I hope you aren't referring to the case where Google maps or some other direction-giving site might have lead to the death of a well-known CNET editor.
I'm also guilty of posting a "we live in mundane times" missive in this thread (albeit related to space exploration) but you are right, we aren't seeing the forest for the trees. We take as granted things that were science fiction dreams just a couple of decades ago.
From time to time I will catch myself thinking "Wow, we are now finally living in the real future" as imagined in the Sci Fi pulps of the past. Step back a bit and take a look at through the eyes of someone from the 50's or 60's.
The huge, flat TV's that hang on walls like a picture are here!. The cars with sleek aerodynamic designs running on electricity are here! The clean forms of energy that banish the clouds of soot from the sky are here! These things will be improved even more as time goes on.
Add mass media to that. Although we had also our fantasy vehicles (Thunderbirds, etc.), these would spur us on to greater realms of imagination as here was the future as it might be and we were the ones who were going to design it.
Now, the state of entertainment has reached such high levels of realism that we know it is absolutely impossible for us to replicate that level and the real exploration done seems frighteningly mundane and remote. Yes, we have robots exploring the surface of Mars, but they do it at a snail's pace. Does the average person check to see what Spirit and Opportunity are doing this week?
The one thing you notice in all these pictures is how cool the rocket ships looked. Now people refer to the Space Shuttle (a *real* space plane!) as an inefficient, obsolete mistake. The ISS (a *real* space station!) as an overpriced, useless boondoggle where little science is done and the astronauts spend more time on maintenance than anything else.
Wrong, but only because your mind is inserting "All" at the beginning of both statements. By way of the vagaries of the English language this is possible and changes what most would understand as the intent of the original headline: "A group of people who are creationists are violating copyright". We see these every day and are interpreted in ways that suit the various vested interests. For example, a group of white guys beat up and rob two black couples. Headline next day: "Whites beat black couples."
I have a picture taken a long time ago reprinted from a newspaper. There is a parade with the town's senior dignitaries at the front and a marching band behind.
On the far side of the street a little 7 year-old boy in traditional British school uniform with shorts leans forward shyly to see better.
That little boy is my 82-year-old father.
He had no expectation of privacy as he watched that parade 75 years ago and the picture of the parade is no different than the pictures Google is taking now.
If I knew Google's cameras were going around Vancouver I'd run around after them trying to get myself in as many shots as possible so no matter where you go, there I am.
Phase 5 is where you don't care about how small Japanese women's chests are and start noticing how good Japanese women can keep looking as they get older.
You know, I've had sigs turned off for a while now (I don't even remember when I did it) and I don't recall putting in that particular text as a sig as I'm just not like that. Maybe I've been sig-hacked.
As long as I can remember my sig was:
Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. Those who live in the past are already repeating it.
Nope, the permanent resident stamp (eijyuu kyouka) is the holy grail of foreign status in Japan. You can work, get loans and mortgages and as long as you renew your Alien Registration Card (Gaikokujin Torokusho) every seven years and have a valid re-entry permit when you go out of Japan for any reason it can be for the rest of your life. I've had to transfer mine several times between my passports which every 5 years.
I found a n announcement note that claims initially they may allow families with at least one Japanese parent and a re-entry holder and kids under 16 to use the Japanese citizens line. (and potentially bypass fingerprinting) Don't want the kids asking why Daddy is being treated like a criminal.
Just found the Re-Entry Japan Blogspot page on which Gaijin provocateur Arudo Debito has posted that at Narita there will be at least one booth set aside for re-entry permit holders.
I also see some notes that initially, mixed nationality families (like mine) with at least one Japanese parent and children under 16 will be allowed to use the Japanese counters. (possibly to avoid the embarrassment of having the kids ask why Daddy has to be fingerprinted by a criminal)
1. I didn't say that others with different visas couldn't do this as well. As you say anyone with a re-entry permit can, but then you have to explain the re-entry permit system to everyone. The only real point is that a special ability that you were granted as a resident of Japan is now being taken away and the value of your status in Japan has been reduced to nil as far as airport immigration is concerned. You, me and those lovely Filipino "entertainers" will have to shift over to the visitor counters.
