Introduction
The OS-tans (OS??) are an Internet phenomenon that started on Futaba Channel; the OS-tan or simply OS Girls are the personification of several operating systems by various amateur Japanese artists. Although a pure fan creation, the appearance of each OS Girl is generally consistent across artists. The OS Girls are typically depicted as women and usually depicted as sisters of varying ages.
History
A Summary about Personification
personification (noun);
- a person, thing or name typifying a certain quality or idea; an embodiment or exemplification
- a figure of speech, prosopopeia, in which an inanimate object or an abstraction is given human qualities
- an artistic representation of an abstract quality as a human
Natural phenomenon such as the animal and the stone, the thunder and the wind, gods and spirits, etc. which exists along with humans are very common in myths and fables. Legend such as an animal or a plant that changes into a human form (or vice-versa) not only exist in fairy tales and fables, but also on religious stories as well. Whether those stories were hearsay or not, it continued to spread in the form of caricature, novels, etc.
As those stories being passed, learned, taught, and used for amusement, etc. It is adapted notably in cartoons. For example, in anime and manga where abiotic materials would physically transform into a human being or even so, it could just be easily cosplayed by a certain person.
Personification before the OS-tans
In Japan, personification is not a thing to the extent that is alike especially in creative culture as a whole and can be called unique. The most notable personification related to computers before the OS-Tans is the OS-idol Win-chan (second version goes here) which is a mascot of TECHWIN Magazine. There is also a personification used to promote BSD distributions in the net which is known as Princess of BSD; Magical Toko-chan, portrayed as an outrider, and to go back even to the time of 8-bit computer models in the 1980s. Even so, the iMacs were also personified by an artist named Satoshi Igarashi which is popularly known as Toy. He created the Toy's iMac Girl, the feature of a series of wallpapers first appearing between August 1998 and March 1999.
Futaba: The Rise of the OS-tans
The concept is reported to have begun as a personification of the common perception of Windows Me as unstable and prone to frequent crashes. Discussions on Futaba Channel likened this to the stereotype of a fickle, troublesome girl. This personification expanded, with the creation of Me-tan (dated to August 6 2003) followed by the other characters.
Some anonymous Futaba artist/s introduced a setting on its story where a Toshiaki owns a PC. Then they, all of a sudden included a group of women in which they personify every operating system he (Toshiaki) owns, in which also they didn't gave an explanation on how were they formed or did appeared or born in the setting. These group of women are the OS-Tans. The first batch of OS-tans created are all personifying a series of Windows OS, which means they are portrayed as sisters from each other. The series of Windows OS that was personified includes 3.1, NT, 95, CE, NT Workstation, 98 98SE, ME, 2000, XP and Server 2003. The OS-tans obviously considers Toshiaki their master. They live on a house with their master. They almost have the traits of the operating system they respectively represent. Not only do they help their master on maintaining things that are technically related to computers, but they also do his chores and obligations around the house. That setting on those stories became temporary at first, until Futaba artists accepted it and followed popularly.
Other than the Windows sisters, other operating system such as MacOS, Linux, and Linspire were also given a personification and commonly appeared with the Windows sisters at that time. Followed by the personification of MacOS9 along with the original design for the personification of MacOS converted into being MacOSX (not to be confused with +nijiura+ concept of OSX catgirls, See Below). Currently so as Vista as well. Futaba artist also started to draw male counterparts at that time. They are known as the OS-kuns (OS君). Although some non-OS male characters exist for programs and hardware. For example, Norton Antivirus is usually portrayed as a creepy looking, possibly lecherous old doctor. Futaba also includes their own memes to be shown along with the OS-tans. Most notable memes includes Yamada, WE (Taeko) and Pizza-tan.
+Nijiura+
Since popular in Futaba, OS-tans were also seen in other japanese imageboards as well. Such as +Nijiura+ (not to be confused with the nijiura board on Futaba) in which they are more known on being an OS-tan imageboard. +Nijiura+ mostly makes CG illustrations and wallpapers than 4komas.
+Nijiura+ produced their own concept of MacOSX. Since Futaba's concept is the conversion from the personification of MacOS, +Nijiura+ 's concept was to expand it into every different big cat given codenames such as Cheetah, Puma, Jaguar, Panther, Tiger and soon to be Leopard. Almost same applies to their own concept of Windows Vista, in which designs have been expanded into Vista's several editions such as Ultimate, Home Premium, Home Basic, Bussiness and Enterprise.
+Nijiura+ currently included the personification of BeOS.
