Hiroyuki Nishimura (pictured), 2channel founder, NicoNico Douga CEO and gravure idol, has transferred the world’s largest forum 2ch to an unknown Singaporean company, in a move which has taken observers largely by surprise.
The (public) background to this is that as an anonymous board, 2ch is frequently used to make actionable comments, and the desperate trail of lawyers hunting for someone to sue has long been an impediment to the site’s management, even if Hiroyuki is notorious for ignoring them.
This is thought to be part of the reason why Hiroyuki recently announced on his blog that the site has been completely transferred, taking effect on the 1st of January.
Now it would appear that 2ch has no formal connection to Japan at all, despite being its largest forum.
The company to which 2ch has been transferred, Packet Monster Inc, is completely unknown, and in fact is likely merely a shell or holding company for taxation and litigation minimisation.
The whois details are as follows:
Before:
Registrant:
Monsters Inc
#602, 5-12-5
Shinjyuku
Shinjyuku-ku
Tokyo, TK 160-0022
JPDomain name: 2CH.NET
Administrative Contact:
Nishimura, Hiroyuki
#602, 5-12-5
Shinjyuku
Shinjyuku-ku
Tokyo, TK 160-0022
JP
020-4622-8073 Fax: 020-4622-8073Technical Contact:
Watkins, Jim
9629 Evergreen Way suite 202C
Everett, WA 98204
US
425-353-7103 Fax: 425-353-5962After:
Registrant:
PACKET MONSTER INC. PTE. LTD.
TELOK AYER STREET
SINGAPORE, SINGAPORE 068589
SGDomain name: 2CH.NET
Administrative Contact:
DHANVANTRAY, RAGINI packetmonsterch2div@2ch.net
TELOK AYER STREET
SINGAPORE, SINGAPORE 068589
SG
+1.4165551212Technical Contact:
Watkins, Jim dns@nttsupport.com
9629 Evergreen Way suite 202C
Everett, WA 98204
US
425-353-7103 Fax: 425-353-5962
A spot of searching reveals the lady listed in the contact details to be the CEO of a Singaporean company called Rikvin, specialising in Singapore-based offshore company formations.
With no particular connection to the business of managing web sites, we can speculate reasonably that the management continues to reside with Hiroyuki, and this move is thus entirely driven by tax or legal incentives.
The servers themselves have long been internationally hosted, chiefly for legal reasons, so from this perspective there should be no change.
Aside from the issue of the unknown company, Hiroyuki himself, and subsequent mass media reports, all refer to a complete “transfer” of the site’s ownership to Packet Monster – clearly a huge site like 2ch, which is thought to have millions of dollars of revenue, is unlikely to have just been given away, so unless a secret sale was involved it looks as though Hiroyuki will be retaining an interest.
An issue we do not see given any consideration is that of the less than free speech enjoyed in Singapore – presumably with an offshore Internet concern this is not an issue, as we might not expect a site like 2ch to last long were it a domestic Singaporean site.
Hiroyuki himself remains deeply involved in losing millions of dollars monthly at NicoNico Douga, whilst dreaming about global expansion, so it seems likely shedding some of the burden the management of 2ch involved will be useful to him.
Given that no significant improvements have been made to the awkward, if not obsolescent, 2ch site itself in many years, any innovation or change on this front seems unlikely.
The online reaction to this has been very mixed, with most not really understanding the move, though the more extreme responses such as “He’s abandoning Japan!” are quite unreasonable.
In fact, many ostensibly Japan based major websites are incorporated and hosted overseas, most notably the massive free blog host FC2, the second most frequently visited domain in Japan, second only to Yahoo.co.jp. In this case, the company is actually incorporated in Nevada under the name of an American, and the management resides in Los Angeles.
Whilst this move is being painted by many, not least Hiroyuki, as a case of avoiding the oppressive Japanese courts, we must wonder at the significant tax advantages he will now enjoy…
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Lol , why must he be naked?
the implications of that DVD marked 'oba-chan' are beyond hilarious. But this move is pretty lolwut.
Oh god I wish you hadn't made me notice that... >_<
Since when was the internet ever owned by anyone?
And of all places, Singapore has to own them? The land where law is everything and sense is nothing?
Goodbye 2ch. You will be forever missed.
Wasn't Train Man from 2ch?
Pretty much everything on here is from 2ch.
Not the case at all.
Because the rest of the stuff is from 2chan~
What?
And nothing of value is lost
If he wanted more lax laws about the Internets, Philippines is a good candidate.. considering rampant p2p/torrent usage here and there's almost no law about adult content in the internets.
ask people here if what is loli, they will say "is that a candy(lolipop)"
BWAHAHAHA!
indeed kind sir XDDD
>and gravure idol
It's too bad that I have far too large of an imagination, because my mind was most violently fucked reading this part.
oh great, now the internet was owned by non other than the notorious fine-happy Singapore . . . . . .
T^T I will miss you 2chan T^T (I think train man is from 2chan too . . . maybe?)
I hope the Sinapore company can still keep the site to it par before it was transfered though . . .
That's 2ch, not 2chan. Learn the difference.
