Bringing you yesterday's news from Japan and Asia, today.
technology (Page 33)
While the typical itinerary for visitors to Japan is Tokyo, Kyoto, and then home, western Japan has a lot to offer. As a matter of fact, as I type this, I’m just about to leave for a few days of enjoying the beautiful sights and delicious food of Hiroshima Prefecture.
In order to maximize my time there, I’m hopping on an overnight bus. But while that’ll get me there bright and early, it’s not nearly as stylish as the new sleeper train that was just announced by Japan Railways.
Part of the reason smartphones have become so popular is the way in which they combine the functions of so many other devices people used to lug around instead. With the ability to browse the Internet, listen to music, play games, and take high-quality photos, it’s becoming increasingly harder to convince people they need to shell out the cash for a dedicated camera, handheld video game system, or music player.
But why is it that as more people buy smartphones, fewer of them are buying chewing gum?
Ties are serious business in Japan. Since all but the most informal businesses require all men to wear one during working hours (unless, of course, it’s “Cool Biz” time), it’s pretty much a necessity for every guy to own a few and if you know more than two or three ways to tie one, all the better.
But, surprisingly, it’s not uncommon for Japanese guys to have no clue whatsoever how to tie a tie. The stereotype goes that these mostly young sartorially-challenged individuals rely on their girlfriends or even dads and moms to knot their tie for them, and in a pinch they’ll just stash an already-knotted tie somewhere in their closet, tighten it on and dash out the door.
One such less-dexterous individual apparently took it upon himself to solve his problem by building an automatic tie tying machine, presumably so that he could finally stop relying on his dad for his wardrobe and move out of his parents’ basement:
When my brother and his family moved back to America, leaving my wife and I as the last Baseels in Japan, he graciously offered me his practically new iPhone. Sadly, despite the tempting opportunity of upgrading from my old-school flip phone, I had to turn down his generous offer.
Being happily married, this wasn’t because I needed the boost in attractiveness that comes from an outdated cell, but simply because my brother and I had different providers, and his iPhone was SIM locked, like all mobile phones in Japan have always been.
However, that might be changing soon.
What with desktops, laptops, all-in-ones and tablets, we now have an enormous amount of choice when it comes to buying a new computer. While many of us enjoy the raw power that giant desktops have to offer, others prefer the simplicity and convenience of tablets with their slim designs and fingerprint-absorbing touchscreens.
With the Kira L93, Japanese electronics giant Toshiba is clearly hoping to cover all of its bases and please even the most indecisive computer buyer. With a 13.3-inch touchscreen that can be rotated 360 degrees, stand, detachable keyboard and stylus, the latest entry in the Dynabook series can be used up to seven different ways, making it one of the most versatile machines on the market.
The Shibuya crossing, also known as theShibuya scramble, is without a doubt one of the most famous locations in the world. Now the go-to location for establishing shots of Japan when producers aren’t focusing on geisha and picturesque temples, the intersection has been featured in numerous TV shows and movies, and is a must-see for any visitor to Tokyo.
Surrounded by tall buildings, each covered in giant screens and ads vying for pedestrians’ attention, the Scramble is traversed by an incredible 500,000 people each day, with roughly 3,000 pedestrians crossing every time the lights change during peak hours, making it one of the flashiest and most popular places to advertise in Japan.
And now, it’s about to get just a little bit flashier.
The town of Hakone, located high in the mountains of Kanagawa Prefecture, is one of Japan’s most popular tourist destinations. Visitors come to enjoy its soothing hot springs, beautiful views of Mt. Fuji, and art museums focusing on outdoor sculpture installations and Venetian glass.
Hakone also happens to be home to some of the best driving roads in east Japan, too, which is why Daihatsu picked the site to show off its new compact convertible, the Copen, to fans and press.
Most if the time, video games and sports cars are two of the more trivial things in life. That said, sometimes it’s those non-productive luxuries that give us the recharge we need to be industrious in our daily grind. Some people draw energy and inspiration from an afternoon spent with a good book or favorite album, others get it from a few hours working a PS4 controller or rowing through a crisp-shifting gearbox.
Competitive gaming and motorsports are getting another boost in legitimacy this summer, as the first has led to a job for some talented virtual racers, and their team’s car is helping pave the way for cleaner, more efficient engines.
Scientists at Southwest Jiaotong University in China have built a prototype testing platform for a near-vacuum high-speed maglev train that is theoretically capable of reaching speeds up to 2900 km/h or about 1,800 mph. Currently, the fastest commercially operated maglev reaches just 431 km/h and even the world record is just 581 km/hr.
