
There is, see Wikipedia:Protecting children's privacy. Nihonjoe, email me please. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 07:36, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
I emailed you, but you never replied. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 00:47, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

FWIW: New article on The Chrysanthemum and the Sword

I created this article and found sources for it that show that it's certainly an important subject, but I haven't read the book, don't know much about the subject and I think the article is inadequate. (Nevertheless, I think it's an improvement on what we had before -- an unreferenced section in the article on the author, Ruth Benedict). Perhaps some people involved with this project would have an interest in it and in improving it. Noroton (talk) 02:29, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll list it at Template:Newest Japan-related articles. Fg2 (talk) 03:15, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
A bit OT, if you have a copy of this book, could you please add some quotes to q:Japan, a newly created very stubbish article? Thanks! (I have only Japanese translation version at hand ...) --Aphaia (talk) 19:29, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Unsourced articles

According to this tool, there is over 500 articles that have at least one citation needed/"fact" template in it. I suggest we should get rid of these as much as possible. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 08:12, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

The tool's status is "Snafu" right now. If it's convenient to do so, putting a list in Wikipedia would be helpful. I agree that finding sources for statements that need them is a good goal for WikiProject Japan. Fg2 (talk) 02:33, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Maybe we should make a "Source Patrol" whose only goal is to find at least 2-3 reliable sources for every unsourced article in the project. (^_^) ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 02:43, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Reliable?

Just making sure if KCT is a reliable source. Is it? Also, it would help if anyone here can actually translate these pages for me. « ₣M₣ » 01:02, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

KCT is a cable provider (television, internet, etc.), similar to Comcast. The second page you link to is a page owned by one of their subscribers, so any reliability had by KCT themselves would not apply. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:18, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Towel-Headed Man at AfD (take two)

Towel-Headed Man is up for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Towel-Headed Man (2nd nomination). Note, the last AFD just closed yesterday, so I think this is highly odd to renominated the day after. 132.205.44.5 (talk) 22:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

The second nom has been speedily closed. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 00:46, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Yuki Shimoda

This article is really coming along nicely, but would someone help with the Wikification? Thanks, Chris (クリス) (talk) 19:57, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Assistance

I was wondering if anyone here knows of any Japanese sites or magazines or whatnot that could provide reliable secondary sources for the characters of Yu-Gi-Oh! GX. Cast interviews, show reviews, bios done by secondary materials. Any help anyone has would be appreciated. The Clawed One (talk) 06:11, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I recommend asking over at WikiProject anime and manga as they will be more likely to know about that. You can also check WP:ANIME/R and WP:ANIME/M to see if any of the books and magazines listed there are likely to have what you're looking for. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 06:17, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Japanese television category

Do we have one here? Just want to know. Ominae (talk) 22:42, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Is this what you're looking for? ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 01:53, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
I mean a Wikipedia Japanese television group. Gomen! Should have rephrased the question. Ominae (talk) 07:18, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Do you mean a task force part of WikiProject Japan? Currently there isn't one, but you are welcome to gauge interest and create one if the interest is there. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 02:27, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. Ominae (talk) 12:28, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Interac (Japan)

Would you please look at the article and discussion at Interac (Japan)? The sources on the discussion page are in Japanese, so it's difficult to add them as sources in the English wiki. Can you help in any way? --Busy Stubber (talk) 04:16, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Nihongo ? / help

As some here may have noticed, the Nihongo template has recently changed in appearance, and more recently changed back. Briefly, Nihonjoe changed it, no doubt with the best of intentions. First reactions weren't good. My own first reaction was monosyllabic and crude; not wanting to ruin a beautiful friendship with Joe, I expressed it otherwise when I came to write it down; but anyway I took my sledgehammer to the big red padlock and changed the template back. Discussion here. -- Hoary (talk) 10:22, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Help on Security Police (Japan) article

I've done it. Can someone familiar with the division check it and see if anything else can be added. References are welcome! Ominae (talk) 12:30, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Creation of Japanese television task force