Pokemon Inc. Goodbye to the old 2ch.. T^T
Tax incentives lulz
money - tax = swimming in money
yes indeed..
tax evasion is a common thing here
the internets has no tax here.
here mainly the internets is for
friendster
yahoo messenger
youtube
free cheaply made MMORPGs
and pr0n
hehehe I like the last usage
Who the hell is this company anyway?I live at here but never heard of it the starting of a bad year.
Guys, this is more than likely a way to get potential lawsuits out as they are now beyond the boundaries of Japanese law, like how the article says.
Stop commenting as though 2ch is dead.
A few famous Singaporean websites are hosted offshore too, for obvious reasons
examples of those website?Anything that involve this country company I hate it.
Registrant:
Monsters Inc
Let's just hope that a blue furry devil and green eyeball doesn't come out of our closets when we visit 2ch the next time around.
No chewing gum and posting on 2ch anymore anons.
Never heard of this company.
its probably a front company created soley to be legaly responsible for 2ch. That way if 2ch burns legaly, nothing else gets damaged, and 2ch is isolated from japanese law.
However I wonder too whether they would have been better regestering somewhere else.
Never heard of that company.Must be an unknown one I hate it when news of us being mention and unknown company of the country provide hosting for it.It pisses me of.Crunchyroll and now this what a way to start the year.
Hope the tax incentive thing isnt hindering frre speech. So many anon things are spawned from that happy place.
When I saw news of Singapore involved with things in anime it pissed me off as it must be bad news.why the name of our country gets mention so much?Why are there so many unknown company originate from here why not other countries.If it involve other countries I don't care but when saw this country name it has now completely ruins my mood.I don't even understand the article while briefly reading through it.
i can tell tt u r veri pissed of but there isn't anythng u can do bout it.
Does that mean you got pissed when afa '08 was announced that it would be held in Singapore and that May'n would be holding a live performance?
Secondly, "Why are there so many unknown company originate from here why not other countries...". Its not like it doesn't happen in other countries, maybe you should read the yellow pages.
"I don’t even understand the article while briefly reading through it." <-- And i can understand that you are getting upset over something very small when you clearly do not understand the article.
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=TELOK+AYER+STREET+SINGAPORE,+SINGAPORE+068589&sll=1.352083,103.819836&sspn=0.665857,0.884399&g=Singapore&ie=UTF8&ll=1.281217,103.848782&spn=0.010404,0.013819&t=h&z=16&iwloc=addr [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=TELOK AYER STREET SINGAPORE, SINGAPORE 068589&sll=1.352083,103.819836&sspn=0.665857,0.884399&g=Singapore&ie=UTF8&ll=1.281217,103.848782&spn=0.010404,0.013819&t=h&z=16&iwloc=addr]
Here's what the building looks like, of the company who owns 2ch now.
No.They are not owning it they are just hosting it.I wish to go there and thrash all the companies that are involved in anime.I never been there myself through.
I don't really care much through.
Sounds like the transfer was made to some bootleg company... <_<
Here is a blog from a person who lives in Singapore and actually went to check out the adress in the whois:
http://kilvear.livejournal.com/135554.html
Notice this picture:
http://img165.imageshack.us/img165/7218/p0201091256kc0.jpg
"Rikvin BLDG"
HANNIN WA OMAE DA!
HAHA i wtf'd out loud to the picture. Of course thats the 2ch founder. Gravure idol thats awesome
That company building was pathetic.Why the hell would the founder give up the host and let some patheic bootleg company run it in his place and how they manage to contact one another in the first place and why would the founder trust them and do this?I really do not understand.
He's likely still in complete control - read the article.
The company in question specialises in helping international companies create offshore entities in Singapore to reduce their tax and regulatory burden - read the article.
Probably this company is just a few lawyers processing the paperwork and allowing their names to be used as nominees.
I think he's trying to wash his hands off and let Singapore take the blame for all the lawsuits against him.
Lawsuits does transfer from owner to owner.
What does this have to do with singapore and why must it always be Singapore?
First 2ch! Tomorrow, NICO NICO! BWAHAHAHAAHAHAHA!
Forget it.I don’t really care much through.
"Packet Monster Inc" seems like the name of a phantom company. tomorrow NicoNico Douga will be acquired by "Faux Enterprises" xD
I still don't know the real reason on this moves
Hiroyuki uses tax evasion...
Japanese law missed!
---
Japanese law uses taxation...
But it failed!
>:P
Nobody could be blamed for not wanting to fund a bunch of old people who voted themselves a pyramid scheme welfare state...
I like your politics
but the question is, isnt all saving for old age positioning ourselves to enslave the next generation.
Whether by saving more money yourself, or national power structure.
And given that the wealth of japan vs say indonesia was built by these people, dont they deserve it?
A contributions based pension system lacks this problem as people are actually using up the very money they saved whilst working, rather than assigning future tax revenues to pensions, irrespective of what happens in the future (declining birthrates and increasing lifespans).
Does each of these old Japanese (or anyone else in one of the many countries with this problem) "deserve" to be able to force two working people to surrender the better part of their income so they can spend it on frivolity? What will happen to the wealth of the nation when whole generations are forced into this arrangement?
http://www.2chan.net/
it doesn't look any different.
Why would it look different? Also 2ch is not 2chan.