2. Get real. That four years is a theoretical minimum that almost never applies in practice. It took me 5 years and I was married to a Japanese and already had one kid. My friends have all taken MUCH longer. The requirements to get a Permanent Residence have also become MUCH stricter as of late.
3. Yes I do. There has been a LOT of discussion about this on JapanProbe.com, JapanToday.com and JapanTimes.com. Although current residents have spotted the camera and fingerprint machines at the Japanese passport counters they has been no guarantee that they will be used there unless there is an overflow of foreign tourists. We'll see in a couple of days when the lines at immigration stretch back to the planes.
4. That's obvious, You'll always pick the the shorter lines but every single time I've entered over the past 10 years the Japanese lines have always been shorter. In any case I've never found the visitor counters faster. if you're heading over to the Japanese counters they can assume you already are legit.
5. This is confusing. You don't renew a permanent resident permit. The maximum length of a re-entry permit is 3 years for regular visa holders and permanent residents. There is a 5-year re-entry permit that can only be obtained by Special Permanent Residents (The resident Koreans for the most part). The validity of a multiple re-entry permit can usually only be affected by the expiry of your Alien Registration Card or passport.
Your last two points made me chuckle. I have already been fingerprinted by the Ward office. I started living permanently in Japan in 1986. The advancement we permanent residents were able to achieve by the removal of the fingerprinting requirement is now being taken away. The most important point to remember is that Japanese are NEVER fingerprinted unless they have been found guilty of a crime. I don't know for certain that Japanese applying for high-security positions aren't fingerprinted but knowing the cultural stigma associated with it, I think it unlikely. The usual excuse is that the Japanese have koseki so they don't need that form of identification.
And finally, yes, it is possible and I time myself to try and set a new record but that will no longer be possible. A sub 5-minute transition requires it just being myself with only a backpack at a brisk jog from the jetway without having to take the shuttle at terminal 2. No-one lined up at the Japanese and re-entrant's immigration counters with a friendly young male officer who tend to want to get rid of you quicker then a run down the escalators and use the same young male officer trick at customs walking up to him with passport open at the eijukyouka page and saying "Konnichiwa, eijusha desu kedo, kyou shucho kara kaetekimashita. That gets me through without them even opening my pack. Then it's just another little sprint down to the Skyliner ticket counter.
You were a visitor. You weren't staying there very long and I don't know how much Japanese you were able to learn and in which environments you found yourself but obviously you weren't there long enough to proceed to phase 2 of the Gaijin experience in Japan.
This happens when you REALLY start to learn to speak Japanese and start to talk to more of the citizens. When you get a job and have to do things like look for housing or deal with banks. Then the xenophobia starts to rear its ugly head. Landlords refuse to rent to you simply because you are a foreigner. You begin to understand the racist muttering from the older folks. You notice the condescending and discriminatory depiction of non-Japanese on the TV shows. Many gaijin go home at this point
Phase 3 begins when you accept that this is the reality of Japan and find ways to work around it. You move to the more progressive areas and modify your behaviour to fit better into the society. If you can get to this stage you will have a life-long love of Japan and all the wonderful things it has (geek toys, hot springs, and food, oh God the food!) despite all the negative aspects (pollution, crowding, expense, racism).
Eventually you may still move back to your country as some things cannot be overcome. In our case it was the education of our children. There was just no way we could put our kids through the Japanese school system and the living space we had was just too small to be comfortable. Hindsight has shown this to be a very wise move especially considering the experience of our kids when they have gone back to Japan for short-term attendance at Japanese schools.
Japan has gone further. Not only are visitors fingerprinted and photographed but also foreign residents like my friend Terrie LLoyd in the second article who has been there for almost a quarter of a century and who has started several successful companies that employ Japanese citizens.
What is most irritating is that Japan really doesn't have reason to fear an international terrorist incident on their soil. As Terrie says, all the terrorist incidents in Japan have been done by Japanese and the amount of crime by foreigners in Japan is minuscule compared to the overall total.