I'm wondering if anyone supports or opposes the idea of WikiProject Japan team having a task force dedicated to live action Japanese TV. It can drama, action shows, talk shows or even entertainment. I'm thinking of this like the WikiProject British TV shows IIRC. Need at least 4-5 to support it. Ominae (talk) 12:30, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I neither support nor oppose; I'm just blank. (To me, live action Japanese TV runs the gamut from irritating to soporific.) But I'm interested by the military-sounding name. Will members carry small arms and live ammo? As a possible bystander, should I wear kevlar? -- Hoary (talk) 15:38, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
LOL! I see. Nah, it's a group that would take care of articles that relate to Japanese TV, particularly live-action and reality ones... Ominae (talk) 01:46, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
I'd be interested in working with it. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 02:13, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Not sure what you mean by "live action" -- does that mean live actors (not anime)? I do lots of articles on jidaigeki and actors and actresses. Next, what are the benefits of a task force? I have my own kevlar... Fg2 (talk)
Live actors. This proposed task force would include shows that are not tokus (Wikipedia Tokusatsu takes care of that) and anime obviously (Wikiproject Anime and Manga IIRC).

Benefits? Well.... it'd be like any other Wikipedia History Japan task force. Primarily to create and check on Japan television-related articles. Ominae (talk) 22:35, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Requesting semi-protection of Hiroshima

The article has had 44 revisions, including vandalism and reversion of it, since January 9. See this history difference. Time to semi-protect it? Fg2 (talk) 21:32, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Should have been protected ages ago - request made. John Smith's (talk) 21:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks Fg2 (talk) 10:09, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Basic question re: romanisations

Hello, wasn't sure where else to ask this. When special characters appear in a word, such as the Ō in Ōbaku, should it always appear after the first use, or is it acceptable to use Obaku afterwards? Random name (talk) 12:53, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Unless the word is regularly used in English without the macrons (eg. Kyoto, jujitsu, etc — that is, the article title doesn't used them either), it would be good practice to always use the macron. Jpatokal (talk) 13:30, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Ok, thanks for that! Random name (talk) 17:00, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Net cafe refugees

Hi, I expect some of you have already heard of this, but this is a new hot topic in Japan. I would like help for:

  1. Categorization of this article
  2. And does anyone know that word that means "difference society", I thought it was sakaku shakai, but I can't find kanji matching this.

Thanks! -Theanphibian (talk • contribs) 19:40, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I put the article in Category:Japanese society. You might be thinking of kakusa shakai ja:格差社会. Fg2 (talk) 22:50, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Excellent, thanks! Next I'm thinking about making an article about the kakusa shakai, and also one about Japan's temporary worker temp agencies (which the Japanese page has ample information on). -Theanphibian (talk • contribs) 00:02, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Makiko Kuno

I'm trying to clean this up, but I simply don't know where some of these sentences are going. Please help! Chris (クリス • フィッチ) (talk) 05:26, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I've taken a stab at the lead paragraph. See how you like it. Fg2 (talk) 05:47, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

virus or coding glitch

Does List of jōyō kanji lock up anyone else's internet when you try to open it? Chris (クリス • フィッチ) (talk) 05:40, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

My computer does ok (but it's slow) with IE7 and Firefox 2. The table is really big; wonder if it's a memory shortage? Fg2 (talk) 05:53, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
A totally different possibility is that it could be related to the new parser. See if anything relevant has been reported on meta:Talk:Migration_to_the_new_preprocessor. Fg2 (talk) 11:26, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
The page loads just fine for me. It takes a few seconds since it's over 200K in size, but ither than taking slightly longer than most pages, I see no performance or other issues when loading the page. I suggest clearing your cache and seeing if that helps. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 18:22, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Karasawa Genba

