Stories about Japanese from December, 2007
Japan: Web visionary Umeda Mochio
While famous in Japan as a web visionary, Silicon Valley resident Umeda Mochio, president of Muse Associates, co-founder of Pacifica Fund and board member of the Japanese bookmarking and diary service Hatena, is little-known overseas. His recent book "Web Shinkaron" ("Theory of Web Evolution") sold 370,000 copies and become a national besteller in Japan. Umeda was recently interviewed by the Japanese magazine Central Review (Chuo koron), portions of which are introduced and translated in this post.
Japan: Learning from the failure of Second Life
Second Life in Japan is virtually dead. While three-dimensional environments such as "meet me" and Hatena World have seen their popularity rise, the most famous virtual environment in the world has seen its virtual space depopulate in Japan. What lessons can be learned from the burst of the Second Life bubble? One blogger offers his thoughts.
Japan: Economics of the “Illegal” Download
Following on recent moves by the government to regulate the Internet, plans for regulation in other areas of online communication have been moving ahead apace in Japan. Among these is the plan to revise article 30 of Japan's Copyright Law to make it illegal for individuals to download copyrighted material for personal use, something which up until now had been considered legal. Blogger and economist Ikeda Nobuo delves into the economics of the "illegal download", strongly criticizing the proposed revision.
Japan: The battle of HCV victims
Stories about tainted blood products are nothing new in Japan. In the 1980s, patients with hemophilia contracted HIV from tainted blood products, the result negligence on the part of the government and pharmaceutical companies about an earlier FDA decision to withdraw its approval of the products.
Japan: Final Report on Internet Regulation
The idea that a country boasting one of the world's most active net cultures would attempt to regulate online content within its borders may appear to some as infeasible. But plans unveiled earlier this year by the Japanese government aim to do exactly this, targeting a broad range of content that includes blogs and personal homepages.
Japan: English-language Blog about Japan IT, Asiajin
Akimoto at Akky Blog writes about his new English-language blog [ja] entitled Asiajin. While there are many great online services in Japan, he explains that almost none of them make...
Japan: Alpha Blogger Awards 2007
Three years after its establishment in 2004, organizers of the Alpha Blogger Awards, established to showcase influential bloggers in the Japanese blogosphere, have changed their approach. In contrast to previous years, the group of nominees in the 2007 awards were largely unknown even to the presenters themselves. Include in this post is a summary of the event and an interview with one of the winners.
Japan: Pearl Harbor and John Lennon
kitanomizube[jp] reflected on peace and violence on the day of the Pearl Harbor attack, which also happens to be the day John Lennon passed away.
Japan: Welcome, we'll collect your fingerprints and mugshot
tokyodo-2005[jp] has reposted a cartoon by Hashimoto Masaru. “People are not concerned even when the government violates human rights. This probably means that people who live in Japan in fact...
Japan: Three inmates executed
Tomumaru[jp] quotes recent BBC coverage of the Japanese executions of three death row inmates on December 7. The glogger condemns the secrecy of Japanese executions and discusses in detail the...
Japan: Flaming and the secrets we hide
The phenomenon of flaming (enjo) is widespread in Japan, particularly on anonymous posting forums such as 2-channel. One Japanese blogger picked up the topic of flaming last week and asked: are the things that people are attacked for so viciously online really so out-of-the-ordinary?
Japan: In the shadows of influence
A scandal that had been brewing for months came to a head last week when former Vice Defense Minster Moriya Takemasa and his wife Sachiko were arrested by authorities in Tokyo, suspected of having received millions of yen in bribes from former defense equipment trader Miyazaki Motonobu of Yamada Corporation. Many bloggers were surprised, and some dug deeper into the problem of behind-the-scenes maneuvering in Japanese politics.
Japan: The Terabutadon Incident
Blogger Kikko writes about the Terabutadon (テラ豚丼) incident in which two employees of Yoshinoya, Japan's largest beef bowl restaurant chain, shot a video of themselves piling pork over a rice...
Japan: Michelin Guide Hits Tokyo
On November 22, the much-talked-about Michelin Guide Tokyo went on sale. With a combination of French connections and something of gastronomical interest, you can never go wrong in Japan. Sure enough, for days leading up to and after its release, the Japanese media flocked to cover the event and the Guide itself, the most recognized restaurant and hotel guide book published by French tire manufacturer Michelin.
Japan: 16 suicide cases in Self Defence Forces
tokyodo-2005 [ja] quotes a November 14 newspaper article which reports 16 cases of suicide among Self-Defence Forces personnel deployed in the Indian Ocean and Iraq this year (up to October)....
Japan: Anti-fingerprinting protest leaflet
Re-entry Japan is a collaborative blog site which offers information and discussion on the newly introduced fingerprinting of non-Japanese nationals in Japan. The site has a protest leaflet which people...
