I want to say no to this, since where do we draw the line? Almost everything can be tied to the real world somehow. It just seems like it would take WAY too big a chunk out of Subeta's items.

Besides, Subeta is already taking away some of it's own charm with the removal of magical plushies and shurikens so I kinda don't think they even care too much anymore about the charm of the Subeta world. :| Might as well keep the 'real world' items, honestly.

One was released for a holiday while the others weren't.

Good point about it being a holiday item along with the other Guy Fawkes items. Subeta no longer acknowledges this real life festival, though, so I can't see these items being unretired during a future Fireside.

They were not retired because they were ethnic. They were retired because they were amongst the oldest items in their respective shop. The warajis were not retired because Sole Train did not have a massive wave of retirements.

That's really the reason why these are retired. Because old.

They've never been replaced by real world ethnic clothes, though, only ethnic inspired clothes.

To all. It was just a suggestion. I'm all for items being inspired by real world stuff - it just seems odd having real language textbooks left on the site when we no longer have real world festivals etc.

I know it is not a common word but I looked it up just to check and it may not be originally a German word but it is both in the online dictionary I use and my at home one. I was just saying that Alegarten is still basically a play on the common Biergarten.

: I understand the point you're trying to make here, but do you have proof that those items were retired BECAUSE of their cultural relation? I'm not aware of these things as I was not around at that time so I can't speak on it. However, it could be possible they were simply retired due to age, not culture. I would find it a bit nitpicky to use them as an example if that were the basis, because that is logical for the site to do. Simply keeping items that are old and becoming worthless on the site and allowing them to continue to restock BECAUSE they are cultural would be the exact same as your point, but in reverse.

I'd also like to point out that holidays are national, but clothing and languages are cultural. There's a large difference there.

The retired clothing items were not replaced at all, since the reason of the retirement was to make room for newer stock.

French is spoken in Canada, but they do not celebrate Bastille Day.

Think of having the textbooks on site following the same logic. The language is the same, but the culture isn't.

i understand that ^^ i was just wondering, since i'm from germany, and we - hardly - ever use it, only when referring to english things ^^

A lot of people have already raised many interesting points, but a lot of items WERE retired, solely because of their age, just as previously stated. When I joined Subeta, the language textbooks were not very old items, at least, not compared to books like the Potions series, or Subeta History, for that matter. Confection, Ropera, and others also have good arguments, but I'd like to emphasize Tche's commentary on Canada still having French as a spoken (and official) language, even if they don't celebrate Bastille Day/other exclusively French festivals.

I have seen a similar suggestion as this on another thread some time ago, where the person was wondering why Subeta can't repurpose the names of some items (i.e. dogs and cats,) into Subeta species. The loss of a connection with the "real world", in terms of culture, is one of the things which made me reluctant to return to Neo (as they deleted my active account without warning. They didn't even freeze it or send me an e-mail - they just deleted it, and decided one day that my e-mail account had no Neo account associated to it.) There are already enough items which relate to the species as is, but with the advent of Custom Wearable items, not a lot of items can be particularly named after "ethnic" things (i.e. once I commission my tribal weaved sets, I can't place alampay/batik/tinalak/pinya/bahag/saya/malong (I am sorry, Subeta staff. I cannot find a good translation for those words, as they are clothing items limited to where I come from, and they have no English cognates,) and get away with it.)

English is essentially a mash-up of various languages, with all the words it borrows from various cultures. You can't really find an alternate for the word "kimono", as that is distinct to Japanese culture, and is even already assimilated into the English language, but that is beside the point. You make a good point where you note that it's hard to keep up cater to the various cultures that Subeta users so happen to possess, but I don't think it's a bad thing to adapt site events to real-world festivities. I actually like how they blend elements of various feasts together, and come up with interesting equivalents.

On a last note, I come from a place which has a language highly based from Spanish, and even has a Spanish creole on this own. However, we are Asian. We do not celebrate Spanish and Latin American feasts (although our "Flores de Mayo" MIGHT be the same thing as the "Cinco de Mayo", albeit on a different day of May, and focusing on... FLOWERS AND PRETTY GIRLS IN GOWNS D8 ) We refer to things by their Spanish names if we have no equivalent for them (like using words from "real world cultures",) but we also have our local and indigenous words for them, and we use them as much as we can (using Subeta equivalents.)

You can analogize colonization into the cultural influences Subeta draws from, in a way, but not absolutely and exclusively.

Just also wanted to point out that there ARE relics and textbooks of ancient languages (such as Greek and Latin) in our real world. You could always assume the textbooks and similar items are sort of like relics of our world, should Subeta be set in the future.

As I said in my previous post, they've been replaced with newer items, some of which have been inspired by real life cultural clothing. We've never had any new items which are specifically real world cultural clothing, though. This relates to what Tche said.

Why doesn't the newer stock include any real world ethnic clothes any more? The original real world ethnic clothes dated from the time when Subeta included real life holidays and festivals etc. Since the site changed its policy about that we haven't had anything on the lines of 'Scottish Kilt' with a description telling us it's showing the Stewart tartan (or substitute the name of another Scottish clan). This doesn't mean we could never have a garment inspired by a kilt, of course.

Holidays can sometimes be a cultural thing depending where you are - I'll use the UK as an example here. Diwali isn't an official national holiday here but this festival is celebrated by the British Hindu population. Hannukah isn't an official national holiday here either but this festival is celebrated by the British Jewish population. The same goes for the Chinese New Year which is celebrated by Chinese people in the UK at a different date to the 'UK national new year' although in Scotland it's known as Hogmanay and the festival includes many customs which haven't spread to the rest of the UK.

