Hasta La Gadget!

Japanese mobile company Willcom have launched a new winter campaign that allows users to put their heads down and really relax while they have a conversation, on a pillow phone.

The network provider is giving away the “dare to demo pillow” (meaning “with anyone”) headsets free to those who sign up to their services throughout the month of December. The pillows come in a range of colors and allow users to rest their heads while chatting by plugging their handsets in. The star shaped pillows have built in microphones and speakers and users can also play back music on them as well as chat.

Unlike other mobile providers, Willcom deals solely with less popular PHS phones and recently also released a phone accessory that is a mobile phone. The marketing efforts come in a bid to lure customers back to the company as users have rapidly declined over the years instead turning to smartphones or other mobile providers. In fact marketing efforts involving the cute and fluffy aren’t new ground to Willcom either, check out our article from way back in 2008 when the same company released a fully functional stuffed Teddy Bear Phone that was even featured in the Good Design Awards….cuddly before their time?!

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While it’s certainly not pleasant to think about future disasters in Japan (or anywhere else), they do happen, and with them come instant problems with displaced people, broken infrastructure, and sanitation needs. Since we cannot prevent most of these problems, we can only do our best to alleviate the symptoms, and the difference between the aftereffects of the earthquakes in Japan as opposed to Haiti can be summed up in one sentence: Wealth is Health.

Thus, the creative iBousai emergency kits from the Ritsumeikan University Research Center for Disaster Mitigation of Urban Cultural Heritage (yes, that’s the name) are simple solutions to very First World problems. In fact, most would be seen as luxuries during the even the best times in the Third World.

The iBousai come in four varieties currently being developed:
– Kirei (Beautification): Essential oils and other products for women
– Miru (Medical Care): Gauze, alcohol, and other wound treatment
– Kaeru (Going Home): Maps, mini radio, and items to assist in travel
– Yoru (Nighttime): Socks, whistle, and other items needed in the dark

Additional products in the kits are soaps, LED lights, mobile alarms, dry shampoo, and other toiletries.

For future disasters, these types of kits are not only compact and easy to ship, but they are designed to improve the quality of life for people living in extenuating circumstances. It might seem trivial to receive essential oils during a tragedy, but the goal of the project is to be useful for both physical and mental health, and that’s an admirable goal.

In the months since the disasters hit up in the North of Japan a number of innovative movements have sprung up to try and offer assistance and relief to the hardest hit areas. We came across one such project this weekend, the “Ehon Project” (Picture Book Project), a mobile kids picture book library that is bringing smiles and relief to children who lost everything.

The project started in the few weeks after the tsunami hit on 3.11 by Chieko Suemori, an editor of children books, founder of Suemori Books. Originally it was set up to collect picture books from around Japan to be sent up to the evacuation shelters to be distributed to the many children who had lost their parents or family. As the movement grew and it received support from various Japanese companies, the decision was taken to build small mobile libraries which could be loaded up with books and tour the areas so kids instead of receiving the books as charity had chance to pick out the books they want as if in the library.

I chatted with the very cheerful and energetic Halhiko Suemori (pictured below), a coordinator of the project who told us how “many young children have been donating their old picture books and writing letters of support to the children who will receive the books in Iwate, “it is touching how much comfort it gives them, children are helping other children who lost everything.” The project has already collected over 50,000 books from all over Japan and is now raising funds for the Ehon Cars.

So far the organisation has managed to raise enough funds to buy and customize one of six mobile libraries it will send to the area. “Our idea is to custom-furnish lightweight vans as mini bookmobiles we will call “Ehon Cars” that can be driven by our volunteer staff and will be relatively inexpensive to maintain and fuel”. The cars and the volunteers aprons are also emblazoned with the Ehon Project logo which is a fantastically simplistic eye-catching design from Sotocoto, a popular Japanese web magazine focused on the environment.

The aim is to then donate the Ehon Cars to local communities in the area once the project is over,”when the vehicles are handed over, they will of course be packed full of picture books!”. For those wishing to donate you can visit the project website here with full instructions in English.

