The Katakana “Dot”

[Buntaro]

I saw a poster for the Shinagawa Skin Clinic. It said:

品川スキンクリニック

It did not have a separating dot as in:

品川スキン (dot) クリニック

I remember that multi-katakana words always used to have this separating dot. Is this dot disappearing from written Japanese?

(Does anyone know how to write this dot in the fonts on this forum?)

 

[Majestic]

In my IME it appears as an option when I type in 「てん」.
It also appears above the forward slash on my keyboard itself, but I'm guessing this is only a thing on Japanese/English keyboards.
Regarding your question, I don't think there is or was any rule that says western words must be separated by this dot. I tend to think it is more a question of practicality. Does the sentence look better or more readily comprehensible with the dot or without it? Would multiple words with multiple dots just be cluttered and hard to read?
I think use of this separating dot is more of a question of style rather than a hard rule of spelling.

 

[Buntaro]

Thanks, Majestic, I appreciate it. By the way, if you could, please make a post and see if you can put that middle-dot in it. I'm thinking that I may be able to put it in posts if I cut and paste it.

 

[Majestic]

Here you go
・・・

 

[Toritoribe]

There is a thread exactly about the topic.

Question - How to type interpunct? | Japan Forum

 

[Buntaro]

Thanks Majestic

品川スキン・クリニック

It works!

Toritoribe, thanks for the link.

For anyone who is interested, the poster appears at 14:17 in this YouTube video, in pink, on the left. (It should be mentioned that the words スキン and クリニック appear on different lines, so I guess it would be difficult to use the dot here.)

TOKYO.【品川駅】.Introduction to Tracks of Shinagawa Station.(revised video)

 

[mdchachi]

The premise of your question has changed with this latest information. I think it's highly unusual to use the dot across multiple lines. The dot is used as a separator as is the line break. There's no need for both.