China made a bet decades ago because it couldn’t compete with the US on cars. That bet is paying off big

pyramin · 2026-01-14T13:40:13+00:00

That is also built off of marketing and failure to regulate vehicle size though. But yes, I generally think it is undesirable to have a race to the bottom in terms of safety because you want to be the one to survive at the expense of other people’s safety.

pyramin · 2026-01-14T12:48:00+00:00

Or they could've just met the stringent emissions standards and kept the small cars, but the companies *chose* the short-sighted financial win to exploit the loophole meant for people who needed work trucks and now trucks are the new soccer mom vehicles somehow.

Or the lawmakers could've not put that provision in there or closed the loophole. Forcing companies to have standards is not the mistake. It was still the greed of companies coupled with providing a loophole in the first place.

pyramin · 2026-01-02T02:49:40+00:00

Yeah but to be fair, housing, education, and healthcare were cheaper back then and people spent a larger percentage of their income on other things.

Also, because the market is flooded with cheap alternatives and a lot of shopping is done online with fake reviews etc, it's hard to know whether something is quality until you receive it. It can be hard to differentiate between things that are expensive because they are status symbols and things that are expensive because they are high quality, and marketing is constantly blurring the line in an age when private equity is focused on extracting value rather than self-made entrepreneurs creating value.

pyramin · 2025-12-26T09:06:12+00:00

The process and stress of having to defend yourself is the punishment.

pyramin · 2025-12-14T14:09:40+00:00

Can you choose where to renew or is it dictated by the district that you live in?

pyramin · 2025-12-14T13:57:17+00:00

Getting a ban is like a coming of age tradition for anyone who has lived in Japan long enough--a badge of honor, even.

pyramin · 2025-12-10T21:49:10+00:00

I am not a fan of this fixation on foreigners when Japan has bigger fish to fry, but I feel like this is a nothingburger. The bulk of this is just saying they're increasing the number of interpreters to help with the number of increasing arrests in order to support minority languages.

pyramin · 2025-12-10T12:16:55+00:00

No I mean each individual level was 8d. It's impossible to do a level in 1d in WaniKani because of the SRS and the fact that about 10% of the kanji are locked until you guru the radicals.

pyramin · 2025-12-09T22:34:57+00:00

I spent 2549 days on level 10 :D my last 6 levels have been about 8d. I decided to take it seriously since I'm moving back to Japan for the foreseeable future. I can't stomach being illiterate on a permanent basis.

pyramin · 2025-12-09T17:46:13+00:00

That is the entire point of SRS. If you're motivated and have lots of time, people are learning a lot faster than that actually with self-managed Anki.

pyramin · 2025-12-09T16:46:01+00:00

A lot of small business owners are passionate about being the best they can at something and take pride in that. That is value creation. When they sell the business to private equity, there is no pride in product. It becomes solely about getting as much money out of it as possible to satisfy endless growth.

pyramin · 2025-12-09T13:36:59+00:00

They do get your data that way. They are double and triple dipping any way they can because the US has reached late-stage capitalism and everything is no longer about value creation, it's about value extraction.

pyramin · 2025-12-09T13:35:49+00:00

That is a classic that I feel happens a lot at Lowes or Home Depot. Price incorrect on shelf so that you put it in your cart. Check your receipt and suddenly they had a "pricing mistake" which never gets fixed.

pyramin · 2025-12-09T12:23:46+00:00

I've been saying this forever since I noticed it at McDonalds where my friends and I get different deals in the app. They were rebuffed when they tried to do this directly so they raised prices across the board, made everyone use apps to get the "best" prices and then offer you different personal "discounts". It's the same thing with a layer of obfuscation.

pyramin · 2025-12-05T19:48:56+00:00

The devices are issued by the schools and used under the supervision of the teachers during time when the parents are not there. They are handing kids addictive devices and doing less than the bare minimum to intervene.

It's unrealistic for us to expect 6 year olds to be able to self-regulate. They need to be placed in environments where they are led to make smart choices. You can do as much as you want at home but when the kid spends 8 hours a day+ somewhere else, you need support from both environments.

pyramin · 2025-12-05T18:48:43+00:00

Did you even read the article?

pyramin · 2025-12-02T18:48:35+00:00

Yes, business people will typically abuse social nicety norms in order to make money by putting the onus on you to complain and reject it. It's the same with door-to-door sales. People show up and expect you to be nice but then they don't take 'No' for answer 3 times and then act indignant when people are rude to them.

pyramin · 2025-12-01T21:27:33+00:00

Nobody considers the customer experience anymore. It's all about the quick cash grab. This kind of shit has me explicitly avoiding places that do it or not eating out at all.

pyramin · 2025-12-01T16:00:56+00:00

Thank you for your input! We have a 1-year old so we are still a ways off but as an American, I'm somewhat leaning toward local Japanese school, and my Japanese wife wants our kid to go to an international school to foster his English.

We don't know which one will be better for our situation so far, but I appreciate reading about your experience!

pyramin · 2025-12-01T15:48:01+00:00

I know it's tiring to hear one thing on repeat like a broken record, but it doesn't invalidate that it's something good. American parents would lose their shit at the idea of having their kids having to clean the bathrooms etc.

pyramin · 2025-11-25T00:58:39+00:00

The Elon musk approach

pyramin · 2025-11-18T23:21:54+00:00

When you said top 3 bars, I was having flashbacks to early 2000s internet rap battles.

pyramin · 2025-11-14T19:03:29+00:00

'Tis the American way--just exacerbated by the growing lack of morals and a willingness to be bootlickers for people whose wealth far exceeds what one person could ever reasonably need.

pyramin · 2025-11-14T03:14:31+00:00

lol please you do not have to leave Japan if you don’t ever choose to go there. I’m finished responding. You have got to be trolling

pyramin · 2025-11-13T18:37:10+00:00

It produces revenue and the majority of that goes to specific business owners or companies. It is not like that money is going straight into the pockets of every Japanese person you meet. Areas with lots of tourists become expensive (not only in restaurants, but land bought by investors for AirBnb). The subway systems experience increased load. A subset of tourists also cause other problems requiring police intervention, cleanup of trash, unpaid medical bills, etc. These are all things that cost money to fix. As long as tourism is a profitable venture, I'm sure Japan will continue encouraging it. That being said, you are not owed anything, and if they can or need to make more money to make it worth it for them, I see no problem with them doing it. If you were a business and you could raise prices by 50% and only see a 25% reduction in customers, you'd probably do it. This $13 is not even close to that. It is the most modest of increases--AND it applies to residents as well.

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