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A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

disruptingjapan.com

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Re: A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

#81

Post by mostertoaster »

Dalewyn wrote: post #77

Speaking as a Japanese-American, I personally think the biggest problem with Japanese programmers comes down to the Japanese being too crafty and elitist. What do I mean by this? Basically: If you're a wizard at peeling the skin off an apple with your knife you never need an apple peeler; consequently, you never get a good peeler industry going. Meanwhile, Americans manufacture the best apple peelers because they can…

I enjoyed reading this. Thank you. Specifically how you beautifully put “Japan is too good for that”, in a way that both compliments and criticizes at the same time.

Re: A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

#82

Post by iforgotpassword »

fexecve wrote: post #20

I disagree with everything in this article post-2000. There were no "software gatekeepers" preventing Japanese software from flourishing on the PC or Mac. I'm not sure what the author is talking about there. So there's still the unexplained question of why Japanese software is still bad, in 2023. And I think the answer is the language barrier. Windows and Mac dominate the world's computer systems, and the development…

Sorry but this is BS. What's your background here? The author of the article has quite some credibility here having lived in Japan for decades, and worked in said industry.

> And I think the answer is the language barrier.

You need to learn about a dozen English keywords to use something like C++. The rest is abstract thinking. Windows, Visual Studio etc have been available in Japanese for a long time. By that logic, every country that doesn't speak English should suck at software development.

As I read the article, post 2000, the simply wasn't any path forward for a startup. Nobody would give you money. Nobody would take you seriously. There was no easy way to distribute your software. It didn't cross anybody's mind to do so.

Re: A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

#83

Post by Insanity »

Dalewyn wrote: post #77

Speaking as a Japanese-American, I personally think the biggest problem with Japanese programmers comes down to the Japanese being too crafty and elitist. What do I mean by this? Basically: If you're a wizard at peeling the skin off an apple with your knife you never need an apple peeler; consequently, you never get a good peeler industry going. Meanwhile, Americans manufacture the best apple peelers because they can…

That is a really interesting perspective, thank you for sharing!

The idea of Japanese people honing a skill/job to perfection is definitely a stereotype where I am from. Perhaps it might be a justified stereotype which ties into this. Definitely the apple peeler example rings true.

Re: A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

#84

Post by bsder »

makeitdouble wrote: post #62

The key part to me: > But the rest of the word was moving in a different direction. The rest of the world was moving away from dedicated hardware and towards innovative software running on standard hardware platforms. This piece is about Japan vs the world, but looking at countries other than the US I'm not sure this narrative works. For instance did the UK become a Software behemoth ? France ? Germany ? Brazil ? Ind…

Japanese mobile phones kicked the ever lovin' crap out of western phones for a very long time. The Japanese got into social media way before the West did. And Yahoo Japan actually still exists and seems to be doing okay.

And that's not to mention the success of Japanese video games.

The big problem that Japanese software has is simply that its market is too much smaller than anything which caters to English. This is why video games can do so well--language is of secondary importance.

Re: A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

#85

Post by sovietswag »

I was surprised to see nothing about Japan’s funneling of money into 5GL programming language research (having to do with AI and ... IIRC Prolog).

- https://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1080343&seq...

- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth-generation_programming...

- https://groups.google.com/g/comp.lang.lisp/c/IVH_UqOGsew

I took a programming languages class with a cool professor that spent some time discussing the history with us.

Re: A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

#86

Post by Der_Einzige »

Insanity wrote: post #83
Dalewyn wrote: post #77

Speaking as a Japanese-American, I personally think the biggest problem with Japanese programmers comes down to the Japanese being too crafty and elitist. What do I mean by this? Basically: If you're a wizard at peeling the skin off an apple with your knife you never need an apple peeler; consequently, you never get a good peeler industry going. Meanwhile, Americans manufacture the best apple peelers because they can…

That is a really interesting perspective, thank you for sharing! The idea of Japanese people honing a skill/job to perfection is definitely a stereotype where I am from. Perhaps it might be a justified stereotype which ties into this. Definitely the apple peeler example rings true.

It is justified. That's why Toyota/Lexus is superior to all other brands in terms of fit and finish, and quality.

I can literally see the difference in stitching quality between Lexus and any other brand vehicles. Even poor Porsche gets brutally mogged by the LC500.

Re: A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

#88

Post by braingenious »

Loocid wrote: post #87
braingenious wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was the question I asked

Tell me why I should give a shit about your arbitrary word limit in exactly 1424 words please.

How is it you have posted the same responses to me as another account within seconds of eachother?

At least twice?

Re: A mistake that killed Japan’s software industry?

#90

Post by jfk13 »

Dalewyn wrote: post #77

Speaking as a Japanese-American, I personally think the biggest problem with Japanese programmers comes down to the Japanese being too crafty and elitist. What do I mean by this? Basically: If you're a wizard at peeling the skin off an apple with your knife you never need an apple peeler; consequently, you never get a good peeler industry going. Meanwhile, Americans manufacture the best apple peelers because they can…

> Japanese programmers continue to be utterly inept

That's quite a sweeping statement! Plenty of Japanese programers I know are extremely competent.

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