世論 What Japan Thinks

As the year draws to a close, goo Ranking decided to look at what gives Japanese that feeling that the year is coming to an end.

Demographics

Over the 21st and 22nd of November 2007 1,101 members of the goo Research monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.7% of the sample was female, 6.2% in their teens, 15.4% in their twenties, 30.2% in their thirties, 27.1% in their forties, 11.0% in their fifties, and 10.3% aged sixty or older.

For me, it has to be ordering the New Year postcards. What gives you that end of year sense?
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Whilst I get in contact with the winners of each group, I’ll do mini-reviews of all the blogs that didn’t quite make it. Next up is the culture blogs

neomarxisme and clast: Despite two blogs for the price of one here, he just didn’t quite manage to get enough votes to win. His personal neomarxisme has sort-of wound down, with his work-sponsored clast taking up some of his blogging time – his other blogging home, neojaponisme also picks up fromwhere neomarxisme left off. His blog reminds me of a friend from school who used to write letters to our local newspaper about existentialism.

Sushi Day: Not really a blog about Japan, but I thought it was such a colourful and nicely-designed blog it would be fun to introduce it to everyone. Many interesting sushi recipes with an American flavour; funnily enough, her latest post mentions that she has eaten raw fish sushi for her first time ever!

No-sword: A blog about Japanese language, literature, culture, and art, as it describes itself. Another fascinating blog about little looked-at corners of Japan. This is the sort of blog that should have better exposure, so I hope that this goes some way to spreading its name around.

ryuganji: he opening page is more magaziney than bloggish, which helps to highlight the very good use of photography to illustrate the stories. Lots of stuff on the side of Japanese cinema that doesn’t usually get touched upon in English.

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Chavs are a UK phenomenon; youths of ill-repute, often football hooligans, who were (and might still be) wont to dress in designer brands, with Burberry, and in particular Burberry baseball caps, being the item of choice. A recent survey conducted by MyVoice into high-class brands found that Burberry was also the most owned high-class brand in Japan.

Demographics

Over the first five days of December 2007 14,452 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample was female, 2% in their teens, 16% in their twenties, 39% in their thirties, 28% in their forties, and 15% in their fifties.

I don’t think I own any posh brand items and I think they are all a rip-off anyway! I do snigger, however, whenever I see Dunhill branded items, in particular fragrances, as for me they are forever associated with cigarettes. However, given Japanese male’s love affair with smoking, I suppose that’s a plus in Japan.

The photographed Chav-mobile is from Starphuk on flickr.
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Apologies to anyone who tried to access the site yesterday – just before bedtime I updated a plugin without testing it, and it broke my blogging software, making the site bascially unavailable for the whole day.

Normal service has now (hopefully) been resumed.

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Whilst I get in contact with the winners of each group, I’ll do mini-reviews of all the blogs that didn’t quite make it. I’m sure there’s a word to describe this, but if I stare at “humourous” for too long the word just starts looking all strange and meaningless. Anyway, on with the show.

The Hopeless Romantic and His Adventures in Japan (Claytonian@YouTube): I have to admit that I find personal videos hard to watch as I have a thing about seeing my own face, and somehow other people’s faces remind me of that. Also, for some reason my computer’s not playing the sound on the videos either. Sorry Claytonian, but I’ll review your actual blog instead! Lots of good stuff about his life in Japan; I liked and can identify with trying and failing to speak keigo!

an englishman in osaka: Hey, that’s cool; if you search Google for an englishman in osaka, you – well, just try it and see. This blog is updated far less regularly than it should be, and his British sense of humour is spot on, for instance with this look at the new fingerprinting procedures.

Gaijin Tonic: Another British blogger, this time drinking his way through life in Japan. Wonderfully silly stuff throughout!

TV in Japan: Silly Japanese. YouTube. Copyright trampling. On TV. In Japan.

Today’s SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) lesson – the top two vote-getters called for votes through YouTube video broadcasts – perhaps this is a worthwhile way of promoting one’s blog.

Read more on: blog of the year

Perhaps this Christmas many children in both Japan and the rest of the world found a mobile phone in their stockings. To see how elementary school-aged children view their phones, goo Research released on Christmas day the results of a survey of users of Kids goo (goo’s child-targeted portal) on children’s use of mobile phones.

Demographics

Between the 9th and 26th of November 2007 1,100 elementary school-aged users of the Kids goo portal completed a public survey available through the web site. 60.0% were girls, 3.7% in first year of elementary school, 4.8% in second year of elementary school, 7.7% in third year of elementary school, 20.0% in fourth year of elementary school, 28.9% in fifth year of elementary school, and 34.9% in sixth year of elementary school.

In Q6, it’s interesting to see the differences between the sexes; boys have significantly less contact with friends through mobile phones. The reasons for this would be fascinating to investigate further; is it that girls are more sociable with their friends, or do boys prefer to meet in person, or is there another driving force behind the differences?

In Q7 I’m really surprised that 45% of the mobile phone using children have basically no parent-enforced usage rules. I would hope that the parent has set up limits with the service provider such as blocking potentially harmful sites or even turning off internet access altogether, and other limits such as not allowing them to make any payments for site access or content download.
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Read more on: children,goo research,mobile phone

Whilst I get in contact with the winners of each group, I’ll do mini-reviews of all the blogs that didn’t quite make it.

