When you first see Danny Choo in his no frills black-tee-and-pants attire, you’ll be forgiven if you had mistaken him for a stagehand trying hard to be inconspicuous while working.

But which stagehand can command a crowd as well as he, as was evident at the Animax blogging workshop attended by 50 people at the *Scape Youth Centre on Nov 19, where the celebrity blogger demonstrated his expertise on the blogosphere by touching on the money-making potential of the popular online platform, from his own perspectives.

Danny’s blog, dannychoo.com, which has an impressive 2.5 million unique page views per month, features a diverse assortment of entries (1,476 at the current count), ranging from his love for Gundam models and other juicy bits to what’s new in the Japanese anime/manga scene, scenic pictures of Tokyo at night, as well as useful tips and suggestions to renting living spaces in Japan.

Born and bred as a Londoner to his Malaysian Chinese parents, he remembers not being able to read a single word of Japanese during his years of adolescence. It wasn’t until he started gaming- particularly with his first console, the Sega Megadrive (which just turned 20) – that he became motivated to sharpen his proficiency in the language. This in turn laid down the groundwork for his eventual migration to Japan.

After a range of internet-related jobs at Amazon , Microsoft and Japan Airlines, Danny now operates his own business as Representative Director of Mirai Inc., a web solutions company.


The Blog Evolution – From Personal to Commercial

Like your average typical youth, Danny set up his personal blog as a simple means of “letting my friends know I was alive by posting something every 6 months”, posting entries that showcased the 3D images and Gundam models that he had created.

Being an irregular blogger back then, he wasn’t sure of the prospect of monetizing his site. He was thus pleasantly surprised to notice that the products he placed on his site’s side bar (using Amazon Web Services, presumably during his stint at the firm itself) to keep refreshing his content actually “started to sell like hot Haruhi‘s figures off the conveyor belt”.

Spying the potential of this money-making opportunity he had accidentally stumbled upon, Danny boned up on the basics of serving online ads, got into the habit of writing regularly on his passions as an otaku fanatic, and has not looked back ever since. The collective revenue earned, he says, was enough to pay for everything, from his phone bills to even an upmarket apartment!

And it’s not difficult, he says – One doesn’t exactly need to have intricate knowledge of web-based programming to effectively run a web site.

“There are loads of third-party tools such as WordPress and Blogger which bloggers can use to build up their templates. Many successful sites (such as these) are maintained by people who’re not technical at all.”

Of course, knowing the technologies will better aid your efforts. Dannychoo.com is run by a “home-brewed” Content Management System (CMS) built by Danny himself. This probably means that the complete control over the layout gives him a lot of freedom in experimenting with an ideal site interface that caters to his community of users and also the public at large.


Passion, Not Money

Danny insists though, that he’s not working on his blog-turned-Japanese-portal for the cash.

“I’m not selling anything to my users. I’m selling products that interest my clients,” he remarked, attributing his success to factors such as a close-knit Tokyo web community that works on the basis of referrals that, in turn, help to bring businesses to his doorstep.

While he noted that youths can make use of their “pro-active communication” on the Internet to monetize their blogs, he is aware of their potential lukewarm response to the idea. Either way, he encouraged them not to change the authenticity of their creative content.

His mantra, it seems, is simply to stay true to one’s passions. “Making money from my interests is just a welcome addition,” was how he adeptly put it.


The Things That Tickle

Going back to the blogging workshop, despite what Danny had said about the business being not just for the tech-savvy, the technicalities of the web tool made it rather hard for this UrbanWire reporter to sit through the content without nodding off in the midst of note-taking.

Thankfully, Danny was thoughtful enough to anticipate this, and kept the lot thoroughly entertained with his apparent love for cutesy 2D Japanese anime girls by displaying his site mascots alongside other representative leading ladies from other animes for visual breaks.

Other enjoyable moments included his humorous impersonations, from a Londoner to a Japanese to finally a Singaporean Indian speaking English, where he affected the appropriate accents. One local blogger, tj_han, even had his site mascot Tripeman, featured as part of the presentation, which had the floor breaking out in a bout of laughter.

Needles to say, his passion and daredevil attitude definitely reverberate outside this workshop.

Danny’s Storm Trooper stints done throughout various parts of Japan also struck the funny bones of the international community, becoming “viral hits” that generated over a million views on video uploading site YouTube. That was not before seeking permission with his wife (who happens to have a similar outfit), whom he consults on for everything, including that of “shar[ing] the bank account and the toothbrush”.

“Having such a nice piece of armour at home is absolutely pointless, because the only person who think it looks cool is yourself. So I decided to go out, and we made some videos,” he explained.

Again, he remarked that it was done solely in the name of meeting people and having good fun, and that it was not deliberately planned as a marketing tool to make money and drive web traffic. And if you were beginning to wonder – Yes, you can pee while still being dressed in armour!

That’s the bottom line for this wild Japanese ambassador who sure does his land proud. The next time you see a white-looking figure strutting his dance moves through the streets of geek-cool Akihabara, don’t be surprised – It’s just Danny Choo doing the things he loves the best. And that never kept anyone in the background.

Event pictures courtesy of Jonathan Rahardja