Looks like it’s that time of year again, when various colorfully-named awards sprout up around the blogosphere. Nobody has any idea where they’ve come from, but we humor them anyway!
This time around The Geek Clinic has been nominated for the Sunshine Award by Black Ragdoll over at Absolutely Anime, which we’re very grateful for! Normally i’m meant to pose my own questions to some other bloggers, but i’m a little pressed for time at the moment so i’ll have to pass. Without further ado, here we go:
1. To what degree do you separate your blog content and personal life, and why?
I guess I can separate my life into three categories. There’s my online persona (including blogging, people that I email and talk with regularly on Steam), my personal life and my professional life.
Each category spills into the one next to in in the list above, so a little bit of my online persona spills into my personal life as I share my blog with others who might be interested and also share information about the everyday me on my blog as needed (for instance, I like to explain any reasons that I might not be able to post for a while).
Given the setting I plan to work in, at this point I am not comfortable allowing my online persona to mix with my professional life. There are still far too many people out there who make the mistake of relating geeky past-times to childish ones and it would be remiss of me to allow those misconceptions to affect my ability to do my job. As soon as you lose the respect of your patients your ability to treat them is crippled, so I imagine i’ll never tell anyone I work with or for about my blog or hobbies.
2. If you could only watch one anime for the rest of your life, which one would it be and why?
Is it bad that I had to refer to my own recommendations list for this?
Obviously such a series needs to be long so I can get the most entertainment from each viewing, so i’m going to have to go with Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood. Code Geass is a close second, but I still haven’t forgiven its ending XD
3. Do you use MyAnimeList (or any other) to track your anime progress?
Yep, I have a MAL account that i’m pretty good at updating. I’m more than happy for people to add me over there.
As a side note, I also have a VNDB account for all of that great visual novel stuff.
4. What’s your opinion on the anime industry and where it’s headed?
I think that the anime industry as a whole attempts to appeal to a wide range of tastes and thereby limits its own potential. The issue is that harem storylines and fan service sell well and that means that those features get included far too often. Time and time again, however, it’s the shows that break that mould that are praised by the anime community and make memories for people.
Do I think that anime is dying or dead, as I see the odd individual espousing? Not at all, it’s a medium in constant flux…which happens to be the opposite of dead. Because it’s always changing there’s always hope for improvement as well.
5. Why do you write about anime and what’s your goal when it comes to this?
I write about anime because I have nothing better to do. Well, not quite.
I really like sharing the things I like with other people. Anime happens to be one of those things I like. I write reviews because I want to give other anime watchers my opinion on shows in the hope that they can use it to inform their own; the best moments on my blog are when people come back and tell me they’re glad they listened to my suggestions.
The second reason is to meet other people online to discuss anime with. Practically none of the friends I hang out with regularly are interested in anime, or my other hobbies, so blogging is a great way to connect with other people. Together with this is the opportunity to discuss and/or defend my views in comments on the blog itself.
Basically…I find it to be fun.
6. Do you buy anime merchandise?
I only have a few figures at the moment but the overall answer is yes (well, only if I really like the figure). I like having physical representations of the anime, video games and visual novels i’ve enjoyed the most.
7. Do you think you will keep watching anime long-term or eventually grow out of it?
I’d long to think i’m in this for the long haul. I regularly encounter new shows that I love and with my backlog as massive as it is I can’t see that changing any time soon.
______________________________________________________________
That’s it from me as far as answers go! Feel free to give your own answers in the comments!
The Geek Clinic 
Man, if I had to choose one anime it would be something a lot longer running that either FMA: Brotherhood or Code Geass. I’d at least want one that had new or original content every now and then rather than watch the same episode of a small series. For that reason I would probably say Gintama considering how much of it there is, I haven’t watched it but as far as original content it puts long running shonen like DBZ and Naruto to shame.
I decided on quality over quantity because I could see myself watching FMA and coming back to it in time, whereas I might not even finish the longer series before giving up on them and then wouldn’t watch them ever again. I wouldn’t have picked a 12 episode series but 50+ is enough for me.
“when various colorfully-named awards sprout up around the blogosphere.”
The interrogation continues.
Nice choice with Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood :p I would had picked Gintama myself, I’ll probably still laughed my ass off even if I watched it a hundred times, and the series has more than enough episodes too.
Do you have a myfigurescollection account? And did you get the Saber figure? :p
Damn, I got ninja’ed by Lazarinth.
Doesn’t happen much, but when it does happen it’s a good feeling =P
I still need to give Gintama some more time. I watched about 6 episodes with some friends but the gathering never happened again XD I’ll direct you to my answer to Lazarinth otherwise.
I don’t have an account but my two major figures are that Saber and http://myfigurecollection.net/item/166621