The TRON Project: How Japan almost ruled IT (2022)(undervaluedjapan.blogspot.com)
undervaluedjapan.blogspot.com
The TRON Project: How Japan almost ruled IT (2022)
https://undervaluedjapan.blogspot.com/2022/08/the-tron-project-how-japan-almost-ruled.html
222 comments
I don't think the tech war is the full explanation for the decline of Japanese tech; the failure to focus on software is a big one and seems to be due to internal factors such as conservatism and business models tied to sale of hardware.
However when the US combines it industrial interests with its state apparatus it is a formidable force; media described the Japanese society as authoritarian, bitter and racist - eager to get back the Americans after world war 2 - with the everyday Japanese being mindless warrior drones in a strict hierarchy. (For examples of this sentiment see the movies Black Rain or Rising Sun - or lookup the tragic death of Vincent Chin - a Chinese mistaken for being Japanese).
The US justice system ran a series of entrapment campaign targeting Japanese firms. And there was buy-american campaigns and extra tariffs were put on Japanese imports.
Ultimately the Japanese yielded. The plaza accord fixed the Yen at a very high price point hampering Japanese exports. And quotas were set for US exports to Japan and Japanese car factories were setup in the US.
And then in 90es you had the rise of now competitative tech firms from South Korea and Taiwan.
However when the US combines it industrial interests with its state apparatus it is a formidable force; media described the Japanese society as authoritarian, bitter and racist - eager to get back the Americans after world war 2 - with the everyday Japanese being mindless warrior drones in a strict hierarchy. (For examples of this sentiment see the movies Black Rain or Rising Sun - or lookup the tragic death of Vincent Chin - a Chinese mistaken for being Japanese).
The US justice system ran a series of entrapment campaign targeting Japanese firms. And there was buy-american campaigns and extra tariffs were put on Japanese imports.
Ultimately the Japanese yielded. The plaza accord fixed the Yen at a very high price point hampering Japanese exports. And quotas were set for US exports to Japan and Japanese car factories were setup in the US.
And then in 90es you had the rise of now competitative tech firms from South Korea and Taiwan.
>the failure to focus on software is a big one and seems to be due to internal factors such as conservatism and business models tied to sale of hardware.
It's the same in Germany. Up until 10 years ago or so, they still thought the future of their economy will be selling more diesel engines to everyone. Today Germany is still the world's leading exporter of diesel engines, but how long can that cow be milked until they realize a significant part of their economy is living on borrowed time?
It's what you get when your majority wealth holders, politicians and business leaders are well past their retirement and don't care about the changing world around them, don't care to empower the youth in wealth generation, gate-keeping it all for the existing gentry.
It's the same in Germany. Up until 10 years ago or so, they still thought the future of their economy will be selling more diesel engines to everyone. Today Germany is still the world's leading exporter of diesel engines, but how long can that cow be milked until they realize a significant part of their economy is living on borrowed time?
It's what you get when your majority wealth holders, politicians and business leaders are well past their retirement and don't care about the changing world around them, don't care to empower the youth in wealth generation, gate-keeping it all for the existing gentry.
but how long can that cow be milked until they realize a significant part of their economy is living on borrowed time
Oh, they know it. When I lived in Germany 5-10 years ago, this issue was regularly discussed in the media. Some companies do try to adapt. E.g. Bosch traditionally delivered a lot of diesel-related tech, but they are also investing a lot in batteries and fuel cells. E.g. a large number of eBikes in Europe (probably a large majority even) use Bosch motors and batteries.
Only time will tell if it's enough. Of course, companies will try to stretch the transition as much as possible so that they'll have time to catch up.
Oh, they know it. When I lived in Germany 5-10 years ago, this issue was regularly discussed in the media. Some companies do try to adapt. E.g. Bosch traditionally delivered a lot of diesel-related tech, but they are also investing a lot in batteries and fuel cells. E.g. a large number of eBikes in Europe (probably a large majority even) use Bosch motors and batteries.
Only time will tell if it's enough. Of course, companies will try to stretch the transition as much as possible so that they'll have time to catch up.
Another article that shows the similarities in mindset from the time is this one from 1987, it's quite funny how similar it reads to stuff published today.
https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1987...
https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1987...
This is interesting and.. quite different in one very important key way:
"Are the Japanese picking our brains?'' a congressional staffer asks. ''Yes. They're doing it very well. They're doing it legally. The question is whether we have a two-way street"
"Are the Japanese picking our brains?'' a congressional staffer asks. ''Yes. They're doing it very well. They're doing it legally. The question is whether we have a two-way street"
The Japanese were also accused of and successfully trailed for industrial espionage.
If they were successfully trialed, that means they weren't doing it well enough. They got caught.
Every nation does that. US likely does it less than most others, primarily because others have more to catch up.
Every nation does that. US likely does it less than most others, primarily because others have more to catch up.
[deleted]
> In the 80es the us and Japan fought a tech and trade war very similar to the us china tech war that is going on today.
Fundamental difference between these two trade wars is that US had then and still has now military presence in Japan while none in China. Japan has a somewhat limited sovereignty that affected how they could fight the trade war.
Fundamental difference between these two trade wars is that US had then and still has now military presence in Japan while none in China. Japan has a somewhat limited sovereignty that affected how they could fight the trade war.
aurareturn(6)
It is glaring how under-represented both Japan and Korea are in the rsync.net user population.
We get signups from mainland China. From Saudi Arabia. From Ghana. Even attempted signups from Iran.
But it's very, very rare someone from Japan signs up.
Why is this ?
We get signups from mainland China. From Saudi Arabia. From Ghana. Even attempted signups from Iran.
But it's very, very rare someone from Japan signs up.
Why is this ?
I'm not familiar with that community or even ones closely related, but I've worked several years in Japan and Korea, so I'll take a stab at it.
For Japan, I'm pretty confident it's the language barrier. As in most countries, tech people in Japan are mostly males, and mostly are not very strong in the humanities and in social skills. This group tends to be extremely self-conscious about their limited English ability and generally avoids interaction with foreigners.
For Korea, I see a trend, but I'm not confident about the explanation. I see lots of bright kids at university, see them get hired at big tech firms, and see them enthuse about their work over beers. I don't see them interacting a lot with foreigners. My impression is there is so much going on within Korea that they don't feel strongly motivated to look outside.
For Japan, I'm pretty confident it's the language barrier. As in most countries, tech people in Japan are mostly males, and mostly are not very strong in the humanities and in social skills. This group tends to be extremely self-conscious about their limited English ability and generally avoids interaction with foreigners.
For Korea, I see a trend, but I'm not confident about the explanation. I see lots of bright kids at university, see them get hired at big tech firms, and see them enthuse about their work over beers. I don't see them interacting a lot with foreigners. My impression is there is so much going on within Korea that they don't feel strongly motivated to look outside.
That's true in general for Japan, but trained Japanese engineers who want a rsync-able cloud storage service are fine to register English web services.
There are reasons I come up with: Little known in Japanese community; there are many people don't watch English community even if they are fine to read English docs and send PR. There are almost zero article introduces rsync.net. Yen is weak for Dollar at this time. Overseas storage service tend to be slow from Japan. It's harder to be adopted by enterprises without Japanese reseller.
In my experience, rsync+ssh with higher latency is slow and price isn't attracting, so I haven't tried it yet.
There are reasons I come up with: Little known in Japanese community; there are many people don't watch English community even if they are fine to read English docs and send PR. There are almost zero article introduces rsync.net. Yen is weak for Dollar at this time. Overseas storage service tend to be slow from Japan. It's harder to be adopted by enterprises without Japanese reseller.
In my experience, rsync+ssh with higher latency is slow and price isn't attracting, so I haven't tried it yet.
It's never fine to read English docs and send PR for Japanese engineers. You're probably familiar with Japanese audiences on the Web with a strong, how should I call it, a very unnatural grammatical "accent" almost as heavy as a stereotypical Indian accent but in literal form.
That "accent" is due to our standard English teaching method that builds up an on-the-fly bidirectional translation layer on top of pure Japanese internal monologue. We're trained all the way from middle schools to college/University to do this complex rule-based word transposition and word-for-word substitution technique and that is unnatural as anything and slow as, like real QEMU. This is also why many dumb-faced Japanese people with some English skills are rather quick to issue and respond to fewer-words commands with highly technical expressions("don't lubricate [that] receptacle") but are far slower at returning verbal responses with higher word counts("I'm already 5 minutes into the future from the point I was to be there"), because they're doing it and it's not just a complex multi-parallel but also kind of an exponential time process.
