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Osaka Temple Offers Visitors Visions of Hell, Tasty Sweets

At the moment there’s a picture book that’s very popular in Japan called “A Picture Book of Hell.” It’s intended to teach kids good manners, and it’s become something of a hot topic, if you’ll excuse the pun. Popular illustrator Akiko Higashimura even mentioned it in her manga series “Mama wa Tenparisto”, loosely translated as “Momma With a Short Fuse”. As you can imagine, there’s been a lot of interest among mothers and educational professionals.

I suppose terrorizing your kids with two-dimensional representations of hell is OK, but did you know there’s a place you can take them to experience it in real life? Read More

Awesome Course Schedule, an app released last year by Japanese content provider Labit, has been rapidly gaining traction with students at Japanese universities, because it allows them to rate and review their courses. Read More

Voting is open for the “Most Evil Corporation of the Year” Award for 2012

Established by a 10 member team including journalists, activists and University professors, the committee for the “Most Evil Corporation of the Year” (in Japanese “Black Corporation Award”) has made a shortlist of nominees each vying to be the blackest of businesses.

In Japanese, the term “black business” refers to companies who rake in huge profits while exploiting their own work force by discrimination, harassment, unpaid overtime, and short-term contracts.  This type of business is a widespread problem in Japanese society but often goes on undiscussed in mainstream media.

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Only 4 July, Suwon, South Korea officially opened their newest attraction; “The Restroom Cultural Park” which is the world’s first toilet theme park.  To answer the question on everyone’s mind – What the…? – we should first look at a little background on Suwon city.

This city located outside of Seoul is well known for two things.  First, the great Hwaseong Fortress ranks among UNESCO’s world heritage and has ruins which run throughout the city.  Second is their recently deceased mayor who was known affectionately as Mr. Toilet.

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  • Jul 12, 2012

Legendary Manga to Make Comeback? Mystery Countdown on Weekly Shonen Jump Magazine Website Could Mean Exciting News For DB Fans!

If you’re a fan of Japanese manga, you may be familiar with the comic magazine “Weekly Shonen Jump” (“Shukan Shonen Jump in Japanese”), one of the longest running and most widely read comic magazines in Japan. Well, you might be interested to know that a mystery countdown has been going on the magazine’s website, and until recently, the page showing the countdown contained just a short Japanese phrase (“最強、始動” which roughly translates to “The Truly Mighty are Getting Ready for Action” ) followed by the letter D covering the page. Read More


  • Jul 11, 2012

We recently posted a story on the new Toy Story snacks and goodies that have become available at Tokyo Disney Sea in advance of the opening of the new attraction, “Toy Story Mania!“. Well, now that Toy Story Mania! has officially opened on July 9th, we wanted to let you know what the crowd was like on opening day. Okay, the attraction was highly anticipated, with excellent advance reviews, so a huge crowd was fully expected. But who would have imagined that the wait time for the ride at 10:30a.m. on opening day would be a staggering 400 minutes? That’s a 6 hour 40 minute wait! Read More

HexRinger Turns Your Phone’s Vibrate Mode On and Off Based on Your Location So You Don’t Have To

How many of you forgot to put your phone into manner mode (vibrate) when going into the office or a movie theatre only to have it ring and draw the angry scowl of everyone in the room?  Of how about when you remember to turn on manner mode but when forget to turn it off you miss that important message you were waiting for?

Wouldn’t it be nice to have an app that automatically turns your manner mode on or off depending on where you are?  Wouldn’t it be nice to have HexRinger?

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Robot Guide Scheduled To Work Atop Tokyo Tower Needs a Name

With the recent opening of the Tokyo Sky Tree, it’s older little brother, Tokyo Tower has its work cut out for it to gather tourists.  In an effort to break out of the shadow of the tallest tower in the world, Tokyo Tower plans to add “Japan’s first autonomously moving robot with a signboard.”

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Here’s a hypothetical that you can discuss with your neighbors during the next BBQ or dinner party:  One of your neighbors had fallen into a pit full of human excrement and the rest of you have to rescue them.  Who goes in?  What would you do?

This crappy situation played out in a central China province after a pig running into the cesspool of a farm resulted in two people being hospitalized.

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A Naruto Fan and Non-Fan Give Their Impressions of the Naruto Live Action Movie on YouTube

One of the most popular anime and mangas around the world in recent times has got to be Naruto.  With such fame often comes fan fiction, and thanks to the development of easily available production equipment, fan movies are an ever improving art form.