This is xenophobia pure and simple and will kill whatever tourist industry Japan was trying to get with their "Yokoso Japan!" campaign. A lot of businesses will avoid Japan because of these regulations as business travellers definitely do not like being treated as criminals.
I have permanent resident status in Japan. This is the equivalent of a landed immigrant in most countries, however it is more permanent as you essentially have it for the rest of your life unless you become a Japanese citizen or leave Japan without a re-entry permit. This status takes a very long time to get (5-10 years) and requires you to submit tons of personal information and have Japanese guarantors. One of the benefits has been that you can line up at the Japanese citizens counters at airport immigration and be through very quickly. (My record: plane to train in under 5 minutes)
Despite this, from this Tuesday I will be required to line up with the regular foreign tourists and have my picture and fingerprints taken every time I enter Japan and every time I *leave* Japan.
Also, I still have to make sure I have a re-entry permit which I have to get every 3 years or I will lose my status completely.
All of this because I *might* be a terrorist or criminal.
The one thing I wonder is, if I pass away during a trip abroad are they going to take my picture and fingerprints when they bring my body back to the nice gravesite in rural Gumma prefecture where I'm going to be buried when I die?
I just found out that Paul Frees, who did the voice of Guardian (processed of course), also did Boris Badenov the Russian agent from The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show as well as: (Gasp!)
Slashdot Mirror
You must be one of those people who can easily solve those "lateral thinking" problems.
Like, "in what month do Australians drink the least beer?"
When Shall we Dansu was playing, patrons were seen ballroom dancing out of the theater.
I would say any visual stimulation that invokes strong emotions be they violent or exuberant will have an after effect on some people.
Nothing to see here, etc.
I hope you aren't referring to the case where Google maps or some other direction-giving site might have lead to the death of a well-known CNET editor.
Remember, this is just telling you where you are, not where you should or would like to be.
Which probably isn't in downtown Toronto.
And no matter where you go, there you are.
Even if the Chinese were able to feed the astronauts when they got to Mars, the astronauts would be hungry again before they got back.
And spend a couple of hours retracing the entire distance the rover has moved in the past three years.
But then I got a new job.
(Hanging my head in shame at not being able to post anything more insightful than this as everyone else already has.)
I'm also guilty of posting a "we live in mundane times" missive in this thread (albeit related to space exploration) but you are right, we aren't seeing the forest for the trees. We take as granted things that were science fiction dreams just a couple of decades ago.
From time to time I will catch myself thinking "Wow, we are now finally living in the real future" as imagined in the Sci Fi pulps of the past. Step back a bit and take a look at through the eyes of someone from the 50's or 60's.
The huge, flat TV's that hang on walls like a picture are here!. The cars with sleek aerodynamic designs running on electricity are here! The clean forms of energy that banish the clouds of soot from the sky are here! These things will be improved even more as time goes on.
Add mass media to that. Although we had also our fantasy vehicles (Thunderbirds, etc.), these would spur us on to greater realms of imagination as here was the future as it might be and we were the ones who were going to design it.
Now, the state of entertainment has reached such high levels of realism that we know it is absolutely impossible for us to replicate that level and the real exploration done seems frighteningly mundane and remote. Yes, we have robots exploring the surface of Mars, but they do it at a snail's pace. Does the average person check to see what Spirit and Opportunity are doing this week?
The one thing you notice in all these pictures is how cool the rocket ships looked. Now people refer to the Space Shuttle (a *real* space plane!) as an inefficient, obsolete mistake. The ISS (a *real* space station!) as an overpriced, useless boondoggle where little science is done and the astronauts spend more time on maintenance than anything else.
My, how our dreams have fallen.
Wrong, but only because your mind is inserting "All" at the beginning of both statements. By way of the vagaries of the English language this is possible and changes what most would understand as the intent of the original headline: "A group of people who are creationists are violating copyright". We see these every day and are interpreted in ways that suit the various vested interests. For example, a group of white guys beat up and rob two black couples. Headline next day: "Whites beat black couples."
