Latest posts by Chris Salzberg from October, 2008
Japan: Wallpaper pictures
Sinsoku VIP [神速VIP] has a long list of “cool and sad” pictures to stick on your wall [ja].
Japan: Financial crises and financial markets
Japanese blogger and economics scholar id:eliya provides a brief background to financial crises that “even a high-schooler would understand” [ja], and then in a later post answers the questions: “What are financial markets for? And are they useful to me?” [ja]
Japan: The dangers of pre-paid cards
An article at Jan-Jan describes the situation of people who bought pre-paid cards [ja] to use at Kakimoto Sekiyu, a company in Aomori Prefecture that went bankrupt and closed its gasoline stands on the 6th of this month. Customers who bought pre-paid cards in advance, some for as much as...
Japan: Popularity of elderly on the rise?
At E.L.H. Electric Lover Hinagiku, blogger y_arim reacts to a news article [ja] in Yomiuri shimbun reporting that popularity of the elderly in Japan is on the rise among young people [ja], writing that he's rarely seen news so gross. “At the heart of the grossness is the fact that...
Japan: Chart Maniax
Japanese programmer and blogger id:amachang introduces [ja] Chart Maniax [ja], a service they developed for charting when and through which services web pages have been bookmarked. Services included are Hatena Bookmarks [ja], Livedoor Clip [ja], Delicious and Buzzurl [ja]. As an example, have a look at the chart for id:amachang's...
Japan: Machida city council requests regulation of Street View
Blogger and lawyer Yōji Ochiai [落合洋司] reports on news [ja] that the Machida city council in Tokyo has made a written request [ja] for investigations into regulation regarding Google's Street View Service, which has sparked some negative reactions in Japan [ja]. “My position has been to oppose entirely the targeting,...
Japan: Verbal gaffs and Japanese politics
Blogger Ken writes about verbal gaffs in Japanese politics [ja]. Ken uses the example of a recent statement by Minister Nariaki Nakayama, which the blogger says became a gaff because Nakayama offended both the teachers union and citizen groups opposing expansion of Narita Airport. Ken argues that verbal gaffs are...
Japan: Web becoming Fifth Estate
Ikeda Nobuo at OpenSpectrum Japan reports on two news stories related to copyright law in Japan: the conditional access system B-CAS has been scrapped (and with it so-called “Dubbing Ten”), and on September 18 the plan to extend copyright from 50 to 70 years was also abandoned. Ikeda observes that...
Japan: Street View and Public Space
The debate about Google's new Street View service in Japan, which sparked criticisms following its launch over a perceived lack of cultural sensitivity, has come back into the spotlight with the recent visit to Tokyo by Google vice president Kent Walker, and with reports emerging that the service does not appear to properly distinguish between public and private spaces.
Japan: Nikkei drops below 10,000 yen
mojix at Zope Junky Nikki picks up news that the Nikkei stock average has slumped below 10,000 yen for the first time in nearly five years [ja], featuring a PDF of a print article from Nikkei Keizai shimbun announcing the drop. mojix writes: “There are good sides to a strong...
Japan: Children and mobile phones
A Japanese parent blogs about their daughter's experience getting her first mobile phone [ja], and the problems involved: the dangers of dating and porn sites, misunderstandings in communication, and constant interruptions during study time. The blogger relates the social distance created by these phones to the shift from traditional sushi...
Japan: Perspective on problems at IBM Japan
Blogger id:higayasuo traces recent problems at IBM Japan to the old guard in the company not understanding modern conditions of the industry [ja], carrying over experience from an age of general-purpose computers to a modern Americanized age of rational production through outsourcing and specialization. Based on this experience, id:higayasuo explains,...
Japan: Newsgraphy and HatenarMaps
With ever-increasing amount of news information making its way onto the Internet every day, the question of how to parse and interpret this information is becoming more and more critical. One Japanese engineer and blogger has proposed two new services, HatenarMaps and Newsgraphy, as a way to overcome this problem through data visualization.
Japan: GLOCOM report on new JICA president Sadako Ogata
The GLOCOM blog has a report (in both English and Japanese) on new JICA president Sadako Ogata's [緒方貞子] presentation Oct. 2nd at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan (FCCJ), which follows on the Oct. 1st consolidation of much of Japan's Official Developmental Assistance (ODA) through the merging of JICA and...
Japan: Photos that evoke the senses
Have a look at Sinsoku VIP [神速VIP] for an amazing list of photos that evoke the senses [ja].
Japan: Google, the anti-social corporation
In a post entitled “Google, the anti-social corporation” [ja], former Mainichi journalist and writer/blogger Hiroyuki Fujishiro [藤代裕之] at Gatonews picks up on an ongoing series of posts [ja] by blogger and security researcher Hiromitsu Takagi [高木浩光] criticizing Google's handling of the roll-out of its Street View service in Japan. Fujishiro...
Japan: 1st Keitai Photo Awards
id:heimin posts pictures he's taken with his keitai [mobile phone] camera over the last year [ja], including: shots before and after he shaved his head, close-ups of cutting nostril hair, snapshots of meals he's eaten, cats and dogs, the Hanshin Tigers, manga and ice cream. The popularity of Keitai Shosetsu...
Japan: Heiankyo Alien
mojix at Zope Junky Nikki writes [ja] about Heiankyo Alien [平安京エイリアン], a video game developed by the University of Tokyo's Theoretical Science Group in 1979. mojix explains that the game, which consists of dropping aliens into holes in Heian-kyo (ancient Kyoto), can now be downloaded and played without even installing...
Japan: Jiyugaoka Street Exhibition 2008
Space Journal has pictures of an ongoing street exhibition in Jiyūgaoka (Tokyo) held today and tomorrow (Oct. 4-5), designed by architecture group g86 [ja]. The show, located on Shirakaba street next to Jiyūgaoka station, is a “virtual exhibition” featuring QR codes as a “window” to various works by artists and...
Japan: Pictures from Hatena Haiku
id:y_arim at Electric Lover Hinagiku collects together pictures he has posted over the past two months at Hatena Haiku [ja] and adds short comments to each. Pictures feature anime characters Asuka Langley Soryu and Rei Ayanami, and a figure reminiscent of anime Weiß Kreuz.
Japan: The Future of Web Community and Contents
Blogger and writer Chiki Ogiue [荻上チキ] at seijotcp announces that the 2008 Young Critics Summit on “The Future of Web Community and Contents” [ja] will be held on Sunday Oct. 12 from 14.00 – 16.00 (doors open 13.30) at Sanseido Bookstore [ja] in Kanda, Tokyo. The summit will feature three...
