What is the difference between doujin and doujinshi

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So, what's the difference between "doujin" and "doujinshi"? Is doujinshi a specific type of doujin? Or what? Edit: Doujin basically means "amateur self-published works". There are a couple different sub catagories, most prominent is Doujinshi, which is published as manga.

Oh, and they're also illegal. No, Comiket - the bi-annual gathering in Tokyo which now draws more than a half-million people - is staged by creators of doujinshi.

The industry has a presence there now, but it didn't start out that way - Comiket began as a gathering of a few dozen artists and drew only attendees. Like so many stories, there's an "only in Japan" quality to this one. The short answer is pretty simple - the anime industry came to see doujinshi as helpful to their business.

The rising popularity of doujinshi helped to increase the popularity of the franchises they depicted. A trip to Akihabara or Ikebukuro or Osaka's Den-Den Town reveals the importance of doujinshi in the everday affairs of Japan's anime industry. The top three floors of Akihabara's main drag Chuo-dori's largest retailer, Toranoana, are given over to doujinshi the "all-ages" ones have their own floor. Other large retailers like Mandarake and Melonbooks devote much of their retail space to doujinshi.

Touhou has their own dedicated retail outlet, and there are several smaller storefronts that sell exclusively doujin works. The influence doesn't end there. Historically, many well-known mangaka and writers such as Akamatsu Ken have moonlighted as doujin writers, usually under assumed names. In addition, there are important industry figures like KEY co-founder Hisaya Naoki who got their start as part of doujin circles Hisaya still writes doujins today.

Perhaps most remarkable is the evolution we've seen in the relationship between doujin creators and the large studios and publishing houses. The natural connection developed organically, but the business of anime now actively seeks to use the doujin community as a "farm system".

Every major player scouts out the massive doujinshi halls at Comiket, searching out talent that can potentially make them money. And doujin artists and writers head to Comiket actively seeking to draw the attention of these scouts, seeing it as a unique opportunity to advance their careers. Every Comiket sees dozens of hastily-arranged meetings between industry figures searching for mangaka and animators and independent creators looking to break in.

Perhaps as much a sign of doujinshi's increasing establishment status as anything, is the prominence it's achieved in mainstream manga, light-novels and anime. Once upon a time its existence was rarely acknowledged in official works Genshiken is a notable exception but today, a trip to Comiket has become almost as much a trope as an onsen episode or a school festival arc.

Meta-satirical works like Ore no Imouto and Watashi ga Motetei Dousunda mine Comket for comedy, while other series like Shoujo-tachi wa Kouya wo Mezasu build their entire premise around it. Probably the most memorable depiction of the doujin world in modern anime came from Tanaka Romeo who also wrote Shoujo-tachi in his Jinrui wa Suitai Shimashita novel series, splendidly adapted by AIC A.

While Jinrui's depiction of an entire sub-genre of BL Boys Love fandom from birth to absorption by the establishment was thoroughly tongue-in-cheek, its satire is spot-on - and it provides a great "Doujin " introduction for those unfamiliar with the phenomenon.

Not coincidentally, Jinrui immediately followed it up with an equally cutting satire of the commercial manga business.