In case you haven't noticed, Japan is running nominations as we speak.  Some crazy nominations there, but it is in progress, so we don't know who will be in until the first round begins.

Korea, on the other hand, takes all the characters that are even remotely eligible and gives all possibilities an entry, so we know the full entry list of Korea Best Moe 2008.  They have just released the first round schedule.  I'd figure it would be best to clue you in on who will be making their 2008 debuts in Korea or whatnot.

Because there are a whopping 96 arenas in the first round preliminaries this year, there is no way that I am covering all of them.  Instead, for the preliminaries, I will cover matches that include respective ISML candidates, and I will continue to do so until Korea is down to the final 64.  I'll give a reminder on the front page (when I can) whenever one of the ISML 2008 candidates are up for their match.


NOTE: Sakura Kinomoto qualified in part to a cameo in Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles.  The Princess Sakura is not eligible for Korea this year.

NOTE: Haruhi Suzumiya qualified in part to a cameo in Lucky Star.  Konata Izumi, Kagami Hiiragi, and Tsukasa Hiiragi are not eligible for Korea this year.

KOREA 1st Round Schedule

Friday July 11 - 0900-3230 GMT
#46 Mion Sonozaki (12-27) @ Arena 8

Saturday, July 12 - 0900-3230 GMT
#11 C.C (30-9) @ Arena 9
#10 Hinagiku Katsura (32-7) @ Arena 11
#47 Chiaki Minami (12-27) @ Arena 11
#21 Nagi Sanzen'in (26-13) @ Arena 15

Sunday, July 13 - 0900-3230 GMT
#3 Tomoyo Sakagami (37-2) @ Arena 24
#13 Nagisa Furukawa (29-10) @ Arena 24

Monday, July 14 - 0900-3230 GMT
#44 Ayumu Nishizawa (13-26) @ Arena 30

Tuesday, July 15 - 0900-3230 GMT
#33 Ryou Fujibayashi (19-20) @ Arena 33
#55 Alice Carroll (6-33) @ Arena 36

Wednesday, July 16 - 0900-3230 GMT
#35 Louise Francoise (18-21) @ Arena 41
#1 Shana (37-2) @ Arena 43
#52 Tamaki Kawazoe (9-30) @ Arena 44

Thursday, July 17 - 0900-3230 GMT
#63 Konomi Yuzuhara (1-38) @ Arena 52
#19 Rika Furude (27-12) @ Arena 54
#2 Kyou Fujibayashi (37-2) @ Arena 54
#26 Maria (25-14) @ Arena 55

Friday, July 18 - 0900-3230 GMT
#27 Rena Ryuguu (24-15) @ Arena 58
#9 Kotomi Ichinose (33-6) @ Arena 58
#34 Hanyuu Furude (19-20) @ Arena 63
#56 Kiri Komori (4-35) @ Arena 64

Saturday, July 19 - 0900-3230 GMT
#59 Yuno (3-36) @ Arena 71

Sunday, July 20 - 0900-3230 GMT
#23 Sakura Kinomoto (26-13) @ Arena 74
#6 Haruhi Suzumiya (36-3) @ Arena 75
#28 Fuko Ibuki (23-16) @ Arena 76
#61 Tamaki Kousaka (2-37) @ Arena 79

Monday, July 21 - 0900-3230 GMT
#18 Horo (27-12) @ Arena 86

Tuesday, July 22 - 0900-3230 GMT
No ISML candidates

Sorry for not being around for a while - I had another exhaustion period.  You know how that goes.

Anyway, I've been getting reports that the site went down, approximately right after I went to sleep.  While I do apologize for not being available immediately, do notice that if the main site goes down, the voting site should still be up, so matches will continue to be conducted.  Therefore, there shouldn't be any problem as far as this league will progress.

For those of you who are indeed very devoted to this league, I think that it is best that you save my e-mail.  My e-mail is hendrickfan66@yahoo.com.  Should the site go down, if you save the e-mail, you should be able to contact me.  Some of the staff members already do have it, so it is best that you should hold on to it as well.

Let's get to the important business.

As some of you have already noticed with the breaking news on the site, ISML received a request from a devoted voter from this contest.  If you recall, we had some major problems with Sapphire 8, and as a result, we only had 19 hours of the 24 accepted, and some who did vote during times in which the voting script went "down" did not receive a warning for that.  While in normal conditions I would have restarted the match pronto, in this certain situation, I decided that we need to move on, as we already had one postponement for Sapphire 8.  We did indeed do that, and eventually declared Kyou Fujibayashi as the final Sapphire winner, but once I received the recant message, pointing out valid arguments that I just couldn't argue against, we decided to consider it.

While I can't argue that the recant shouldn't be considered at all, the ISML staff have been mulling over this for quite a while, deciding what we would indeed do with this option.  So, I've decided that you guys should have a say in this as well.  For this next match set, an Arena 0 will be added right above the Haruhi vs. Fate match, in which you answer the question provided above.  Take time to think about all the possibilities that could happen and try to answer honestly.  The majority vote may or may not sway my decision, but I will take the final vote of Arena 0 into consideration.

