Stories about Japan from September, 2008
Japan: Manga teaches children danger of fast food
Japanese blogger and author Chiki Ogiue [荻上チキ] scans an educational manga book he stumbled on at an eco cafe [ja] that teaches children good dietary habits with incredibly frank visual messages and storylines, emphasizing the danger of fast food and the value of eating rice, among other things. Webpage of...
Japan: Wordcamp Tokyo 2008
Akky Akimoto writes about the first Wordcamp (conference of WordPress users) in Japan [ja], Wordcamp Tokyo 2008 held on September 23rd, and also rounds up other Japanese blog posts on the event.
Japan: The true revolution of Google Street View
Blogger id:bohemian_style reflects on the launch of Google Street View in Japan [ja], noting that the way the service is viewed differs depending on where people are living: in modern urban areas, people's sense of privacy tends to be limited their immediate living space, which ends at the entrance to...
Japan: Maga on War and Japan
Japan Focus just published a translation of one of Mizuki Shigeru’s short manga pieces, entitled “War and Japan“, with a brief introduction to the man and his work written by Matthew Penney. via Mutant Travelogue.
Japan: The changing value of knowledge
Japanese Hatena user id:TomoMachi argues that now that everything on the Internet is so easily accessible to everyone, the value of simply “knowing something” is disappearing [ja]. User id:aureliano follows with a post pointing out that while rote memorization is becoming meaningless, the same is not true of writing an...
Japan: Not just Hatena, the whole Internet has too many ads
Hatena user id:gnarl responds to id:rycotan's complaint that Japanese bookmarking service Hatena has too many ads on its keyword page with a post arguing that it's not just Hatena: the whole Internet has too many ads [ja].
Japan: Takeda Castle, the Japanese Machu Pichu
An entry entitled “Japan's Machu Pichu? The ruins of Takeda Castle, Castle to the Heavens” [ja] posted at Tomorrowearth.com has an incredible set of photos (more here, here and here) of an abandoned castle in Asago city, Hyōgo Prefecture. More pictures and a map of the castle ruins here [ja].
Japan: Nobuto Hosaka on the streets of Tokyo
Politician and blogger Nobuto Hosaka [保坂展人] of the Japan Social Democratic Party writes at his doko doko diary [保坂展人のどこどこ日記] about his experience yesterday giving speeches [ja] on the streets of Koenji [高円寺], Asagaya [阿佐ヶ谷], Ogikubo [荻窪] and Iogi [井荻] (neighborhoods of Tokyo) in preparation for upcoming elections.
Japan: Too many ads in Hatena Keywords
User id:ryocotan complains that the keyword page at Hatena, Japan's largest social bookmarking service, has too many advertisements [ja], demonstrating this problem with a diagram for the keyword “violin” (バイオリン [ja]) in which actual information is highlighted in blue, and ads highlighted in red.
Japan: Virtual Shopping Mall
Serkan Toto from Asiajin introduces a popular virtual window shopping website in Japan.
Japan: The Birth of Blog Critique
Hiroshi Yamaguchi at H-Yamaguchi.net discusses [ja] Japanese journalist, author and Internet commentator Toshinao Sasaki‘s latest book, “The Birth of Blog Critique” [ブログ論壇の誕生]. In the book, Sasaki describes the circumstances through which statements in blogs have come to genuinely affect modern Japanese society, in a variety of different contexts.
Japan: Japanese input on iPhone 2.1
Views on the usability of Japanese characters on iPhone 2.1: At Thir's notes, thir reports that while many have complained that the input of characters is too slow on iPhone, 2.1 firmware offers a great improvement [ja]. Blogger wa-ren at Cross the Chasm! [キャズムを超えろ！] approves of these improvements, but reports...
Japan: Missing Pieces in Tainted Rice Scandal
The latest food scandal making headlines in Japan revolves on the nation's staple commodity: rice, one of only a small handful of foods for which the country achieves almost complete self-sufficiency. Bloggers discuss the roots of the latest food scandal, and one blogger points out holes in media's reporting on the issue.
Japan: DVD release by Politician Yuri Fujikawa
The upcoming release [ja] of a DVD featuring 27-year-old Japanese politician Yuri Fujikawa [藤川 優里], member of the Hachinohe city [八戸市] assembly in Aomori Prefecture [青森県], is all the talk in the forums [ja]. Back when she first joined office in January of this year, Fujikawa was called “too beautiful”...
Japan: The Unhealthy Image of “Ladylike”
Japanese blogger Miyakichi at Miyakichi Nikki writes about why the image of ladylike beauty in the world today so unhealthy [ja], tracing the preference for pale skin, 40cm waists and high heels back to the histories of Europe, America and China and connecting them to modern styles in Japan.
Japan: Wire Free Gadgets Network Bloggers Meeting
The Agile Media Network blog has a post [ja] about a bloggers meeting in Tokyo's Shiodome area on September 29th, organized by NTT Communications, on the theme of “Wire Free Gadgets Network”. Doors open at 19.00 and the event starts at 19.30. There is no admission fee, but people interested...
Japan: Virtual Boyfriends Social Network
Akky Akimoto introduces a very distinctive social network game in Japan called Web-Kare – virtual boyfriends social network.
Japan: The End of OhmyNews Japan
At the end of August, 2008, OhmyNews, the citizen journalism site from South Korea that entered the Japanese market in 2006 with much fanfare, closed its doors. First officially announced on February 22, 2006, and launched shortly thereafter with help from the Japanese media giant Softbank and an investment contract valued at 1.3 billion yen, OhmyNews had a rough ride in Japan right from the beginning. Bloggers reflect on the rise and fall of the Japanese citizen journalism project.
Japan: Healthy Diet
Ampontan writes some Japanese diet tips for staying healthy.
Japan: Respect for the Aged Day
Martin J Frid from Kurashi blogs about local NGOs’ attempt in encouraging more senior citizens in Japan to tackle environmental problems in “Respect for the Aged Day”.
Japan: Hilarious Google translations
Blogger Cozy Ozy picks up a few simple sentences and compares English-to-Japanese machine translations [ja] from Google Translate, Yahoo, Excite and Korya Eiwa 2009. While translations by other services are understandable, Google Translate produces bizarre results: “We played baseball” becomes “This is our baseball” (私たちの野球です), “Lucy has no friends to...
