2008/07/30

People you should meet at iSummit2008- Yoko Nishikido

Yoko Nishikido



Yoko Nishikido is "the woman who knows about the internet in Japan". She is an editor at a publishing company Impress R&D, and had been the editor of a monthly magazine called "Internet Magazine" which is the first magazine in Japan on the "Internet". She won the "Internet Person of the Year, 2007" for her continued efforts and contributions to the industry through her work "The Internet white paper"(since 1998), "The K-tai white paper"(since 2005).

Her bio is as follows:

I am an editor in chief of the book editorial department of Impress R&D in Impress group.After working for the first Internet journal in Japan "Internet magazine" (since 1994 to1997,I have been editing the year book "The Internet white paper"(since 1998), "The K-tai white paper"(since 2005),and many books about the Internet industry and society. In this year, "Apple and Google" written by Hiroshi Ogawa and Nobuyuki Hayashi, and "K-tai industry in how strange Japan " written by Yasuhiko Taniwaki.


錦戸陽子さんはインプレスの有名編集者で、インターネット黎明期のバイブル「インターネットマガジン」に携わった後、インターネット白書やケータイ白書を担当され、その功績により2007年のウェブ人オブ•ザ•イヤーを受賞されています。個人的には、前職時代から大変お世話になっております。いつもありがとうございます :D

プロフィールはこちらです。

1994年、株式会社インプレスに入社。日本初のインターネット専門誌「インターネットマガジン」スタッフとして日本の黎明期のインターネット業界を取材した後、1998年より「インターネット白書」、2005年より「ケータイ白書」という年鑑を担当している。白書以外にもインターネットと社会、インターネットとビジネスをテーマにした本を多数手がけ、今年になって担当した書籍は「アップルとグーグル」(小川浩、林信行著)、「世界一不思議な日本のケータイ」(谷脇康彦著)。現在、インプレスグループのR&Dカンパニーである株式会社インプレスR&D 白書・書籍編集部 編集長。

People you should meet at iSummit2008- Yuji Arakawa

Yuji Arakawa



-who is he?-

Arakawa-san is the CEO of Japan Rights Clearance (JRC), which is one of the collecting agencies in Japan.

In Japan, JASRAC had been the largest and dominant collecting agency for more than 60 years due to the law, and still has nearly 99% share of the market (music copyright payment based), even after private companies like JRC entered the market. This is largely because JASRAC has a system where the TV stations needs to pay JASRAC 1.5% of the revenue and in return they can use JASRACed music as much as they like. It's sort of a fixed fee contract. If the TV station wants to use other agencies' music, they need to pay separately, but as long as they used JASRAC's music, they do not need to pay extra fee. This accelerated the TV stations' use of JASRACed music, made a strong barrier to the competitors.

This domination of the market was criticized repeatedly.

Arakawa-san had been working for an advertising agency creating sponsored entertainment projects. He then became a board member of a company that planed and operated concerts, and in 1995 became a staff of an epoch-making internet live of Ryuichi Sakamoto, and felt strongly that the network will impact the way content industry and the rights would become. This experience led him to found a new collecting agency- JRC in the year 2000.

JRC is funded by 11 music productions. They have contract with famous artists such as L'Arc-en-Ciel, Spitz, Mr.Children, Shogo Hamada, Ringo Shiina, etc.

As the "collecting agency of the new era", JRC is constantly challenging new schemes and projects. In March 2008, for the first time in Japanese collecting agencies, JRC made a contract with Google (YouTube)- which states that "as for JRC-managed music, users can sing/play the music and upload to YouTube. " (Uploading the music by artist is copyright violation)

日本の皆さんはよくご存知だと思いますが、日本の音楽著作権管理団体の業界では、60数年にわたって法律が定めてきた独占事業者であることが大きく影響し、JRCのような民間企業が算入できるようになった今でも、JASRACが市場の99%を押さえています。

原因の1つは、JASRACは、テレビ局が放送事業の収入の1.5%を支払えば、JASRACが著作権を管理している曲を、何度でも自由に使うことを認めるという包括契約を結んでいるため、他の新興事業者の参入が難しくなっていることがあげられています。

そんな中、荒川祐二さんは広告代理店やコンサートの企画運営を行う中で坂本龍一さんのコンサートに携わり、ネットワークがコンテンツ産業や権利のあり方に大きな影響を与えることを確信し、株式会社ジャパン・ライツ・クリアランス(JRC)という新しい著作権利管理団体を立ち上げました。ラルク/ミスチル/スピッツ等の有名アーチストが所属されています。

