Annus Mirabilis

In Latin, Annus Mirabilis means miraculous year. This means Annus Mirabilis is the exact opposite of Annus Horribilis.

Apparently, we are all sick and tired of Annus Horribilises. From wars and persecutions, to earthquakes, weather disasters and pandemics. To make matters worse, one of the Internet's biggest preservationists, Internet Archive, suffered a setback in the courthouse, effectively endangering the future of preserving the past. But all of this is nothing compared to the Great Tribulation, because during the Great Tribulation, spreading the true Gospel will be a crime that can get you executed in multiple different ways, and nowhere on Earth will the true Gospel be legal during these terrible times...

However, when the Great Tribulation gets cut short thanks to Christ coming back, the Evil One will be serving a prison sentence in the bottomless pit for 1000 years. By the way, the 1000 years will be in Anno Mundi years because Jesus will make us go back to using the Anno Mundi Calendar, which was always the correct calendar since the beginning of man's days on Earth. This means when Earth comes under God's jurisdiction, there will be 1000 years of Annus Mirabilises. Talk about utopia...

A Farewell to the eShops

Today is the day the 3DS and Wii U eShops close their doors for good, meaning the Virtual Console service and its emulation of Nintendo's past hardware is officially discontinued. However, the Nintendo Switch Online's Game Boy, Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance emulators are already up and running, with DS and GameCube emulation being considered. To say that Nintendo dislikes emulators is not true. They just do not like unlicensed emulators competing with their official ones.

Nobody to Buycott

The Internet Archive has just suffered its biggest setback in the courthouse. However, they have decided to have the verdict overturned in their favor. If the overturning of the verdict does not happen, then Internet Archive will potentially have to go offline, and many will suffer as a result.

That is why the parallel economy pioneered by Gab is on the rise. It's calling for people who boycott businesses that do not like them to buycott from Gab's parallel economy marketplace instead. However, time may not be on Gab's side as well, who knows what will happen in the next five to ten years...

Uproar Over Injustice

Today is the day Nintendo bids farewell to Ash Ketchum. However, if he does not get any justice at all, Nintendo must brace themselves for an even bigger boycott than then ones triggered by their legal actions against copyright piracy. Even if Gary Oak was named after Shigeru Miyamoto or Ritchie was named after Hiroshi Yamauchi, that is no excuse for anybody who has wronged Ash Ketchum to not get any comeuppance whatsoever. If Ash Ketchum gets no justice when his days in the Pokemon TV series ends, there will be a bloodbath so bad it will be far worse than the one in Ukraine right now because this injustice will even make rogue dictators throw tantrums, and nobody likes it when rogue dictators throw tantrums...

But then again, if Pokemon was all just a dream, and Ash Ketchum was a dying, mentally ill Zainichi Korean all along, then the late Takeshi Shudo did have a legitimate reason to come up with a depressing series finale for the Pokemon TV series. To be Zainichi Korean is to suffer, because Zainichi Koreans are not only being discriminated in Japan, but they are also being discriminated in South Korea as well. Another sign that democracy in Asia is on the decline...

Update: The Ash Ketchum Arc has officially ended, and it ended with "Next Time, A New Beginning". It was not the depressing series finale that the late Takeshi Shudo proposed, but for Gary and Ritchie to not get any comeuppance whatsoever was disappointing. Then again, nobody wants to offend Shigeru Miyamoto and Hiroshi Yamauchi, because they are of far greater importance than anime fans.

Pokemon World Hate Crimes

It's only a matter of time before Nintendo bids farewell to Ash Ketchum. But one big question about his real identity remains...

If Professor Oak's grandsons Blue and Gary having the catchphrase "Smell you later" was any indication who Red and Ash really are, then there really is racism against Zainichi Koreans in the Pokemon World because Zainichi Koreans were often subjected to racist insults such as being called dirty, smelly, lazy and stupid. Such racist insults will be classified as hate crimes, and Professor Oak's grandsons Blue and Gary should be ashamed of committing them. In fact, many Pokemon fans, including myself, would be screaming for their heads to be on pikes for all those years of tormenting Red and Ash.

Unfortunately, there are Zainichi Koreans who are communist sympathizers, and both Japan and South Korea have zero tolerance for communist sympathizers. This results in Zainichi Koreans getting accused of being communist spies. Maybe Blue and Gary are suspicious that Red and Ash are Zainichi Korean communist sympathizers. But this is no excuse for Blue and Gary to humiliate Red and Ash. And yet, almost nobody punishes those who commit such hate crimes against Zainichi Koreans. That's why some Zainichi Koreans became mentally ill.

Then again, Zainichi Koreans were better off not having any justice if it means not letting communism dominate the Earth. Even if Nintendo does not punish Blue and Gary, their bullying will be nothing compared to the damage the communists' "noble causes" have done to entire countries...

Update: The Ash Ketchum Arc has officially ended, and it ended with "Next Time, A New Beginning". It was disappointing that Gary Oak did not get any comeuppance, but the writers chose not to because it will offend Shigeru Miyamoto, and that is even worse...

Vernal Equinox Lamentations

Another name for the Spring Equinox is the Vernal Equinox, which is also synonymous with the beginning of the Anno Mundi Calendar. However, this year's Spring Equinox may not begin the Anno Mundi Calendar Year on a positive note...

As if natural disasters, pestilences, wars and persecutions aren't bad enough, the Internet Archive had to settle a court case that could determine the future of digital libraries. This court case is one the Internet Archive must win, otherwise, archiving the past may be classified as a cybercriminal act.

