November 12, 2003
Closing comments on this blog
Due to the actions of a bunch of blog spammers who defaced my blog, I am turning off open comments on all my blog entries.
For now, if you have comments, please e-mail them to me, and give me your permission to post them to the blog.
I hope someone finds a reliable solution to blog spammers! This is a start.
November 04, 2003
Digital "Manbiki": An unintended consequence?
I am constantly fascinated by situations where there are unintended consequences of a technology being adopted by the general public. Another one has come to my attention: Digital "Manbiki", a kind of copyright abuse that appears to have recently become common in parts of Japan. (In this report from Sept. 5th, 2003, it was reported that 37% of people surveyed knew about the concept of Digital Manbiki. 13% of the respondents thought that there was nothing wrong with doing it.)
"Manbiki" is a colloquial word for "shoplifting", and it goes like this: a person with a new, high resolution digital camera cell phone enters a book store. They find a guide book that they like. They browse the guide book, and find information about a hot spring that they would like to go to some day. They whip out their phone, and before the shopkeeper even knows what has happened, they have taken a picture of that page. At some later date the person can print this picture and use it to call or drive to the hot spring.
With cell phone cameras becoming ubiquitous, Japanese society seems to be absorbing many of these unexpected ramifications of a mobile multimedia communications enabled populace. There are going to be many other problems down the road: invasions of privacy, camera predators, and others. After looking at the thread about Digital Manbiki on Slashdot Japan, I think that the debate about all these issues will be a lively one.
July 2005
September 2004
April 2004
March 2004
February 2004
January 2004
December 2003
November 2003
October 2003
August 2003
July 2003
June 2003
May 2003
April 2003
March 2003
February 2003
January 2003
May 2002
April 2002
March 2002
