Category: News

A thread titled “Incidents only geezers born in the Showa era know about” drew a flood of case names from the Showa and early Heisei periods that rarely come up anymore — the Shimoyama Incident, the Toyota Shoji scandal, events tied to Aum Shinrikyo, and more. Posters chimed in with things like “Even us Showa-born folks don’t know about incidents from before we were old enough to understand” and “My teenage years were already in the Heisei era, so I’m not that familiar,” highlighting just how much knowledge varies even within the so-called "Showa generation."

*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5channel (Nandemo Jikkyo G, a live-commentary board) thread “Incidents Only Geezers Born in the Showa Era Know About.”

A ranking of each prefecture’s “dominant company” — the biggest by revenue or market cap — became a hot topic on 5ch’s Nandemo Jikkyo G board. Reactions poured in over results that defied expectations, like Saitama and Ibaraki having nothing but regional banks at the top, Hyogo’s pick being ASICS, and Yamaguchi’s being Uniqlo (Fast Retailing). At the same time, plenty of people questioned the methodology itself, pointing out that Saitama Resona Bank doesn’t show up on its own since it’s a subsidiary of Resona Holdings, and that companies headquartered in Tokyo get counted as “Tokyo” no matter where their actual factories are located.

*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Nandemo Jikkyo G) thread “Announcing Your Prefecture’s Dominant Company.”

It’s come to light that former Morning Musume。’ member Rena Tanaka, while working to get her driver’s license for her child’s sake, invited Akane Haga — who had also been wanting to get licensed — to join her, and the two attended driving school together to earn their licenses. On 5ch’s Hello! Project board, some posters expressed surprise that the two kept in touch privately, while others hailed Tanaka as a “genius” for passing the written exam on the first try every time, and still others jokingly dismissed the fuss over “just” getting a license. The thread eventually drifted into speculation about what kind of cars the two might drive, along with stories about other former members who’d struggled to pass their own driving tests.

※This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Hello! Project) thread “Rena Tanaka and Akane Haga go to driving school together and get their licenses together! The driving instructor turns out to be a LoVendoЯ fan wwwwwwwww“.

The thread was sparked by a post noting that Morning Musume。’23’s Hana Kojima said her manager has forbidden her from naming the talent agency she used to belong to. Posters piled on with more examples of transfer members who avoid naming their former agencies — Kasahara (Angerme), Konno (a Morning Musume。 OG), Kawanishi (formerly of Amuse) — and opinions split over whether this is a Hello! Project-specific custom or standard practice across the entertainment industry as a whole. Some defended it (“It’d actually look more unnatural if she didn’t stay quiet about it,” “Might be a copyright or publicity-rights issue”), while others took it as proof that the agency is simply closed off.

※This article is compiled and summarized from the 5ch (Hello! Project) thread “[Sad News] Hana Kojima: “My manager has forbidden me from saying the name of the agency I used to belong to” ← UFA’s closed-off culture.”

Juice=Juice’s Kawashima Mifu has become the talk of 5channel’s Hello! Project board after fans noted she’s the most popular member during “photo-op time,” the window at Hello! Project events when attendees can shoot close-up photos of the members. Posts ranged from simple support (“she’s the ace,” “she’s just cute”) to comments tracing a crowd-pleasing-looks “lineage” running from Konno Azusa to Michishige Sayumi to Kawashima Mifu, with some arguing her appeal reaches casual viewers, not just hardcore fans. Meanwhile, claims that she “seems to glow” drew pushback that it’s just a lighting effect, reviving the old looks-versus-skill debate.

11AnonymousSep 12, 2026 22:26

12AnonymousSep 12, 2026 22:27

If you've ever seen her up close even once, you'd get it —
she genuinely glows.
If Chansan is an idol cyborg,
then Mippuru (Kawashima's nickname) is a natural-born idol.

13AnonymousSep 12, 2026 22:28

She's honestly turning into the best thing Hello! Project has produced in recent years.

14AnonymousSep 12, 2026 22:29

A Nogizaka fan said this and it weirdly made sense to me:
once a Hello! Project act actually gets popular, they end up doing the same generic idol work as everyone else anyway.
Quit doing the kind of work 'Kawa-Lab' does.
Turns out idols don't need skill after all —
just being cute is enough.
Think about what the idol job actually involves, and Nogizaka's got the right formula.

60AnonymousSep 12, 2026 22:43

Takao's smiling too.