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Starting from today and lasting a month passengers riding a singe train on Tokyo’s Yamanote line will be able to access a special information service called Train Net through smartphones via an on-board Wi-Fi network. JR (Japan Rail) have partnered with Mitsubishi to roll out the service as a trial on one of Tokyo’s busiest lines.

The new service was on display at today’s Ceatec Exhibition and is currently only installed on one train on the Yamanote line until November 2nd. This is the first time Tokyo’s trains will offer on-board Wi-Fi all be it for this one specific purpose and users can’t browse other sites through the network. Passengers are able to log on to the on-board Wi-Fi network and access a wide variety of entertainment and train information. One interesting function lets users know which carriages are the quietest and also the coolest, giving real time temperature read outs, particularly useful given the amount of people who ride the Yamanote line.

Going beyond mere functional train information the service also offers location based services, recommending different shops and restaurants in the vicinity of the stations the user is approaching and provides coupons and deals exclusive to those who use the service. There are also entertainment options that allows users to download web magazines and manga comics to browse between stations.

The system can be used with devices with browsers and users, once connected to the “trainnet” wifi, simply open the browser and the site opens automatically. The information compliments the screens currently on the trains which display simple information to commuters. One annoyance of the screen being that it scrolls through the information, meaning passengers needing to know which station is next have to wait until it appears on the screen, whereas the service allows access to the information right away.

The layout of the site is also nicely done, with the line information at the top of the screen most of the time and easy enough to navigate through all the other options. It is interesting that JR and Mistubishi have opted for a browser-based portal site that users have to visit through the Wi-Fi network as well as an app with similar functionality. People with devices that have wi-fi but no 3g can access information quickly, and the amount of content for everyone can be broader to include nice quality videos and music. The app is available for both Android and iPhone.

For all those train spotters wanting to check out the service on the train themselves, you can visit the site and see an update in real time where the train is and hop on at the nearest stop.

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Recently, we came across an interesting interactive promotional display of new shoe technology by Asahi Corporate, at one of the train platforms in the center of Tokyo. An apparent first in the world, “SHM (Scre Home Mechanism) shoe technology” is supposed to “keep knees healthy and the walk enjoyable”. The product is targeted to anyone with troubled knees, either for future pain prevention or for current support of the knee joint movement. However, this product mostly focuses on the growing aging society in Japan, which is proportionally, the highest in the world (65+ make 23% of the population in 2010).

According to the Asahi research, each year, about 30 million knee joint transplants are performed in Japan, mostly among women over 50 years old. As a result, already in 2003, Asahi started developing SHM shoe technology, cooperating with orthopedic surgeons and researchers in Japan. It took them few years of clinical research and product development, followed by marketing and began selling them from 2006, but not until recently has it become a mainline capmaign.

The SHM technology is embedded into the heel of the shoe and apparently lightens the burden on the lower exterior knee joints, which supports the knee and is responsible for rotation when stepping on the heel. According to Asahi, this unique shoe structure; takes off the pressure of body weight when stepping on the heel, creates slight exterior rotation form the center of the heel to the tip toes while stepping on the foot, and controls movement of knee joints. Moreover, this mechanism creates an effective use of the inner thighs, which support the knee as well.

The display was particularly interesting, although aimed to the aging society, it was fairly interactive including touch screen panels which featured personal health questions and a virtual physical examination. A built in television screen then displayed a detailed clinical explanation by physicians, and there was a movable display with wide variety of products. Questions such as: “Is it painful recently, to walk down the stairs?” or “You prefer taking the escalator rather than the stairs?”are set so as to determine your knee’s age (i.e if there has been excessive wear and tear). If the answer in most cases is “Yes”; your knee’s age is apparently over 70. The most interesting question for me was “Recently, is it hard to sit seiza? (Japanese traditional sitting position with folded knees)”. The majority of non Japanese people I am familiar with (including myself) –regardless their age- are absolutely incapable of spending more than 5 minutes in that position, which brings me to think about our Western knee’s age!

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