I'm done with that method for better or worse, and I suspect my "tone" in literal English should not even be convincingly Japanese. But it's still way harder to do English, and for the vast majority of us who aren't demonstrably English speaking, it's just their precise translation skills coming with massive overhead.
That "accent" is due to our standard English teaching method that builds up an on-the-fly bidirectional translation layer on top of pure Japanese internal monologue. We're trained all the way from middle schools to college/University to do this complex rule-based word transposition and word-for-word substitution technique and that is unnatural as anything and slow as, like real QEMU. This is also why many dumb-faced Japanese people with some English skills are rather quick to issue and respond to fewer-words commands with highly technical expressions("don't lubricate [that] receptacle") but are far slower at returning verbal responses with higher word counts("I'm already 5 minutes into the future from the point I was to be there"), because they're doing it and it's not just a complex multi-parallel but also kind of an exponential time process.
I'm done with that method for better or worse, and I suspect my "tone" in literal English should not even be convincingly Japanese. But it's still way harder to do English, and for the vast majority of us who aren't demonstrably English speaking, it's just their precise translation skills coming with massive overhead.
Your explanation of a bidirectional translation layer analogs a lot to where I am in my study of Japanese. Three years in, there are quite a lot of kanji where I see it and think the English word; the Japanese pronunciation takes a noticeable amount of processing time to surface. My word count is fairly low (maybe 500 - 1000 words) and my grammar is on-par with a three-year-old. However, I'm getting better. Not bad, I suppose, for someone who started study at the age of 46 and only devotes about an hour a day to the task.
My question would be, how are they solving this problem if they are not using this service?
My current backup is done by "unlimited" Google Drive (will be dead sometime) + Duplicacy because my RTO/RPO requirement is loose and data is bigger. There are other options like Rclone + S3/B2/etc or just Dropbox/OneDrive like worldwide people use.
BTW, Backblaze is great about PR thanks to HDD stats. News websites frequently advertise their name for free. They also have local reseller.
BTW, Backblaze is great about PR thanks to HDD stats. News websites frequently advertise their name for free. They also have local reseller.
Would you mind noting their local reseller?
https://www.sourcenext.com/product/0000000618/
Relatively famous software reseller (repackager) but focused on individuals
Relatively famous software reseller (repackager) but focused on individuals
Ahhh thanks, this isn’t quite what I was looking for but TIL!
Wonder if it’s seeing much adoption, this company looks to be kind of like Carbonite for Japan
Wonder if it’s seeing much adoption, this company looks to be kind of like Carbonite for Japan
Isn't it that Japan is REALLY inward-focused society? I've read multiple times that watching their TV as a foreigner is a weird experience, for the most part they talk about stuff going on in Japan more so than anywhere else.
I am a foreigner living in Japan, and I can confirm it. Watching the news is weird, they will focus on random, totally unimportant internal events (like a dude stealing a bike in an unnamed village in nowhere Hokkaido), while ignoring major world events.
Well I think I have some experience to talk about Japan. Not so much about Korea.
My experience is that English in Japan isn’t really spoken outside of big tech firms and even there the quality isn’t great.
I have tried organizing an event on the same topic in Japanese and in English, almost no one showed up in English but it was full in Japanese.
They have their own alternatives to some services and stack overflow, qiita.
The thing is that they don’t really need to speak English and for the cases they need English they bite a foreigner.
My experience is that English in Japan isn’t really spoken outside of big tech firms and even there the quality isn’t great.
I have tried organizing an event on the same topic in Japanese and in English, almost no one showed up in English but it was full in Japanese.
They have their own alternatives to some services and stack overflow, qiita.
The thing is that they don’t really need to speak English and for the cases they need English they bite a foreigner.
So there’s clearly stuff being done to train a younger generation to speak English better than was the case previously.
The problem is that even with that, the mindset still appears to preserve the notion of Japanese supremacy over everything irrespective of data to the contrary. So improvement isn’t happening.
Take the Shinkansen as anotherq example. Impressive if you look at the train specs and reliability/punctuality. What isn’t seen so readily is the manual process of booking seats at stations with limited options for booking online. That manual process is often so inefficient that you might as well travel by a slower train given the loss of time involved.
Similar inefficiencies are observable throughout Japan. The people are typically oblivious because they are indoctrinated into following the process without questioning things. True of the younger English speakers as well from what I’ve seen. Not entirely sure if that’s blind deference, fear of conflict/group judgement or the result of brainwashing into a collaboration over competition mindset. Maybe it’s a mix of all of the above.
So I see very narrow examples of personal excellences where that obsession and perseverance doesn’t involve getting others on board. But innovation or improvement involving groups is more dysfunctional than anything I’ve seen elsewhere by a wide margin.
The problem is that even with that, the mindset still appears to preserve the notion of Japanese supremacy over everything irrespective of data to the contrary. So improvement isn’t happening.
Take the Shinkansen as anotherq example. Impressive if you look at the train specs and reliability/punctuality. What isn’t seen so readily is the manual process of booking seats at stations with limited options for booking online. That manual process is often so inefficient that you might as well travel by a slower train given the loss of time involved.
Similar inefficiencies are observable throughout Japan. The people are typically oblivious because they are indoctrinated into following the process without questioning things. True of the younger English speakers as well from what I’ve seen. Not entirely sure if that’s blind deference, fear of conflict/group judgement or the result of brainwashing into a collaboration over competition mindset. Maybe it’s a mix of all of the above.
So I see very narrow examples of personal excellences where that obsession and perseverance doesn’t involve getting others on board. But innovation or improvement involving groups is more dysfunctional than anything I’ve seen elsewhere by a wide margin.
You can book Tokyo-Osaka Shinkansen tickets online now. The lines owned by JR Central all have online booking now. You can also connect your IC card to your ticket, so no paper ticket is required.
The people are typically oblivious because they are indoctrinated into following the process without questioning things.
It's not just we have alternatives for some services, the entire Internet looks like "our" thing from this side. Everything is either perfectly localized, or built and run by local entities, or dominated by local users. In rare cases that none of above are true, social graph of users are still completely closed off from the outside world.
I mean, it's even the case offline. Have anyone seen or used the omnipresent NCR made ATM, with transparent green card slot? There are lots of Ingenico Lane/5000 lately, but that green plastic cover still isn't a thing here. I think there are very few regions that you could live without ever seeing one in life. We're isolate as that.
I mean, it's even the case offline. Have anyone seen or used the omnipresent NCR made ATM, with transparent green card slot? There are lots of Ingenico Lane/5000 lately, but that green plastic cover still isn't a thing here. I think there are very few regions that you could live without ever seeing one in life. We're isolate as that.
> Everything is either perfectly localized, or built and run by local entities, or dominated by local users.
People who are tied to the English-speaking net are often totally unaware of how many areas are dominated by local companies even in markets that are linguistically much closer and more used to using English.
And that's not really a criticism - it's hard to keep up when you're not immersed in it.
I'm Norwegian but live in the UK, and I keep being surprised by Norwegian or Scandinavian online services I was unaware of when I go home to visit family, for example, despite following Norwegian news, and visiting twice a year. It's not that they're necessarily more advanced (though sometimes they are) or better, but just that often you find local companies better entrenched than you'd expect.
People who are tied to the English-speaking net are often totally unaware of how many areas are dominated by local companies even in markets that are linguistically much closer and more used to using English.
And that's not really a criticism - it's hard to keep up when you're not immersed in it.
I'm Norwegian but live in the UK, and I keep being surprised by Norwegian or Scandinavian online services I was unaware of when I go home to visit family, for example, despite following Norwegian news, and visiting twice a year. It's not that they're necessarily more advanced (though sometimes they are) or better, but just that often you find local companies better entrenched than you'd expect.
Why is using a particular backup software solution related to it. Maybe they are using tarsnap or blackblaze ?
It's not that there aren't alternatives, but that it's an interesting question why that specific market is under-represented. It could well be just luck of the draw, but there might be other reasons as well.
Not sure about Korea, but Japan also has one of the fewest tech unicorns when you adjust for socioeconomics and population size.
Compare with Singapore, Taiwan.
Compare with Singapore, Taiwan.
Except TSMC, what unicorns does Taiwan have?
Foxconn is Taiwanese.
Some related Tron OS links shared around here over the years:
The funky keyboard http://xahlee.info/kbd/TRON_keyboard.html
More on the OS architecture: http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/itron.html
The funky keyboard http://xahlee.info/kbd/TRON_keyboard.html
More on the OS architecture: http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/itron.html
The TRON smart house: https://youtu.be/7jPKEyM44GU
Demonstration of BTRON: https://youtu.be/7RNbIEJvjUA?t=1505
Demonstration of BTRON: https://youtu.be/7RNbIEJvjUA?t=1505
These are the ones to watch.