Keep in mind that this is a Yes or No question.  The No will be that we keep things the way they are and move on.  The Yes will have the following conditions.

A) Emerald 6 will be moved to Thursday, July 3.

B) Sapphire 8 will be redone on Saturday, July 5.

C) Kyou will keep her Sapphire necklace.  She will also be eligible for the necklace qualification for next year.

D) If there would have been a different winner for Sapphire (I'm looking at you, Haruhi), that winner will also receive a Sapphire necklace and will also be eligible for the necklace qualification for next year.

Therefore, keep all of that in mind when voting in Arena 0.

Also, some of you may be wondering whether the whole world will have a say in this.  While I can't speak every single language, I'll try to get at least a text image of a translation of "Restart Sapphire 8?" and go from there.

In other news regarding ISML, you may have noticed that development on this league has slowed down rather considerably.  In addition to the Sapphire 8 possible recant, this is also the last week of my June college course, and work includes a research paper and then some, so I have been working very hard on that.  The good news is that I am off for one-week before returning to take my next college course in July, so hopefully whatever should be needed to get done will indeed be done.

Also, I promised that I will cover both J Saimoe and K Saimoe.  The report on J Saimoe as of right now is thus: in addition to our candidates who are expected to compete in J Saimoe, Haruhi, Yuki, and Mikuru are crashing the party this year as candidates representing Lucky Star.  Nominations are still continuing at this moment, and we usually wouldn't need to worry about them.  Links will be provided once the preliminaries begin.

Finally, advertise, advertise, advertise.  As I said, J Saimoe has begun, and this is a great opportunity to grab voters to come to this upstart league.  Many of us are calling for diversity among voters, and while I congratulate the KyoAni crowd for dominating Amethyst and Sapphire, it's no fun when we don't have a humongous upset after a while.  I'm looking at the Rozen Maiden, Higurashi, and Hayate no Gotoku crowd who doesn't know that we even exist, who can certainly pull a turn around and make this league much more exciting.  Don't be afraid to give Haruhi some competition every once in a while, and let's make this much more fun.

Apologies for being very very late, but I was at least able to begin the match at the schedule time.  It will end at the scheduled time of 2530 GMT.

As for the rest of the Emerald matches, they are posted on the Emerald page, which is found here.

Because of the problems we have experienced in Sapphire 8, our transition weekend has been cut short, so we're trying to speed things up this time around.

This is a reminder that Emerald 1 will begin at 0130 GMT tomorrow.  The full Emerald schedule will be posted tomorrow evening at the latest.

Notice:

If anybody has an image of Kyou Fujibayashi in a dress, preferably one that can easily be vectored, please send it to KholdStare88, our victory poster graphics designer at the following e-mail: kholdstare88@gmail.com

I have been recently informed that there is a radical movement in progress trying to shut this league down by trying to crash our voting server. 

Heh, it worked with SaiGAR, but it won't work here.

Please note that we are doing our best to try to rid these radical voters and keep them out of harms way.  With the exception of Malaysia, regions on the current banlist are added on there without warning as a precaution.  However, even after this "war" is over and ISML is albeit victorious, if you are banned and innocent, please send me an e-mail at hendrickfan66@yahoo.com or the IP region ban will NOT be lifted.

We will do our best to notify you if there are any problems.  However, at any rate, we must continue forward with our matches at the moment.  We will work on this and try to make our voting polls more secure.

I'm sorry guys, but apparently, somebody hacked into our server at 2445 GMT, 15 minutes before the match ended and deleted our data for Sapphire 8.  Please note that the match has been restarted.  While the match is going on, I will do my best to make sure that this does not happen again.

Also note that Sapphire 9 will now take place on Saturday at 0000 GMT.

Apologies, but we have had some technical difficulties and I haven't noticed until two hours late.  Because of this, Sapphire 5 will end at 2700 GMT.  Also note that because it will be so late in my timezone (I live about 30-50 miles from New York City), results may or may not be up immediately after, so you may have to wait to receive results in the morning.

I haven't posted here in a long while, but now that I have an opportunity to do so, let me talk about what's been happening around here.

Like I said, it's graduation season, and being that I have FIVE people I know graduating, three of them my cousins, it's been hectic around here lately, as I have to attend graduation after graduation.  Add to that a history summer course filled with research papers and trying to look for funds to take a second summer course in religious studies, and you have a recipe for one hectic summer.  Don't worry, I'm enjoying it out here, but I'm also trying to find as much time as I can to update the site.

Usually, it's the main site that has been updated recently, but I have been working on the contestants pages a little bit.  Now that I have had at least some time, I've been adding contestant pages a little bit more frequently.  As you can see, the schedules themselves have been removed from the contestant pages, the main reason being that all schedules are tentative.  I know that the current schedule needs to be as stable as possible, but it really isn't, as I have had to make time for other obligations, some of which have been cutting into my time regardless of awareness of this league.  Nevertheless, we are halfway there, and we can expect this league to be a success.