61AnonymousSep 12, 2026 22:49

■Camera-Ready! Mi Amore Photo-Op Highlights Roundup (Updated September 2026)
Danbara


Inoue


Kudo


Matsunaga


Arisawa


Irie


Ebata


Ishiyama

Endo

Kawashima



Hayashi

Inaba

Miyamoto

62AnonymousSep 12, 2026 22:50

Because she's as pale as a squid (Japanese slang for very fair, translucent skin).

*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5channel (Hello! Project board) thread “Why Kawashima Mifu-chan is the most popular during photo-op time.”

5channel’s “News VIP” board held its regular Saturday-night buzzer quiz thread. The lineup totaled 29 questions in all — 9 on “Radio,” 18 “Free-for-all,” and 2 on “Madoka Magica” — run in a first-to-buzz format that awards points based on finishing order. Questions ranged across genres: naming a radio show’s title, identifying actress Kurenai Manko by name, the nickname given to a movement from Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons,” and the real town that inspired a Pokémon game location. The banter between the quizmaster and the answerers stayed lively throughout, with the thread’s host even getting ribbed as someone who’s “been alive since the age of the Ōkagami” (a centuries-old Japanese chronicle — i.e., joked to be ancient).

*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5channel (“News VIP”) thread “[He’s Back After Three Weeks] Saturday Night Quiz Thread [29 Questions This Past Month].”

Daisuke Hori, a streamer who bills himself as a “short sleeper” (someone who claims to need only a few hours of sleep), has been running a marathon sleep-deprivation broadcast — and thread regulars reacted when dark circles that supposedly never appear under his eyes were accidentally caught on camera. Viewers called it “about five times worse than I expected.” The stream reportedly shows him sleeping just 27 minutes over three days, and total “super chat” donations (YouTube’s paid live-chat tipping feature) have already topped 300 million yen. The thread also brought up a past case: fellow streamer Yuta Iwata previously attempted the same “Hori Daisuke Challenge” and lasted 164 hours. Commenters split between concern over the stream’s authenticity and Hori’s health, and admiration for it as a piece of content.

*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5channel (Livegalileo/”anything goes” board) thread “[Bad News] Short-sleeper Hori accidentally shows the dark eye circles that normally never appear wwwwwwwww.”

A video showing Nippon-Ham Fighters pitcher Itoh locked in a tense stare-down with the Seibu Lions dugout during a game has gone viral, sparking a flood of reactions on 5ch’s live-game-thread board (“Nandemo Jikkyou G”). The early theory was that Itoh snapped back after a Seibu coach accused him of sign-stealing, but partway through the thread another account surfaced claiming the real trigger was Fighters pitching coach Kuroda scolding him for “too much rosin.” Posters remain divided over which explanation is true. Seibu’s Genda reportedly looked visibly riled up too, and some pointed out that the rosin theory alone doesn’t explain that.

*This article is compiled and summarized from the 5ch (Nandemo Jikkyou G) thread “[Video] Fighters’ Itoh Nearly Brawls After Being Accused of Sign-Stealing.”

On 5ch’s “Nanademo Jikkyo G” (roughly, “Whatever’s Live” board), a post comparing having a child to an investment — claiming “the moment you have a kid, you’re sitting on a ¥20 million unrealized loss” — sparked a heated debate. Opinions split between posters who calculated that investing that same amount would grow into tens of millions of yen by retirement, and those who countered that once you factor in child allowances and education subsidies, the real burden is much smaller. Then, in the second half of the thread, personal stories of parents who showered their kids with love sat alongside accounts of neglect and verbal abuse, and the conversation shifted from cost-benefit math into a clash of deeply personal views on whether to have children at all.

※This article is an excerpt and summary of the 5ch (Nanademo Jikkyo G) thread “Child: “The Moment You Have Me, You’re Carrying a ¥20 Million Unrealized Loss” — Do You Really Need Kids, Minus the Sentiment?“.

A thread on the Nandemo Jikkyo G (Live Game Commentary) board about the 1995 RPG *Chrono Trigger* asked, “Isn’t it amazing how well-crafted this time-leap story was for that era?” The discussion quickly expanded into comparisons with Doraemon’s time-paradox episode, *The Girl Who Leapt Through Time*, and *Back to the Future*, before spiraling into a full-blown debate over the “true originator” of time-travel fiction — going all the way back to H.G. Wells’ *The Time Machine* and even Dickens’ *A Christmas Carol*. At the same time, some pushed back, arguing that *Final Fantasy V* and *Romancing SaGa 2* are more playable and enjoyable today, showing that opinions on Chrono Trigger itself were far from unanimous.

※This article is compiled and summarized from the 5channel (Nandemo Jikkyo G) thread “[Thesis] Isn’t it amazing that Chrono Trigger pulled off a time-leap story back in that era.“