Japan may have to cancel the Olympics
Japan may have to cancel the OlympicsCovid-19 could scupper Prime Minister Abe Shinzo’s pet project IF BANYAN HAD to choose one country in which to ride out a pandemic, it would surely be Japan. Early 19th-century woodblock prints of bathing testify to Japan’s old and admirable cult of cleanliness. Modern Japanese have for years been quick to don a face mask at the first sniffle, out of considerat
Japanese debate how foreigners should refer to them
Japanese debate how foreigners should refer to themA chrysanthemum by any other name would smell as sweet THE WORLD calls the leader of China Xi Jinping. His North Korean counterpart is known as Kim Jong Un. The man who led North Vietnam to independence is almost always dubbed Ho Chi Minh. In all three instances, the surname comes first, and then the given names, as is customary in China, Korea an
The surprising revival of the Hawaiian language
The surprising revival of the Hawaiian languageCould that success be replicated elsewhere? Ma uka, ma uka ka ua,Ma kai, ma kai ka ua SO SING THE children at Hawaii’s Punana Leo O Hilo kindergarten on the Big Island of Hawaii. “It is raining on the uplands, it is raining by the sea.” The chant is much like any other “Rain, rain, go away” nursery rhyme, but it has an unusual power: it is one of the
Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are useless
Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are uselessFor blockchains, the jury is still out AN OLD saying holds that markets are ruled by either greed or fear. Greed once governed cryptocurrencies. The price of Bitcoin, the best-known, rose from about $900 in December 2016 to $19,000 a year later. Recently, fear has been in charge. Bitcoin’s price has fallen back to around $7,000; the prices of other cry
Python has brought computer programming to a vast new audience
IN DECEMBER 1989 Guido van Rossum, a Dutch computer scientist, set himself a Christmas project. Irked by shortcomings in other programming languages, he wanted to build his own. His principles were simple. First, it should be easy to read. Rather than sprawling over line-endings and being broken up by a tangle of curly braces, each chunk would be surrounded with indented white space. Second, it sh
Japan’s sex industry is becoming less sexual
Japan’s sex industry is becoming less sexualAn ageing population and a protracted economic slump have changed the face of the business IN THE 17th century Yoshiwara, in north-eastern Tokyo (then known as Edo), was one of a number of red-light districts. Both female and male prostitutes walked the streets, offering a full range of services. Four hundred years later Yoshiwara remains a centre of the
Bitcoin is no longer the only game in crypto-currency town
Bitcoin is no longer the only game in crypto-currency townWhich could be the next digital coin to rule them all? IT STARTED as a joke. Dogecoin was launched in 2013 as a bitcoin parody, using as its mascot a Japanese shiba inu dog, a popular internet meme. The crypto-currency was never really used, except for tipping online, and one of its founders has called it quits. But recently its price has s
Bitcoin-futures contracts create as many risks as they mitigate
Bitcoin-futures contracts create as many risks as they mitigateAnd don’t mention tulip-bulb futures! OFTEN promoted as a way of mitigating risk, futures contracts are frequently more like new ways of gambling. That was true of a close precursor to the instrument, introduced in the Netherlands in 1636, linked to the hot investment of the day—tulip bulbs. Likewise the world’s first two futures contr
Bitcoin is a speculative asset but not yet a systemic risk
Bitcoin is a speculative asset but not yet a systemic riskIs there an investment case for the cryptocurrency? FINANCIAL markets rarely miss opportunities to make money. That is as true of cryptocurrencies as anything else. Trading in bitcoin futures began on the Cboe Global Markets this week; CME Group will launch its own futures on December 18th (see article). That has given a further boost to th
What if the bitcoin bubble bursts?
What if the bitcoin bubble bursts?Is the latest frenzy like tulipmania, a gold rush or the dotcom boom? MARKETS frequently froth and bubble, but the boom in bitcoin, a digital currency, is extraordinary. Although its price is down from an all-time high of $2,420 on May 24th, it has more than doubled in just two months. Anyone clever or lucky enough to have bought $1,000 of bitcoins in July 2010, w
Toshiba admits to a ruinous overpayment for an American nuclear firm
Toshiba admits to a ruinous overpayment for an American nuclear firmIts share price plunged by 40% in three days as investors worried about its financial viability THE probe in 2015 into one of Japan’s largest-ever accounting scandals, at Toshiba, an electronics and nuclear-power conglomerate that has been the epitome of the country’s engineering prowess, concluded that number-fiddling at the firm
The strong dollar has given Abenomics another chance
The strong dollar has given Abenomics another chanceBut a bottleneck of corporate timidity remains a big problem JAPAN’S prime minister, Shinzo Abe, was the first foreign leader to meet Donald Trump after his improbable election victory. The photographs show him smiling almost as broadly as the new president-elect. But not even Mr Abe could have guessed how much he would have to smile about.
Epic fail
AS POLLING errors go, this year’s misfire was not particularly large—at least in the national surveys. Mrs Clinton is expected to win the popular vote by a bit over one percentage point once all the ballots are counted, two points short of her projection. That represents a better prediction than in 2012, when Barack Obama beat his polls by three. But America does not choose its president by popula
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Bill Gates on how to fight future pandemics
What to make of cryptocurrencies and blockchains
Bright idea
Japan finally gets casinos
Crypto-currencies are in a tailspin
Once a leader in virtual currencies, China turns against them
A surge in the value of crypto-currencies provokes alarm