Good news for unemployed spys. The FSB (�U�R�A, offspring of KGB) is, again, hiring. Its wage, a little bit higher than Wal-Mart level. And its perks are far above the hamburger-flipping McJob's. Irresistible perks are thrown in, like: "See the world, free travel assured. And free funeral, even if something went wrong."

Already, Akiba speciality shops are jam-packed with hordes of anonymous agents who buy up all the professional snoop gear to outfit their personnel. Days of in-house gadget development have gone long time ago. Sure, outsourcing is the norm of this century. Akihabara can supply any spy gear to anybody indiscriminately; cheaper, better and more sophisticated.

Compared to those flourishing "agents" from Russia, the US and China, local Japanese spys are pretty much in bad shape. Stingy Government "restructured" them in bulk. They had really a convenient excuse for this mass-firing, sure, all-covering godsend, subprime.

Don't fondle your K-tai on the escalator steps in Japan. You could be mistaken for a tousatsu pervert, or worse, an unemployed spy.

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Dejikame (digital camera) has annihilated quite a few jobs in the photo business. First to go were thousands of mom-and-pop camera shops that used to be a staple in the Japanese townscape. Suddenly, people stopped buying film cameras. Dejikame era has come decisively.

Another mom-and-pop camera shop went belly up and closed its shutters for the last time.

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Ever heard of a Prada phone? Or, worse, an Armani phone? According to Mobile Ojisan's lopsided view, genuine lumps of idiocy. Solid pieces of illusion, driven by not electrons but by pretension.

What, you've got one already! Er... in that case, I retract from my word and apologize.

DECO-ed and personalized Sony VAIO Type T. Traditional Kyoto Yuzen-zome beauty on your lap.

Ah well, some women (even some men, too!) eagerly spit out tons of their good money for a cheapo plastic bag with funny logo printed on it. Compared to those air bags, silly phones have got, at least, some concrete ICs and circuit boards in them. All the same, nothing can ratify their stratospheric price tag.
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Mmm, you'are an eco-conscious IT lady. Definitely, you need a suitable garb to express your ecologically correct attitute to everybody... well, at least, to your loved ones. A lady's lingerie firm, Triumph International (Japan), has shown the ultimate answer. Solar cell bra.

"No! to disposable chopsticks bra." She's got her personal o-hashi stashed somewhere in her bra.	"No! to plastic bag bra". Her bra transformed into reusable shopping bag. She has to wear two layers of bra for the picture.

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I guess you were pretty disgusted with that silly bubblewrap simulator of my last posting. You are not alone.

Anyway, only Japanese engineers could incubate that kind of wicked concept, and materialize the madness as an actual object. And only Japanese customers are crazy enough to welcome this hopeless object wholeheartedly. So much so that �� Puchi Puchi became one of the hit products of 2007; more than 2 million pieces sold. Disgusting, isn't it?

Problem: The engineer who had concocted this simulator was not reprimanded or ostracized at all. He was given another chance, instead.
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