Posted in: Did DeepSeek copy ChatGPT? Trump adviser thinks so See in context
Given that Chat GPT is effectively founded on large-scale unauthorized use of intellectual property, it's a bit rich for them to complain about this.
9 ( +12 / -3 )
Posted in: In 10-hour news conference, Fuji TV execs step down over TV host sexual misconduct scandal See in context
10 hours and it's still unclear what he did???
2 ( +4 / -2 )
Posted in: Number of 18-year-olds in Japan rises to 1.09 mil See in context
A rise in new adults is a good thing. Let's hope this number keeps ticking upwards.
Alas, there is no point in hoping - next year's adults were born 17 years ago so we know exactly how many there are. No upward tick in sight for the foreseeable future.
4 ( +10 / -6 )
Posted in: Influenza cases soar in Tokyo See in context
It's a particularly bad flu this year - I had it and it hung around for at least 10 days. Stay safe everyone.
10 ( +13 / -3 )
Posted in: Former yokozuna, popular TV pundit Kitanofuji dies at 82 See in context
Nice to see a former yokozuna last to a respectable age. RIP.
7 ( +7 / -0 )
Posted in: On the eve of Oscars honor, James Bond producers reflect on legacy and future of 007 See in context
Cubby, not "Cuddy"!!
1 ( +1 / -0 )
Posted in: Man in wheelchair dies after apparent hit-and-run in Yamaguchi See in context
@BertieWooster that is exactly what "apparent" means. Nobody saw the incident so we don't know for sure, but it APPEARS that he was hit by a car. Seems like a perfect use of the word!
4 ( +4 / -0 )
Posted in: Police officer arrested for allegedly having sex with minor, filming it in Gifu hotel See in context
To the people here who keep saying “age of consent is 16” blah blah blah:
This is not correct - there are national laws and regional laws, so effectively the age of consent differs from prefecture to prefecture. Many prefectures have stricter laws than the national baseline. I believe Tokyo, for example, is 18. I don’t know what the situation is in Gifu but it is quite possible that a law has been broken, and the police evidently believe so.
3 ( +3 / -0 )
Posted in: 64-year-old man arrested for molesting 1-year-old girl in Kyoto park See in context
@Alongfortheride, it seems somewhat unlikely that the mother would have called the police and he would have been arrested if he had patted her on the ankles.
For a long time the crime section in the English speaking news refused to write the words buttocks, ass, or more intimate areas when reporting train groping. I think we all knew that when the report said "the school teacher was arrested for touching the girl's waist" that we was touching her somewhere else.
1 ( +3 / -2 )
Posted in: Should airlines be allowed to overbook on flights (selling more seats than available to account for the likelihood of no-shows)? See in context
Yes, but the deal should be that only volunteers are kicked off the plane. Make an offer, increase it until someone says "yes, OK, I'm happy to not board this one". In the 21st century this should be straightforward enough to accomplish prior to boarding.
They should not have the option of just randomly selecting someone regardless of their circumstances.
3 ( +3 / -0 )
Posted in: Father, son arrested on suspicion of abandoning corpse of woman See in context
Doesn't seem as though they actually abandoned the body - quite the contrary!
3 ( +3 / -0 )
Posted in: Japan sea sludge tells story of human impact on Earth See in context
Similar story on the front page of the BBC today, talking about Canada, with some quite striking video showing identification of periods by sediment.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-66132769
15 ( +16 / -1 )
Posted in: Saturday will be 12 years since the March 11, 2011 disaster. If you were in Japan, what are your memories of that day? See in context
I remember how kind everyone in Tokyo was that day. I lost count of the number of times a stranger asked me if my family/friends were OK.
1 ( +1 / -0 )
Posted in: Man arrested for setting fire to bar after being told other customers don’t like talking to him See in context
@Abe234: given the way he reacted it is very likely that he was being extremely obnoxious, possibly scarily so.
There were no other customers there so seems much more likely that he was harassing the staff. Completely ridiculous to blame them, given that they were clearly dealing with an extremely irrational individual.
18 ( +23 / -5 )
Posted in: Japan reports 97,788 coronavirus cases See in context
@Commodoreflag the answer to your question "how'd I do?" is "quite badly" as y our comment contains a blatant falsehood.
There were not "384,203 hospitalizations today alone", in fact there are a total of 384,203 active cases. The overwhelming majority of those active cases did not arise today, and an even more overwhelming majority have not and will not be hospitalized.
There was in increase in people in hospital of TEN so you're out by approximately 384,000.
Aside from that, you're spot on.
-5 ( +4 / -9 )
Posted in: Operator of major restaurant review site Tabelog ordered to pay damages See in context
A 0.2 drop is huge because although the scale officially runs from 1.0-5.0, in reality almost everywhere seems to fall in between about 3.1 and 3.9. It is ridiculous to make that change just because they are a chain - as @Asiaman7 says, if people like the chain then surely their rating should reflect that.
1 ( +2 / -1 )
Posted in: Ex-Tokyo Olympics chief Mori displeased at backlash over sexist remarks See in context
In what way has he been canceled out??? He said what he believed, other people said "you're wrong and you're a silly old fool" and now he has reiterated his opinion - and his remarks have been reported in the national press. Nobody has been canceled, you snowflake!