The fledgling American production team Thousand Pounds Action Company has put together a YouTube movie with an original story based on the Naruto universe.  A follow-up to their celebrated Street Fighter X Tekken video, the Naruto movie has been getting an equally good reception and then some.

However, would Naruto fans be offending with their handling of the source material, and could this tiny movie company grab the attention of non-fans with their talents? We take a look at it from both sides to see.

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McD’s “Miami Fries”, Only in Italia! We Went to Have a Taste

They don’t mess around in Italy. Next to the regular french fries on the McDonald’s menu, you’ll find Miami Fries. Customers regularly substitute these fries with the combo sets. Read More

The following is a list of the 30 most sold video games in Japan in the history of video games across all platforms.  Western Gamers may be surprised that violent shooters take a rather large backseat to RPG’s, mushroom stomping, and Pikachus in the minds of Japanese game consumers.

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Tokyo University’s Wildlife Research Center has discovered that a group of monkeys living on Awaji Island are more laid-back than all other monkeys in Japan.  The cause of this, they claim, is a gene that dictates our gentleness.

Researchers put an ample supply of monkey bait within an 8 meter circle marked out on the group and then observed the monkeys.  Of the monkey population on Awaji Island in Hyogo Prefecture a whopping 180 monkeys came out to enjoy the treats inside the circle together with minimal conflict. Read More

[Breakthrough] A Cursive Lower Case Y Looks Just Like Lupin III

Hot on the heels of the latest Higgs boson development, leading graphologists are in a frenzy to confirm a new hypothesis set forth by one Twitterer: A cursive English letter y bears a striking resemblance to anime’s favorite criminal Lupin III when you add little eyes, a nose and an ear.

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Was KFC’s Great Chicken Give-Away a Success? Depends on How You Look at It

This past Fourth of July, while Kentucky Fried Chicken was celebrating Independence Day in the US, KFC Japan was busy commemorating the anniversary of the fried chicken chain’s entrance into the Japanese market.

On this day they held a one-day all-you-can-eat sale where customers could get 45 minutes of non-stop chicken for 1,200 yen.  A very generous deal but how much did KFC stand to lose on such an offer, or did they lose?  Let’s crunch the numbers and see.

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Sony is releasing a new product, their HF Series cassette tapes. There will be 10, 60, and 90-minute versions and prices are expected to range from around 100 to 230 yen for individual tapes, though they’ll also be available in 10-packs. Possibly in consideration for its target clientele (hint: not the young), Sony has made the printed font big, as well as made the labels and index sheets easy to write in big letters. As could be expected, the netizen response to this unveiling has been colorful … Read More


  • Jul 6, 2012

“Little Green Man” to Appear at Tokyo Disney Sea – But Not in Humanoid Form

According to a post on the official Tokyo Disney Resort Blog, “Little Green Man” will be making an appearance at Tokyo Disney Sea starting July 5th. So, does this mean that the theme park will be overrun by aliens? No, but it does mean that there will be some tasty new snacks available at Disney Sea, and you’ll love them if you’re a fan of the Toy Story series. Read More

We Check Into the Cheapest Hotel in Japan, US$6 a Night

Located near the center of Osaka City is an area called Kamagasaki which was once known to be a gathering place for day laborers.  Now, it’s a rather charming place where street cars run that kind of takes you back half a century.  On the other hand, beneath the surface runs some violent energy as this area is often ground zero for riots and other acts of civil disobedience.

It’s here that I went in search of the cheapest hotel in Japan, The Kimiya, where it is said one could spend the night for a mere 500 yen (US$6).

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  • Jul 4, 2012

That’s the Power of Music – It Really Does Bring Joy to the World!!

A delightful surprise performance that recently took place in Spain has been receiving acclaim from around the world on the internet, and we thought we’d share the feel-good story with you. It’s all captured in a video clip titled “Som Sabadell flashmob” and it begins when a girl drops a coin in a musician’s hat on May 19, 2012, in the city of Sabadell, Spain. But what follows is no ordinary musical performance. Everyone who happened to be there was in for a real treat!

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Tomato Juice Fad Dead at 6 months

We had a lot of fun here at RocketNews informing you of the tomato juice diet fad earlier this year, followed by the shocking announcement of tomato juice preventing drunkenness.

Despite my own personal hatred for this beverage that tastes like vomit chilled in the freezer for 30 minutes, it was good to see people get into this otherwise healthy drink.

Sadly, it looks as if this fad has run its course, based on the latest tomato juice based research sponsored by juice maker Kagome.  Coroners have estimated the time of death for the fad to be 9:20pm on July 2nd.

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