After the runaway “Moe Boom” that sounded in wake of the retardedly successful Densha Otoko drama, a local government’s urban gentrification campaign,  the influx of big-name department stores, the rapid proliferation of online shopping and perhaps finally, the insane stupidity of one Stabby McKnifey last June, Akihabara is dead.

When I first arrived in Japan in 2005, Densha Otoko was already a best-selling book and a successful movie but whilst I was being leashed upon an unsuspecting public, so was a saccharine TV drama that told the true story of one nerd’s meteoric rise from weakling otaku to internet forum legend, as he sought help from the users of 2chan to impress and court a nice girl he met when he stood up to a drunken old man on a train one day.

Magazines (the Japanese equivalent of Cosmopolitan and Cleo) ran articles on how to snag your own “A-Boy” and how otaku are generally kind and well-meaning and thus would make good husband material. Also, the magazines pointed out, otaku generally couldn’t afford to be too choosey when it came to women. Maid cafes opened and closed within weeks and meanwhile Akihabara Station began to shrink under shadow of a massive behemoth of concrete construction.

Later that year, Yodobashi Camera opened the world’s biggest consumer electronics store in Akihabara. Despite having a store near every major train station in the country, Yodobashi’s flagmark store in the middle of electric town was a huge success. And it opened the floodgates for other companies to move in and add to the miasma brand-name recognition.

In the space of 6 months a number of smaller builidings and blocks, each housing 15-20 stores were closed, knocked down and surrounded by hoarding. In their place another Sofmap, another Laox, another Labi opened - all selling the same computers, TVs and cameras and all within the same price-range.

But you could still come to Akihabara to line up for new releases on a Thursday morning and there was always the pedestrian paradise on Sundays and public holidays. A whole 6 lane main road closed for 2km of it’s length, filled with cosplayers and wannabe idols posing, preening and performing mini-concerts.

However, soon the gentrification began.

Under the guise of public safety, and the formation of crowds which made pick-pocketing easier (on the odd occasion it did happen), the police began to break up photo-sessions and tell cosplayers and singers to move on. This resulted in pre-planned “flash mobbing” and people coming prepared to bolt at the first sign of the fuzz, just to avoid getting ticketed.

Even worse, a new pile of dramas like Akihabara@DEEP and Maid In Akihabara pushed the maid cafe and moe imagery into the mainstream bringing thousands of hangers on and massive amounts of tourism and gawkers to Akiba. Chiyoda City (where Akihabara is located) was trying to cash on the culture it was strangling. Murmurs of discontent began to circulate on 2chan, and people began talking about how they didn’t see the point in going to Akihabara as a lot of the good shopping was gone and when you did you go, you had to compete with magnitude increase in competition for the items in the second-hand shops and for newer items.

And why bother when you can now pre-order and item and have it delivered by courier to your door, COD on release date and get stuck into that new game or DVD? The loop was starting to close, the sociability of otakudom had always been in the procuring of new items or discussing them in detail. The games, anime and books are always a sole pursuit and you can just net-game on your new PS3 or Wii anyways and discuss them from your own dakimakura-filled room over the internet.

The only reason to go to Akiba on a Sunday was finally killed on Sunday, June 8 2008 when Tomohiro Katou drove a rented 2-tonne truck into a crowd of pedestrians and knocking 5 to the ground. He leapt from the cab and stabbed at least 12 people randomly before police cornered him.

As a result the pedestrian paradise has been closed. The overwhelming brands of Akihabara are that of Sofmap touts and the Yodobashi Camera jingle. The true believers have moved on, but occasionally will make a pilgrimage back and look upon what once was.

And on their way back to the station, they’ll run a gauntlet of flyer-distributing maids.