WEEKLY MAHJONG

Japanese Modern (riichi/dora). This week's column is about the rapid rise and unfortunately sudden fall of Yakitori Online, a website devoted to the community of Western aficionados of modern Japanese riichi/dora majan.

Since the advent of the Internet, Western players (that is to say, European and North American players) have been able to exchange information about mahjong as never before, and even to find other players and play online. Particularly in Europe, where board games enjoy great popularity, players have extensively played Chinese Classical, HKOS, and -- despite the dearth of information in English until recently -- Japanese riichi/dora majan. It's very interesting that those of us who've played multiple variants invariably come to the same conclusion -- that the Japanese game is particularly fun and exciting.

Players of the Japanese game used to exchange information at rec.games.mahjong. But Usenet is limited by being primarily a text medium, and is falling into disuse. Martin Rep created a forum on his site, MahjongNews.com, but that forum is primarily devoted to MCR. My own bulletin board is admittedly a bit one-sided, partly because I'm not very technical and partly because I've come to like it the way it is.

So it was a bit of a surprise when Yakitori Online (or YO for short) went live in mid- June 2007 and was immediately populated by a very lively crowd of enthusiastic English-speaking players of the Japanese game. The site was a huge success from the day it went live.

YO was created by Andy Barzaghi, a 23-year-old Italian who goes by the online moniker "dbrn," in partnership with Jenn Barr, Japan Professional Mahjong League player and ReachMahjong.com founder and columnist. But suddenly, on June 15, 2008, Yakitori Online went offline. Apparently Andy had paid for just one year of domain name registration, and failed to renew after the year was up.

The once lively riichi community now has no place to gather. If YO never goes back online, ReachMahjong.com will likely become the new focal point for riichi aficionados going forward. I'm finding it difficult to reach former Yakitori Onliners for commentary or information, but I'll keep you apprised of ongoing developments in future columns.

Click the entries in the header frame, above, to read other columns.

Question or comment about this column? Email and the discussion will be posted on the Mah-Jongg Q&A Bulletin Board.

Links about Japanese-style mah-jongg:

• Tom's 1st Mah-Jongg Adventure in Japan
• Vega Mah-Jongg Parlor - in ENGLISH
• Vega Mah-Jongg Parlor - in JAPANESE
• Riichi-ing out in Shibuya, 2002
• More Adventures in Japan
• Little Tokyo no tomodachi
• Janyou no tomodachi
• Japanese Mah-Jongg is usually played on automatic dealing machines.
• A downloadable English-language booklet has been made which describes the standard Japanese riichi/dora majan rules of the European Mahjong Association. http://mahjong-europe.org/rules/. Direct links to the 24 page booklet and the 2 page summary: http://mahjong-europe.org/filer/riichirules.pdf; http://mahjong-europe.org/filer/riichisheet.pdf.
• http://guide.riichi.nl/ - Ryan Morris' excellent English-language guide to Japanese mahjong is finally back online - hosted in Holland.
• Yakitori Online ( http://www.yakitorionline.com/) is a lively discussion forum where the sole topic is Japanese majan.
• Reach Mahjong ( http://reachmahjong.com/) features columns by Jenn Barr, Garthe Nelson, and Gemma about Japanese majan.

© 2008 Tom Sloper. All rights reserved.