I can't help but feel wistful about what could have been if these had become mainstream then.
I can't help but feel wistful about what could have been if these had become mainstream then.
For the ones who remember BeOS and its history, from Wikipedia : In 2002, Be Inc. sued Microsoft claiming that Hitachi had been dissuaded from selling PCs loaded with BeOS, and that Compaq had been pressured not to market an Internet appliance in partnership with Be. Be also claimed that Microsoft acted to artificially depress Be Inc.'s initial public offering (IPO). The case was eventually settled out of court for $23.25 million with no admission of liability on Microsoft's part.
And how can we forget the war that MS waged against Linux for many years, and the copyright lawsuits brought by SCO, partly financed by MS?
So ... stop for a moment and think about where we could be in terms of software and operating systems if some actors (all from the same country) didn't keep trying to kill the competition with unfair tactics in order to continue selling one of the worst operating systems ever created and the main vehicle for all the viruses, malware and ransomware.
Apparently Hitachi did pre-install BeOS, but didn't include a bootloader option to boot it, you had to manually enable it...
https://www.osnews.com/story/136392/the-only-pc-ever-shipped...
https://www.osnews.com/story/136392/the-only-pc-ever-shipped...
Which if true would emphasize again just how critically important defaults are.
The overwhelming majority of the public won't change settings. Even those that are trivial, low- or no-risk, and readily reverted.
The overwhelming majority of the public won't change settings. Even those that are trivial, low- or no-risk, and readily reverted.
The definitive English Tron Project website is http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/homepage.html
Ken Sakamura is a genius.
Ken Sakamura is a genius.
Download it from Github.[1]
[1] https://github.com/tron-forum/mtkernel_3
[1] https://github.com/tron-forum/mtkernel_3
Any hope of seeing this ported to the Raspberry Pi?
Yeah, grab the source and get to work! :)
Honestly, what do you think running this on a rbp would accomplish for you? It's an RTOS, not a desktop operating system.
Honestly, what do you think running this on a rbp would accomplish for you? It's an RTOS, not a desktop operating system.
Not mutually exclusive: http://toastytech.com/guis/qnxdemo.html
A RTOS can be a general purpose operating system.
Whereas an operating system that isn't an RTOS cannot be general purpose, as it cannot be an RTOS.
Whereas an operating system that isn't an RTOS cannot be general purpose, as it cannot be an RTOS.
There is actually a closed source desktop variant called BTRON spec. uITRON clones are just small(and among very few of actually practical) parts of the grandiose TRON Project universe.
Why would you run a desktop OS on an open frame computer?
And before I get downvoted (and lose the precious karma points) into oblivion, I answer the 'question' myself:
- availability of the software
- ease of use
- familiarity
- performance (throughput, not latency)
- popularity (with the advantages that this brings: availability of help, applications, thoroughly tested, etc.)
Many use RPi as a low power, somewhat feeble desktop computer but that doesn't make a desktop OS an ideal or obvious choice for embedded applications where open frame computers are (arguably more sensibly) used.
And before I get downvoted (and lose the precious karma points) into oblivion, I answer the 'question' myself:
- availability of the software
- ease of use
- familiarity
- performance (throughput, not latency)
- popularity (with the advantages that this brings: availability of help, applications, thoroughly tested, etc.)
Many use RPi as a low power, somewhat feeble desktop computer but that doesn't make a desktop OS an ideal or obvious choice for embedded applications where open frame computers are (arguably more sensibly) used.
I’ve heard that it wasn’t going so great so it provided a convenient excuse to cancel it.
TRON is still widely used in Japanese industry.
TRON is still widely used in Japanese industry.
Look up the book "The Fifth Generation" (1982)
How the Japanese were going to conquer the world with AI.
How the Japanese were going to conquer the world with AI.
Japan's 10-year "Fifth Generation Computing Systems" initiative. I remember, this was very famous in the 80s. It was talked about all over the world. Even in popular magazines in Brazil (like Time), for example.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Generation_Computer_Syst...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Generation_Computer_Syst...
> The project imagined an "epoch-making" computer with supercomputer-like performance running on top of large databases (as opposed to a traditional filesystem)
Oh that sounds pretty reasonable; It's like the distributed systems that all large services rely on.
> using a logic programming language to define and access the data
Ugh, already going downhill.
> The FGCS Project did not meet with commercial success for reasons similar to the Lisp machine companies and Thinking Machines. The highly parallel computer architecture was eventually surpassed in speed by less specialized hardware (for example, Sun workstations and Intel x86 machines)
Oh of course they tried to build a high-level CPU too. Still a terrible idea decades later: https://yosefk.com/blog/the-high-level-cpu-challenge.html
Oh that sounds pretty reasonable; It's like the distributed systems that all large services rely on.
> using a logic programming language to define and access the data
Ugh, already going downhill.
> The FGCS Project did not meet with commercial success for reasons similar to the Lisp machine companies and Thinking Machines. The highly parallel computer architecture was eventually surpassed in speed by less specialized hardware (for example, Sun workstations and Intel x86 machines)
Oh of course they tried to build a high-level CPU too. Still a terrible idea decades later: https://yosefk.com/blog/the-high-level-cpu-challenge.html
> Oh of course they tried to build a high-level CPU too. Still a terrible idea decades later:
I'll bite. A high-level CPU doesn't nessecarily have to add stuff, sometimes a high-level CPU does less because the tight integration with OS and language does more.
If memory safety is enforced by your compiler, e.g by your OS only executing WASM, you can get rid of the MMU. [1]
If you get rid of branch prediction and prefetching logic you get more space for more cores. If you hook up memory in parallel to those cores you get higher effective memory throughput and executed instructions per second.
If you got rid of the mmu you can also use that space for accelerating database indexes. CPUs already contain trie walkers for their page tables, you might as well use that for looking up data in indexes directly.
In the end highly parallel architectures won. It's just that we don't run logic programs in parallel but fuzzy neural stuff via array programming language DSLs.
1: https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&d...
I'll bite. A high-level CPU doesn't nessecarily have to add stuff, sometimes a high-level CPU does less because the tight integration with OS and language does more.
If memory safety is enforced by your compiler, e.g by your OS only executing WASM, you can get rid of the MMU. [1]
If you get rid of branch prediction and prefetching logic you get more space for more cores. If you hook up memory in parallel to those cores you get higher effective memory throughput and executed instructions per second.
If you got rid of the mmu you can also use that space for accelerating database indexes. CPUs already contain trie walkers for their page tables, you might as well use that for looking up data in indexes directly.
In the end highly parallel architectures won. It's just that we don't run logic programs in parallel but fuzzy neural stuff via array programming language DSLs.
1: https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&d...
Replacing hardware memory safety with WASM is a great idea, but FWIW you can get most of the benefits by just using hugepages. Eg, clang spends 7% of its time on TLB misses and you can get a free 5% speedup using hugectl: https://easyperf.net/blog/2022/09/01/Utilizing-Huge-Pages-Fo...
The practical solution would be to replace the MMU with a tiny one that's backwards compatible and extremely cheap in silicon area and latency. Old binaries would limp along due to translation overhead while new software would use only a couple of pages across the whole system since memory protection is done in software when the bytecode is compiled and you never need to swap to disk. New binaries would run >>7% faster. I wouldn't call this a high-level CPU tho. Most high-level CPU ideas are really stupid ones like tagging every word with a type ID that must be checked by hardware while wasting cache on something the compiler could have done.
> If you get rid of branch prediction and prefetching logic you get more space for more cores. If you hook up memory in parallel to those cores you get higher effective memory throughput and executed instructions per second.
Sounds like a GPU. Compiling normal code to run on chips like that is still an open problem and I doubt it will be solved within the next decade. We'd need AGI to rewrite code the same way humans do
> CPUs already contain trie walkers for their page tables, you might as well use that for looking up data in indexes directly.
I had the same idea and I feel like it should be possible with today's CPUs, tho I'm not sure how to implement it. Eg convert IP prefixes to page table entries and use the TLB to decide where to route packets the same way routers use TCAM in ASICs
The practical solution would be to replace the MMU with a tiny one that's backwards compatible and extremely cheap in silicon area and latency. Old binaries would limp along due to translation overhead while new software would use only a couple of pages across the whole system since memory protection is done in software when the bytecode is compiled and you never need to swap to disk. New binaries would run >>7% faster. I wouldn't call this a high-level CPU tho. Most high-level CPU ideas are really stupid ones like tagging every word with a type ID that must be checked by hardware while wasting cache on something the compiler could have done.
> If you get rid of branch prediction and prefetching logic you get more space for more cores. If you hook up memory in parallel to those cores you get higher effective memory throughput and executed instructions per second.