新しい取り組みにどんどんかかっておられる代表例が、JRCのミュージシャンの音楽であれば歌っても演奏してもYouTubeにアップロードしてOKという契約をGoogle(YouTube)と結んだことでしょう。(ミュージシャン本人の曲をそのままアップするのはNGです。)


まだこちらの記事(JASRAC独占、なぜ崩れないのか——JRCの荒川社長に聞く (1/3)-IT Media)を読んだことのない方は、是非ご一読されることをおすすめします。

荒川さんのプロフィールは下記です。

1965年、長野県生まれ。
90年代前半、広告代理店にて企業のスポンサードによるエンタテインメントの企画制作を手がける。
95年にコンサートの企画制作業務を行う株式会社プロマックス取締役に就任、様々なアーティストのコンサート企画制作に携わる。95年に坂本龍一が行ったインターネットライブの際にスタッフの一員であったことから、ネットワークがコンテンツ産業や権利のあり方に大きな影響を与えることを確信。
2000年、音楽プロダクション11社の出資により、音楽著作権管理事業会社「株式会社ジャパン・ライツ・クリアランス」JRC)を設立、代表取締役社長に就任。2002年より事業を開始。
2008年3月には、日本国内の著作権管理事業者としては初めて、YouTubeにおけるJRC管理楽曲の利用に関してGoogle社との間で包括的利用許諾契約を交わすなど、新しい時代の著作権管理事業者として積極的な展開を推進している。

2008/07/27

Gununu

"Gununu" was in Buzztter a LOT yesterday.

Buzztter is a service that calculates the buzz words in Twitter, calculated by the hour.
English version is here:
Japanese version is here:

What is Gununu?
It's not a word, it's an expression of a feeling where this character Anna in animation "Ichigo Marshmallows" expressed... she wanted to fight back but couldn't and she was going "Gununu..." or "Grrrr.......".

Gununu itself is just cute, and there's nothing more to it, but the reason I took this up was because I was amazed by people creating more than 1,000 Gununu pictures remixing with other characters. And funny it is, we can generally tell what character it is using :)

This blog has some of those 1000 Gununu pictures...

I thought this is sort of a good example of how Japanese geeks suddenly picks something up and starts creating massive remix out of it :D

People you should meet at iSummit2008- Yasuhiro Nakanishi

Yasuhiro Nakanishi



-who is he?-

Nakanishi-san works for Dentsu, which is the largest ad agency in Japan.

He is currently working on an International Technical Standard for Digital Rights Permission Code with the following components:

1) Content ID (identifies the content)
2) From ID (identifies the rights holder or permission manager)
3) To ID (identifies the distributor, consumer or device)
4) N digital rights permission code (expresses specific, detailed usage permission conditions)

You can see his presentation here:



As many organizations are currently looking into establishing the copyright registry system all over the world, I think it is important that people considering similar projects to be in discussion with each other. If iSummit can be a place where people can share their plans, opinions, discussions to make the system better, it would be awesome.

-when will he be in the summit?-

7/30 and 7/31 AM only.

日本語でも少しだけ。中西康浩さんは、株式会社電通のコミュニケーション・デザイン・センターにお勤めで、デジタルライツの国際技術標準の策定に取り組んでおられます。

現在、様々な団体がこういった形でコンテンツの登録制の取り組みを行っているため、iSummit2008の場に集まっている人たちの中で同様の検討を行っている人たちが多くおられると思います。せっかく集まるこの場で、情報共有、意見交換等を行うことができれば。。。と考えております。

People you should meet at iSummit2008- Hiroyuki Itoh

Hiroyuki Itoh



-who is he?-

Itoh-san is the managing director of Crypton Future Media, which created a DTM software called "Hatsune Miku".

I have written TONS of posts on Hatsune-Miku because it was actually a phoenomenon making software which enables the users to make the character Miku- with an anime voice actor's voice- sing the songs they inputed.

People started composing lots of music, uploaded them on video sharing sites, others started to sing those songs, play with orchestra, created videos for those music, 3D videos for them, and some even started to create 3D modelling software for Miku. It really created a cycle of creativity around various users and artists.

You can read my introduction to Hatsune-Miku post here, but Itoh-san says he will bring his PC to the summit and if there is anyone who wants to know about Miku, he'd be happy to speak or demo for you. I think you really should take this chance- it is really awesome. Must see.

Bio of Itoh-san:

Managing director of Crypton Future Media, Inc. The Company's motto is "Get the inspirations from sounds". Having more than 50 business partners all over the world, Crypton is in the business of licensing/distributing several million sound contents in Japan, creating/delivering contents for mobile phone, as well as developing search technology of sounds. The company is also known as a developer of "HATSUNE MIKU" singing software. Since this year, Mr. Itoh also serves as a guest professor at Hokkaido Information University.


