Remember a while back when I showed you a team of Tokyo University student's who had invented an iPad clone for $7! They sold them out within hours. See that story here with photo's: The $7 dollar iPad Look-a-Like Made in Japan.
This morning, I stumbled upon this extremely interesting video about a guy who has come up with an idea that he calls, "The Poor Man's iPod." Regular iPods cost anywhere between ¥4,200 ~ ¥20,900 (about $54.00 USD ~ $270.00 USD)... This Poor Man's iPod (the smallest ones) can hold about 15 songs for $5...
His idea uses a Thumb Drive to store songs to play on your car stereo. Since Thumb Drives have gotten so cheap these days (and are getting even more inexpensive soon) this seems to have potential... Perhaps back to the old days when we had cassettes with our fave artists in a box? One Thumb Drive for your favorite Rock artist, one for dance, one for ?
The Poor Man's iPod
Interesting, no?
Many have said that Apple could be in trouble because Steve Jobs is gone and Steve's replacement is a clone (meaning no new ideas or initiative). Maybe so.
Perhaps this isn't a earth-shaking new idea or even profitable, but it is a new idea and it shows that this guy is thinking...
Yesterday's blog was extremely, er, "popular"... Actually, I posted about this sort of stuff on this blog long ago when this blog was just in infancy, but at those times, I guess I only had 5 readers (4 of those being my family).
This brings me to being able to coin a new word in the blogosphere. And that word is "Blag." "Blag" means a blog post that brags. OK? So I brag that I have made a new term because I am so fricking superior that I can show you stupid white imperialist trash just how superior our Japanese air-forces are to your corrupt Rooseveltian power-hungry scum are. Damn! I'm great!
Also just how cool and suave and debonair I am because I have come up with new terminology.
Anyhow, here's another cool Japanese anti-American anime is that I want to introduce to you uncultured foreign savages....
From Youtube (especially watch from 1:00 in the video...) Ha! Ha! Ha! We bomb Pearl Harbor in Momotaro's Sea Eagles and kick some serious American butt!) Die! Die! Die! Amerikanischer Swine!:
American cartoons weren't afraid of stereotypes during World War II; Popeye and Bugs Bunny battled racist visions of Japanese soldiers, and one can easily guess why the short "Tokio Jokio" wasn't part of regularLooney Tunes TV rotation. Of course, Japan had its own school of WWII cartoon propaganda, and the most famous are Momotaro's Sea Eagles and its sequel, the first feature-length Japanese cartoon, Momotaro's Divine Warriors.
Unlike the slapstick of Popeye shorts, the Momotaro cartoons are relatively serious children's films in which Prince Momotaro and his cuddly animal friends don sailor suits and bomb Pearl Harbor. Well, they don't actually say it's Pearl Harbor, but Momotaro's Sea Eagles glorifies its heroes' attack on the ogres and other vicious foreign devils of Onigashima. Momotaro's Divine Warriors tells much the same story, but with even more scenes of cute little bears and squirrels and monkeys crowding into realistic airplanes and parachuting down to slay their racial inferiors.
Momotaro's Divine Warriors isn't available on DVD in North America, but Momotaro's Sea Eagles is. Zakka Films released it as part of a "Roots of Japanese Anime" collection, along with less offensive animated works. Historical value aside, the film is both insidious and surreal, like a Funny Little Bunnies version of Triumph of the Will.
Sakigake!! Otokojuku! Must be the world's most nationalist traditionalist pro-Japanese male anime ever made! And it is hilariously funny!
Sakigake loosley translates into "first line of attack" (or "Charge!"). Otokojuku is "Men's school". So, these guys are the first line of attack at a men's high school. Get it? No? Oh, you will...
Sakigake!! Otokojuku (lit. Charge! Men's Private School) by Akira Miyashita is a comedy martial arts manga that was originally serialized at the Weekly Shōnen Jump from 1985 to 1991. It is staged in a private boy's school that teaches ōendan to troubled teenagers. The students are trained to "revive the Spirit of Japan" and mainly engage in fighting or killing courses. The nature of the manga is usually considered by the readers as a comical, or even parodic view of Japanese nationalism.