Outside Japan
There are still illustrations, drawings, flash animations, videos etc. which related to OS-Tans that continues being posted in the internet. In which it gave more exposure to the viewers outside Japan, and because of that, contributions about OS-tans coming from English-speaking imageboards and websites came to grow. Most notable example is Juzo-kun's renditions of Linux distros wallpapers. While imageboards such as 4chan, wakachan and idlechan gave English translations on some comics.
| OS-Tan Collections is an English speaking themed website that deals with OS-tans which is open for all OS-tan viewers around the Internet. Artists from OS-Tan Collections not only includes Futaba and +Nijiura+'s OS-tan current line-up, but also other operating system they could name of and be given personification as well. |
The -tan Suffix
The Japanese suffix -tan (#12383;#12435;) is a child's mispronunciation of -chan (#12385;#12419;#12435;), an informal, intimate, and diminutive honorific suffix for a person used for friends, family, and pets. In this case, the mispronunciation is used intentionally to achieve the contrived cute or charming effect that is commonly associated with its use by young children. It is also sometimes added to the names of non-mascot characters, such as Sakura from Cardcaptor Sakura. The personifications as a whole are commonly simply called mascots or mascot characters. The -tan suffix itself means nothing outside its role as an honorific and its implications of cuteness; it is never used on its own. Normal suffixes including -san and -chan, are also used with OS Girls depending on the character and the speaker's preference, or omitted entirely. A common misconception is that -tan is a word meaning mascot or its addition to a name denotes a character being a mascot or personification. This is not so. Furthermore, the -tan suffix has largely fallen out of favor with the original creators of the OS Girls on Futaba Channel. Various and varying suffixes and names are used instead, for instance, the Windows 98 and Windows 98SE OS Girls are most commonly called Hacchan and Secchan.
References and in-jokes
When the OS-tans are portrayed in comics, they are often accompanied by Japanese puns or references to Futaba Channel culture.
Scallion
Often the Windows girls are seen carrying scallions. This is a pun: a popular Japanese firewall program (NEGiES) sounds like the Japanese word for scallion (negi) so the OS-tan carry scallions around as shields or weapons. A scallion is also the icon used for the firewall itself.
Breast Size, Hunger, and Memory
It has been suggested from time to time, that the breast sizes of the individual OS-tans represent their RAM requirements. Because Windows XP is considered a memory hog due to its increased resource consumption, XP-tan is incredibly well endowed (and she has no qualms about getting upgraded from time to time). 2K-tan normally rates as a close second, whereas as someone like MSDOS-tan lies at the complete opposite end of the spectrum. Another theory states that the breast size of an OS-tan represents the overall fanciness of their graphical user interface. Since XP was designed with 'bells and whistles', she has the largest breasts, but DOS, being no more than a command prompt, is at the other extreme. An alternate method of displaying memory or resource requirements in general is through the character's appetite. XP is often seen eating ridiculous amounts of food, sometimes to the point of obesity.
Controversy
The OS-Tan phenomenon has had its share of problems. The first of which was with Deja Vu artworks, a doujin group who claimed ownerships of several designs, including NT-tan. The second was with Netrunner, an magazine who also claimed ownership of the design for Me-tan. The third comes with the comic Troubled Windows USA, which has come under fire due to its excessive use of American stereotypes. A more recent but less severe problem has come with the design for the personification of Windows Vista.
Flash Animation and Videos
Its exposure came to increase more and could've got more attention around the net (including viewers outside Japan) when someone (or either some group of people) anonymously made and posted Troubled Windows (#12392;#12425;#12406;#12427;#12539;#12358;#12355;#12435;#12393;#12358;#12378; Toraburu Windouzu) in the internet. It is somehow showing a possible intro to an imaginary anime show (in which there also exists a Photoshop-modified picture, mimicking news of a new animation release in a Japanese magazine.). It features interactivity, where the viewer can click to cause different visuals in the animation. A fansub of this has been created, and can be found here. The fansub, however, is a video file, and is not interactive. The music is Sakuranbo Kiss ~Bakuhatsu da mo~n~ (#12373;#12367;#12425;#12435;#12412;#12461;#12483;#12473; #65374;#29190;#30330;#12384;#12418;#65374;#12435;#65374;; translates to Cherry Kiss ~it's an explosion mo~n~), by KOTOKO, which was originally the opening theme from a visual novel known as Colorful Kiss (#12459;#12521;#12501;#12523;#12461;#12483;#12473; #65374;12#12467;#12398;#33016;#12461;#12517;#12531;!#65374;), released by GIGA. An ending theme called OS-Pittan also exists. The music is Futari no Xenopittan (#12405;#12383;#12426;#12398;#12380;#12398;#12404;#12387;#12383;#12435;), a remix version of Futari no Mojipittan, a song from the PS2 word puzzle game Mojipittan. The song was made for a game based on Mojipittan called Xenopittan, which features characters and terminology from the PlayStation 2 game Xenosaga. It is found on a fan disc for Xenosaga, known as Xenosaga Freaks. It can be heard at the end of the medley found here. The song was sung by voice actresses Ai Maeda (who voiced Shion Uzuki in Xenosaga), Suzuki Mariko (who voiced KOS-MOS in the same game), and Shishido Rumi (who voiced MOMO in the same game). Both flash files can be viewed here. Also, as a satire, Bill Gates was mentioned in the credits of this hypothetical anime (after about 50 seconds).