-which session can I see him?-

He will be on the panel "Copyright from Creators' Perspective" with Joi Ito, Kenji Eno and Tadashi Fukuda on 8/1 @ 11:30, but unfortunately this session is Japanese only and no translation. I highly recommend you talk with him directly.

-when will he be in the summit?-

He will be at the summit on 7/30-8/1.

日本の方は伊藤博之さんや初音ミク、クリプトン•フューチャー•メディアのことはよくご存知だと思いますので多くは語りませんが、初音ミク現象については私も他の人もたくさんたくさんブログを書いているので一個だけこちらをご覧頂ければと思います。伊藤さんには8/1の11:30@特別会議室のセッション「クリエイターから見た権利と文化」にご登壇頂きます。Joi、角川デジックスの福田社長、ゲームクリエイターの飯野賢治さんとの豪華なパネルディスカッションです。是非ご参加ください。

伊藤さんのプロフィールは下記の通りです。

伊藤博之
クリプトン・フューチャー・メディア株式会社代表取締役。会社のスローガンは、『音で発想するチーム』。世界各国に50数社の提携先を持ち、数百万件のサウンドコンテンツをライセンス販売するほか、コンテンツ配信・検索技術など、音を発想源とした事業をフラットな社内体制のもと日々進めている。「初音ミク」の開発会社としても知られる。北海道情報大学客員教授も兼任。

People you should meet at iSummit2008- Paul Keller

Paul Keller



Photo CC-BY Joi Ito

-who is he?-

Paul Keller is the CC Netherlands project lead, coordinates the collecting societies working group of Creative Commons International, and the board of iCommons, and senior project lead of tech for Knowledgeland.

He led a bunch of legendary projects such as CC Netherlands to get funded by the government, and also got CC Netherlands to do an experimental project with the collecting society "Buma/Stemra" where they allow artists to make their works available using non-commercial CC licenses. Very impressive.


Video by Fumi Yamazaki


Bio of Paul Keller is as follows:

Paul Keller is senior project lead of technology and the public domain at Knowledgeland, an Amsterdam based think tank. He is public project lead for Creative Commons in the Netherlands and coordinates the collecting societies working group of Creative Commons International. He has been on the board of iCommons from 2005.

Prior to joining Knowledgeland Paul Keller headed the Public Domain programme of Waag Society, an Amsterdam based research and development lab for new media. He holds a masters degree in Comparative Political Science (University of Amsterdam, 2002).


-which session can I see him?-

He is the keynote speaker on 8/1.
Title of his speech is "Collecting Societies -Mars Landing-"

This presentation will explore the evolving relationship between Collecting Societies and individual rights management practices as expressed through the use of Creative Commons licenses by musicians and other free culture practitioners. The past three years have seen intensive interactions between Collecting Societies and Creative Commons and over the last year we have seen the emergence of experiments that explore the potential of combining collective rights management and individual rights management.

I will reflect on the history and role of collecting societies, the challenges posed by Creative Commons and other individual rights management practices to the status quo and the models that seek to combine the two.

There are currently two different approaches of combining (NC) CC licensing with collective rights management. In the Netherlands (highly regulated and restrictive) and Denmark (more or less a laisser faire approach). the presentation will describe these approaches and the processes that have lead to them coming into being and explore future scenarios.



He will also be speaking in the Open Business track at 7/31 11:30 at room 108.
Mars Landing: How Collecting Societies Have Opened


Open business models in the music industry have a strong link to collecting societies. The field is broader than the discussion about collecting societies although at the moment collecting societies are one of the important players.

This session is a panel discussion around the issues at the intersection between the open music business and collecting societies. There have been some significant changes recently in the collecting societies regime and these will be grappled with in this session. At least half of the time in the session will be dedicated to open discussion.


-when will he be in the summit?-

He will be in the summit the whole period- from Day0 to Day3. yay!


日本語でも少しだけ。

ポール=ケラーさんはCCオランダのトップ、iCommonsの役員、Knowledgelandというアムステルダムのシンクタンクの技術トップ等を兼務しつつ、Creative Commons Internationalのcollecting societies(日本でいうJASRAC等)のワーキンググループのコーディネータをしています。

オランダが先進的な国であることは事実ですが、それにしてもCCオランダの運営資金調達を政府相手に行って成功したり、CC オランダのcollecting societyである "Buma/Stemra" と共同実験を行い、ミュージシャンが非営利利用の場合はCCライセンスを選べるようにしたりと、ものすごい企画推進力のある人です。

基調講演(8/1)も行いますし、また Open Businessのセッションではオープンな音楽ビジネスとcollecting societiesのあり方について、近年見られる色々な変化についてディスカッションするということで、JASRAC等の問題に関心がある方は是非彼のセッション(7/31 11:30@ room 108) に参加することをお勧めします。

People you should meet at iSummit2008- Hiroaki Kitano

I am going to start a series of posts called "People you should meet at iSummit2008".