Sounds like a GPU. Compiling normal code to run on chips like that is still an open problem and I doubt it will be solved within the next decade. We'd need AGI to rewrite code the same way humans do
> CPUs already contain trie walkers for their page tables, you might as well use that for looking up data in indexes directly.
I had the same idea and I feel like it should be possible with today's CPUs, tho I'm not sure how to implement it. Eg convert IP prefixes to page table entries and use the TLB to decide where to route packets the same way routers use TCAM in ASICs
I thought they were going to continue their 80s dominance with their robot technology, starting with those amazing vending machines. But then nothing happened.
In industrial automation, the Japanese do have a large market share.
But they continue to dominate in factory automation. Germany too.
I searched it on Amazon and didn't see anything relevant there. Could you share more details?
I believe Microsoft had a hand in killing off many great technologies by a variety of means — Nokia, webOS, Firefox OS, WordPerfect, maybe even Amiga. One ironic exception is Apple, which it bailed out (to thwart government intervention).
Thankfully the Gnu’s open source philosophy allowed Linux to survive and thrive. Otherwise we’d be living in a even narrower dystopia of computing choices. (Not even Google would exist.)
Thankfully the Gnu’s open source philosophy allowed Linux to survive and thrive. Otherwise we’d be living in a even narrower dystopia of computing choices. (Not even Google would exist.)
> All the hardware and software would have been publicly available at the cost of an annual membership fee to the TRON Association. Ranging from about $23,000 a year down to a modest $4,600.
Cause of death identified. They wanted to do open source with a paywall. A fee structure well outside of what a hobbyist can afford, but hobbyists are the core of open source.
Cause of death identified. They wanted to do open source with a paywall. A fee structure well outside of what a hobbyist can afford, but hobbyists are the core of open source.
Also the available resources were to be mere specifications and reference implementations. The idea was that each computer manufacturers would build their own versions to compete on the same ABI. Sure, that's how you do manually fabricate operating systems out of blank floppies. That was among the project's fatal mistakes.
> but hobbyists are the core of open source.
Is this actually true?
Is it true when looking only at core projects like the Linux kernel?
Is this actually true?
Is it true when looking only at core projects like the Linux kernel?
Linux is a combination, but it's worth noting that it wouldn't exist without hobbyist work.
That said, it would be interesting to do a breakdown of how much work comes from corporate vs individual contributors for, say, all the packages in a default install of some popular distros. (Also it sounds like a nightmare to try and do that analysis (ex. how do you even determine corp/non-corp contributors?), but it would be interesting if you could do it)
That said, it would be interesting to do a breakdown of how much work comes from corporate vs individual contributors for, say, all the packages in a default install of some popular distros. (Also it sounds like a nightmare to try and do that analysis (ex. how do you even determine corp/non-corp contributors?), but it would be interesting if you could do it)
Hobbyists grow up to be contributors. If they can’t become hobbyists because the cost is high, they’ll never become contributors either.
To use an example that's relevant here given the smart home context: Home Assistant has a huge community of hobbyists around it, and I think it's fair to say it couldn't have gotten nearly as far as it has without community contributions.
Hobbyists/government subsidized University students in CS/CE certainly forced a lot of Pareto optimal paths that won't be chosen in committee developments in open-source movement and projects. I'd not think that e.g. "hobbyist simply knows better", necessarily.
It’s less true for the kernel than it is for most open source projects. The kernel has a fair bit of corporate backing now, but out in user land there are way more projects being maintained by volunteers because they find value in it.
Now, yes, but it wouldn't have so much corporate backing now without all the hobbyist contributors before. And even now there are so many OSS projects, so many core libraries that entire industries and businesses are reliant on which are kept alive by a handful of people or even just a single person with no corporate backing at all.
Corporate backing is the exception, not the rule.
It feels like every country (that is not the US) has a legend about how the X company could have been the next Apple/IBM/Microsoft if it weren't for evil/corrupt/incompetent politicians. Usually these stories fall apart on closer inspection.
Not surprisingly, this story doesn't pass my smell test either. It's very light on details. It also talks a lot about the thoughts in Bill Gates' head, but fails to provide any quotes to back them up.
Not surprisingly, this story doesn't pass my smell test either. It's very light on details. It also talks a lot about the thoughts in Bill Gates' head, but fails to provide any quotes to back them up.
The style of argument in the article is so weird because, at least to me, it has the exact opposite effect of what I presume the author intended. It just sounds like over-the-top nationalistic sour grapes, even if I give it the benefit of the doubt and assume the factual details (which are rather few and far between) are true.
Which is a big shame I think because I'd be very interested to know more about the TRON project and how it compared to other OSes of the day. I went to the Wikipedia page, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRON_project, which unfortunately suffers from the same semi-ridiculous bias: "The project's goal is to create an ideal computer architecture and network, to provide for all of society's needs." Who writes shit like that?
Which is a big shame I think because I'd be very interested to know more about the TRON project and how it compared to other OSes of the day. I went to the Wikipedia page, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRON_project, which unfortunately suffers from the same semi-ridiculous bias: "The project's goal is to create an ideal computer architecture and network, to provide for all of society's needs." Who writes shit like that?
> "The project's goal is to create an ideal computer architecture and network, to provide for all of society's needs." Who writes shit like that?
Quacks do. That's a good way to know a quack - they are often too greedy for their own good. If you see a remedy which cures common cold, cancer, rheumatism and autism, all with no side effects whatsoever - you know it's bullshit. If you have somebody who can do anything, and be excellent at it - you have a con man. If you have a software system that is ideal for any use - it's a scam. Real good things always have requirements and limitations, and the more complex the goal is, the more requirements and limitations there are. If my career in software taught me something is that one of the basic principles is "the right tool for the right job", and there's no tool that is perfect for every job, and can't be.
Quacks do. That's a good way to know a quack - they are often too greedy for their own good. If you see a remedy which cures common cold, cancer, rheumatism and autism, all with no side effects whatsoever - you know it's bullshit. If you have somebody who can do anything, and be excellent at it - you have a con man. If you have a software system that is ideal for any use - it's a scam. Real good things always have requirements and limitations, and the more complex the goal is, the more requirements and limitations there are. If my career in software taught me something is that one of the basic principles is "the right tool for the right job", and there's no tool that is perfect for every job, and can't be.
Just visited Japan for a couple of months. The big tech retailer there is "BIC Camera" which contrary to the name sells everything from Cameras to Macs/PCs to drones and pretty much all consumer electronics. 20 years ago it had a bunch of interest stuff that wasn't available in the west and was typically better constructed than the stuff we got.
Now it's way behind the curve. PCs and accessories that I've not seen in UK/US stores for over a decade. Fax machines are still a thing and sold new.
But outside of such curiosities, it's interesting looking at where Japanese tech has sunk.
The Japanese can't bear to stock Samsung/LG televisions for reasons of national prime one presumes. So there are a bunch of locally branded televisions that seem antiquated - a far cry from the era where Sony held the crown for top end displays.
The PC vendors from Sony Vaio to Toshiba/Dynabook are gone or diminished. The consumer electronics/home electronics that once were interesting look increasingly dated given the Japanese obsession with putting lots of confusing buttons on their products instead of cleaning up the user experience (Japanese toilets are a great example of this... press the wrong button and get violated!)
And of course the camera section of BIC Camera is perhaps the most interesting predictor of where Japan's tech industry is headed. Sure the latest Canon, Nikon and Sony mirrorless cameras are amazing feats of engineering. The problem is that the cameras in phones have become so good that for 99% of the market, the camera in their phone is more than sufficient. So the Japanese camera vendors have become and will continue to will become increasingly niche. Of course the DJI drones next to the camera section offer capabilities the mirrorless variety can't match. So even more of the Japanese core tech industry will get eaten by China.
Pair all of the above with 260% debt to GDP (which is insanely insane even compared to the US/Europe), a population demographic pyramid showing not just an aging population but one that's rapidly declining and an economy that seems build on smoke and mirrors (go into any 7-Eleven and see unbelievably low prices for convenience groceries compared to any US/European store). Such businesses are part of what I'm told is an extensive network of zombie corporations that are run at a loss, subsidised by the banks in order for the banks to get aid/subsidies from the Japanese Government.
Then there's Toyota. Once a clear leader in both fossil fuel and hybrid cars that now has to issue press releases about future battery tech that isn't even close to production. They lag behind both Tesla and the European electric car vendors in actual offerings. Likewise Nissan's electric offerings look increasingly uncompetitive between their shenanigans getting their former non-Japanese CEO thrown in jail.