I've posted about this hilarious cartoon and other anti-American anime before in Hilarious Collection of 12 Most Anti-American Anime. The makers of this cartoon take a comedic look at hating foreigners and definitely have humorously decided the correct place of women. I'm sure they long for the good old days when men were men and women were women. The days when women walked two steps behind their man (well, actually I know lots of Japanese women who still do this). Sakigake!! Otokojuku! also disrespects foreigners. The makers long for the good old days when foreigners (read: uncultured savages) were foreigners and not living in Japan!
Hee! Hee! Who doesn't?
Here is a snippet of my favorite Sakigake!! Otokojuku! of all time. It is the most anti-American cartoon I've ever seen. This stuff is hilarious as the sterotypes just crack me up. See if you enjoy it too!
God! Isn't that fantastic? Can you imagine something like that on TV in the USA? The PC crowd would NEVER allow it! Sekigake!! Otokojuku! "How to Deal With Foreigners". In the above episode, the protagonist, Momotaro kicks the butt of an American. After mopping the floor with the guy, the Japanese girl "falls in love" with him. She says, "He's so strong!" and runs up to him and asks if he'll start dating her. He replies,
"Yesterday, dating a foreigner. Today, dating a Japanese. I hate stupid girls who change their minds all the time!" As the boys are walking away they say, "Otokojuku doesn't need women!"
大爆笑！(LOL!)
See, I told you that this cartoon was wonderful!
Sakigake!! Otokojuku! Is a very famous cartoon that ran on Fuji TV for only 34 episodes in 1988. I think it was cancelled because many people failed to see the irony, cynicism and humor and thought that the makers of this cartoon were completely serious.
Trust me, I was here in 1988 and there were a heck of a lot of people with no sense of humor... I mean, just how racist and sexist could a cartoon on national TV be? (As opposed to sexually explicit manga and all sorts of other underground publications that still exist?)
This next snippet is from an episode where the boys go to a "fashionable" club to kick the butt of the regular American guy who was usually the main antagonist mocking Japanese men and taking advantage of "naive" Japanese women. The boys are getting ready to gang up on him and beat him up, but first, they have to confuse the dumb foreigner by bedazzling him with his command of the English language. The episode itself is funny, but the best part is the English subtitles! Enjoy!
In Sakigake!! Otokojuku! women are definitely looked down upon (as well as the main characters sometimes being made fun of because of being stupid). Women in this anime, as in the minds of the makers of it, most certainly have their place in Japanese society.
The note on this next Youtube video is hilarious:
Fans all know women should never appear in this, the manliest series ever. EVER. This movie takes it one step further and proves that the manliest of men can be fooled by plastic dummies with hooters, eighties hairstyles and swimsuits. Post cockblock, the Otokojuku delinquents must take on WHALES AND AN ARMED HELICOPTER for their mistake. Poor guys. A little Engrish pops up again, and Toramaru kills a whale with his own lethal fart technique. Must be seen to be believed
Sakigake! Otokojuku! Women are Always Traps!
Oh, how the makers of this anime must long for the good old days of Japan! (Or, at least, when they were getting paid to make this great cartoon!)
Oh, how I long for the good old days when Japan had cartoons like this!
It's been written on these pages since the beginning of 2011: Groupon has BIG trouble. Now, with events in Greece completely throwing a wrench into the Eurozone and markets, it looks like Groupon could suffer greatly from events in Athens. It must be confirmed by the latest news today: There must be crisis in the EU and the Groupon boardroom bordering on a full-blown panic.
Nov. 1, 2011. Two days before Groupon pricing Dow Jones
drops nearly 2.5%... Situation in Europe up in the air.
Groupon must IPO. Their situation is getting serious. They have yet to turn a profit and, if the books were closed today, they'd be over $221.7 million dollars in the red. Groupon is running out of cash.
