Tokyo Shift

The future is now in the land of the rising sun

by Rick Martin, Japan

View at own risk: Five insanely addictive Japanese commercials

Jul 6, 2009 08:03

Since coming to Japan I've been trying to watch as much television as possible in the hopes that the language might gradually seep into my brain. Unfortunately, by doing so, I've subjected myself to more than a few catchy advertising jingles that just will not get out of my head. Here is a list of the worst offenders. Be warned, if crack could be transmitted through a television set it would probably look something like this. You'll never be the same after watching these commercials. I'm not entirely sure how the Japanese make such sticky ads, but in the age of viral Internet video, it's certainly good marketing strategy.
Read more »

4 comments | Share

Move over Gundam, construction on Gigantor is almost complete

Jun 30, 2009 08:24

Now that the life-size Gundam figure is complete, it was only a matter of time before Japan constructed a second giant robot. After all, you wouldn't want the first one to get lonely, right? It seems the folks in Kobe have nearly finished a 60ft-tall Testujin robot.
Read more »

3 comments | Share

New & improved Busty Mousepad is more realistic than ever!

Jun 27, 2009 01:44

Perhaps you've already seen the boob-shaped mousepads that have become so popular in Japan. Well, it seems one innovative young man was not quite satisfied with anime boobs and took it upon himself to make it more realistic. He printed out a picture of his favorite scantily clad idol on a piece of cloth and then pressed that cloth over one of these lumpy fun-pads.
Read more »

4 comments | Share

Augment your reality and be a Transformer

Jun 23, 2009 20:46

The new Transformers movie is finally out in theaters, but for those of you who haven't had the chance to check it out out (like me), here's something you can try.

Drop on over to weareautobots.com and give their augmented reality experiment a try. Using facial recognition the site will pick up your face with the Web camera, and then it masks your ugly mug with an Optimus Prime head. Sadly, it does not seem to work for my dog Pepe Q-tip.
Read more »

Leave a comment | Share

Problems with Facebook's custom url

Jun 13, 2009 15:04

Like most people, I just grabbed my custom url on Facebook. While I wanted Facebook.com/rickmartin, I noticed that the first option presented to me was /rick.martin. And that was what I hastily took. But when I checked to see who had grabbed /rickmartin, I found that it was redirecting to my rick.martin page. It turns out that Facebook doesn't really care for dots and skips right over them.�So oddly enough, if you browse to http://facebook.com/r...i...c...k........marti........n you'll still find me.

Neato, right?�Not so fast... I was discussing this with my friend Clark when we noticed that as you browse to a custom profile url, it wreaks havoc with the url structure for the remainder of your Facebook browsing session.

3 comments | Share

About Rick Martin

After a few years in China studying Mandarin and watching the Chinese Tech scene, Rick Martin has escaped to Japan and is loving every minute of it. When he's not working on his pet projects, 2JPN and DS Ninja, he can usually be found exploring all things tech in the land of the rising sun. Drop him a line on Twitter, Facebook, or contact him via Email.