As this is our first year, this has been a learning experience for me as well.  Remember that I did kind of start this up on the fly, so I haven't taken much of the time to prepare.  But I do see potential in this league to rise and someday become recognizable from many communities, and I will be able to take what I learn this year and to try to make next year much more better.  This time, I'll have about three to five months to prepare instead of... well... three-weeks plus endless postponements, but next year, we should do fine.

I now realize that we may not be able to have all the contestant profiles up, but I am making an effort to try to get all 64 up at least by the end of Emerald, if possible.  I will be focusing more on whoever has a chance to make the top 16 and work my way downward, so that we can have the profiles ready for the double-elimination tournament.  For those candidates who will most likely not be returning next year, I will be making an archive for contestant profiles, so that while the profiles will be recycled somewhat for the returning contestants, those who are pretty much one-hit wonders will still be remembered for their participation.

One of Korea's voters posted a blog entry on his website about the flaws of ISML compared to Korea Best Moé.  The entry somehow got to me, and I have been working on a response to that.  Please note that you have anything negative about this league, I won't be offended so long as you state why you don't like it and valid arguments to back up your point, such as the entry I received.  These arguments will actually help in my favor.  If all the things I need to improve on for next year are pointed out, it makes my job much easier, and it gives me a focal point in terms of next year.

Crisu, our Saimoé analyst, has been nice enough to redo the standings from Aquamarine 1 to now, as an update to the current formula we have for Tiebreaker 2.  While our previous one would be valid as far as the end of the season goes, it doesn't work in short-term dilemmas, such as the decision of awarding necklaces.  If possible, we should be able to update our photobucket archives so you can have the necessary info you need.

If you noticed, our match images have gotten much better.  That's because Wolfii, our new graphic designer, wanted to be able to work on our match images.  So I allowed her to do so, and while her drafts are not what I anticipated, she at least gave me a good idea, and I came up with a small template for the Sapphire period.  Right now, she's working on something for Emerald, so we should expect something pretty good.

One issue of personnel that I have: Translators.  We are still looking for that Japanese translator.  So far, no one has showed up to take the offer.  Also, Adrenalin, our current Korean translator, has been much busier than I am, so I am also looking for a second Korean Translator to cover for him and to relieve him of some of the work I assigned for him.  Of course, we now accept any language for translations, and if you want to try to get another non-English-speaking community to come here and vote, we would love to have you on board as a translator.

Speaking of Japan and Korea, their tournaments are coming up really soon.  As both of their tournaments hold pre-qualifiers for next year's competition, the ISML news page will cover as much of those competitions as possible.  We'll keep you posted with most of the competition over in those tournaments as the the top 8 in each of those tournaments receive an automatic entry to take part in next year's competition.  We will also keep a close eye on those competitors who are currently in ISML 2008's roster, as they could play an important role in "stealing a lock-in slot", giving the slot to someone in the .500 wait-list or adding a nomination slot, whichever applies in that situation.  Korea's tournament begins tomorrow, while Japan's tournament begins at the end of the Sapphire period.  For both tournaments, we will keep you posted and if possible, also provide links to their tournaments on the front page.

One last thing: Thursday night, I have a graduation ceremony to attend, so Sapphire 6 may start as early as 2345 GMT on Thursday, so if you are lucky to vote early, you can.  The match will still end at 2400 GMT as notified.

Okay, before we get to the more important points about the future of this website, I want to make one comment about the music that is playing on the home page.

I know I'm going to get so many questions and concerns about using a Hayate no Gotoku OP song as the song playing on the page.  So let me address that now - I have planned to feature I've Sound's songs (mainly KOTOKO and Kawada Mami) for a while, depending on the theme of their songs, and throughout the Ruby period, I have planned to use some songs they have performed whose lyrics deal with fire.  It just so happens that all of them are also the Shakugan no Shana openings, and I haven't found one that wasn't related to Shana in any way or manner.

Therefore, I came to the conclusion that if there were any OP and ED songs that are related to an ISML contestant, I would either use them at the right time or do my best to avoid them.

This week features possibly the top matchup of the Hayate no Gotoku camp.  Hinagiku Katsura and Maria, two top 16 candidates that represent the respective anime, will face off this Wednesday.  Therefore, this is the only chance that I would be able to feature this song at the time.

As far as the future of this league, I most likely won't be able to spend as much time as I wanted.  I know that we are so far behind as to the development of the website, but real life does take priority, so we have to give or take a little bit.  The Contestants page has been a little slow, and I am thinking about removing a few features to lighten the workload, and instead directing you to a WikiSpace where those features are located.

I'll do the best that I can to keep as many of the features as I can, but as far as the voting process goes, that will run as smoothly as possible.