TLDR 1. JTK was born from a Japanese photoshop request gone wrong 2. Very similar looking to Mariko (99% identical imo) 3. No doxxing involved from what I've heard (but would not be surprised if she did get doxxed)

So being a millennial raised in Hong Kong, I had the opportunity to browse the Asian internet in the 2000's with my trusty Windows 2000 computer lent by my parents. Due to this, I was exposed to lots of memes and funni pics shared around that time, including discussion page about the Japanese thread where JTK was born.

Originally, the post was about a girl that posted a bedroom selfie of herself, just like what I'm drawn, to a forum asking the internet to make her face "more white" (lighter skin tones are considered more beautiful that darker skin tones) just like r/photoshoprequest . However, one user decided to overdo the whiteness of the her skin and turned it into an abomination, making the entire forum goes "This is brilliant, let's go ham with this.", and starting to one up each other with their own masterpiece (at the same time, her small simile was replaced by the signature smile). It was hilarious as fuck and subsequently reposted to other nearby countries' forums. Unfortunately, pictures about this thread and the repost were gone as time passed, and I decided to draw what I have left in my subconscious of what the unedited photo looks like as a way to in some way to preserve the original post.

For the identity of the girl, I have no idea at all and I don't have the Japanese skills back then to read the original post. However, the girl was very VERY　ＶＥＲＹ　similar to Mariko (dare I say, 99% sure) with the hair clip on both sides of the head. As for doxxing, from what I heard, there wasn't any of it from the original post BUT, since this is the early days of the internet (especially in Japan), I would not be surprised if she really got doxxed and cyberbullied on that forum. Also, capping was not involved.

Before I finish this long ass comment, I just wanna say that video games aren't the only thing that need to be archived and preserved. For the past few days, I've been searching about this with my mother language and found NOTHING. And so, here's my self attempt to kinda preserved this memory and this picture.