If these aren't enough - look around Japan outside of the 5 major cities. So much of the mid tier and smaller parts of Japan have been starved of cash. Cities built at the peak in the 80s and 90s with no signs of new development in 20-30 years.
My conclusion: Japan Inc. is a Ponzi scheme that Bernie Madoff would have loved to have conceived, veiled in superficial politeness intermingled with lots of courteous smiles and bows.
Now it's way behind the curve. PCs and accessories that I've not seen in UK/US stores for over a decade. Fax machines are still a thing and sold new.
But outside of such curiosities, it's interesting looking at where Japanese tech has sunk.
The Japanese can't bear to stock Samsung/LG televisions for reasons of national prime one presumes. So there are a bunch of locally branded televisions that seem antiquated - a far cry from the era where Sony held the crown for top end displays.
The PC vendors from Sony Vaio to Toshiba/Dynabook are gone or diminished. The consumer electronics/home electronics that once were interesting look increasingly dated given the Japanese obsession with putting lots of confusing buttons on their products instead of cleaning up the user experience (Japanese toilets are a great example of this... press the wrong button and get violated!)
And of course the camera section of BIC Camera is perhaps the most interesting predictor of where Japan's tech industry is headed. Sure the latest Canon, Nikon and Sony mirrorless cameras are amazing feats of engineering. The problem is that the cameras in phones have become so good that for 99% of the market, the camera in their phone is more than sufficient. So the Japanese camera vendors have become and will continue to will become increasingly niche. Of course the DJI drones next to the camera section offer capabilities the mirrorless variety can't match. So even more of the Japanese core tech industry will get eaten by China.
Pair all of the above with 260% debt to GDP (which is insanely insane even compared to the US/Europe), a population demographic pyramid showing not just an aging population but one that's rapidly declining and an economy that seems build on smoke and mirrors (go into any 7-Eleven and see unbelievably low prices for convenience groceries compared to any US/European store). Such businesses are part of what I'm told is an extensive network of zombie corporations that are run at a loss, subsidised by the banks in order for the banks to get aid/subsidies from the Japanese Government.
Then there's Toyota. Once a clear leader in both fossil fuel and hybrid cars that now has to issue press releases about future battery tech that isn't even close to production. They lag behind both Tesla and the European electric car vendors in actual offerings. Likewise Nissan's electric offerings look increasingly uncompetitive between their shenanigans getting their former non-Japanese CEO thrown in jail.
If these aren't enough - look around Japan outside of the 5 major cities. So much of the mid tier and smaller parts of Japan have been starved of cash. Cities built at the peak in the 80s and 90s with no signs of new development in 20-30 years.
My conclusion: Japan Inc. is a Ponzi scheme that Bernie Madoff would have loved to have conceived, veiled in superficial politeness intermingled with lots of courteous smiles and bows.
> If these aren't enough - look around Japan outside of the 5 major cities. So much of the mid tier and smaller parts of Japan have been starved of cash. Cities built at the peak in the 80s and 90s with no signs of new development in 20-30 years.
FWIW I live in a "mid-tier", depopulating city in Japan, and there's been a ton of development. We got a bullet train 12 years ago, and since then we've gotten like 2-3 large new modern hospitals, 3-4 new large fancy shopping malls (replacing old dilapidated shotengai), big new beautiful parks, an expensive decade-long tunneling roadworks to reduce congestion, lots of roadworks and constant, constant construction of new modern condos replacing old buildings and single-family homes. We also now have so much solar they're paying home consumers to use excess generation on sunny days.
Compared to a similar-sized city I'm from in Europe, it feels like we've being lavished with money. And it makes sense - this is where all that debt is coming from!
FWIW I live in a "mid-tier", depopulating city in Japan, and there's been a ton of development. We got a bullet train 12 years ago, and since then we've gotten like 2-3 large new modern hospitals, 3-4 new large fancy shopping malls (replacing old dilapidated shotengai), big new beautiful parks, an expensive decade-long tunneling roadworks to reduce congestion, lots of roadworks and constant, constant construction of new modern condos replacing old buildings and single-family homes. We also now have so much solar they're paying home consumers to use excess generation on sunny days.
Compared to a similar-sized city I'm from in Europe, it feels like we've being lavished with money. And it makes sense - this is where all that debt is coming from!
Yep. Anyone going to Japan looking for a dose of techno orientalism will be disappointed.
Perhaps go to China if you are looking for tech unlike what you find in the west.
Perhaps go to China if you are looking for tech unlike what you find in the west.
Is there a good book or something to understand postwar Japan, I’ve read bits and pieces on the ”economic miracle”, lost decade(s), the trade wars, the demographic crisis etc, but is there a good resource that compiles and connects it all?
Not a book, but this article was eye-opening for me: https://aeon.co/essays/a-history-of-kidults-from-hello-kitty...
Thanks, that was a good piece.
It makes me want to share a story about an additional piece of perspective on what happened with Japan.
I worked for a CEO in the early 90s who was midwestern ex-WallStreet-analyst deeply concerned about American manufacturing competitiveness (and Japan). A little bit after Japan’s market crash he told me in astonished tones “They have chosen not to let anyone go under! They will be (economically) stagnant for 30 years!”
It was for me a profound moment of awareness of the different cultures of US vs Japan. And my boss’s words showed themselves true in the years since. But it was not at all a surprise at the time that Japan would make such a choice; a society where corporations’ obligations to employees and vice versa were much stronger than in the US and s culture of saving face was much deeper. Not so the US culture of Schumpeter’s creative destruction and bankruptcy. What was astonishing was the scale of the choice and impact on their society, glimpsed in a moment.
Chinese culture is different. I predict their current trials will turn out differently. And they have studied hard the lessons of Japan. But I don’t know enough about Chinese culture to know how they will cope with market-crash-type phenomena. Will they silently absorb the losses, or let things go under, or do something completely different? Or maybe choose deliberately lower growth for a while in an attempt to chart a middle course? We will see.
It makes me want to share a story about an additional piece of perspective on what happened with Japan.
I worked for a CEO in the early 90s who was midwestern ex-WallStreet-analyst deeply concerned about American manufacturing competitiveness (and Japan). A little bit after Japan’s market crash he told me in astonished tones “They have chosen not to let anyone go under! They will be (economically) stagnant for 30 years!”
It was for me a profound moment of awareness of the different cultures of US vs Japan. And my boss’s words showed themselves true in the years since. But it was not at all a surprise at the time that Japan would make such a choice; a society where corporations’ obligations to employees and vice versa were much stronger than in the US and s culture of saving face was much deeper. Not so the US culture of Schumpeter’s creative destruction and bankruptcy. What was astonishing was the scale of the choice and impact on their society, glimpsed in a moment.
Chinese culture is different. I predict their current trials will turn out differently. And they have studied hard the lessons of Japan. But I don’t know enough about Chinese culture to know how they will cope with market-crash-type phenomena. Will they silently absorb the losses, or let things go under, or do something completely different? Or maybe choose deliberately lower growth for a while in an attempt to chart a middle course? We will see.
Alright, hold those horses.
A few points I'd like to make regarding your assumptions and my view of Japan, which I'm not claiming is fully correct, but has a different perspective to offer:
a) I'm not an expert, but Japan's debt is mostly domestically owned (companies in Japan, Bank of Japan, et cetera) and they hold huge reserves in foreign currencies. Economics is more complicated than a simple debt figure, and I'm not well informed about the details, but the ratio of "debt to GDP" by itself isn't the holy grail as far as I know. Devil's in the details. It's a huge problem, but not as large as the number by itself indicates.
b) Japan is self contained. They have a unique self contained non-extremely-western-poisoned culture, an aging population without relying on immigration, their ethnicity makeup is 98% Japanese (I'm sure them being an island, the language and culture barrier are a factor). Find that bad or good, but I think there's something to that, and I think it's important when discussing their culture or their country.
c) Japan is a paradise for geeks, regarding how many possessions are treated and treasured. You've seen outdated tech and thought it was bad? I'm here ordering old consoles, games, dvds, books from Japan and the condition "slightly worn" from a Japenese seller is the American equivalent to "As good as new, perfect condition". Japan is a paradise for cameras, old game consoles, hard to find hardware, watches, ... arcades you wouldn't be able to find in any other country because they've given way to "the times" in other countries... you see a fax machine, or I guess potentially minidisc player, a discman, old cassette player... sold as "new" and think it's bad? I'd love the fact and buy all of them...
d) Toyota is one of the top 10 companies by revenue in the world, still one of the largest car manufacturers, and famous (among other Japanese companies) for efficient and world pioneering management techniques... Japan has the third highest GDP and ranks 19th in the HDI... is it maybe too soon to sing their demise?
