Internet users in the West have Bert Is Evil. Japanese users have Nevada-Tan.

On June 1, 2004, an online feud between two 11 year old girls attending the same elementary school in Sasebo, Nagasaki Prefecture escalated into murder. “Girl A” (there’s also a “Boy A” who committed an even more gruesome crime) slit her classmate’s throat and arms with a boxcutter knife, in the same classroom where they attended school.

The victim, Satomi Mitarai, bled to death.

Shocking enough as the murder may seem, the story didn’t end there. “Girl A” became “Nevada-tan” after after images of the suspected murderer were published showing her wearing a pullover hooded sweatshirt with the word “NEVADA” emblazoned across the chest (the “-tan” suffix is a child’s pronunciation of the honorific “-chan”), according to Wikipedia.

Internet users on Japan’s 2ch soon discovered that Nevada-tan had a very active life online. Says Wikipedia:

It appears that “Girl A” was heavily influenced by some of the more visceral aspects of Internet culture. An analysis of the case states that she “was a girl fascinated with urban legend, internet subculture, even going as far as guro. From her site she had linked shock flash movies and bizarre ASCII movies that would unnerve even the most hardened internet warriors”. Her website showcased her interests, which included fanfiction about her favourite film Battle Royale and strange “recipes” (with names like “Curse of the Purple Skull” and “Demonic Art”). A particularly strong influence was the “Red Room” horror flash video, which she based the site’s design around.

The Wikipedia article includes an exhaustive amount of links to both Nevada-tan’s “artwork” as well as some of the things she was interested in. A word of warning: if you think tentacle sex is strange, you may not want to follow the link to guro. What does guro mean? In one word: gross. It’s pretty nasty stuff. Wikipedia has more on it.

Nevada-tan became extremely popular with Japan’s 2ch crowd, and several mirror sites of the girl’s website have been preserved. It’s argued that the incident has morphed from a brutal and sad case of pre-adolescent murder into a bonafide Internet neta, or meme.

Even more perversely, Nevada-tan has been turned into a “character”, much like Sanrio’s Kitty-chan, and the killer has spawned fan artwork and ascii images. OtakuBooty hosts a number of fan-generated images of Nevada-tan here.

More interesting links:
Wikipedia has an excellent description of Japan’s 2ch (ni chaneru, or Channel 2) here.

An English guide to 2ch, 4-ch, exists here, and contains a fascinating guide to Japanese Internet slang and, most importantly, etiquette.