I have a picture taken a long time ago reprinted from a newspaper. There is a parade with the town's senior dignitaries at the front and a marching band behind.
On the far side of the street a little 7 year-old boy in traditional British school uniform with shorts leans forward shyly to see better.
That little boy is my 82-year-old father.
He had no expectation of privacy as he watched that parade 75 years ago and the picture of the parade is no different than the pictures Google is taking now.
If I knew Google's cameras were going around Vancouver I'd run around after them trying to get myself in as many shots as possible so no matter where you go, there I am.
Phase 5 is where you don't care about how small Japanese women's chests are and start noticing how good Japanese women can keep looking as they get older.
Maa ne.
You know, I've had sigs turned off for a while now (I don't even remember when I did it) and I don't recall putting in that particular text as a sig as I'm just not like that. Maybe I've been sig-hacked.
As long as I can remember my sig was:
Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.
Those who live in the past are already repeating it.
- Me in one of my more lucid moments.
I would like to see your response.
Nope, the permanent resident stamp (eijyuu kyouka) is the holy grail of foreign status in Japan. You can work, get loans and mortgages and as long as you renew your Alien Registration Card (Gaikokujin Torokusho) every seven years and have a valid re-entry permit when you go out of Japan for any reason it can be for the rest of your life. I've had to transfer mine several times between my passports which every 5 years.
I found a n announcement note that claims initially they may allow families with at least one Japanese parent and a re-entry holder and kids under 16 to use the Japanese citizens line. (and potentially bypass fingerprinting) Don't want the kids asking why Daddy is being treated like a criminal.
Just found the Re-Entry Japan Blogspot page on which Gaijin provocateur Arudo Debito has posted that at Narita there will be at least one booth set aside for re-entry permit holders.
I also see some notes that initially, mixed nationality families (like mine) with at least one Japanese parent and children under 16 will be allowed to use the Japanese counters. (possibly to avoid the embarrassment of having the kids ask why Daddy has to be fingerprinted by a criminal)
Comments on your comments:
1. I didn't say that others with different visas couldn't do this as well. As you say anyone with a re-entry permit can, but then you have to explain the re-entry permit system to everyone. The only real point is that a special ability that you were granted as a resident of Japan is now being taken away and the value of your status in Japan has been reduced to nil as far as airport immigration is concerned. You, me and those lovely Filipino "entertainers" will have to shift over to the visitor counters.
2. Get real. That four years is a theoretical minimum that almost never applies in practice. It took me 5 years and I was married to a Japanese and already had one kid. My friends have all taken MUCH longer. The requirements to get a Permanent Residence have also become MUCH stricter as of late.
3. Yes I do. There has been a LOT of discussion about this on JapanProbe.com, JapanToday.com and JapanTimes.com. Although current residents have spotted the camera and fingerprint machines at the Japanese passport counters they has been no guarantee that they will be used there unless there is an overflow of foreign tourists. We'll see in a couple of days when the lines at immigration stretch back to the planes.
4. That's obvious, You'll always pick the the shorter lines but every single time I've entered over the past 10 years the Japanese lines have always been shorter. In any case I've never found the visitor counters faster. if you're heading over to the Japanese counters they can assume you already are legit.
5. This is confusing. You don't renew a permanent resident permit. The maximum length of a re-entry permit is 3 years for regular visa holders and permanent residents. There is a 5-year re-entry permit that can only be obtained by Special Permanent Residents (The resident Koreans for the most part). The validity of a multiple re-entry permit can usually only be affected by the expiry of your Alien Registration Card or passport.
Your last two points made me chuckle. I have already been fingerprinted by the Ward office. I started living permanently in Japan in 1986. The advancement we permanent residents were able to achieve by the removal of the fingerprinting requirement is now being taken away. The most important point to remember is that Japanese are NEVER fingerprinted unless they have been found guilty of a crime. I don't know for certain that Japanese applying for high-security positions aren't fingerprinted but knowing the cultural stigma associated with it, I think it unlikely. The usual excuse is that the Japanese have koseki so they don't need that form of identification.
