About English and Japanese Nico Nico Douga
Some Data on English Niconico blog.nicovideo.jp/en_info/2013/0… we need to comment… more? that sounds pretty scary
— Choja Hiragawa (@chojahiragawa) April 1, 2013
@chojahiragawa what i thought as well when i tried english niconico out; i think its because we’re too used to staying quiet among moonrunes
— Prody★Parrot (@ProdyParrot) April 1, 2013
I’ve been browsing Nico Nico Douga since 2007, around the time just before that Donald audio MAD got popular and around the time the Yujin Mario/Kaizo Mario was trending. I did not know how to read or understand Japanese at all before I registered. It’s been about 5 years since then, and I’ve been following certain series on Nico Nico Douga. Whether it is let’s plays (known as Jikkyou Play among Japanese), peformance videos (marasy) or vocaloid videos and all its associated following trends (I also have some favourite artists/singers to name, like cosMo and 96neko).
Why do I have the passion for videos on Nico Nico Douga? Youtube offers the exact same video streaming service. The only difference is the lack of scrolling comments across the screen. Yes, so the only difference is those comments. Now you know this is kind of a big deal.
This is more of an article I chose to write and covers on why I think a user’s experience in visiting English Nico Nico Douga and Japanese Nico Nico Douga would be different, and also the nature of comments that appear on Japanese Nico Nico Douga. I would also think this might cover reasons for the difference in the comment density between the English servers and the Japanese/Taiwanese servers. As a disclaimer, anything I write in this article is based off observation through my subpar Japanese skills and is not to be taken anywhere near officially.
A look over the type of comments on Nico Nico Douga
If there’s anywhere that explains the nature of comments that appear on Nico Nico Douga the best, it would be comments that appear on the anime broadcasted on Nico Channel. Nico Channel is a service that offers free anime streaming of current season anime but it is only free for a week before the user has to pay through the Nico point system to view them. If you’re an anime enthusiast, or just the casual anime watcher, imagine if every single tiny detail were to be commented on by an anonymous viewer. However, the comments’ sense of humour would depend entirely on your standards when it comes to humour. Then again, look at shows like Nyaruko-san and Oreimo which have a gargantuan amount of views (The former I remember reaching one million). If anything, Nico Channel is already successful in its current service.
Sometimes, I would even take screenshots of any instance where the comments seem interesting (Compliation at the end of this post). However, I would say at least fifty percent are only understandable to any viewer looking through them while the rest were just taken due to a witty comment pointing out the flaws of a particular scene.
Screencap on Toaru Majutsu no Index II on Nico Channel
This is the first screencap I ever took on Nico Channel. In this scene, a boat crashes through town, breaking a bridge in the process, and makes it to the sea. Nico audience’s reaction,”NOOO! THE BRIIIIIIDGE!” “Ice boat lolol”. This was taken from years ago (When Index II was still airing) so the nature of the comments nowadays might differ to a certain extent. For something like this, it’s easy to imagine such comments appearing in different type of languages. Now, look at another Nico Channel screencap from the same show:
Index making her debut in front of Kihara and Accelerator
To understand the jokes displayed in this screencap: Index II aired around the same time when Ika Musume and Madoka was trending. Index herself hardly made appearances in the show, which led to the audience deliberately forgetting her name:”In-what-san?”, then here comes the trends from other anime. Ika Musume’s titular character is, well, coincidentally called Ika Musume, or Ika-chan. This might be a slight spoiler for Madoka: Kyubey’s full name was revealed to be Incubator some time before this episode was shown on Nico channel. The end result: Everyone calling Index different names.
The more important issue here is: How would the joke make sense when it is viewed by English speaking people? The true nature of these kind of jokes would only be understood by viewers of all three anime, or by people who have at least some knowledge in Japanese.
Another case study: まったく、小学生は最高だぜ!! (Man, elementary school children are the best!!)