While progress has been slow and begrudging, anti-smoking movements are finally starting to gain traction in Japan. For example, smoking is largely banned in train stations, except for in designated enclosed smoking spaces, and even many of those are being removed.
Likewise, when smartphone advertising firm Adways moved into a new office, management saw it as a chance to rethink how to make the workplace more comfortable for nonsmokers, and came up with a solution that uses a mix of technology and simple common courtesy.
With technology moving faster than ever, it’s hard to imagine what careers will look like 20 years from now. But The Canadian Scholarship Trust Plan (CST), a not-for-profit foundation dedicated to helping Canadian families save for their children’s post-secondary education, wanted to find out.
With help from foresight strategists, CST took a look into the future to find the jobs that may be commonplace by the year 2030.
The social messaging service Line is a huge hit in Japan. It’s easy to use, free, and even lets you decorate your messages with stickers to add a personal touch.
All of this makes Line great for keeping in touch with your friends or dating partner. As a matter of fact, it might have just become a little too good at keeping you connected to your significant other, with a new set of stickers specially designed for clingy girlfriends.
Fantastic octopus wiring!
My brother has been observing the slugs since he got divorced.
Let’s start from where we left off yesterday. Get down on all fours.
No, these aren’t the ramblings of a man with concussion; these are genuine excerpts from Twitter feed and study guide “Non-essential English Vocabulary: Words that will never come up in tests”, a language resource for Japanese students of English that presents entirely useless but infinitely memorable phrases.
With more than 40,000 Twitter followers so far, Twitter feed curator and author Nakayama-san (otherise known as @NISE_TOEIC)’s cheeky tweets are clearly resonating with English learners here in Japan, but why, when the rest of the nation is busy with earnest study, would someone take the time to create a Twitter account dedicated entirely to unusable English? Japanese website Excite Bit sat down with the Nakayama-san to pick up a few study tips and learn little more about the thinking behind the bizarre project.
Electronics giant LG has announced that its line of “HomeChat”-enabled appliances — a refrigerator, washing machine, and Lightwave oven that can be communicated with and operated via messaging service Line — is now available to buy in its native South Korea.
By using the popular smartphone app, users can chat with their various gizmos as if they were ordinary human contacts, asking them questions as well as providing additional information to alter their functions. Thanks to the technology built into the appliances with which the app communicates, it’s possible not just to remotely check the temperature inside the fridge or put on a load of laundry, but to find out how many beers you have or delay your usual wash cycle by 30 minutes simply by telling the machine you’ll be home late.
With over 1,800 commonly-used kanji characters, plus two different sets of 46 phonetic characters each, typing on a word processor in Japanese works a little differently than in English. Many words in Japanese have the same pronunciation but are written differently, so first you have to type the word phonetically, then select the proper rendering from a list that pops up.
The cool thing is that sometimes the selections aren’t just written characters, but drawings of the object in question. Poking around in a Japanese word processor is like a linguistic treasure hunt, and our searches turned up illustrations of mythical creatures, delicious food, and famous landmarks of Japan.
Never has something been the focus of so much simultaneous nerd love and outrage than the venerable flux capacitor from the equally venerable film series that popularized time travel, Back to the Future. After all, it was the defining technology for time travel in the films that made screeching about time travel paradoxes all the rage in geek communities.
And now, it can be yours in all its ’80s glory with this official DeLorean Motors Company-licensed hardware that you can actually install in your real DeLorean – or presumably (and much more likely) – the crappy Pinto you’re currently borrowing from your grandpa.
As we’ve said before, the PlayStation 4’s PlayStation Camera is a woefully underused device. Gamers who enjoy streaming footage of the games they play often use their cameras to capture their own expressions and add real-time commentary, and upcoming virtual reality headset Project Morpheus will make use of the unit to provide additional head tracking, but otherwise it gets relatively little love.
Fortunately, Sony Japan looks to be working on content that will inspire a few more PlayStation 4 owners to plug in their cameras. In two videos released last week, Sony staff show off their experiments with augmented reality, which combines real-world footage with computer-generated images that respond to a number of stimuli. These may only be tech demos, but the sight of a miniature T-rex hiding in the darkness, a man decanting water (complete with rubber duck!) between two virtual boxes, and even a short performance from a tiny Hatsune Miku on the living room rug left us thirsty for more.
The Robot Restaurant in China’s Heilongjiang Province is a conventional restaurant in every sense, save the glaring exception that the food is prepared and served entirely by an army of 20 robots with just a modicum of human oversight.
Nissan
Now that Nissan has revolutionized the rearview mirror, it has moved on to another problem: It is developing a self-cleaning car.
