JEB
JEB is the Japanese Community of Pen Spinning. The abbreviation comes from the name of the community forum: JapEn Board.
History
Japanese community before JapEn Board
Pen spinning has been historically mentioned in Japan even in pre-WW2 newspapers, but it remained relatively undeveloped until Hideaki Kondo began collecting pen spinning tricks in the 1980s. In 1997 Hideaki Kondo made the first pen spinning website[1], 私のペン回しの歴史 (My History with Pen Spinning) and soon after the first pen spinning bulletin board, ペン回し研究室 (Pen Spinning Research Room). Attention was brought to the website by traditional media, bringing in new hobbyists and allowing more pen spinning tricks to be developed. Other sites began to appear such as Crasher's site, ペン回し道場 (Pen Spinning Dojo) in 2001. Hideaki began creating a nomenclature for pen spinning that he derived from organic chemistry, which became the basis of Japanese Notation.
In 2003 and leading up to 2004, the initial pen spinning movement in Japan had run out of steam, and many of the experienced early spinners had quit the community as it was believed that the possibilities of the hobby had been exhausted. In the first half of 2004, however, Japan was first exposed to the Pendolsa 1st CV being shared on the 2ch text board. This brought in a new generation of spinners that would populate the JapEn V1 Forums.
On February 2nd, 2004, Aysh created a website titled ペン回し資料室 (Pen Spinning Reference Room) where new concepts were developed, including the wiper tricks and the concept of freestyle pen spinning. Other sites such as DaReKa's ペン回しの惑星 (Pen Spinning Planet) and RYO's WLPS (We Love Pen Spinning) were launched soon after.
JapEn Board V1
Pen spinners from 2ch opened JapEn Board in August 2005, with okkar as the administrator, this would later come to be known as JapEn Board V1. DaReKa organized a project for the community: JapEn 1st, which would come to be released on December 25th, 2005. In May 2006 Bonkura became popular after his appearance in the PSN 2nd CV, due to his style and unusual combo approach. In January 2007 SPSL 1st was released, the start of one of the longest CV series in pen spinning, with 17 entries as of 2021.
In July 2007 PSAJ (the Pen Spinning Association Japan) was founded by Masaki Tsukada, with the goal of promoting pen spinning in Japan. They had large amounts of traditional media attention, and worked with toy company Takarotomy to create the PENZGEAR commercial mod. They organized a major meetup known as the 1st PSAJ General Assembly on the 15th July 2007 to commemorate the founding of the association, with roughly 100 people attending the event. Bonkura had been a vice-president of PSAJ and one of the founding members.
Bonkura's sudden death on September 13th, 2007 dealt a serious blow to the Japanese community. Events were held in his memory and a limited edition PENZGEAR mod was made styled after him to be distributed at the Pen Spinning Tournament Japan 2008. Ultimately the community did not recover fully from this loss, and the organization of JEB changed in 2008, with a new JapEn Board site opening to replace V1.
JapEn Board V2
JapEn Board V2 opened on the 3rd of February, 2008. PSAJ continued to promote pen spinning at the time, but their activity was dwindling. They collaborated in the organizing of the Naranha Pen Spinning Festival as a successor of their 2008 General Assembly meetup, which became one of their final contributions to the Japanese community before disbanding. The Naranha Pen Spinning Festival meets continued to be organized after PSAJ shut down, being hosted in different locations every time.
In the competitive scene Japanese spinners won the Pen Spinning World Cup 2008, Pen Spinning World Tournament 2013, Pen Spinning World Cup 2014 and the Pen Spinning World Tournament 2015.
Eventually problems with the website's server arose, and a replacement site was created.
JapEn Board V3
Ease created JapEn Board V3[2] on August 10th, 2016 after acquiring permission from other members to move ahead with the project. A new philosophy for the board came into play, with activity on it being kept to a minimum and the majority of interaction now occurring on social media platforms unrelated to pen spinning. An official JEB youtube channel was created that year, and then in 2017 the Japanese Pen Spinning Foundation (JPSF) was founded[3] to continue the promotion of pen spinning in Japan, a functional successor to PSAJ.
JapEn Board V4
On March 31st, 2022, Iteza announced[4] that the previous site would be changed to view-only, directing users to the new forum site[5].
JapEn Series Collaborations
- See also: JapEn collab series
The official collaboration video series of the board, JapEn, has been released in December every year since December 25th, 2005. Sometimes called the Japanese Christmas collab, the series is possibly the most famous in the pen spinning community, in part due to the consistency of the releases and the quality of the videos.