Not picking a fight, but from my perspective your comment comes off as condescending, culturally biased and close-minded... Deriding a whole country/culture/economy because of how you interpreted certain things while visiting...you're citing Japanese toilet buttons as an example for their technological demise given their bad UI (having buttons)? Should it be voice controlled, have a touch panel, connect via Bluetooth to your smartphone and have its own bespoke App, offer fancy usage statistics...
You were there for months and this is your cynical take? How could I, as an outsider applying a similar spirit to yours, rate China (censorship, the CCP, inequality, corruption, certain infrastructure projects, technological tracking), the US (politics, cultural crazes, depression, high school system, prison system, weapons, policing), Europe (immigration and identity crisis, EU, ...), Russia/Ukraine..., Mexico, Brazil,...
This is meant to illustrate: a cynical take is easy to come by...
A few points I'd like to make regarding your assumptions and my view of Japan, which I'm not claiming is fully correct, but has a different perspective to offer:
a) I'm not an expert, but Japan's debt is mostly domestically owned (companies in Japan, Bank of Japan, et cetera) and they hold huge reserves in foreign currencies. Economics is more complicated than a simple debt figure, and I'm not well informed about the details, but the ratio of "debt to GDP" by itself isn't the holy grail as far as I know. Devil's in the details. It's a huge problem, but not as large as the number by itself indicates.
b) Japan is self contained. They have a unique self contained non-extremely-western-poisoned culture, an aging population without relying on immigration, their ethnicity makeup is 98% Japanese (I'm sure them being an island, the language and culture barrier are a factor). Find that bad or good, but I think there's something to that, and I think it's important when discussing their culture or their country.
c) Japan is a paradise for geeks, regarding how many possessions are treated and treasured. You've seen outdated tech and thought it was bad? I'm here ordering old consoles, games, dvds, books from Japan and the condition "slightly worn" from a Japenese seller is the American equivalent to "As good as new, perfect condition". Japan is a paradise for cameras, old game consoles, hard to find hardware, watches, ... arcades you wouldn't be able to find in any other country because they've given way to "the times" in other countries... you see a fax machine, or I guess potentially minidisc player, a discman, old cassette player... sold as "new" and think it's bad? I'd love the fact and buy all of them...
d) Toyota is one of the top 10 companies by revenue in the world, still one of the largest car manufacturers, and famous (among other Japanese companies) for efficient and world pioneering management techniques... Japan has the third highest GDP and ranks 19th in the HDI... is it maybe too soon to sing their demise?
Not picking a fight, but from my perspective your comment comes off as condescending, culturally biased and close-minded... Deriding a whole country/culture/economy because of how you interpreted certain things while visiting...you're citing Japanese toilet buttons as an example for their technological demise given their bad UI (having buttons)? Should it be voice controlled, have a touch panel, connect via Bluetooth to your smartphone and have its own bespoke App, offer fancy usage statistics...
You were there for months and this is your cynical take? How could I, as an outsider applying a similar spirit to yours, rate China (censorship, the CCP, inequality, corruption, certain infrastructure projects, technological tracking), the US (politics, cultural crazes, depression, high school system, prison system, weapons, policing), Europe (immigration and identity crisis, EU, ...), Russia/Ukraine..., Mexico, Brazil,...
This is meant to illustrate: a cynical take is easy to come by...
Some interesting points. He's my rebuttal...
On (a), depends on whether you subscribe to the view the Modern Monetary Theory(MMT) is sustainable or a dangerous experiment that has unknowable consequences.
(b) Japan lacks natural resources (mineral, oil/gas etc.) and is hugely reliant on exports to keep the domestic economy running.
(c) There's a lot of cool stuff at a cultural level if you're a geek. Geeks are alas a small percentage of the population and that cool stuff is often kind of cool because it is a snapshot of the past. Not sure the curiosities are enough to keep the show on the rails.
(d) This one amused me. I recall IBMers talking about how IBM was one of the top companies by revenue right before it entered free fall and gave the tech industry to the modern tech giants. Kanban, Just-in-time manufacturing etc. were interesting and have their place. But something's gone wrong with the Japanese mindset. The thinking that produced interesting innovation back in the 70s, 80s and maybe even early 90s seems to have given way to a stagnant way of thinking that's evident everywhere you look. There's niches of creativity in things like anime but the innovation in technology and in process improvement that once enabled the amazing growth that Japan saw seems to have given way to a rigid way of thinking and a culture of just following the once innovative processes instead of continually improving them.
As for the voice controlled touch panel, probably not - but could the functions be simplified to less buttons and a more intuitive UI, for sure... unless you've embraced or complacently fallen into a culture of stagnation.
On your points re: China, they're innovating in ways Japan can only dream of without the fanfare or buzzwords. It's why most of the products we buy come out of Chongqing or Shenzhen. There's stuff wrong with China for sure but they're knocking it out of the park economically compared to Japan that's kind of riding the train over the cliff.
Re: The US etc., everywhere has issues but Europe/The US does not have the observable stagnation that can be witnessed in Japan. That's not about condescension but about looking at what I see with an open mind and not being afraid to make critical observations based on what I see before me.
I'd suggest Japan might be something of a warning for us in the West - if we stay complacent, keep worrying about superficial stuff that doesn't matter and let the core economic/innovating metrics trend in the wrong direction for too long we risk getting into a similar muddle.
On (a), depends on whether you subscribe to the view the Modern Monetary Theory(MMT) is sustainable or a dangerous experiment that has unknowable consequences.
(b) Japan lacks natural resources (mineral, oil/gas etc.) and is hugely reliant on exports to keep the domestic economy running.
(c) There's a lot of cool stuff at a cultural level if you're a geek. Geeks are alas a small percentage of the population and that cool stuff is often kind of cool because it is a snapshot of the past. Not sure the curiosities are enough to keep the show on the rails.
(d) This one amused me. I recall IBMers talking about how IBM was one of the top companies by revenue right before it entered free fall and gave the tech industry to the modern tech giants. Kanban, Just-in-time manufacturing etc. were interesting and have their place. But something's gone wrong with the Japanese mindset. The thinking that produced interesting innovation back in the 70s, 80s and maybe even early 90s seems to have given way to a stagnant way of thinking that's evident everywhere you look. There's niches of creativity in things like anime but the innovation in technology and in process improvement that once enabled the amazing growth that Japan saw seems to have given way to a rigid way of thinking and a culture of just following the once innovative processes instead of continually improving them.
As for the voice controlled touch panel, probably not - but could the functions be simplified to less buttons and a more intuitive UI, for sure... unless you've embraced or complacently fallen into a culture of stagnation.
On your points re: China, they're innovating in ways Japan can only dream of without the fanfare or buzzwords. It's why most of the products we buy come out of Chongqing or Shenzhen. There's stuff wrong with China for sure but they're knocking it out of the park economically compared to Japan that's kind of riding the train over the cliff.
Re: The US etc., everywhere has issues but Europe/The US does not have the observable stagnation that can be witnessed in Japan. That's not about condescension but about looking at what I see with an open mind and not being afraid to make critical observations based on what I see before me.
I'd suggest Japan might be something of a warning for us in the West - if we stay complacent, keep worrying about superficial stuff that doesn't matter and let the core economic/innovating metrics trend in the wrong direction for too long we risk getting into a similar muddle.
> (b) Japan lacks natural resources (mineral, oil/gas etc.) and is hugely reliant on exports to keep the domestic economy running.
Natural resources aren't a good predictor of economic success. In fact, most resource rich countries seem to suffer from the "resource curse".
> but the innovation in technology and in process improvement that once enabled the amazing growth that Japan saw seems to have given way to a rigid way of thinking and a culture of just following the once innovative processes instead of continually improving them.
To be frank, I think they were just as rigid back then - if not more so. The only real difference was demographics and an asset bubble. As their population ages, they stop spending. Lower spending means lower income for companies who then slash R&D and new product development. It's visible in other sectors too like entertainment, not just technology. Jpop today is a shadow of its former self.
> China, they're innovating in ways Japan can only dream of without the fanfare or buzzwords.
The same thing that happened to Japan is happening to China now - end of demographic dividend, popping of asset bubble, ... China is likely to stagnate the next few decades. The only difference is Japan got rich before things went south while China is still climbing that ladder.
> Re: The US etc., everywhere has issues but Europe/The US does not have the observable stagnation that can be witnessed in Japan.
Again, it probably comes down to demographics. The West is willing to import people to keep their population rising - possibly at the expense of social stability. The Japanese decided to "go down with the ship" and just deal with the fallout as it comes. China ... doesn't really have much a choice but to go down with the ship. Who the heck is going to immigrate there?