Please help clean this up if you are familiar with the historicity of this person. Chris (クリス • フィッチ) (talk) 03:08, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Yesterday, I added all articles on historical people created by this user (now known as User:Exiled Ambition) to the Cleanup tasks list. There's room for a lot of help. Fg2 (talk) 03:48, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
Well for one, while the article linked to as a source seems to be legit (despite the dodgy looking html), there is no mention in it of the historical person in question... TomorrowTime (talk) 10:06, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
This has now been put up for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Karasawa Genba, please vote. Chris (クリス • フィッチ) (talk) 01:43, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Free pictures of Japanese-American emergency camp

According to Japan Probe, the US Library of Congress released quite a lot of images to the public domain, including some WWII Japanese-American “emergency relocation” camp ones. They are found in a Flickr account. Maybe some of them could be uploaded for certain articles, however I am not very adept at distinguishing which would be useful and which would not. -- ReyBrujo (talk) 02:46, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, this should work. At first I was kind of sketchy about the "No known copyright restrictions" tag, but try the file info tool for the commons and it also shows that no copyright vio and attaches a variety of (presumably correct) free use license tags. I would recommend using that tool when you do upload them, as they have significant information attached to them. U.S. Government work is always a great candidate for Wikipedia pictures, and as far as I understand, these are PD and fit the bill perfectly. -Theanphibian (talk • contribs) 04:21, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Don't worry about being selective about which pictures are uploaded, because you often don't know where or how a particular image might be used. Just upload them all into Commons, list them in a gallery under the name of the most related article (Japanese American internment is probably a good name) and add a Commons link to that article linking to the image gallery. That will make the images easily accessible to anyone who would like to look at them and hopefully use them. Cla68 (talk) 23:30, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Speaking as a Commons admin; if they are under a free license, just upload them all and do what Cla68 said. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 23:35, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Interesting, it will take some time, but will be worth it. I guess all images released by that account would be worth, but so far all these fit a single category nicely. Thanks for the feedback. -- ReyBrujo (talk) 06:10, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Internment images are in Commons:Category:Japanese American internment and its subcategories. There's no article (gallery) in that category.

If there are a lot of files, you might be interested in this: Commons has a very useful tool called Commonist for uploading a lot of files from your local disk all at once. It's a Java program for Linux, Mac, Windows. You can put all of them in one or more categories such as Commons:Category:Japanese American internment or its subcategories and select the license once for all the photos. You can additionally put individual images in other categories, add descriptions to individual images and/or in common to all of them, and it constructs a gallery automatically in your user space. You can then copy the gallery to an article with almost no work. You could post the gallery as Commons:Japanese American internment; that name is currently unused. For more information about Commonist, see Commons:Commons:Tools/Commonist. Fg2 (talk) 06:59, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Category:Onsens?

Category:Onsen has been removed and replaced with Category:Onsens. Does anyone have information on this? Fg2 (talk) 10:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Apparently was listed as a candidate for speedy renaming by User:Snocrates a few days back: [1]. cab (talk) 10:37, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. Does anyone know of any discussion? Fg2 (talk) 10:54, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Couldn't find anything. It appears to have been speedied [2], I would suppose because of the following speedy renaming rule: 3. Conversions from singular to plural, or back (such as, Steamship → Steamships). It went unchallenged for the proscribed two days: [3], and was then apparently renamed.
I would say this was a good faith rename, but AFAIK the rule for Japanese word pluralisation was no added 's', as evident also in the onsen article itself. Or am I mistaken? TomorrowTime (talk) 12:16, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I take onsen to be both singular and plural without an "s" so that's why I'm wondering. Thanks for the research! Fg2 (talk) 12:29, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Same here. Is there a Wiki style guideline regarding this? TomorrowTime (talk) 12:41, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes, see Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Japan-related articles)#Pluralization. Fg2 (talk) 12:49, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
OED lists "onsen" and states "plural unchanged" (meaning don't add an "s" to make it plural). It gives examples of the plural with no "s." Fg2 (talk) 12:53, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I would be for speedy renaming it back per the entry in OED. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 15:56, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Should have mentioned that M-W online says the word is not in the dictionary. Fg2 (talk) 22:15, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Onsen or onsens? ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 22:29, 28 January 2008 (UTC)