4 ( +7 / -3 )
Posted in: Saiki City mistakenly let resident claim ¥1.3 million in gift certificates See in context
The real problem this highlights is that government money, once allocated, never seems to be unallocated even when the need doesn't exist. That's one of the biggest reasons public spending never goes down.
In a sane world this town would have said "Hmm, it seems there was only demand for 24,000 books. Let's just scrap the rest of the program WHICH PEOPLE DON'T SEEM TO WANT, then we don't have to pay out the additional 3,000 per book on 36,000 books. We can use the 108,000,000 yen to fund something else that people actually do want. Or, you know, reduce our spending by 108,000,000 this year".
This isn't the only reason why people don't like paying taxes, but it is one of them.
7 ( +7 / -0 )
Posted in: Ex-Tokyo Olympics chief Mori displeased at backlash over sexist remarks See in context
Women may or may not talk more than men on average but they are certainly not the drivers of long meetings in Japan. Anyone who has worked here for any length of time will tell you that the amount of endless, pointless, directionless meetings is off the charts. This is undoubtedly driven by men, and the closer they are to Mori's age the more they "contribute" to this.
5 ( +8 / -3 )
Posted in: Accused groper dies after jumping out of train station office window See in context
@hellokitty
If you had ever been on a rush hour train in Japan, you would realize that cameras would not be able to see anything in the mass of people.
Perhaps if we put the cameras on the floor looking up….. no wait…..
-4 ( +10 / -14 )
Posted in: New ‘Doctor Who’ star is ‘Sex Education’ actor Ncuti Gatwa See in context
@commanteer, if by "agenda" you mean "having a diverse cast doing stuff" instead of "straight white men doing stuff" then I'm not sure what the problem is. It turns out that in real life women, gay people, and people of different enthnicities also do stuff. Why this is a bad thing in a program aimed at kids, I cannot imagine.
I do, however, agree with you on some of the criticisms of the writing.
2 ( +2 / -0 )
Posted in: New ‘Doctor Who’ star is ‘Sex Education’ actor Ncuti Gatwa See in context
Can't quite work out whether those offended are upset because he's black or gay. Seems to me that of all the characters in fiction where ethnicity/sexuality really don't matter, it's this one.
2 ( +10 / -8 )
Posted in: Ex-nursery school head indicted over 5-year-old boy's death in bus See in context
No they should not get life in prison. This was an accident; there is a case to answer for negligence, and punishment may be appropriate but this remains an unintentional act. Life might have been appropriate if they had locked the poor child in the bus as some kind of punishment, but let's not forget that these are human beings likely traumatized by their mistake.
13 ( +17 / -4 )
Posted in: Japan land prices rebound after marking 1st fall in 6 years See in context
@Zoroto it certainly exists in Britain.
2 ( +2 / -0 )
Posted in: We ask for passengers’ understanding, realizing that the policy may cause some inconvenience. But it is necessary for sustainable operations of rail lines. See in context
Makes sense. They'll be keeping the platform displays. It makes no sense to be spending a large amount of money providing a service that 99.9% of people have on their wrist or in their pocket.
-2 ( +3 / -5 )
Posted in: Tokyo, 15 other prefectures facing power shortage See in context
Whilst it may be true that TEPCO is a shitty company which badly let us all down with regards to nuclear safety, I think we should all use a bit of common sense here. They're asking us to try and cut consumption so that we don't have power cuts. I would personally prefer not to have a power cut, so I will be taking some small steps to reduce my consumption. Perhaps if we all do that, as requested, nobody will have a power cut and TEPCO's revenues will be ever-so-slightly reduced.
3 ( +7 / -4 )
Posted in: 2 dead, over 160 injured after M7.4 quake hits northeastern Japan See in context
@diagonalslipToday 06:53 am JST
"one dead".... sad enough, so why do 'they' feel they have to make the headline "at least...."
Well because - obviously - it takes time to establish a precise casualty count just a few hours after an event affecting millions of people.
You will note that since your post, the count has been updated to 2. Turns out the headline writer was absolutely correct to use "at least".
0 ( +3 / -3 )
Posted in: It is time to abandon this ambiguity strategy. The people of Taiwan share our universal values, so I think the U.S. should firmly abandon its ambiguity. See in context
He had almost a decade when his opinion actually mattered - perhaps he should have said this then.
0 ( +0 / -0 )
Posted in: Tokyo reports 18,287 new coronavirus cases; nationwide tally 97,833 See in context
Almost a third of the cases are among kids (0-19), who represent only about 16% of the population. On top of that, it's clear that a significant proportion of the adults got it from their kids. That being the case, it probably is time to stop leaning on the hospitality industry and let the restaurants and bars go about their business.
7 ( +11 / -4 )
Posted in: Man arrested for locking 2-month-old son in freezer See in context
"A freezer" in a hotel room refrigerator very likely means the little freezer box inside a small refrigerator. I wonder if he broke the poor kid's bones stuffing him in there. Disgusting.
12 ( +12 / -0 )
What about the 83.5% of workers in Japan who are not part of unions? Join one!
Posted in: Toyota union seeks wage hike on par with 2024 decades-high raise
Posted in: Trump wants denuclearization talks with Russia and China
Posted in: Japan to release 210,000 tons from rice reserves due to surging prices
Posted in: Trump wants denuclearization talks with Russia and China