Hiroaki Kitano




-who is he?-

Kitano-san is a world-renowned researcher in biological networks
and is also well known for being one of inventors of the AIBO robot.

-which session can I see him?-

He is the keynote speaker on 8/1.
Title of his speech is "Sharing and Open Knowledge and the Future of Scientific Research"

Mr. Kitano has created a massive project called "Payao" which uses networks to allow a large number of researchers to collaborate and share information about biological networks and systems. In his talk, he will describe the increasingly complex nature of research in his field and how it would be impossible without sharing between researchers using open source, open networks and open knowledge.

In addition, he will describe how biological networks are in many ways similar to the Internet and other networks in which commons-based peer production occurs.

-when will he be in the summit?-

He will be coming to the summit only on 8/1.

bio of Kitano-san as follows:

Dr. Hiroaki Kitano

Hiroaki Kitano is a Director at Sony Computer Science Laboratories, Inc. and a Project Director of Kitano Symbiotic Systems Project, ERATO-SORST, Japan Science and Technology Agency. He is also a President of The Systems Biology Institute, a visiting professor of the University of Tokyo and Keio University, and a Founding President of The RoboCup Federation. He received a B.A. in physics from the International Christian University, Tokyo, and a Ph.D. in computer science from Kyoto University. Since 1988, he has been a visiting researcher at the Center for Machine Translation at Carnegie Mellon University. Kitano received The Computers and Thought Award from the International Joint Conferences on Artificial Intelligence in 1993, Prix Ars Electronica 2000, Japan Design Culture Award 2001, and Good Design Award 2001, as well as being an invited artist for Biennale di Venezia 2000 and Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) New York in 2001. His research interests include AI, Robotics, and Systems Biology.




日本の方はよくご存知のはずの北野宏明さん。
8/1の基調講演にご登壇頂きます。
タイトルは「オープンな知識の共有と、科学研究の未来について」

実は私の大学時代のサークルの先輩で、大学時代から「伝説の北野さん」として名を馳せておられましたが、その後電子辞書やAIの研究、ロボットのワールドカップであるロボカップやAIBOの開発などでご活躍なさっています。現在はSONY-CSLの所長として、バイオの研究に力を入れておられます。

今回の基調講演では、「Payao」というバイオ領域での研究者の共同プロジェクトを紹介してくださいます。バイオの領域は非常に複雑で、研究者間がopen source/open networks/open knowledgeを駆使して協業することが非常に重要とのこと。今回の iSummit2008 にはScience Commonsのメンバーも参加しているので活発な議論と情報交換が行われることが予想されます。

北野さんの日本語bioはこちら:

北野宏明 (きたの ひろあき)
1961年埼玉県生まれ。1984年国際基督教大学教養学部理学科(物理学専攻)卒業後、日本電気(株)に入社、ソフトウエア生産技術研究所勤務。1988年より米カーネギー・メロン大学客員研究員。1991年京都大学博士号(工学)取得。1993年ソニーコンピュータサイエンス研究所入社。1996年同シニアリサーチャー、2002年同取締役副所長、2008年同取締役所長。1998年より科学技術振興事業団ERATO北野共生システムプロジェクト総括責任者兼務。2003年10月より、同プロジェクトの発展継続プロジェクト、独立行政法人 科学技術振興機構 北野共生システムプロジェクト (ERATO-SORST) の総括責任者。2001年4月、特定非営利活動法人システム・バイオロジー研究機構を設立、会長を務める。東京大学客員教授。慶應義塾大学大学院理工学研究科客員教授。ロボカップ国際委員会ファウンディング・プレジデント。Computers and Thought Award (1993), Prix Ars Electronica (2000), JCDデザイン賞(社団法人日本商環境設計家協会)(1997), 日本文化デザイン賞(2001)受賞。ベネツィア・建築ビエンナーレ、ニューヨーク近代美術館(MoMA)等で招待展示を行う。

Tech Talks

There are lots of tech talks recently in Japan.

A while ago, I think Japanese engineers didn't give much speech- CEOs or the marketing type people made more speeches. (Correct me if I'm wrong...)

However there are so many Tech Talks recently, all over Japan.

This is the IT tech talk / study group calendar.



You can see there is something, somewhere going on everyday.