Associated phrase: イリーガルユースオブハンズ (Illegal use of hands)
Ro-kyu-bu! is an anime featuring basketball activities in an elementary school. The two phrases above are ones which have established their places as notable quotes which will make a long lasting mark. Even now, “Illegal use of hands” (normally a basketball term and used as such in the anime), may be commented whenever a male character touches a female character, especially if there is a significant difference in age. The joke here is how the original term is merely said by a referee in Ro-Kyu-Bu! while the characters are playing basketball but in any other context it is viewed in a completely different fashion.
Sorry, I don’t have any screencaps related to the issue at hand, but I do have a Nico Channel screencap from the same show:
Here’s another type of comment spam on Nico:
“Wakamoto lolol” “Cell lolol” “Voice actor lolol”
Norio Wakamoto is a pretty established voice actor in anime to the point where everyone has to laugh whenever he plays a role in a show, whether its a really insignificant background character or not (By the way, the screencap is Kannagi, Wakamoto voices a random drunkard here).
Memes
The examples above can already be considered memes. What about ones that lie outside the realm of anime? I would say part of Nico comments that I see gain their humour only because they managed to link up some random meme, obscure or not, to a particular point in a video.
Meme in question: Ippon Manzoku Bar (1本満足バー)
Phrase in question: コバラスイタカライッチョオドッテヤルゼボグゥゥゥゥゥゥ
This kind of meme only covers the occasional “(meme) lolol” whenever a similarity or a direct reference in the video makes an appearance.
The more alarming trending meme is this one: A Midsummer Night’s Lewd Dream (真夏の夜の淫夢) (Slightly NSFW)
Like followers spreading like Dollars members from Durara, one cannot deny the influence this meme has on the current state of affairs on Nico Nico Douga. Explaining this meme any further would already be touching on taboo topics. Consequently, the nature of the comments would also be affected. Nevertheless, this is still considered an increase in activity in the comment board on Nico Nico Douga.
I would cover more cult followings in this post, but there is quite a number of them and I feel that this amount would be sufficient enough.
Conclusion
First, the viewer count needs to be increased.
Next, English Nico Nico goers have to develop their own cult followings in order to establish a community which can grow. Jokes which everyone can understand are what encourages viewers to keep watching. The most one can do is just give their opinion on random tiny detail or notable point in a video, or just “(noun) lolol”. Despite how simple it sounds, it would still turn out to be a rare sight, since most English viewers just turn to Youtube. On top of that, anyone who understands even slightly a bit of Japanese (I fall into this group), would just turn to the already established community with all the random funny jazz already happening. I myself choose to remain quiet as I observe all the Nico commenters go on with their jokes. There is a good reason why I mentioned the above case studies as they are ones I saw for myself being established.
I have never visited Taiwanese Nico Nico Douga, but I am willing to assume that they have successfully established a community for themselves, with their own jokes that they themselves can understand.
I do hope one day that there can be an established English speaking community writing comments as well.
In my opinion, this type of commentary already requires an established community.
Prody's Blog 
Sounds like we’ve had a similar history with Nico, but you started earlier than I had. I’ve always wanted to see anime on Nico to see how the commenters are acting, but I don’t have the free time to even consider buying a Premium account to see that for awhile. Over the years, I feel that commenters have stopped making those really elaborate comments such as your ending picture. I think they got tired of specialized commenting (outside of danmaku), and perhaps old comments being purged played a role. But what about in the animes uploaded to Nico? You’d need a Premium account to see them, so everyone viewing them is capable of making specialized comments. How often do you see people make specialized comments? Such as toying with people’s eyes and such.
Ah. I’ve taken my fair share of screenshots of comments too ranging from 2008 to 2011. What made you want to screenshot people commenting about a bridge?
You can view anime on Nico Channel without paying by using a VPN cilent if necessary (most channels block connections from outside Japan) and within a week of its upload to Nico Nico Douga.
You can expect any kind of comments on Nico Nico Douga, especially innovative ones. I enjoy pattern type comments, danmaku and random witty jokes equally and therefore I don’t mind the lack of elaborate comments. I guess these pattern type of comments tend to appear in Nico Channel videos due to the great amount of opportunities that arise within a single episode of an anime.