Groupon remains unprofitable. The company had $243.9 million in cash at the end of September and still owed merchants $465.6 million. The 8.4 percent increase in cash from the prior period was outstripped by the rise in marketing costs, which jumped 37 percent to $234.4 million.
The company has used 85 percent of the $1.11 billion it has raised from venture capitalists and other investors to buy equity from early investors eager for a return, instead of funding growth. That is contributing to a potential cash crunch, said Sam Hamadeh, chief executive officer of PrivCo, which provides financial data on more than 20,000 private companies. With two days to go until IPO and the stock market's crashing worldwide, then Groupon must be in a panic... If not, then the stuff they were smoking when they rejected the $6 billion dollar offer from Google must be really killer weed!
That's right. You read the title correctly: McDonald's Coffee is At Least Twice as Good as Starbucks.
I do not eat McDonald's food and haven't eaten it in years. I even hate the smell of the place. But when it comes to a cup of coffee, McDonald's blows Starbucks away. McDonald's Coffee is more than twice as good as Starbucks.
Read it again: McDonald's coffee is twice as good as Starbucks.
Need proof? McDonald's coffee tastes great and is well-known for the quality of the beans it uses (actually the only good quality item on the menu - besides the plastic pickles!)
One cup of Starbucks coffee is ¥300 (about $3.82 USD)
Starbucks
One cup of McDonald's ice coffee (my favorite) is ¥140 ($1.78 USD). That means I can buy two cups of McDonald's coffee for less than the price of one cup of Starbucks coffee! Two cups of McDonald's coffee is ¥280 (about $3.57 USD).
Two coffees at McDonald's for less than the
price of one at Starbucks. Oh, and at my neighborhood
McDonald's, there's outdoor tables and a sidewalk cafe.
Some will say that Starbucks is a great place to sit down and relax. I don't think so. In Japan, the background music at Starbucks is blaring so loud that you can't have any good conversation. Others will say that Starbucks sells atmosphere. Well that wonderful for people who have the time to sit down for two hours having a cup of coffee. I don't. I am busy and I am in a hurry.
If I want to sit and talk business, I'll go to a proper hotel coffee shop where I can hear my partner and discuss business - and get free refills. I cannot do that at Starbucks.
Like I said, I am a businessman and I am in a hurry. When I want coffee, I will go to McDonald's. I am not interested in my fashion or how things "look." This is a simple business transaction. I want to best deal for my money. I'd like to think that most good business people are interested in the best deal for the money. We'd want the best deal for our businesses, why not for a cup of coffee?
So next time you want a cup of java, don't be ashamed to say, "Let's get a cup of coffee over at McDonald's..." McDonald's is the best coffee deal in town for the business person in a hurry. And, in these days, what successful business person is NOT in a hurry?
I was going to give myself a present and not post about anything today at all... But then I thought....
All my life one of the most important things I've wanted was just some respect and sympathy.
It seems that I have never gotten it... Well, enough to satisfy me. I've done some pretty wild things and accomplished some pretty amazing things too... But they are not the kinds of things that generally get respect in our society. Nor do they get sympathy.
I mean, I've never been the CEO of a large airlines or the country manager of a big company. So I don't get respect...I've been an independent kind of guy, doing independent things all my life. It's best for me that way... I hate having a boss.... But that doesn't gain me sympathy, either.
Wanting respect and sympathy is something that is wanted by not just me, but by everyone. There is not a person amongst us who feels that they get the respect not sympathy that they deserve.
Do yourself a favor. Next time someone around you does something that you think is small or minor, instead of pointing out faults, why don't you point out good things? What is important to you may not be important to them.
Like Dale Carnagie writes in "How to Win Friends and Influence People":
"Three fourths of the people you will ever meet are hungering and thirsting for sympathy. Give it to them and they will love you."
Show people that you care for them. That shows them that you respect them too.