Onsen. Doesn't have a singular, doesn't have a plural, doesn't have an entry at all. Sometimes M-W tells you a word is in the dictionary, but not the online dictionary (try ronin); for onsen it doesn't even say that. Fg2 (talk) 22:38, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Well, M-W does seem to lag behind Oxford. Based on Oxford, I'd support a speedy rename back to the correct term. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 23:42, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I've submitted the request for speedy renaming to Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Speedy. Fg2 (talk) 05:41, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually, OED provides two alternative plural forms. One is "unchanged"; the other is made by adding an "-s". Words in English are usually pluralized by adding an "s", so most users would intuitively recognise "onsens" as the plural of "onsen". Snocrates 06:50, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Agreed. I missed the -s yesterday, but it is clearly there. The examples don't use it, though. Fg2 (talk) 10:18, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
The discussion has now been moved from a speedy to a full CFD, and can be found at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2008 January 30#Category:Onsens. Jpatokal (talk) 05:24, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

The category has been returned to its original "onsen." Fg2 (talk) 20:28, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

How can I cite references for a 1980s Japanese recording artist?

The article for Kumi Miyasato was recently deleted. The reason given was no stated relevence. I re-created the article and modified the language to assert relevence. I also created a talk page for the article and made a case for her relevence. I was told to cite a few sources in Japanese media that covered her. I don't speak Japanese and have no access to any of the print media (though I do have lists of print media that covered her - as well as lists of public appearances and radio appearances). I have copies of some video interviews, but they come from YouTube. I can't translate them, anyway. What should I do? Tuxedo Mark (talk) 03:30, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

If you have the list of print media that covered her, you can add them in a "References" section. If the video interviews are notable (I mean, they have been done in reliable sources) you can use the {{cite video}} template (although you will need to offer some interview data, like the title, program, date, etc, so that anyone can verify that). Since they come from YouTube, they are likely copyvios. However, most times users uploading there also give the name of the program featuring the artist, date and channel or video name. -- ReyBrujo (talk) 04:21, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Also, you can object deletions stating in the talk page that the Japanese Wikipedia has an article about her that hasn't been deleted. While their notability guidelines may differ, it proves that she is actually known in Japan, giving you some more time to find more references. -- ReyBrujo (talk) 04:22, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

merger of Takarazuka Revue/Takarazuka Theater

This has been tagged for several months, with only support for the merger, will someone knowledgeable perform it? Chris (クリス • フィッチ) (talk) 04:36, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Okay, the merger tag was just removed, but the articles weren't merged as per the discussion. Chris (クリス • フィッチ) (talk) 05:02, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Looks like they were merged. -Theanphibian (talk • contribs) 05:17, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

 Done

I redirected Takarazuka Theater to the earlier article on Takarazuka Revue and left a note at User talk:Relyna85, the talk page of the person who created the Takarazuka Theater, inviting him or her to edit the article. Especially if Theater had content that's not in Revue, Relyna85 can put that in without licensing considerations. If someone knows how to copy content from one article to another and meet the licensing requirements, that would be helpful too. Fg2 (talk) 05:19, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Also, Takarazuka Theater was Relyna85's only contribution. Fg2 (talk) 05:22, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
I gather that from WP:MERGE, the only licensing consideration is that you put in your edit summary something like 'merging from Merged article name', and I have done so. -Malkinann (talk) 08:23, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. I don't know all the licensing rules so I tend to err on the side of caution. Fg2 (talk) 09:22, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Proposed renaming

I have suggested that Late Tokugawa shogunate be moved (renamed) to Bakumatsu period. Please contribute any comments or opinions you may have at Talk:Late Tokugawa shogunate#Requested move. Thank you. LordAmeth (talk) 14:40, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

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