Bloggers’ meetup

Last night, I went to a cafe in a small building in Aoyama, where the “bloggers’ meeting” was held. Han, the guy from Holland, whom I met at YAPC (Yet Another Perl Conference) Asia::Tokyo, invited me as I introduced myself as a “professional blogger” 😉

The monthly meeting is for bloggers around Tokyo area. Webloggers gather to socialize. Han’s friend originally organized it but he could not attend yesterday. Instead, there were 7-8 people, including engineer, translator, project manager, etc.

Not all people are writing weblog. For example, one is taking rest after disk crash vanished his archives.

Even though some of them seem to have good Japanese command, discussions (or chat, if that word is appropriate) are done in English. With my poor comprehension, I could not follow all topics, especially jokes, but they were still interesting. The main reason their stories are interesting is probably how they see things are a little bit different from I. They talked around their jobs, lives, Bush :), organic foods, etc.

What did I talk there? The one I remember is about Japan Blog Association. The one caused issues immediately after its disclose by some governmental (just “heavily influenced”? I do not know) foundation. They do not check Japanese blogosphere much, and seemed to agree the many Japanese bloggers making spoof sites (such like “Galaxy Blog Association”) funny.

I also told about that the TV programme which Mixi and Hatena’s CEO showed up. Of course, the number of users are not so big when compare with English service like MySpace, however, those movements are not easily observed by non-Japanese net surfers. Must be interesting for them. One even asked me to invite. I wish I were more vocabulary.

I also asked them that if they have any recommendation of good English weblogs which are about Japanese and/or Japan. I got some URLs. The first entry I saw is so funny. I will check them more.

They said there are more than 300 people on their notification list, but each time the number of attendee varies. They are also interested in Japanese bloggers joining the meetup.

I read that one in eight residents in Minato-ku are foreigners. When living and working in Tokyo, not knowing any of them might be unnatural then. There should be a lot of chances to become to know them. You do not have to pay much to language schools. Seeing different person is always good, fun things for me. Definitely thinking like that helped me to work in different jobs, offices and countries.