You also can see iCommons Summit 2008 at the top of 7/30 calendar events :)



I think 1000speakers project started by a young IT engineer-Amachang- pushed this move. 1000 speakers is a program to enhance engineers who hasn't spoken in front of the audience much- to forget their shyness and expose their tech stuff. Therefore, they limit the number of people who can join each time, to speakers12- listners18 or so. Therefore, every time they announce the dates of the new event, people rush to their wiki to sign up- and sometimes line up in the waiting list. They had 5 1000speakers event so far, and the next one is planned on 8/9. They stream live using ustream, so people who can't go to the venue can learn via the streaming. Also, they archive the videos on Nico Nico Douga. I think it is extremely important that those talks are shared and archived- kudos to Coji Mizoguchi who always carries his equipments to a bunch of tech talks and shoots videos as well as do streaming for them.

Coji started his website a while ago called "techtalk.jp" where you can keep track of a bunch of videos he shooted at various techtalk events.

I always felt the need to learn programming and such talk events and videos stimulate me -that I really should take some time to learn :)

Second Life at iSummit 2008

iCommons Summit 2008 will have Second Life portion.

iSummit in Second Life can be enjoyed here:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Japan%20Sapporo/128/160/22/.

Here is the schedule of SL events: basically we are streaming the keynote speeches.

The island of the City of Sapporo is the main island to cover the events.

There will also be a contest among Second Life residents to build a dynamic, interactive three-dimensional version of the iSummit logo, organized by David Orban.

Jimmy Wales, who cannot come to Sapporo will give his keynote within Second Life, transmitted simultaneously to the live physical audience.

There will also be satellite locations during the summit for the streaming.

Also, Metabirds- a Japanese SL creative company- has started an event to educate about Creative Commons, show the videos of the past iCommons Summit, promote people to create items within SL with CC license, etc.

This venue is completely in Japanese.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Metaegg/107/93/22


Here you can learn about the 6 CC basic licenses.
Photobucket


Here you can watch the videos from the former iSummit.
Photobucket

Here you can try out the sandbox to create CC licensed objects.
Photobucket

iCommons Summit 2008

iCommons Summit 2008 is going to be held on 7/29-8/1 at Sapporo Convention Center.

Photobucket


Here's the PR video of iSummit by Anna Berthold





Quote from Joi's blog:

The summit originally started as a gathering of Creative Commons country leads, but had evolved over the years into a global conference of people interested in social, educational, business, technical, creative, legal and other aspects of sharing, collaborative and open models for doing just about everything. I think it is the most interdisciplinary and global meeting of its kind.




Keynote speeches include Erin McKean, David Wiley, Rebecca MacKinnon, Paul Keller, and many more from overseas.

Japanese keynote speakers are Joi Ito, Hiroaki Kitano and Tsuguhiko Kadokawa.

Jimmy Wales will be giving the keynote via Second Life.

You can see the complete list of the keynote speakers here.



Other than the keynote, there are 6 labs conveying various topics.

Open Education Policy and Practice in a New Century: Implementing What Works

A track dedicated to knowledge-sharing among open education practitioners and the development of new global initiatives to spread open educational tools, policies and practice to countries around the world.

Open Business

A track designed to both introduce newcomers to the basic concepts of open business tools and practices such as the newly-launched CC+ protocol as well as to collaborate on new global initiatives that will further the goals of the open business community.

Local Context Global Commons: Open Publishing

A track that will showcase regional and local approaches to the concept of Free Culture around the world - and will highlight initiatives such as Wikipedia and Global Voices that are developing innovative approaches to the localisation of global projects.

DIY video

This track will focus on how you 'do' open video by exploring best practices for producing and distributing open film.

Frontiers of Openness in Japan

A Japanese-language track coordinated by the ccJapan team to debate and discuss the commons in relation to Japan, and to plan how to spread ideas about Free Culture and the Commons.This track is conducted in Japanese only.

Parallel Event:
Research Workshop on Free Culture

The First International Research Workshop on Free Culture will gather academics and researchers who are interested in furthering scholarship in the Commons and Free Culture, providing a space for them to share the results of their work and develop ideas for further collaboration.

www=lol

iShare Inc. did a research on their e-mail magazine readers.

One of the interesting results was that when they were asked "what does www mean?" 47.0% answered laughter not world wide web.

In the age breakdown, 61.2% of the twenties and 43.1% of the thirties replied they think it means laughter not world wide web.


Q: What does www mean?

Data source: Ishare.Inc

In Japanese, laughter is "warai" and people often uses "w" for laughter, "www" for more laughter, "wwwwwww" for a big laughter, etc.

You can see the whole survey result here though it's in Japanese.

