From 5ch: VIP Board Regulars Flock to an ‘Info Broker’ Who Answers Every Question With One Word on Paper

Background and Key Points

5ch’s News VIP board (livejikkyo VIP, literally “Very Important Person” board) is the site’s default home for absurdist, low-stakes joke threads, and it has its own visual shorthand: kaomoji “faces” like (´･ω･`) function as recurring mascot characters rather than plain emoticons. The “info broker” gag plays on that convention — a silent AA character who only ever answers via a placard, styled like a noir informant, refusing all follow-up questions with curt non-answers. This is a well-worn format on the board: a single-line, deadpan response to whatever absurd or mundane question gets thrown at it.

Where the thread actually splits is over how seriously to treat the mentsuyu tangent. Most of the exchange is pure bit — trolling, fake IDs, a culprit-is-Yasu meme reference — but one poster’s complaint about mentsuyu’s “use within three days” rule derails the joke format into an actual kitchen-tips subthread, with posters offering real, slightly conflicting storage advice (bonito-heavy varieties, canned versions, single-serve packets) rather than in-character non-answers.

What’s likely to trip up readers unfamiliar with Japanese pantry staples: mentsuyu is a concentrated soy-based dashi sauce used for soba, udon, and tsuyu-based dishes, and its shelf life varies enormously by concentration — ready-to-use (straight, non-concentrated) bottles do spoil within days once opened, but the double- or triple-concentrated versions, thanks to their high salt and sugar content, can safely keep in the fridge for months, which is what the “keeps a year” reply is gesturing at. The thread itself never clarifies this distinction, leaving the advice sound but under-explained.