Anime Boston is almost upon us! If you’re coming up to the city for a weekend at the Hynes, be sure to drop by one or more of my panels to say Hello!

Update (Thursday 18 March 11:30 pm): Time for “Hentai Manga” panel has been moved later into the night.

Update 2 (Monday 22 March 9:30 am): Location for “Anime Themes” panel changed. Also, time for “Cowboy Bebop” panel moved earlier in the afternoon.

Update 3 (Monday 29 March 11:10 pm): Time for “Intro and Ending Themes” panel has been moved earlier in the day.

Friday 12:00 pm noon (Panel 302) – Introduction to Anime Intro and Ending Themes

Friday: 5:30 pm (Panel 306) – After Cowboy Bebop: The Works of Shinichiro Watanabe

Friday/Saturday 1:30 am (Panel 202) – Chains, Trains, and Happy Endings: Japan’s Underground Sex Culture (18+)

Saturday 6:00 pm (107 Panel 6) – On the Road for Anime Pilgrimages

Saturday 10:00 pm (Panel 202) – Impact of Evangelion

Saturday/Sunday 1:30 am (Panel 202) – Hentai Manga: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (18+)

Sunday 1:00 pm (Panel 202) – From Antisocial Loser to Economic Hero: The History of Otakudom

Sunday 2:00 pm (Panel 202) – Anime in Academia

On the Road for Anime Pilgrimages
107 Panel 6 on SATURDAY
starting at 06:00:00 PM

Many anime reference real-world locations, inspiring otaku to seek out these destinations. Come discover the significance of the “anime pilgrimage”!

After Cowboy Bebop: The Works of Shinichiro Watanabe
306 Panel 2 on FRIDAY
starting at 08:30:00 PM

Many fans recognize Cowboy Bebop’s director, but let’s look at his other shows, from Macross Plus to Samurai Champloo to Genius Party and more!

Hentai Manga: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
107 Panel 6 on SATURDAY
starting at 12:00:00 AM

What makes a good ero-manga? We’ll show and support some of the funniest & more artistic adult comics (and hilariously bad, “imaginative” ones too).

Chains, Trains, and Happy Endings: Japan’s Underground Sex Culture
202 Panel 5 on FRIDAY
starting at 01:00:00 AM

The Japanese sex industry is pretty closeted, but here’s a peephole into host clubs, no-panty bars, hentai magazines, costume play, and love hotels.

Apparently I have good word that a number of my other panels will proceed past “wait list” status, so I’ll keep everyone updated here! (You can view the rest of my panels by clicking here.)

The Department of Alchemy has started prepping for the summer convention circuit!

If you’ll be at Anime Boston this weekend, I’ll be talking at the following panels:

Genre, Music, and Shinichiro Watanabe
Friday @ 6:00 pm in Ballroom A
A chance to praise Watanabe and his musical direction! Finally!

Akiba Empire: The Influence of Otaku
Friday @ 8:00 pm in Ballroom A Constitution Ballroom
Pairing up with Nicole from Design Benign, a talk about marketing and the otaku economic force.

The Virtual Worlds of Anime
Saturday @ 1:30 pm in Back Bay Panel/Video
A survey of anime and manga about virtual spaces and how the medium helps us understand new worlds.

Chains, Trains, and Love Hotels: The Japanese Sex Industry
Saturday @ 10:00 pm in Ballroom A
A presentation on, well, sex in Japan.

The Anime That’s Not Anime: Opening and Ending Themes
Sunday @ 11:30 am in Panel Room 207
An attempt to examine and contextualize a solid number of opening and ending themes of anime.

Also, Otakon panel acceptances have just come in, and the Department of Alchemy will be making more appearances:

1. Without Watching the Anime: Opening & Ending Themes
2. Chains, Trains, and Love Hotels: The Japanese Sex Industry
3. The Real Story of Japanese Street Fashion
4. The Impact of Evangelion

With other possible talks to include (pending the waiting list and notices):

5. The Problem with Otaku
6. Japan (and Anime) Beyond the City
7. Anime in Academia

Hopefully, the Anime Boston panels will be recorded if you can’t come up to New England for the weekend, but some of these panels may also appear at Anime Expo and Anime Weekend Atlanta!

There’s life hacking and even school hacking, but can we hack sex? Or, at least follow LifeHacker’s motto and “get things done” with technology when it comes to romping in (or out of) the bedroom.

Explanations aside, today I came across this nifty little item from OhMiBod:

They call it the NaughtiNano — essentially it’s a vibrator powered by your DRM iPod. According to the website, it “vibrates to the rhythm and intensity of the music.” Now good for them if they got the piece of equipment to shake its tail if you turn up the volume. But let’s try to conceptualize: what if the unit pulsated according to a song’s bass, or wavelength oscillation, or any other obscure yet relevant musical factor. It’s already possible for a music UI to produce a visualization of music. But what if an orgasm looked like this…

or this…

(borrowed from TheAlieness GiselaGiardino²³‘s Flickr)

Or, a deeper question: can a genre excite us? Can sexual desire derive from accordion-dominant, Louisiana zydeco between 150 and 170 BPM? Would seventeenth century Gregorian chant serve up a stronger pleasurable climax?

OhMiBod also sells a product, monikered as Boditalk, a vibrator that reacts to your cell phone calls, buzzing for the duration of your wireless chat. I’m sure that someone could engineer an idea to combine the iPhone’s GPS and some odd sort of social network with this amusing gizmo.