Book Club 04: Otaku, Japan’s Database Animals

This episode takes a look at Azuma Hiroki’s Otaku: Japan’s Database Animals. Originally published November 2016.

UPDATE: Since I forgot to edit it in, the question asked by Commander Sparkle around the 1:19:25 mark was: "Evangelion is often referenced to within Azuma's book, and often talking about how it relates to simulacra and the database. Would you somewhat consider it a bridging point between the grandnarrative and the database? Because I feel that it does have underlying grandnarrative aspects.

Yet it solidified/injected aspects into the data base through characters like asuka, rei, and shinji. Being an Eva nerd, I find it interesting seeing how Eva's cultural impact it appeared to have in japan is very different from how I consumed the series. Where I personally viewed in terms of being more traditional narrative, rather than moving onto simulacra (things like the Ayanami Raising Project), or applying it to the database (at least consciously). So it seems interesting to me how it played a role in further kicking off database consumption."