I’m re-reading George Orwell’s 1984. I get something new out of the book every time I read it. This work has probably done a great deal to prevent the world it describes from ever coming into being. Orwell’s dystopia is so real and his grasp of human psychology so strong that would-be tyrants can’t help but sound like characters from the novel.

After my recent trip back to the US, I’m struck by the following quotes from Emanuel Goldstein — a character who plays the part of Osama Bin Laden in the novel.

It does not matter whether the war is actually happening, and, since no decisive victory is possible, it does not matter whether the war is going badly. All that is needed is that a state of war should exist.

The social atmosphere is that of a besieged city.. And at the same time the consciousness of being at war, and therefore in danger, makes the handing-over of all power to a small caste seem the natural, unavoidable condition of survival.

Orwell had a prescience that becomes clearer with each year.

It starts with an earthquake, birds and snakes, an aeroplane – Lenny Bruce is not afraid.

Etc, etc.

The upper floors of an office tower is not the the most stable place to ride out a 6.8 earthquake, but at least it’s reasonably safe. The buildings are designed to sway to absorb the tremors, so we were rolling from side to side long after the quake stopped. The sensation is quite like being in a large boat on stormy seas.

The damage was not too bad in Tokyo, but at least 19 people were killed in Nigata.

In the last five weeks I’ve been trough tornadoes, two typhoons and now a 6.8 earthquake.

…and I feel fine.

Well it’s the biggest typhoon to hit Tokyo since last mont’s biggest typhoon to hit Tokyo and they are shutting down the trains and rolling up the sidewalks once again.

Actually this one looks like it could be bad. Flooding, Trucks and light buildings have been overturned and 12 people are dead so far.

Rikkyo Elementary school has began using RFID chips to track the movements of the students. Whenever a student enters or leaves the school, the fact is logged into the school’s computer and email is automatically sent to the parents.

In any society, prisoners and children are two groups assumed to have very few fundamental rights, and particularly not the right to privacy, so this is not really an invasion of privacy issue. Administrators and parents both love the new system and feel that it will keep their children safer.

This is, however, yet another example of addressing a problem by doing something very visible and newsworthy, but which will have no effect on the problem itself. The RFID system was introduced after a number of high-profile child-murders. When asked how the system could protect students from such crimes the principal said quite frankly. “This won’t prevent crimes against children.”

Of course, actually making children safer is a secondary goal. The primary goal of such systems is making people feel safer.

I was recently interviewed for the Japan Entrepreneur Report. The transcript can be found here.

http://www.japanentrepreneur.com/200409.html#3

I’m not doing too well weatherwise; tornadoes, earthquakes, typhoons.

I’ve just walked to the convenience store and the video rental shop through “the worst typhoon to hit Tokyo in over a decade,” and I have to say that Tokyoites are wimps. Don’t get me wrong. It’s nasty out there. The rain is coming down in sheets and the wind in blowing in all six directions — the four usual directions as well as straight down, and (inexplicably) straight up. The inside of my umbrella is dripping wet.

So if you go outside, you are going to get really wet. But that’s it. There are none of the huge waves that we saw further south and out on the islands. There is no flooding, and I even saw a police officer making the rounds on his bicycle. Granted, he was not particularly happy about it, but come on! You can’t ride a bicycle in a real typhoon.

However, the clerk at the video rental shop looked like he feared for his life, much of public transportation has been shut down, people are being asked to stay indoors, and all of the TV stations are yammering on about how terrible and dangerous this storm is. However, their damage shots are mostly trees blowing in the wind and traffic signs that have been knocked over.

Perhaps I am missing something here or perhaps this is just an offshoot of the “we’re all in it together” theme that runs through Japanese society, but I just don’t see what the big deal is.

Anyway, now that I have dried off, I have a video to watch

My friend’s niece is two years old and is convinced that all proper nouns end with “dot jp”. I am “Tim.jp” my friend is “Mami.jp” and she lives in “Tokyo.jp”.

If you correct her, and that’s not easy, she will stop until she hears someone mention a URL in conversation or on TV. Then everything ends in “dot jp” again.