Recently Amazon launched their cloud based storage offering as well and it looks like they are going for market share with competitive pricing:

A few years ago i was a loyal Flickr Pro subscriber but something – I think it was the performance of that service here in Denmark – caused me to turn my back to that service and looking for alternatives for a while. Well, I had a lot of pictures there nicely organized in to nested albums, a feature not available in http://brams.dk/?p=636

Oh no… just wanted to relax for 5 minuttes and look what I have done :-o

And that does not seem to stop … here is one of the reasons. I keep seeing things that on first glance seem totally alien, but when I take a closer look it makes totally sense and makes me wonder why I have not seen this in my part of the world before.

The picture here is not from a supermarket, but from a website. Apparently it is a prototype – but it is a very clever idea.

Like in the rest of the world, supermarkets here cannot sell food after the expiration date. Some have tried tampering with the labels resulting in public scandals. The solution could be done as an intelligent label that changes color based on the level of ammonia the food emits as it ages.

The label is brilliantly done on more than one way – it is shaped in a way everybody will recognize and it is intended to work render the bar-code unreadable after passing its expiration date.

See more at: To-GenKyo.com

Well – Japan is cool. Period.

Tools and material

Although I have been using the website Reviewing the Kanji for everything online in the process of learning these, but I would not have been able to do so without the hardcover edition of James Heisig’s blue book.

The book is very well written and although some of the material may seem dry and factual at first glance, the author has included a lot of humor between the lines.

If you are not a native English speaker, you will probably – like I did – need a dictionary as well. Although I have been considering myself quite at ease with this language for a while, I have learned quite a few new English words in the process.

Because some of the keywords are quite similar, you will need a precise definition for the memory system to work. Hence the list of translated words will probably be longer than you expect when you start out on this journey.

If you speak Danish, please feel free to peruse my list of translated Heisig key words.

Online

The website Reviewing the Kanji
uses a spaced repetition system based on the popular Leitner System:

In the Leitner system, flashcards are sorted into groups according to how well you know each one in the Leitner’s learning box. This is how it works: you try to recall the solution written on a flashcard. If you succeed, you send the card to the next group. But if you fail, you send it back to the first group. Each succeeding group has a longer period of time before you are required to revisit the cards.
Source: Wikipedia

This is a clever system that will take care of the book keeping on your behalf and make sure you review all the information you have learned and do so before forgetting.

In the beginning it it very easy to be on top of everything. However, with a job not related to learning Kanji and focus away from the website for a few weeks things start to pile up.

Here is the surprise I got when I had a look at the website just after Christmas:

Needless to say – if you let it slip, it will take a while to regain control. But it is all good and certainly worth the effort.

Now what?

First of all this is just the initial 2042 joyo Kanji – there are more to learn. Heisig has published two additional volumes – one looking into the different readings and one with the remaining Kanji. I do, however, think this system will work well and I hope learning the remaining thousand or so Kanji will be relatively easy.

Mind you – this is not the same as learning Japanese! After learning how to recognize and write these important building blocks, you will have to learn the different pronunciations and alternative meanings when combined with other Kanji.

But this is the fun part – learning Kanji first is like eating the outside of the pizza first, leaving the good stuff for later.

:-)

Have a look and enjoy … while I prepare myself for the beginner level JLPT exam Sunday this week ;-)

This amusing video of J-Leaguer Marcus Tulio Tanaka knocking down Masato Morishige with a super-powerful pyscic finger jab is one of the most-viewed clips today on YouTube Japan.

Always amusing owning a prankster…

I never realized the real value of air miles until I noticed something interesting in the newsletter from Scandinavian Air Systems, SAS today:

I have seen this before, so I was not surprised reading that you can earn 1.500 points by purchasing a Mac Book in their online store. Neither was it a surprise to see that you may also use your points to purchase things outside the airline world.

But, here comes the surprise, two cinema tickets are priced at 13.788 points. Although Soda and popcorn is included, the newsletter does not mention flying you to some exotic place first…

Something is clearly out of proportion – either the monetary value of these bonus points is indeed very low, or perhaps the airline is just very reluctant handing over points when purchasing laptops and other expensive items?

I stumbled upon this surprising topic over at the Japan Probe website.  A Japanese software company called Omron has developed a smile scoring system that will grade images with regard to quality of the perceived smile. The idea is to use this software for companies wanting to improve the quality of their customer facing activities. Fast food chains are mentioned as a popular market for this technology.

The technology was demonstrated in a TV program arranging a mini competition between different nationalities. Obviously Thailand – the land of smiles – was destined to come out as the winner, but more surprisingly Japan came out last. That is certainly not the impression I have from Japan – but one of the participants was unlucky and scored only 5% for some reason and made the average suffer.

Although this might just be for fun, it is certainly an interesting idea. I can easily think of prospect clients in my neck of the wood – SAS would certainly benefit from using this feedback system with their cabin crew, but they are not alone… For some reason there seem to be a trend in the other direction – maybe it is now cool not to smile or even be polite?

Gotta love these short movie mods – thanks to Jimmie for this find!

Here is another gold nugget from TED. Helping out with the exam preparation for one of my children I have been on a wonderful journey this morning looking for background information on the Higgs particle and the Big Bang theory.

If you want to keep learning, this is probably a good source – world leading experts giving remarkably inspiring presentations. you really should treat yourself by visiting TED.com once in a while.