One of my favorite Japanese comedians is Ken Shimura (志村けん) who does a hilarious annual samurai era themed show on Fuji TV every year. What’s brilliant about Shimura is that you don’t have to speak a word of Japanese to follow his very physical humor — in many ways his visual comedy reminds me of modern day Charlie Chaplin.
 Product Reviews |
Square-Enix confirms FFXIII demo not westbound
Ars Technica – 10 hours ago By Frank Caron | Published: January 12, 2009 – 11:20AM CT As far as RPGs go, there is no more highly-anticipated title for this entire console generation than Final Fantasy XIII. Square reconfirms FF13 demo is Japan only PS3Center.net Final Fantasy XIII Battle System Detailed IGN CVG Online – PSX Extreme – MCV – Galbadia X all 15 news articles Langue : Français |
Japan’s ageing population is trying to eat itself young with the latest trend in wrinkle reduction: dining on collagen.
 Boston Globe |
Highlights From Day One in Detroit
New York Times – 12 hours ago The vehicles on display on the first media preview day of the 2009 North American International Auto Show in Detroit suggest that the era of the electric-powered car may finally be here. First Drive: 2009 Honda Insight hybrid CanadianDriver Honda's affordable Insight hybrid bids for broader audience AutoWeek The Canadian Press – Wired News – Automotive World (subscription) – Detroit Free Press all 154 news articles |
The Japanese government argues that it must regulate citizens’ lifestyles because it is paying their health costs. This highlights a danger of “universal healthcare.” Any government that attempts to guarantee healthcare must also control its costs. If America adopts universal healthcare, it could result in a “nanny state on steroids.”
If the Tesla Roadster just isn’t enough for you…not fast enough, not weird enough, and not expensive enough, then you should probably start looking out for Eliica’s. Just two of these Japanese peculio-mobiles currently exist, but the Eliica team is looking to get corporate sponsorship to produce 200 of them.
An anonymous reader writes “Verizon Wireless will forge a deal with Microsoft to include the software giant’s Live Search on its mobile phones, giving Microsoft a victory over rival Google and ending a months-long dance toward the partnership. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer will announce the deal in his keynote address at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.” InfoWorld notes that Microsoft is rumored to be changing the name of its Live Search service to Kumo , which is Japanese for “cloud.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Following in footsteps of Sudoku, Kakuro & other number-logic puzzles, Slitherlink is a group of popular loop-forming puzzles originated in Japan & played internationally under variety of names (from Slitherlink to Takegaki, Loopy, Fences, many others).
A ridiculously dangerous science experiment that tosses a Japanese guy 100 feet into a lake.
So, legendary Japanese developer Hideo Kojima is starting from “zero” in 2009, and wants Kojima Productions on an equal footing with western studios. From the great man himself: “We’re currently reviewing everything – from the team structure to tools and our staff – in order to make Kojima Productions a team that can challenge everyone.”