PS:

I like the idea of Subeta being set in our future. :)

Because the market for wearables is less "costumes" and more "versatile" clothing, now. Less disguise and more fashion, compared to what it was four, five years ago.

You want ethnic clothing. Suggest it in the suggestion forum.

: We could argue semantics for days and neither of us move a muscle on it. Yes, holidays may be celebrated by someone who is not in the nation which typically associates the holiday. However, they are typically of that nationality, or have a religious reason for celebrating, and the religion is typically predominant in the nation which would celebrate the holiday. If I move to India and decide to celebrate Christmas there, I'm not altering India's culture; I'm celebrating the nationality or religion which I was originally raised in. The point however, is fairly moot.

Subeta's shift I don't believe was as intentional as it feels. Subeta's entire culture of HAs has shifted, and thus the items released are shifting with it. Recall a few years back when "animal" or "ninja" HAs were prevalent. We saw a lot more costume-y, less realistic art as these more novelty items were popular. Now, people seek to create the most realistic HA, and so much of what exists in the high fashion world is created so HAs can be fantasy "models". I don't see it as a culture shift at all - I see it as a "what's popular" one. Things go in cycles. Fashion does too. I'm sure in time we'll be seeing more realistic cultural items come into the light as they hit the runways, or Subeta's climate shifts again.

EDIT : beat me to the punch, and in a much more eloquent way. Thank you c:

Personally, Subeta releases a good balance in my eyes. The "Wild" cash shop collection recently had some African or Australian safari inspired items, the kaftans were released what, a month ago? The animal wearables have been many different species and breeds from around the world, and the Wainscoting maintained the true Polish name. Yes, we don't see descriptions anymore that describe a particular tribe or ethnicity in the real world, and the items are not as "specific" as kabuto or hakama in the samurai set may be; however we are seeing more general cultural integrations. Perhaps because of their subtlety, or because they are not the cultures you are looking for, it's just harder to notice them?

I don't see a reason to retire things like Sushi. If we retired every type of cultural food we'd have nothing left on the site.

I can understand certain things that are honestly 100% specific to the real world, such as flags. And even the text books. But food ? No. No food is absolutely made in one very specific country and thus should not be retired on here just because you see it as specific. Unless, you know, it's something called "The Ultimate American Burger Of Freedom: Red, White, And Blue All The Way Meaty Delight"

Honestly, who says that we don't have Geisha's on here ? Who says Subeta does not even have the languages ? We know we don't have the specific countries, but languages are spread out. Clothing, food, cultural Holidays (and items from them), are all spread out.

As an example, Halloween. While Mexicans were celebrating Dia de los Muertos, across the sea they were celebrating All Hallows' Evening/All Saints Day/All Souls Day. Same basic idea, two separate places.

As I said in reply to Tche, I'm not looking for specific real life cultural items to be released. I like the way Subeta has gone with it's new policy . It would be impossible to include every real life holiday/festival to cater for every player but now, elements from a number of different real life holidays/festivals can be included in a plot, event or whatever. Wearables which have been inspired by real world ethnic clothes are also more versatile than straightforward ethnic wearables.

Keith and others have made a very good point about the food. With a bit of imagination it's easy to think that Subetans invented the haggis along with the bagpipes although, for myself, I find the specifically Subetan food more fun. I wouldn't want to eat a Pus Custard Pastry or have a bowl of Cannibal Soup, though. :)

I would like some kind of 'Subeta explanation' for the language textbooks, however, just to put my over logical mind at rest.

This sums it up pretty well. ANY food item is from a culture, be it exclusive to one, or none. Retiring "cultural food" would also mean retiring hamburgers, sausages, and even some of the more eccentric food like pickled eggs, because those things are a THING here.

^ THIS, because we celebrate both All Saints Day and All Souls Day in this side of the world (as we were colonized by Spaniards here and all.)

But for the language textbooks, try to think of it as humans being the "aliens" in the Subeta alternate universe, and thus, alien manuscripts are around the place. The entire "artifact" theory may work too, though.

How did Earth humans get to Subeta with their language text books and artefacts? Explaining something like this could be a fun idea for a plot. A Traditional Teacup for tea ceremonies could be based on an ancient artefact from Earth so it wouldn't matter that no Subetan culture we've met so far has this kind of cup as part of its traditions.

: I understand where you're trying to go with this now, but I think part of the fun of a fantasy world is the "suspension of belief". If you try to explain everything away, it can be hard to make the world that's been created believable. I'm a logical mind too, so I can understand the "wanting of answers"...but I guess I'm of the mind that there are some things you mentally agree to "be okay" with when you buy into some fantasies. For me, time travel is a very hard concept to sell me on in a story or fantasy world. It takes a good story and reasonable usage of it for me suspend my belief and allow time travel to exist in the fantasy without questioning it :P

I guess if I had to quantify how/why humans of different cultures "came to exist" in Subeta, I would consider it like Narnia. That the "internet" creates a gateway and when we step through the portal, we can be transported to the wonderful world of Subeta, bringing with us our cultures and languages and diversity, and buildling a whole new fantasy world on this fantasy planet :)

Awww, I don't really agree with this... I like having little tribute items to the real world, besides, there are SO many! Deleting a bunch of them would be taking away a ton of wearables, books, etc.

I would laugh so, so hard if Subeta retired the brand new Union Jack wearable they made. :|

Oops, pardon my HA then.

If you retired all the "real world items" on Subeta, there would be nothing left on the site.