Jul 12 '09
"This place has some sort of micro chip in the plates. The lady comes along with her scanner and places it near the dishes. The total cost is calculated immediately and a receipt automatically comes of a small printer thingy attached to her belt."
listed in: japan, technology | ∞
Apr 8 '09
Japan's Cyber Cafes for the Homeless - A BBC video on how tiny 10' x 10' cyber cafe booths are being turned into affordable housing for the homeless and jobless. Cost? $500/mo. Apparently as cheap as it comes.
Apr 4 '09
Wisconsin Film Festival 2009: Friday
Saw two great films at the Wisconsin Film Festival last night:
Tokyo Sonata (トウキョウンナタ)
The movie starts out with a typical Japanese family of four... a business man, stay-at-home mom, elementary-aged child, and college aged son. Things start to unravel when Ryuhei (the father) loses his job and decides not to tell the rest of his family. As the movie unfolds, we find out that he isn't the only family member with a secret they're not sharing.
It started out a lighter comedy, and I thought it turned darker pretty quick. My more cultured friends called it an in-your-face social commentary on the modern Japanese family, although I didn't pick up on that. Minus some over-the-top emotions near the end, I really enjoyed the movie. The beginning is pretty hilarious, and while the second half looks bleak, the director was nice enough to give you a glimmer of hope at the end.
Food, Inc.
This was a pretty typical hippie anti-corporation documentary, like I've seen every year, but I really enjoyed it. First off, I want to say the title sequence (where they show the beginning credits) was extremely creative and very well done, featuring food labels with the production staff's names.
The movie's biggest points were this: The food industry is run by a very small handful of large corporations, and, Monsanto (I think mentioned negatively in every single anti-corporation documentary I've seen) runs the FDA, and this is all really really really really bad.
The only organization or company to be portrayed positively was Wal-Mart, interestingly enough, for their willingness to buy more and more free-range and organic food. (Although, not as much for ethical reasons as for the profit from consumers now demanding food produced more healthy)
It's definitely worth the watch, as long as you're willing to accept your food isn't made by 'Joe the Farmer' like the packaging leds you to believe.
listed in: food, japan, madison, movies, wisconsin film festival | ∞
Feb 8 '09
Japan's Big-Works Stimulus Is Lesson [For the United States]
listed in: economics, japan, united states | ∞
Nov 21 '08
Ensuring the Future of Food -
A video by Japan's Ministry of Agriculture basically saying "Good Japanese don't east Western food", but they have a very good reason why. You infographic lovers with enjoy this.
listed in: energy, food, geography, global trade, infographics, japan, public health, youtube | ∞
Apr 30 '08
Apr 18 '08
High Tech Bicycle Parking Facility In Tokyo - Think Matrix energy farm, except with bikes instead of human bodies.
Feb 27 '08
Unity bandwidth consortium - Google will help build a high-bandwidth subsea cable system linking the U.S. and Japan.
Feb 15 '08
The Subterranean Farms of Tokyo - Reminds me of the gardens on the spaceship in the movie "Sunshine".
listed in: environment, future, japan | ∞
Dec 29 '07
Tokyu Hands - A 6-story-tall store in Japan of just... random shit. Aisles upon aisles of wheels and wires and dodads and whatamacallits. If I ever make it to Japan, that is one of my first stops.
listed in: do-it-yourself, japan | ∞
Apr 2 '07
Goldfish Living in Deep Fryer - Crazy Japanese Inventions
Feb 26 '07
Japan's Top Emoticons - A lot more complicated than ours :p
Jan 24 '07
Japanese Only - A gallery of Japanese establishments who don't accept foreigners. Extremely interesting.
listed in: japan, photography | ∞