I couldn't stop laughing when Evan Williams twitter this:



I think at least some of them were the Japanese trying to find funny stuff :P

And the post they'd find would be this :P

Tsukiji fish market

One of the places foreigners loves to go in Tokyo is the Tsukiji Fish Market.

****************************************
Toei Oedo line:Tsukiji Shijo station
Tokyo Metro Hibiya line:Tsukiji Station
****************************************

築地
Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

Here's a video of me taking some visitors to Tsukiji.



If you go really early in the morning by 5:30AM or so (I heard it was finished when someone went there at 6AM), you might be able to see the huge Tuna auction. The color of the ribbon represents the level of the tuna.

まぐろ
Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

色でレベル分け
Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

You can buy seafood at the market...

海老
Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

Or, of course you can try out one of the sushi restaurants in the fish market.

大和寿司
Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

When you walk around in the market, make sure you be careful not to be in the way of the people working there... they will be riding a vehicle like this and it's moving quite fast so be careful!

築地
Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

Unfortunately, Tsukiji Fish Market is planned to be moving out in 2012.

The green stickers under the counter says she is against the move.

築地
Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

Recently oil price has sky rocketed, and the oil for the fishing boats has risen by 300% in the past 5 years. The fish industry did a nation-wide one-day non-fishing day on 7/15 to apeal to the government to take necessary countermeasures. Some people feared that this will raise the fish price- which didn't happen. They couldn't raise the fish price as the price is controlled more by the distributers, and also the fishing industry feared that if fish price was raised, the households will start avoiding to eat fish- which would in the end damage the industry.

There is no easy countermeasure for this...

2008/07/24

Kadokawa * YouTube alliance

"Haruhi" was an animation that was broadcasted in smaller TV stations, not with national TV stations. But people loved it so much- and people who were able to watch the anime started uploading the anime clips to YouTube. (Completely illegal.)

And then, there were people who started creating English subtitled versions (called fansubs) and those fansubs had enormous advertisement effect. When Kadokawa started selling English DVD of Haruhi, it sold 60,000 copies just in North America. (Sold 80,000 copies in Japan)

Kadokawa learned from this fact, and decided to have alliance with YouTube as follows:

1) Kadokawa created a "Kadokawa Channel" on YouTube, and will upload video contents there.
2) Kadokawa will give "reference movies" to youTube, and if there are any similar videos uploaded, uploader will get a warning, and Kadokawa will get an alert. (90% accuracy according to Kadokawa)
3) Kadokawa can decide either to "delete" that video, "leave as it is" or "officialize" that video
-officialize meaning they will put a logo that the video is accepted by Kadokawa, and put ads on it.
4) Kadokawa might offer works such as movie creation of scenario writing- to the creators found on YouTube.

Why did this happen?

It is based on a decision made by Tsuguhiko Kadokawa who is the chairman of Kadokawa Group Holdings. According to various articles, he saw various MAD animes created by users and uploaded on YouTube, Nico Nico Douga, etc.

Total views of Kadokawa's copyright infringement videos amounted 100 million views.

He felt that merely telling them that it is illegal and turning them down isn't just right. When Comic Market (Doujinshi market) started, most publishers thought of them as "pirates" and they're bad. Kadokawa thought of them as fans and a new place that creates new creators. The same thing is happening here- this time in the video industry. He wanted to find out a way to approve them.

"We shouldn't turn down the creators, nor should we diminish the motivations of those creators by not paying for the contents/creators. Japan should make a new system where it is benefitial for all of the creators, distributers and content holders."

So here it is. Kadokawa authorized MAD videos.

"Kadokawa" on the bottom right is the proof of Kadokawa authorizing.



Following are various MAD animes that were thought to be illegal until the minute they got the Kadokawa-logo.


This is the famous Haruhi Dance video (right and left is opposite so that people can practice the dance)



Haruhi Dance from all over the world.



Haruhi pictures collaged into a video.



Haruhi MAD with Macross song (another animation's song)



Haruhi * Rakista MAD anime (another animation)



Tokiwo Kakeru Shoujo MAD with Spitz song (non-anime song)

2008/07/23

Vegetarian restaurants in Sapporo

Shoujin Restaurant Yo (精進レストラン葉)
Completely vegan.

