Nengajou are the New Year Cards that Japanese people send to each other, customarily arriving on January 1st in a nice pile that you can use to measure your popularity.
Some of this year’s nengajou innovations also reveal two of the big trends of 2010: the growth of smartphones in Japan and the spread of idol groups into the mainstream (most notably AKB48).
Lawson’s has teamed up with idol group SKE48 to offer 26 lucky people the chance to receive hand-written cards from the cute ladies, decorated, needless to say, on one side with an image of the sender and on the other with a personal message.
Since this year has seen the smart phone market multiply and different models emerge to challenge the dominance of the iPhone, it is no surprise to see that augmented reality novelty cards are also available for the Android, “sent” to you by a range of celebrities (including idols, naturally). The nengajou will apparently move and interact with your smartphone, allowing you to get closer to your hero.
If writing out by hand a large stack of cards is not your forte then there are alternatives of course. Leading local SNS mixi has had a digital nengajou for some years now and other services also allow you to send online cards.
However, digital nengajou services seem more like additional versions, rather than replacements. They are especially good for people who only know each other digitally, and in fact delivery services have sprung up for those consumers who perhaps rarely meet and communicate solely as avatars, user names and email addresses.
The usual analog cards seem in no danger of dying out, though, as witnessed by the Japan Post’s street vendors ubiquitous at this time of year, and their haul of some 2 billion cards last year.
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