One of Year’s Best Startups Isn’t in Silicon Valley, or China
One of the year’s most spectacular startup payoffs isn’t in Silicon Valley or China, it’s in Japan. Mercari Inc.’s $3.7 billion coming-out party will deliver a 149-times return to earl…
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Japan lowers its age of adulthood to 18
The Japanese government enacted a bill Wednesday lowering the age of adulthood from 20 to 18, but teenagers beware: the legal age of drinking will stay fixed at 20. The change, the first of its …
Art on the Road – Three Traveling Exhibitions From the Hara Museum
The Hara Museum of Contemporary Art has two sites in Japan – one in bustling Tokyo and one in the peaceful Gunma countryside, two hours by train from the capital. Located next to the ranch park Ikaho…
Disrupting Japan #122: Why Business Cards Are Disappearing
If you’ve ever done business in Japan, someone probably walked you through the intricacies of Japanese business card culture. Chika Terada, the founder of Sansan, created one of Japan’s most suc…
Facial recognition system unveiled for Japanese passport holders at Narita airport
Automated passport control gates based on facial recognition technology were unveiled to the press Friday at Narita airport ahead of their official debut. The unmanned gates, which will debut on…
70 Long-Lost Japanese Video Games Have Been Discovered in a 67GB Folder of ROMs on a Private Forum
Until yesterday, rare Japanese PC game Labyrinthe, developed by Caravan Interactive, was long thought to be lost forever. That is until the almost mythical third game in the already obscure Horror To…
Nearly 80 Percent of Japan's Airbnbs Were Just Removed
And then there were 13,800. That's how many Airbnbs are left operating in all of Japan, after the home-sharing site removed at least 62,000 homes, apartments, and rooms this weekend from it…
Bossy piggy bank, toilet roll gun wow Tokyo toy show
From a piggy bank that demands your cash to a pump-action gun blasting damp toilet roll pellets: Tokyo's toy show has a bewildering array of gadgets to delight both kids and the young-…
Anime adaptation of popular novel canceled in Japan after offensive tweets
A plan to turn a popular graphic-style novel into an animated television series has hit a dead end after the author's past discriminatory tweets on China and South Korea sparked a controver…
How to Make a Reservation in Japanese
Most US restaurants that require a reservation will allow you to make it online. Few restaurants in Japan have this capacity, however, so you'll need to learn to do so over the phone. It's …