And finally, yes, it is possible and I time myself to try and set a new record but that will no longer be possible. A sub 5-minute transition requires it just being myself with only a backpack at a brisk jog from the jetway without having to take the shuttle at terminal 2. No-one lined up at the Japanese and re-entrant's immigration counters with a friendly young male officer who tend to want to get rid of you quicker then a run down the escalators and use the same young male officer trick at customs walking up to him with passport open at the eijukyouka page and saying "Konnichiwa, eijusha desu kedo, kyou shucho kara kaetekimashita. That gets me through without them even opening my pack. Then it's just another little sprint down to the Skyliner ticket counter.
You were a visitor. You weren't staying there very long and I don't know how much Japanese you were able to learn and in which environments you found yourself but obviously you weren't there long enough to proceed to phase 2 of the Gaijin experience in Japan.
This happens when you REALLY start to learn to speak Japanese and start to talk to more of the citizens. When you get a job and have to do things like look for housing or deal with banks. Then the xenophobia starts to rear its ugly head. Landlords refuse to rent to you simply because you are a foreigner. You begin to understand the racist muttering from the older folks. You notice the condescending and discriminatory depiction of non-Japanese on the TV shows. Many gaijin go home at this point
Phase 3 begins when you accept that this is the reality of Japan and find ways to work around it. You move to the more progressive areas and modify your behaviour to fit better into the society. If you can get to this stage you will have a life-long love of Japan and all the wonderful things it has (geek toys, hot springs, and food, oh God the food!) despite all the negative aspects (pollution, crowding, expense, racism).
Eventually you may still move back to your country as some things cannot be overcome. In our case it was the education of our children. There was just no way we could put our kids through the Japanese school system and the living space we had was just too small to be comfortable. Hindsight has shown this to be a very wise move especially considering the experience of our kids when they have gone back to Japan for short-term attendance at Japanese schools.
This isn't thumb. It's left and right index fingers.
Japan has gone further. Not only are visitors fingerprinted and photographed but also foreign residents like my friend Terrie LLoyd in the second article who has been there for almost a quarter of a century and who has started several successful companies that employ Japanese citizens.
What is most irritating is that Japan really doesn't have reason to fear an international terrorist incident on their soil. As Terrie says, all the terrorist incidents in Japan have been done by Japanese and the amount of crime by foreigners in Japan is minuscule compared to the overall total.
This is xenophobia pure and simple and will kill whatever tourist industry Japan was trying to get with their "Yokoso Japan!" campaign. A lot of businesses will avoid Japan because of these regulations as business travellers definitely do not like being treated as criminals.
I have permanent resident status in Japan. This is the equivalent of a landed immigrant in most countries, however it is more permanent as you essentially have it for the rest of your life unless you become a Japanese citizen or leave Japan without a re-entry permit. This status takes a very long time to get (5-10 years) and requires you to submit tons of personal information and have Japanese guarantors. One of the benefits has been that you can line up at the Japanese citizens counters at airport immigration and be through very quickly. (My record: plane to train in under 5 minutes)
Despite this, from this Tuesday I will be required to line up with the regular foreign tourists and have my picture and fingerprints taken every time I enter Japan and every time I *leave* Japan.
Also, I still have to make sure I have a re-entry permit which I have to get every 3 years or I will lose my status completely.
All of this because I *might* be a terrorist or criminal.
The one thing I wonder is, if I pass away during a trip abroad are they going to take my picture and fingerprints when they bring my body back to the nice gravesite in rural Gumma prefecture where I'm going to be buried when I die?
I think he mentioned it once but may have gotten away with it.
(Finger under nose, goose stepping out the door)
Godwinned?
Amazing!
I just found out that Paul Frees, who did the voice of Guardian (processed of course), also did Boris Badenov the Russian agent from The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show as well as: (Gasp!)
The Pillsbury Doughboy!!!!
Be frightened again:
http://www.the-earchives.com/earframe.asp?c=Colossus:%20The%20Forbin%20Project
I know. What we need is IMAX-digital.
And now you're talking waaay too much bandwidth.