Causation-Correlation

There are certain themes that repeat when I teach research skills to students.

Don't passively accept the first source.

Use the databases that the school pays for.

See if you're looking at causation or correlation.

As I recently read an article about research on ebooks and culture, I came across this statistic. Approximately 58% of Japanese people say that they would never read an ebook, while the number was 4% for Chinese respondants.

Does being Japanese cause you to not read (or at least intend to read) ebooks? I'd say not. You can read the article or take the highlights. http://www.thebookseller.com/news/japan-rejecting-e-books-claims-report.html

Parsing through the rest of the article, I learned:

-the study didn't account for the high number of Japanese people living in rural areas, where the digital divide is great.

-the study didn't take into account age, and 22% of Japan's population is 65 or older.

-the study didn't fully account for the ways that digital reading devices influence the reading experience.

There's potentially a causal relationship in expectations of quality, and it's possible now that the digital experience of reading does not equal the print experience. Here's a telling quote from a CEO of a digital publishing house:

I think users sense the lack of maturity in the e-book market and users are not being tempted to try e-books in large numbers rather than that they are trying them, rejecting them and going back to print. In a nutshell, Japanese consumers are pro-tech but even more pro-quality.

Photo Slideshow of Beautiful Tropical Okinawa

We arrived back in Tokyo this afternoon, to the opulent New Otani. After only a week in Okinawa, the formality of Tokyo was a little jarring. Here are two photos I took on my five hour walk around the city this afternoon.

(I loved the shoes at the door and the suits!)

(Typical professional-wear of the Tokyo denizens.)

Compare with the Okinawa slideshow below.

They say it’s inevitable to get lost when wandering through Tokyo because most of the streets aren’t named, only the main streets. Also, street names sometimes don’t translate well into English. Little did I know that I was nowhere near where I was headed for (loosely) when I took this picture. I just liked the length of the name. :)

Tokyo Wanderings

Yesterday was my one day of the entire trip to explore on my own. A good number of people headed out of the city, mainly south to the town of Kamakura (known for its giant Buddha statues), and a few headed further out-Kyoto, Hiroshima, and the base of Mount Fuji. I know when I lived in New York I wouldn't have felt like I had seen the city if I'd been out a few nights in the Times Square area. So, instead of spending my time getting somewhere, I thought I'd spend it "there." In my attempts to get people thinking about using different forms of social media and using them for different purposes, I tested the slideshow feature of Smilebox. (There are some features I'm not thrilled with, like only allowing one line of captions, but overall it's straightforward. If you don't get something immediately, trial and error will get you there, or you'll learn that it's not possible without the paid subscription.)

The day was lots of walking, but it wasn't as easy to get lost as I had figured. There are subway stops all over, and each stop has a map at ground level. It was neat to see the landscape and the people change in the different districts. I knew I was looking for bookstores and the Kite Museum, but that was about it. Everything else is what I happened across. (You'll get a pretty full picture, but it's missing things like the Mitukoshi department store (similar to Harrods) and the book gallery of antique Asian books.) I had a little trouble finding something for lunch, but I ended up in a ramen shop where another customer who spoke English helped me out when my language guidebook failed. 4.50 ramen from a restaurant tastes suspiciously like .45 cent ramen from the store.

Enjoy the tour of Tokyo!

Bad Fortune at the Shinto Temple

As part of our group tour of Tokyo today, we visited a district called Asakusa. This area is one of only a few in the city that survived the bombings of World War II. We enjoyed a tempura lunch, then had free time to explore the stalls, shrines, and the Shinto temple. We were told by our tour guide that it was so crowded today because today was the first day that the temple had been opened in 50 years, and it would only stay open for a month before closing for another 50 years. We were all amazed that we lucked into coming at the right time. Yet, when I tried to verify this online, I found no information indicating this was true. I also found other people's photographs of the temple, indicating that today can't be the first day that it's open to the public again. This is question one of my follow-up today. Does anyone have any further explanations?

At the temple, which was beautiful, full of color and intricate carvings, there were indeed masses of people. It was probably about half tourist and half worshipers. The tourists were taking photographs and talking. The Japanese were burning sticks of incense, praying with their heads against poles of ribbons, and throwing coins (?) into a box in front of the main figure. One activity I did take part in was mikuji. You put 100 yen in a slot (kind of like in front of devotional candles in a church), ask a question, and shake up a box of sticks (chopstick-shaped). You then pull out one stick and find the corresponding character on a wall of drawers that looks like an old-time card catalog. If your fortune is good, you keep it. If it's bad, you tie it up on a nearby post. I photographed mine before tying it. I hope that doesn't mean the bad energy will follow me on this trip.

There's a book in the library (with the new global books) on the Shinto religion. I'm definitely going to look this ritual up in there when I return. Since I'm sure I got some of the details wrong, if you want to learn more, feel free to check it out. And question two is whether anyone else can shed more light on this tradition.