Natural resources aren't a good predictor of economic success. In fact, most resource rich countries seem to suffer from the "resource curse".
> but the innovation in technology and in process improvement that once enabled the amazing growth that Japan saw seems to have given way to a rigid way of thinking and a culture of just following the once innovative processes instead of continually improving them.
To be frank, I think they were just as rigid back then - if not more so. The only real difference was demographics and an asset bubble. As their population ages, they stop spending. Lower spending means lower income for companies who then slash R&D and new product development. It's visible in other sectors too like entertainment, not just technology. Jpop today is a shadow of its former self.
> China, they're innovating in ways Japan can only dream of without the fanfare or buzzwords.
The same thing that happened to Japan is happening to China now - end of demographic dividend, popping of asset bubble, ... China is likely to stagnate the next few decades. The only difference is Japan got rich before things went south while China is still climbing that ladder.
> Re: The US etc., everywhere has issues but Europe/The US does not have the observable stagnation that can be witnessed in Japan.
Again, it probably comes down to demographics. The West is willing to import people to keep their population rising - possibly at the expense of social stability. The Japanese decided to "go down with the ship" and just deal with the fallout as it comes. China ... doesn't really have much a choice but to go down with the ship. Who the heck is going to immigrate there?
Your really not addressing their comments and kinda missing the point..
But I’ll address toyota - unlike ibm they make a product that is well regarded and not in any danger of being supplemented- while they dropped the ball on ev for hydrogen their existing hybrid tech means “drop in a bigger battery and call it a day” - I think comparing them to imb is a poor comparison at best
And there are many other companies doing quite well in Japan so you shouldn’t be focusing one just one
But I’ll address toyota - unlike ibm they make a product that is well regarded and not in any danger of being supplemented- while they dropped the ball on ev for hydrogen their existing hybrid tech means “drop in a bigger battery and call it a day” - I think comparing them to imb is a poor comparison at best
And there are many other companies doing quite well in Japan so you shouldn’t be focusing one just one
There’s niche players that are very successful. But the success that once was Japan was about being competitive in more than just niche markets.
Not sure transitioning from hybrid to EV is just a case of drop in a bigger battery. That was kind of the point I made before. From toilets to EVs, the mindset is about preserving the once advanced status quo instead of actually continuing to do “continuous improvement”.
For all the adherents of Kaizen in the West or the apologists for what Japan once was, perhaps it would be wise to question why the place has managed to lose its edge across a range of metrics for multiple decades.
Not sure transitioning from hybrid to EV is just a case of drop in a bigger battery. That was kind of the point I made before. From toilets to EVs, the mindset is about preserving the once advanced status quo instead of actually continuing to do “continuous improvement”.
For all the adherents of Kaizen in the West or the apologists for what Japan once was, perhaps it would be wise to question why the place has managed to lose its edge across a range of metrics for multiple decades.
Well, to each their own I guess, I read their response and thought it gave an excellent point-by-point analysis.
At a higher level, I didn't read manxman posts as saying Japan is some sort of tech hellscape, or that their previous high-flying tech companies are all dead, but I think it's pretty easy to argue that innovation in Japan has seriously stagnated over the past 2 decades. I left another comment where I listed tons of Japanese tech I used to have in my (US) house - now I have almost none.
Regarding Toyota, I strongly disagree with "unlike ibm they make a product that is well regarded and not in any danger of being supplanted". I had a Toyota which I loved (it was crazy reliable) for nearly 2 decades that I replaced about 7 years ago - with an EV, and have since bought another EV. I just went to Toyota's website and they only offer a single all-electric EV, the "bZ4X", which I honestly have never heard of. You say it's as easy as "drop in a bigger battery and call it a day" - well, why haven't they then? Toyota is going to get killed in the EV market, which in not too long will be the entire auto market.
At a higher level, I didn't read manxman posts as saying Japan is some sort of tech hellscape, or that their previous high-flying tech companies are all dead, but I think it's pretty easy to argue that innovation in Japan has seriously stagnated over the past 2 decades. I left another comment where I listed tons of Japanese tech I used to have in my (US) house - now I have almost none.
Regarding Toyota, I strongly disagree with "unlike ibm they make a product that is well regarded and not in any danger of being supplanted". I had a Toyota which I loved (it was crazy reliable) for nearly 2 decades that I replaced about 7 years ago - with an EV, and have since bought another EV. I just went to Toyota's website and they only offer a single all-electric EV, the "bZ4X", which I honestly have never heard of. You say it's as easy as "drop in a bigger battery and call it a day" - well, why haven't they then? Toyota is going to get killed in the EV market, which in not too long will be the entire auto market.
I must note while IBM is no longer a shining beacon of innovation, it still exists, still employs almost 300K people, still part of SP100 and still one of the largest technology companies in the world. It may eventually diminish even more than it has now, but I don't think it's time yet to talk about it as if it were dead and buried.
> If these aren't enough - look around Japan outside of the 5 major cities. So much of the mid tier and smaller parts of Japan have been starved of cash. Cities built at the peak in the 80s and 90s with no signs of new development in 20-30 years.
I live in a small Japanese city of 40k people, and your comment is... way too gentle. Yeah, outside of the major cities the infrastructure was never very good to begin with, and now is seriously decaying, which combined with the extremely chaotic Japanese urban development results in a level of ugliness that is pretty much unthinkable in a normal developed country. But the worst part is that you tell the local people, and nobody seems to care or even realize that something is wrong.
I live in a small Japanese city of 40k people, and your comment is... way too gentle. Yeah, outside of the major cities the infrastructure was never very good to begin with, and now is seriously decaying, which combined with the extremely chaotic Japanese urban development results in a level of ugliness that is pretty much unthinkable in a normal developed country. But the worst part is that you tell the local people, and nobody seems to care or even realize that something is wrong.
I remember back in the 80’s when we were all witness to Japan’s economic miracle. Some said it was the tightly managed Keiretsu supply system, some said it was MITI, some said that it was Deming, or maybe it was just Japanese culture?
It really looks now like it’s demographics. This is just the sort of amazing thing that countries with a young well-educated workforce and a below-50 managerial class can accomplish. Now we’re all in the age of the gerontocracy, with Japan Inc. leading the way. Even the United States, ostensibly the most societally agile nation in the world, can’t seem to find political leaders who aren’t in comas or don’t suffer micro-seizures in public.
It really looks now like it’s demographics. This is just the sort of amazing thing that countries with a young well-educated workforce and a below-50 managerial class can accomplish. Now we’re all in the age of the gerontocracy, with Japan Inc. leading the way. Even the United States, ostensibly the most societally agile nation in the world, can’t seem to find political leaders who aren’t in comas or don’t suffer micro-seizures in public.
I observed the same for BIC Camera 5 and now thinking back, 15 years ago, I got already highly disappointed by the Japanese tech.
Thanks, this was a great post! It actually made me realize how, relatively recently, I had a bunch of Japanese tech in my house, but now almost none. Sony Vaio was a great laptop. I had a Sony Ericcson phone back in the day, as well as Bravia TV. I remember a family member had one of the "mini" Toshiba laptops in the 90s (I think it was a Portege? not sure) that I remember being so cool back then.
PlayStation is still going strong, and Nintendo, too, but it's really amazing to see how much has changed in such a short time period.
I do take issue with your conclusion, though: "Japan Inc. is a Ponzi scheme that Bernie Madoff would have loved to have conceived, veiled in superficial politeness intermingled with lots of courteous smiles and bows." I don't think it's really much different than modern capitalism basically being a Ponzi scheme that depends on ever increasing population. Japan just hit it a lot earlier than other places because (1) they had such a massive asset bubble in the late 80s, and 34 years later the Nikkei is still well below its peak in the late 80s, and (2) they experienced population decline well before most other advanced economies - their population peaked in 2010.
Edit: Oh, and I used to own a Toyota, too, which I loved and had for nearly 2 decades. Until I replaced it with an electric vehicle.
PlayStation is still going strong, and Nintendo, too, but it's really amazing to see how much has changed in such a short time period.
I do take issue with your conclusion, though: "Japan Inc. is a Ponzi scheme that Bernie Madoff would have loved to have conceived, veiled in superficial politeness intermingled with lots of courteous smiles and bows." I don't think it's really much different than modern capitalism basically being a Ponzi scheme that depends on ever increasing population. Japan just hit it a lot earlier than other places because (1) they had such a massive asset bubble in the late 80s, and 34 years later the Nikkei is still well below its peak in the late 80s, and (2) they experienced population decline well before most other advanced economies - their population peaked in 2010.