Adress :2-12, W7S17 Chuo-ku, Sapporo 0640917
tel/fax +81-(0)11-562-7020
e-mail: info*shoujin.com


Mon/Tue 11:30-16:00
Thu to Sun 11:30-16:00, 18:00-22:00
(L.O 21:00 for food, 21:30 for drinks)
Closed on Wednesday


Subway "Nanboku line" Horohirabashi station (5 minutes walk)
Streetcar "Shiden" Seishu Gakuen Mae (1 minute walk)

青い空 流れる雲(Aoi Kumo, Nagareru Kumo)
Adress :Minami1, Nishi22 Chuo-ku (中央区南1西22)
Tel 011-623-3887
11:30-19:00(Wed, Thurs, Fri)
11:30-20:00 (Fri, Sat)
Closed Mon and Tues
No eggs, sugar or milk products

Kitchen Polan

Address: Kita7 Higashi9 Higashi-ku Ario Sapporo 1F (東区北7東9アリオ札幌1F)
Tel 011-743-9319
11:00-22:00
Open everyday

Vegetarian restaurants in Tokyo

Tokyo Vegetarian Guide:

Vegetarian-Restaurants.net:

Yasaiya Mei
Place:Omotesando Hills
Address:4-12-10 Jingumae Shibuya-ku
Omotesando Hills Main bldg 3F
TEL 03-5785-0606
11:00-24:00
Open everyday


Daigo
Place: Atago Green Hills
Address:2-3-1 Agato Minato-ku
Atago Greenhills Forest Tower 2F

TEL 03-3431-0811
FAX 03-3431-1382
Lunch 12:00〜(L.O.14:00)
Dinner 17:00〜(L.O.20:00)
Open everyday
budget (lunch 10,000yen/dinner 20,000yen)

2008/07/21

Yukata

In my previous post, I recommended you wear a yukata for firewokrk events.
So let me explain what Yukata is.

Yukata is a Japanese traditional cooling garment for summer.
Some of you may wonder the difference with Kimono, which is a formal, Japanese traditional clothing.

You can see the difference by taking a look at the photos:

These photos are Kimono


Photo CC-BY-NC-ND by Gullevek


Photo CC-By iMorpheus

These photos are Yukata


Photo CC-BY-NC-ND by Gellevek


Photo CC-BY Joi

Yukata actually means bathing cloths, which you wear after you take a hot bath and cool off- but it is not limited to wear only after taking a bath.

Yukata actually has 2 types- Yukata to wear and go out, a more casual Yukata to wear inside of hotels etc.

A big difference - I think- is the Obi, the strap that you put around your stomach to fix the yukata.

This how an Obi looks- but there are so many ways to tie the obi.

Obi of Yukata.


Photo CC-BY-NC-ND by Gullevek

The casual "bath" type yukata (for inside your house/hotel) usually does not have obi.

I found a small Japanese souvenir shop in Shibuya yesterday. They have kimono, yukata, and bathing type yukata, and other Japanese goodies.

Maruara-Watanabe is the name of the shop.
Address: 16-8 Udagawa-cho, Shibuya-ku, TOKYO
Phone: 03-3461-0064
Open weekdays at 11:00-19:00, weekends and holidays at 13:00-19:00
Closed on Wednesdays.



If you go to a department store during summer, it would be easy for you to find a nice yukata. There are also online shops such as this one

If you don't have much time but want an inexpensive yukata to give it a try, you can go to one of the Uniqlo shops. Uniqlo is a chain, casual wear store with T-shirts etc but they have yukata during the summer.


Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

If you don't want to buy a yukata but want to try it on- and also you want to try Japanese onsen (hot spring) but you don't have time, then you might want to try out Oedo Onsen Monogatari in Odaiba. It's a place in the Tokyo bay area. Admission 2,827 yen includes the hot spring, yukata rental, etc.

You get to select a yukata from 19 styles


CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

A very Japanese atmosphere from the old ages.

CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

They might teach you how to dance "Bon-odori" a Japanese dance.

CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

BTW, if you are buying a yukata, I highly recommend you get someone to teach you how to wear a yukata or get them do it for you, but for your reference this is a nice site that has animations on how to wear yukata, how to do the obi, etc. They also have a section for men's yukata.

OH I almost forgot to post this photo :P

Hello Kitty wearing Kimono!


Photo CC-BY-NC by micamica

Fireworks

Japanese people LOVES fireworks.


Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi Yamazaki


Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi Yamazaki

I remember that when I was a child and lived in Chicago, fireworks were prohibited and independence day was the only time I could see fireworks (maybe it has changed...?) but in Japan, we have LOTS of firework events.