Concerning the bridge, it was my earliest screenshot from Nico Channel and I was quite amused that time by everyone’s attention suddenly being directed to the bridge like it was one of the main characters. It still happens now and then when people treat random background objects similarly.
Hello, I have few questions regarding to watching nico douga:
– I understand that on specific time, nico will “blur” the videos, making it a bit harder to watch unless you have a prem account. Could you tell me which time they do this?
Moreover, is there any ways to get prem account without using CC? I would love to pay via Paypal but looks like dwango doesn’t support it so…
– I’ve been using PacketX VPN for watching newly released anime since they block outside connections. While using this VPN, on some occasions the video buffers pretty fast while other time I’ll have to wait for a while (i.e waiting for like 30 minutes to buffer 25% of the video).
Is there any other VPN services I can try which has better speed? I was recommended various VPNs/proxies however every single one of them I tried turned out to be a dud and some of them won’t even let me access to the blocked sections on nico. I’m also willing to spend couple of bucks for pay-once-and-done, though I’m not keen on spending every months.
– What is version Q? I haven’t converted yet since I didn’t liked the layout but is there any benefits in switching to it?
Thank you and I hope that I didn’t asked a hard questions for your to answer. I really enjoyed reading your post and I agree that scrolling comments is very unique and stands out compared to youtube. This is the one of the reason why I watch videos on nico so that I can see other people’s comment and reactions real-time (even though I can’t read much kanjis).
1: The blur you mentioned is called “economy” mode. Videos viewed during this time generally load faster, but have their quality reduced. It starts from 6pm Japan time and ends at 2am Japan time on weekdays. For weekends and Japan public holidays, it is more longer, but the end time still remains at 2am Japan time. I might be wrong though, since this is merely something that I learnt about by myself by visiting the site everyday. Concerning premium accounts, I can’t help on that since I’ve never touched on it before.
2: For VPN service, I use this: http://www.vpngate.net/en/, the load time seems to be unpredictable, it is mostly quick but sometimes it can get slow as well. Sometimes, I add ?eco=1 to the end of the video URL to force economy mode so it loads faster.
3: Version Q is an alternate video player. It is possible to switch back and forth between the old player and version Q player. I myself prefer to use the old player since it is something I’ve stuck to for very long. As far as I know, version Q has an additional button that switches the comments server between English and Japanese.
Thanks for reading! I started off knowing nothing about Japanese as well when I first got into Nico Nico Douga, but I slowly learnt how to read hiragana and katakana as I watched many videos. I think the Let’s Play videos are the ones that helped me the most.
Thank you for the reply.
1. Ha ha, I see. So During economy mode, video will buffer fast but the quality will drop. But what about prem accounts? I know that your not familiar with it but let’s say you have a prem account – Your within economy timezone, since you don’t get low quality videos, is your buffering speed same as others (i.e faster than normal hours) or is it slower than others?
2. Thank you for the VPN service. I was able to install successfully (SoftEther VPN) however I’m not quite sure which servers to choose from… What am I suppose to look for when choosing servers? Do I need a server with less VPN sessions? short line speed? or vice versa? less ping?
3. Ah I see. Well I’ve just tried converting to Q version and it was awful. Like you said, I’d rather stick to older versions. I just hope that they won’t change it permanently and forcing everyone to use Q version like they do on youtube layout.
Once again, thank you for the help.
1: I’m not sure about the speed since I’ve never used premium, but I do know you can force economy mode by adding ?eco=1 to the end of the URL if you like, whether you got premium or not.
2: I usually sort by ping and select a random Japan server.
Alright, well I was planning to get a prem account but seems like it won’t get the benefit of buffering faster during eco mode.
I just remembered that you require less bandwidth for low quality videos, thus buffering faster. So, if I play the video while I’m on prem account, the high quality will stop me from buffering faster.
Hmm, so you pick the lowest ping out of those servers from Japan.
I had a Japanese account but I switched it to the English language GUI and now it won’t let me type in Japanese, only English. Very annoying how it blocks me fro typing anything Japanese might read….dont even date to change your settings people.