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We’ve had a bunch of emails over the last few days asking about that little Flash widget down there at the bottom of the right sidebar (take a look waay down there), usually from readers asking what the heck all that Japanese stuff is.

Read the full story Internet | Japan | Software 05:33 PM J Mark Lytle • Permalink • Comments
Tagged with: blogs flash widgets

Should Homer Simpson ever try to smuggle his unqualified identical twin brother into work in his stead, a new biometric identification system that will be used to secure nuclear plants is sure to prompt a “D’oh!” or seven.

Exotic molecules like carbon buckyballs may soon become part of our everyday lives if the latest prototype fuel cell from Sony ever makes it to the stores.

We recently lifted the lid on just how useful – not to mention pervasive – RFID technology is in Japan, so it’s with a glad heart that we bring you news of a move that’s sure to help it spread more quickly in the West.

The field of disability aids has seen many devices controlled by computers that visually track the eye movements of paralysed people, but none that reads the electricity given off by swiveling eyeballs.

Robots are good for plenty of things, but having a meaningless chat generally isn’t one of them – something that has to change if a group of Japanese researchers are to be believed.

One of the more low-key exhibits at the Display 2008 show in Tokyo was a new kind of e-paper that promises an electronic experience far closer to real paper than anything we’ve seen before.

Aside from flashy 3D displays, the other big draw for fans of future tech at Display 2008 in April was electronic paper in at least 57 flavor-packed varieties.

Flat-panel displays are so mainstream these days they have an entire massive exhibition dedicated to them – the Display Expo in Tokyo. That’s where the technologies we’re likely to see in the shops over the next few years get an early airing, and we were there last month.

Alternative fuel is all very well, but it’s pretty damn hopeless, regardless of good intentions, when all you can get on Main Street is regular gasoline by the liter.

Over the last few years, residents of busy metropolises like London and Hong Kong have grown used to the convenience – not to mention lower prices in London’s case – of transport networks that accept electronic payments. Handy pieces of plastic, like the Oyster Card, with chips onboard are clearly a part of life for many people, but the same RFID technology has a far greater reach in Japan, where it has taken the next step and migrated to mobile phones as well.

Here at DWT we don’t ask for much, but just this once we’d appreciate a few minutes of your time that might make a heck of a difference to the lives of a lot of people in general and our pal and DWT contributor Emru Townsend in particular.

Ever wondered what we’ll all be reading on the hover bus in The Future?

It’s kinda late notice (understatement and a half, eh?), but our pals at Orbital Manga in London have an in-store event today to mark the launch of Demon Prince: Children of Gaia from Dimensional Manga.

The To the Source of Anime retrospective ends its run today at the Cinémathèque Québécoise with a tribute to Noburo Ofuji. The “Wartime Japanese Animation” programs included propaganda cartoons that feature strikingly American character designs.

Like many Far-Eastern technologies, Japan’s QR Code gets attention in the West more for being exotic than for any real benefit it brings, so we fully expect the latest all-singing version of the 2D barcode to follow suit.

Most of the breakthroughs in high-speed data connections that we hear about are of purely theoretical value in the short term, but Oki Japan seems set to buck the trend by committing to making its latest technology commercial in the near future.

“It all started with Osamu Tezuka” or “It all started with Astro Boy” have been common ways to start describing the history of anime for years, even though a moment’s sober reflection would reveal the fallacies in those statements. Somewhat surprisingly, the increased popularity of anime outside of Japan has largely served to reinforce, rather than disabuse, these and other notions about the country’s rich animation history.

A seemingly insignificant press release from a Japanese company we’ve never even heard of has suddenly set tongues wagging about everyone’s favorite rumor – the fabled 3G iPhone.

The myth that Japanese mobile phones are the best in the world is typically perpetuated by overseas observers obsessed with the cutting-edge services on offer there and confusing those with what are typically very dull handsets.

So, there we were on a jetfoil in Tokyo Bay the other day, cruising back from a DWT jaunt to Kozu-shima when we spotted this rather attractive monolith in the ocean just to the southeast of Haneda airport.