Trans-Pacific Radio: In second place was the only PodCast I listen to, TPR. They cover Japanese politics in their core show, but also foray into business issues in BizCast Japan. I’m glad, I suppose, that they didn’t win as I’m such a big fan it would have seemed like a fix. Despite the Debito-supplied Duran Duran I listen to every show and you should too.

Japan Probe: One of the top entertainment blogs on Japan, but one that also tries to educate. James has a great eye for a story and has amassed a good selection of contributors to the blog without losing focus. There’s so much good material that this is another must read site.

JapanNewbie.com: This is a new-to-me blog, but the latest post today on Donald L Philippi was most interesting, and there’s a lot of other good content to be found. I’ve added this one to my reading list.

Daily J: This blog is centred around Japan blogger interviews, and is trying to foster, no, make that build a Japanese blogger community, something I feel should exist, and I hope that this Japan Blog of the Year vote has somehow helped towards that goal. Oh yes, and about the Japan Blog Matsuri – I have an alternative yet cunning plan, and I’ll have to talk to you soon regarding one or the other matsuris!

On a side note, one thing I noticed about all four blogs is that their RSS feeds are well-hidden! Japan Newbie’s was the only one appearing above the fold (ie, appearing on the page without scrolling) although it does look a little lonely sitting all alone there; on the other hand Daily J does have a newsletter within easy reach.

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japan.internet.com recently reported on another of these fascinating (for suitable values of fascinating) snippets of Japanese consumer behaviour as uncovered by a survey conducted by goo Research into digital cameras, focusing on camera modes in particular.

Demographics

Between the 7th and 9th of December 2007 1,097 members of the goo Research online monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.0% were male, 16.6% in their teens, 18.1% in their twenties, 21.7% in their thirties, 16.2% in their forties, 15.6% in their fifties, and 11.8% aged sixty or older.

I use my digital camera in full auto, full silent mode on the whole, but I’ve tweaked the quality down to perhaps medium level; 3 mega-pixels instead of 5 mega-pixels, but high quality mode to try to save a bit of space on the memory cards, although having both a 1 gigabyte and a 512 megabyte card makes this a rather academic exercise. One of the answers for Q2 mentions “Scene Mode”; many cameras have multiple modes for specific situations, not just night, scenery and flash modes, but also close-up, food, baby and I think even pet mode too, although I haven’t studied my instruction manual in sufficient depth to work out what they all do, so just leaving it in auto mode covers 95% of the situations sufficiently.
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With much of Japan soon to be setting out on their New Year holidays, and the rest of Japan due to be kept updated every news bulletin on the traffic situation caused by the first group, japan.internet.com reported on a survey conducted by goo Research into how people will be spending their New Year holidays, specifically regarding internet connectivity.

Demographics

Between the 17th and 20th of December 2007 1,083 members of the goo Research monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.9% of the sample was male, 17.7% in their teens, 19.9% in their twenties, 17.4% in their thirties, 17.6% in their forties, 16.6% in their fifties, and 10.6% aged sixty or older.

It may be useful to refer to a survey earlier this month on how long a New Year break people are having.

As I have no plans for travel, I cannot say what I plan to do, but if I were, I certainly wouldn’t bother taking a PC with me, but if it was available I would check my mail. Having said that, the last time I took an overnight stay, a couple of the free PCs in the lobby were loaded with slightly suspicious-looking applets in the icon tray, so I gave checking my email a miss just in case there was a keylogger installed on the machines.
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Read more on: goo research,holiday,Internet

First, thank you to everyone who voted, and thank you to everyone who nominated or commented in the threads. I hope you all found it interesting and have added a few new blogs to your reading list; I’ve enjoyed running this, so it would be nice to try to make this an annual feature.

Second, this is just a summary of the winners; over the slow New Year period, and once I get some comment from the winners, I’ll review the winners in detail and the candidates in summary, and work out how to distribute the prizes, etc. In addition, I will also select a bonus winner from amongst the commenters in the voting and the nomination thread.

So, without any further ado, here are the winners:

Best serious Japan blog of the year – Observing Japan

Observing Japan wins for its detailed coverage of the political scene, as one of the growing number of blogs looking into aspects of Japan that rarely get aired in English.

Best humourous Japan blog of the year – tofugu.com

tofugu.com takes a multimedia look at Japan, and its YouTube coverage of this poll was responsible for driving a lot of votes here.

Best culture Japan blog of the year – Let’s Japan.org

Let’s Japan.org wins, a fit reward for being a key gathering point for those disgruntled at the meltdown at Nova, and perhaps with less swearing it may even have been in line for the best serious blog!

Best technology Japan blog of the year – Pink Tentacle

Pink Tentacle takes a slightly sideways look at technology in Japan, and I read it to study the style and to pinch writing tips!

Best personal Japan blog of the year – My So-Called Japanese Life

My So-Called Japanese Life has excellent writing, and is a most deserving winner in this section.

Read more on: blog of the year