A good towel is always nice to have, especially in a country like Japan where bathing is a hobby, hand dryers and paper towels are largely nonexistent in public restrooms, and the three to five months a year of blazing heat and sweltering humidity will make you itching to wipe off all that sweat.
Yes, it’s hard to overstate the value of a good towel, though some might say Japanese textile maker INI is coming close with its 5,000-yen (US $49) bath towels. That price, though, gets you a towel unlike any that’s been made before.
Tokyo Tsukiji fish market site to be redeveloped with 50,000-seat stadium, hotel, shopping center
Japanese ramen restaurants under pressure from new yen banknotes
Red light district sushi restaurant in Tokyo shows us just how wrong we were about it
McDonald’s new Happy Meals offer up cute and practical Sanrio lifestyle goods
Pokémon Sleep camping suite and guestrooms coming to Tokyo Hyatt along with giant Snorlax burgers
New private rooms on Tokaido Shinkansen change the way we travel from Tokyo to Kyoto
Beautiful Red and Blue Star luxury trains set to be Japan’s new Hokkaido travel stars
Japanese chiffon sandwiches are a treat worth travelling for
Mt. Koya planning to instate visitor’s tax to cope with huge tourist numbers
Starbucks Japan adds a Motto Frappuccino to the menu for a limited timeMcDonald’s new Happy Meals offer up cute and practical Sanrio lifestyle goods
All-you-can-drink Starbucks and amazing views part of Tokyo’s new 170 meter-high sky lounge
More foreign tourists than ever before in history visited Japan last month
Starbucks reopens at Shibuya Scramble Crossing with new look and design concept
Studio Ghibli releases new action figures featuring Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind characters
French Fries Bread in Tokyo’s Shibuya becomes a hit on social media
Studio Ghibli glasses cases let anime characters keep an eye on your spectacles
Is the new Shinkansen Train Desk ticket worth it?New private rooms on Tokaido Shinkansen change the way we travel from Tokyo to Kyoto
Beautiful Ghibli sealing wax kits let you create accessories and elegant letter decorations【Pics】McDonald’s new Happy Meals offer up cute and practical Sanrio lifestyle goods
Studio Ghibli releases Kiki’s Delivery Service chocolate cake pouches in Japan
New definition of “Japanese whiskey” goes into effect to prevent fakes from fooling overseas buyers
Our Japanese reporter visits Costco in the U.S., finds super American and very Japanese things
Studio Ghibli unveils Mother’s Day gift set that captures the love in My Neighbour Totoro
Domino’s Japan now sells…pizza ears?
New Japanese KitKat flavour stars Sanrio characters, including Hello KittyAll-you-can-drink Starbucks and amazing views part of Tokyo’s new 170 meter-high sky loungeMore foreign tourists than ever before in history visited Japan last month
New Pokémon cakes let you eat your way through Pikachu and all the Eevee evolutions
Sales of Japan’s most convenient train ticket/shopping payment cards suspended indefinitelyMcDonald’s new Happy Meals offer up cute and practical Sanrio lifestyle goods
Sold-out Studio Ghibli desktop humidifiers are back so Totoro can help you through the dry season
Japanese government to make first change to romanization spelling rules since the 1950s
Ghibli founders Toshio Suzuki and Hayao Miyazaki contribute to Japanese whisky Totoro label design
Doraemon found buried at sea as scene from 1993 anime becomes real life【Photos】
Tokyo’s most famous Starbucks is closed
One Piece characters’ nationalities revealed, but fans have mixed opinions
We asked a Uniqlo employee what four things we should buy and their suggestions didn’t disappoint
Princesses, fruits, and blacksmiths: Study reveals the 30 most unusual family names in Japan
New private rooms on Tokaido Shinkansen change the way we travel from Tokyo to Kyoto
Beautiful Red and Blue Star luxury trains set to be Japan’s new Hokkaido travel stars
Japanese chiffon sandwiches are a treat worth travelling for
Mt. Koya planning to instate visitor’s tax to cope with huge tourist numbers
Starbucks Japan adds a Motto Frappuccino to the menu for a limited time
Sakura tree falls on man at Sannenzaka near Kiyomizu temple in Kyoto 【Breaking News】
Lawson convenience stores now offering subscription service for one free coffee daily for a month
LED gaming chopsticks are here for your mid-game munchies or whenever you eat in the dark
An overnight trip on the Sunrise Izumo, Japan’s awesome Tokyo-Shimane sleeper train【Photos】
Doraemon found buried at sea as scene from 1993 anime becomes real life【Photos】
French Fries Bread in Tokyo’s Shibuya becomes a hit on social media