The "BIG 3" Tokyo firework festivals are:

隅田川花火大会 (Sumida-river Fireworks)
Place : Asakusa
Go to Aasakusa station or Kuramae station and walk from there
Date : 26th July 2008 19:10-20:30
About 20,000 fireworks
About 980,000 people attended last year


2008神宮外苑花火大会 (Jingu Gaien Fireworks)
Place : Jingu stadium
Need to pay if you want to go into the stadium. Fireworks can be seen from outside.
Go to Gaienmae station or Aoyama-1choume station and walk from there
Date : 7th August 2008
About 10,000 fireworks
About 1,000,000 people attended last year


東京湾大華火祭 (Tokyo Bay Great Fireworks)
Place : around Tokyo Bay
Go to Toyosu station or Kachidoki station and walk from there
Date : 10th August 2008
About 10,000 fireworks
About 35,000 people attended last year

This is the video I took last year, of Sumidagawa fireworks from my friend's house.



This is the video I took last year, of Odaiba fireworks from Miraikan.



It would be nice if you can get a yukata- summer version casual kimono - like this :)



Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi Yamazaki

Beware that there is going to be a BIG crowd of people though- as you can see from the "number of people expected" above. It's going to be really really packed.


Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi Yamazaki

As you can see from the far back side of this photo, some people rents the boat and watches the fireworks from the boats. The boats reservation fills up quickly though...

Enjoy!

Wii Fit

Recruit, which is one of the major magazine publishers did a survey on 1,000 internet users who are 20-34 years old.

In the marketing world, 20-34 old male are called M1, 20-34 old female are called F1, so the result of this survey was called "M1F1 Grand Prix".

M1F1 Grand Prix results for January-June 2008 is as follows:

Data Source: Hot Pepper (Magazine by Recruit)

Ranking till the 20th can be seen here with the photo from the awarding ceremony.

You can see that Wii Fit won the 1st place both in M1 and F1.
Many Japanese people loves games, but I think Wii and Wii Fit opened the door to the non-gamers out there to start playing games.



Photo CC-By-NC by Nataliej

This Japanese programmer - Yappo - has created a PC controller by hacking wii fit and presented at YAPC Asia (Yet Another Perl Conference in Tokyo). Very cool :)



Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi

Following is the data of weekly sales of games in Japan.



Data source: Famitsu.com

Wii Fit is ranked 5th now, but the total sales is incomparable from other games.

Ponyo

What's the buzz this weekend?

I'd say it's the anime movie by Studio Ghibli, "Gake no ue no Ponyo" or "Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea" which just launched this weekend.


Pic data source: download section of Ponyo official site

Wikipedia article on Ponyo is here.

This is the newest movie of Hayao Miyazaki, the animation movie director who made Nausicaa, Laputa, Totoro, etc whom I am a big fan of, and the music which is attracting and addictive so many people - I see lots of my friends writing Ponyo Ponyo Ponyo Ponyo because of that- is made by Joe Hisaishi, who was doing the music for many of the Ghibli movies, and I'm also a fan of Hisaishi-san too :)

Japanese blog posts including the word "ポニョ"
Data source: Technorati Japan



Movies yearly box offices in Japan, 2007


Data source: Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan, Inc.
1USD is approximately 106 JP Yen

Movies yearly box offices in the U.S., 2007



Data source: Box Office Mojo

iPhone 3G

What was the hottest topic last week?

It was iPhone 3G- as was in other parts of the world.




Photo CC-BY-NC by Buru



iPhone is sold by Softbank which was one of the newer mobile career in Japan. According to a research conducted by GfK Japan, the sales share of Softbank at electronic shops was 19% on 7/10 (the day before iPhone) was 50% on 7/11. On 7/11 and 7/12, 67.5% of the mobile phone sales was iPhone 3G, according to GfK.

You can see further data on CNet Japan- the blue column on the bottom is NTT Docomo, which always had more than 50% of the sales shares- but on 7/11 and 7/12, it became 31% and 40% accordingly. Red column just above Docomo is Softbank Mobile. NTT Docomo announced that they will start selling iPhones too.




Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Fumi



iPhone was on sale on 7/11, but at Softbank Omotesando shop, people started to line up 4 days before the sales, and on the day of the sales there were around 1500 people waiting for 15 hours or so. This is the photo I have taken when I visited the line after joining the iPhone-Night event. The line had already around 1,000 people at midnight when I got to the end of the line. The lines were organized- as you can imagine from the fact how Japanese people are used to lining up in big queues-. They had lining up rules- for example, people had to ask for toilet tickets when they leave the queue, and come back within 30 minutes, etc.




Photo CC-BY-NC-SA by Nobihaya

This is one of my friends in the iPhone que. Ichiroo was cosplaying as iPhone :P He's the editor in chief of Gizmodo Japan. You can see their coverage on iPhone queue here.



Japanese blog post including the word "iPhone"
-data source Technorati Japan



FYI: Blog post including the word "iPhone"
-data source Technorati Japan



This is a video of iPhone queue at Omotesando Softbank shop by Hokayan.