| There are many interesting aspects about the Japanese arena. One of the most unforgiving is that users do not understand that their phones are connected to vast networks or that navigation system in their car is powered by a computer with memory, et cetera. When I first moved to Japan I asked normal people on the street to tell me what they found interesting about their phones -- I was shocked to learn that many Japanese women and men told me that they believed the popular website Mixi was just a screen (画面) that displays when the press buttons! (In Japanese: ミクシーはあたしの携帯に入っている画面だよ！とよく言われた) One of the other aspects of software vs. hardware is that hardware is relatively easier to debug than most software environments. You will find that easy to debug environments like consoles have many software developers. This is important because the Japanese are very risk-adverse. Making claims on others and keeping everyone/everything in check is a big part of life in Japan. Finally, programming is considered more of an engineer's profession than a creative profession. Engineering is seen as directly applying nature's laws into practice and as such, the approach is one of: "if you want to say build a bridge then you may choose from these designs that we already know are best" Programming in Japan follows this cookie-cutter model and although there are very bright, creative engineers and programmers in Japan, the schooling system is very rigid. |