Archive for September, 2009

Dog stuck in tire

Last week, someone in Okayama city discovered a dog that had somehow got its head stuck in a car tire:

The dog was freed by a rescue crew and is currently being held by the city government. An official says that he’s noticed that the dog has a tendency to stick its head in narrow places, a behavior that might be caused by a fear of humans and a desire to escape.

It is assumed that the dog was a stray. After waiting to make sure no previous owner of the dog comes forward to claim their pet, the city will make the dog available for adoption. They’ve already received 79 inquires from people who want to adopt the dog.

—

• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

Whale meat shabu shabu

A TV show visits a restaurant in Nagasaki, Japan’s #1 whale-consuming city:

They start out eating whale sashimi. They are then treated to a course of whale meat shabu shabu (the hotpot, not the drug). The sashimi and shabu shabu courses are 2,100 yen and 4,730 yen each.

[hat tip to Shironbo7441]

—

• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

The graphics department must be on vacation

NTV’s graphics department must be off for the silver week holiday, because one of their news programs used this crude drawing while discussing a story about a train that nearly hit a small child:

—

• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

Ozawa favors granting voting rights to foreigners with permanent residency

Ichiro Ozawa, the man who is said to hold the real power within Japan’s ruling Democratic party, has said he favors passing a law to grant voting rights to foreigners with permanent residency:

Meeting at the DPJ headquarters in Tokyo, Ozawa told Lee, elder brother of President Lee Myung Bak and head of the South Korea-Japan parliamentarians union, that he is for the idea of granting such rights to permanent residents of Japan, including South Koreans.

“I want it to take form somehow during the regular Diet session,” Ozawa was quoted as saying, in remarks that suggest his intention to compile the opinions of DPJ members on the matter during the next ordinary session.

DPJ House of Councillors member Yoshihiro Kawakami, who took part in the meeting, told Kyodo News he believes the DPJ-led government would submit a bill aimed at giving permanent foreign residents the right to vote in elections for local government heads and assembly members to the regular Diet session.

While I think that it’s nice to give some local voting rights to foreigners who have come to Japan and received permanent residency, I think it is a bad idea to extend voting rights to Japanese-born Korean special permanent residents. Such a policy only encourages their position as perpetual non-citizens and discourages them from taking Japanese citizenship.

Wouldn’t it be better if the Japanese government streamlined the process by which they could naturalize and become full-fledged citizens of this country?

—

• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

Chinese plagiarism of Japanese anime

Simon Scaraffiotti of The Observers reports on an “original” work of Chinese animation that copied scenes from a Japanese work:

Same set, same features, same hairstyles – manga fans were not fooled. Several scenes from the 52-episode cartoon were copied directly from “Byousoku” (Five Centimetres per Second), a popular Japanese animated film by Makoto Shinkai released in 2007.

CCTV, China’ state-owned television network, says it was not aware that the production violated copyright. China’s propaganda department, which co-produced the cartoon, had billed it as an educational programme. “Soul’s Window” was supposed to teach children a lesson in ethics.

Replying to the accusations, the cartoon’s producer, Lanhai, recognised that roughly 1 percent of the 2,500 scenes mirrored parts of “Byousoku” and offered an apology. The company said it would launch an inquiry in order to “identify those responsible and draw lessons from this case”.

More screen capture comparisons can be found here.

[hat tip to 空]

—

• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

Bear attack reenacted with the aid of computer graphics

ATV news uses computer graphics to add some flavor to its coverage of the bear that attacked and mauled 9 people at a highway rest stop on Saturday:

It looks like it might have been created by the same graphics team that made their crude CG recreation of the cross-dressing loan applicant. It might have been better if they tried using some toys instead, or maybe relying on their cartoonist?

—

• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)