Sukumizu Faux Pas

Attention, female readers. If you feel that your swimsuit does not have enough fanservice appeal, bear in mind a sukumizu makes you look immature and uncool.

In many Shojo TV shows, wearing a school swimsuit (sukumizu) outside school premises is a major faux pas because any female character wearing a school swimsuit to a swimming complex or a water park or the beach outside of field trips would be considered immature. This will cause other female characters to scramble to get her proper swimwear lest she be seen as uncool.

Even a two-piece swimsuit comprising of a sports bra swim top and boyshorts swim bottoms, which appears to be modest by two-piece swimwear standards, would have far better approval than a school swimsuit in swimwear terms, and yet, people are saying that Samus from Metroid shouldn't be wearing swimwear as alternate costumes to any Super Smash Bros games, claiming that fanservice is not allowed in many of Nintendo's games. Nintendo, however, states clearly that the sports bra and boyshorts attires worn by Samus in the Game Boy Advance Metroid games are eligible alternate costumes for Zero Suit Samus in the Super Smash Bros games given that such costumes are also worn by female wrestlers in professional wrestling, and Smash not only has several stages that allows the swimming feature, but also a boxing ring that stands in as a wrestling ring.

As for wearing a sukumizu to take part in an Anime convention swimwear competition, that is definitely out of the question.

Metroid © Nintendo.

From Ugly to Uglier

How did Jenova become one of the ugliest penultimate bosses in video game history? This would make you wonder how Polygon Man went from PlayStation's rejected advertising mascot to the malevolent mastermind behind PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale...

Sephiroth bringing Smash despair was clearly one of Jenova's dark plans to begin with. In addition to Jenova being too grotesque, her dark plans are far too sinister for Polygon Man to comprehend, therefore disqualifying her from being involved in any of Polygon Man's malevolent plans. This could explain why the only Eldritch Abominations that get to be stage hazards in PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale are those owned by Sony.

Final Fantasy VII © Square Enix.

Tofu-dreg Hotel

There have been many terrible things that happened on the Ides of March, and one of them happened in 1986. That's right. We're talking about the Hotel New World Collapse in Singapore. But what we hardly know about this building collapse was that Hotel New World was one of those tofu-dregs building projects, and it was showing troubling signs several years before that fateful Ides of March in 1986...

The inquiry on the Hotel New World Collapse found that the concrete used in Hotel New World's construction did meet international building safety standards, the quality of the building foundations also met international building safety standards, and the soil the building was built on was stable. However, the one factor that made Hotel New World a tofu-dregs building project was that the draftsman did not factor in dead weight.

For a structure with building plans that did not factor in dead weight to last 15 years is an incredible feat, and that's because Hotel New World was built on stable soil with building foundations and concrete that met international building safety standards. Unfortunately, 33 people died, including Hotel New World's owner because the building plans did not factor in dead weight. As a result, tofu-dregs building projects are no longer allowed by Singapore's construction authorities, resulting in no building collapses after Hotel New World's collapse.

No Justice for Zainichi Koreans

For those wondering what pachinko is, pachinko is a pinball variant originating from Japan that combines pinball with slot machine elements, and involves shooting balls into bonus areas to win more balls. Eventually, players win a prize that they can trade for other prizes, if they can win one that is.

Ever wondered why many pachinko parlors are run by Zainichi Koreans? To start, pachinko bypasses a Japanese gambling ban by having the prizes sometimes being exchanged for cash. Despite this advantage, pachinko received a dubious reputation as a result. This give Zainichi Koreans, who are often treated as second-class citizens in Japan an opportunity to make a living. Sadly, this does not prevent them from becoming hate crime targets, and almost no legal action, if any, had been taken against these hate crimes.

The novel Pachinko and its TV series adaptation focuses on more than just the titular pinball machines and why Zainichi Koreans became synonymous with them. It explores the trials and tribulations Zainichi Koreans go through. To quote Mozasu, the likes of him would be called a Japanese [REDACTED] in South Korea, and in Japan, he would just be another dirty Korean no matter how much money he makes or how nice he is.

Wii U Woes

Will somebody please think of the Miis?

The Wii U's woes in the days leading up to the Wii U eShop's closure couldn't get any worse. Cybersecurity issues forced Nintendo to take down Mario Kart 8 and Splatoon online servers. A hardware issue is causing the infamous Wii U NAND corruption error that is bricking Wii U consoles that had been left to collect dust. 2023 is really turning into an Annus Horribilis for the Wii U. So much for the Wii U being Nintendo's biggest flop that's not the Virtual Boy or the Game Boy Micro, especially when its sales figures are lower than the Gamecube.

Update: It turns out that the Wii U NAND corruption error has nothing to do with leaving the Wii U to gather dust. Instead, the Wii U NAND corruption error has been found to be caused by Hynix NAND chips found in selected Wii U units, and the Hynix NAND chips are dying faster than those manufactured by Samsung and Toshiba.

Disappearing Legacy

Do you remember somebody's particular artworks on DeviantArt? What about their Blogspot blog posts? Their Tumblr posts? Their Twitter Tweets? Their YouTube videos?

What if one day, they disappeared like GeoCities and became unsearchable?

That's right. Some Internet users close down their Blogspot blog, their Twitter account, their Tumblr account, or permanently deactivate their DeviantArt account, or make their YouTube videos private, or dare I say, either delete their YouTube videos or terminate their YouTube accounts. While this will be a big loss for Internet history, Internet users' privacy have sadly, been severely compromised. Perhaps leaving behind a legacy on the Internet might not be so great an idea after all...