Edit: Oh, and I used to own a Toyota, too, which I loved and had for nearly 2 decades. Until I replaced it with an electric vehicle.
Sony Ericsson was Swedish by the way, it was basically the old Ericsson phone division with Sony Walkman and Cybershot branding slapped on top.
The Japan models were the old Sony and they always had completely different (and much better) hardware than the models in any other country. IIRC the W900 was the attempt to merge Japanese hardware with Ericsson software and the UI was way smoother and it was the only SE device for years that would record QVGA video instead of QCIF.
The Japan models were the old Sony and they always had completely different (and much better) hardware than the models in any other country. IIRC the W900 was the attempt to merge Japanese hardware with Ericsson software and the UI was way smoother and it was the only SE device for years that would record QVGA video instead of QCIF.
I’m deeply cautious of the argument that modern capitalism is reliant on an ever increasing population.
I think this perceived requirement is the result of efforts to undermine or corrupt capitalism to preserve the interests of incumbents at the expense of innovation.
Innovators are always starting at zero and have literally a world of opportunity ahead of them irrespective of whether the world population is growing or declining.
Apple’s growth and value creation was never about chasing user numbers as the first order priority. Instead they built an ecosystem where they delivered value to a small user base and then got that user base to buy into more product categories and services. Those users also evangelise to others more than most. That delivered massive growth that has been buffered against age/population demographics.
Alas Apple seems to be getting into maintaining value over doing real innovation now so maybe their decline is coming, but it’s interesting how the Japanese tech world has not been able to break out of the old ways of doing things and largely doesn’t seem to have learned from the advances in User eXperience that we’ve made in the past couple of decades.
As for PlayStation and Nintendo, true for now but that space is about to move to VR. Enter Meta and Apple but also DJI with interest VR headset control of their drones. I don’t see the Japanese with a credible response to these impending shifts either.
I think this perceived requirement is the result of efforts to undermine or corrupt capitalism to preserve the interests of incumbents at the expense of innovation.
Innovators are always starting at zero and have literally a world of opportunity ahead of them irrespective of whether the world population is growing or declining.
Apple’s growth and value creation was never about chasing user numbers as the first order priority. Instead they built an ecosystem where they delivered value to a small user base and then got that user base to buy into more product categories and services. Those users also evangelise to others more than most. That delivered massive growth that has been buffered against age/population demographics.
Alas Apple seems to be getting into maintaining value over doing real innovation now so maybe their decline is coming, but it’s interesting how the Japanese tech world has not been able to break out of the old ways of doing things and largely doesn’t seem to have learned from the advances in User eXperience that we’ve made in the past couple of decades.
As for PlayStation and Nintendo, true for now but that space is about to move to VR. Enter Meta and Apple but also DJI with interest VR headset control of their drones. I don’t see the Japanese with a credible response to these impending shifts either.
Wow I did not know this about this country near the world's highest per capita GDP. What is the best way to short an entire country? /s
Near highest... you sure about that? https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/JPN/japan/gdp-per-capi...
Wow, looking at that table of GDP per capita makes you realize what a crazy outlier the US is. Every country ahead of the US is either a relatively teeny financial haven, or in the case of Norway and Qatar, small petrostates. I'd say the only other countries that are even close in terms of overall economic structure that are near the US in GDP per capita are Denmark and Australia, and they are still significantly behind.
Lower than I remembered. Oops.
Part of it is how geeks like us were promised a tech utopia on shows like Beyond 2000 in the late 80s and early 90s.
Those shows were fun to watch, but most of it didn’t scale up and ended up as vapourware.
Those shows were fun to watch, but most of it didn’t scale up and ended up as vapourware.
It’s easy to frame “could have been” stories and is an efficient route for soft nationalism.
>how the X company could have been the next Apple/IBM/Microsoft if it weren't for evil/corrupt/incompetent politicians //
Surely it's the other way around, companies only get this big and powerful by abusing their power, and probably politicians helping them (if only to boost a private share portfolio) instead of adding for the people?
So if your political system works (applies morality to business, favours the demos over corporate power) you're not going to get these sorts of mega-corporations. Not sure if IBM fit that category, but Apple and Microsoft seem to.
Surely it's the other way around, companies only get this big and powerful by abusing their power, and probably politicians helping them (if only to boost a private share portfolio) instead of adding for the people?
So if your political system works (applies morality to business, favours the demos over corporate power) you're not going to get these sorts of mega-corporations. Not sure if IBM fit that category, but Apple and Microsoft seem to.
I was hoping to hear more about TRON but instead the article goes in a different direction.
Wikipedia is always the good place to start from : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRON_project
I appreciate the link, but also Wikipedia is kinda a pain for some technical things. The absolute minimum and technically correct descriptions are so often ... not very illuminating.
Granted it's not Wikipedia's point, but it also makes their article's hard to digest at times.
Granted it's not Wikipedia's point, but it also makes their article's hard to digest at times.
> In 1989 the U.S. software industry group, ADAPSO, concluded in a report on Japanese software that TRON had “strong undertones of nationalism and will have the practical effect of impeding foreign penetration of the Japanese market.”
This is revealing and a highly important point. A "universal" IT standard like TRON can only come from an entity that has essentially governmental authority over digital technology. It can't come from just a smartphone company or software company, because competitors and other companies have no incentive to comply.
It's a bit of a conundrum, because a universal open standard could be really nice for the average hacker, but its practical existence implies an entity that has near total dominion over tech standards. I.e. some entity that could force Apple and Google to implement the standard for all their products.
This is revealing and a highly important point. A "universal" IT standard like TRON can only come from an entity that has essentially governmental authority over digital technology. It can't come from just a smartphone company or software company, because competitors and other companies have no incentive to comply.
It's a bit of a conundrum, because a universal open standard could be really nice for the average hacker, but its practical existence implies an entity that has near total dominion over tech standards. I.e. some entity that could force Apple and Google to implement the standard for all their products.
> I.e. some entity that could force Apple and Google to implement the standard for all their products.
So like the EU?
Didn't the EU literally just force Apple at gun point to implement USB-C on their phones or lose access to the EU?
Aren't they also now trying to force Apple to open up parts of iOS like the browser and store?
So like the EU?
Didn't the EU literally just force Apple at gun point to implement USB-C on their phones or lose access to the EU?
Aren't they also now trying to force Apple to open up parts of iOS like the browser and store?
> It is hard to imagine Microsoft not having stifled TRON as an OS for general users anyway. Still it is a shame that the Japanese government had no strategy and corporate Japan was such a coward. If they had envisioned the future rise of information technology correctly, they would have known about the superiority and importance of their software.
It sounded from this same article like geopolitical pressure had been brought to bear.
Not knowing more about the situation, I'm not ready to call that "such a coward"; it might've been the right call. For example, imagine a parent accepting humiliation, to protect their children from an immediate threat.
It sounded from this same article like geopolitical pressure had been brought to bear.
Not knowing more about the situation, I'm not ready to call that "such a coward"; it might've been the right call. For example, imagine a parent accepting humiliation, to protect their children from an immediate threat.
I had never heard of the Tron project before this. I do remember Microsoft and msx however which was a Microsoft / Japanese partnership which was quite big in Japan. Anyway thanks hacker news for bring tron to my attention!
[deleted]
To quote my late grandfather...
"Almost isn't."
"Almost isn't."
A video about the intelligent house:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jPKEyM44GU
Edit: Sorry, it seems this was already posted. Still, the video is more informative than this article.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jPKEyM44GU
Edit: Sorry, it seems this was already posted. Still, the video is more informative than this article.
I would argue Westinghouse demonstrated some of these ideas first, in the 60s. They could have executed on some of it too I am sure, but I believe it was mostly aspirational demonstrators of what the future could hold.
Hah, imagine having a standard open OS for IoT gadgets, which seems to be a part of this project.. then we wouldn't be in the current dystopia..
There’s not much in this article to me that indicated that TRON “Almost Ruled IT”.
reminds me of Geoworks: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29402609
[deleted]
USA using threats of sanctions in order to stop competition from the Japanese computer industry. Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
(2022)
[deleted]
[deleted]
A war that Japan decidedly lost.
Here is an article from Chinese state media drawing the parallels:
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2019-07-11/Lessons-from-U-S-Japan...
What can we learn from U.S.-Japan trade war of 1980s?
It is true that the ongoing trade war between China and the U.S. is different from the one between the U.S. and Japan in the 1980s, but the two trade wars do have a lot in common. First, both involve the world's largest and second-largest economies; second, China is the country with the largest trade surplus with the U.S., the spot was held by Japan during the 1980s; third, China is highly dependent on the U.S. market, so was Japan. The U.S. approach and the intensity of the trade wars are also more or less the same.