11–20 of 158 posts
Reading this article, I get the feeling that a nationally inefficient infrastructure is made to be perceived as a stable one through a single JR mark. Privatization forces people to bear inefficient and high train costs due to misguided policies, but the value of a well-designed brand logo and branding offsets all of that. Looking at the content of the article itself, there are some unsettling points, the dissolution…
The U.S had the greatest rail network and then we built the Interstate Highway system and abandoned rail. Truth is that nobody funds multiple competing transportation network. Japan chose rail, we chose highways.
japan is a small island the US is one of the most extensive and biggest distance from population centers country on earth I tihnk that helps explain the feasiability of train on each country more than inherent choices
A sparse railway system would leave parts of the country less populated by design as it’s simply harder to get to them. People would bunch up into cities and towns because they had to.
The U.S had the greatest rail network and then we built the Interstate Highway system and abandoned rail. Truth is that nobody funds multiple competing transportation network. Japan chose rail, we chose highways.
Reading this article, I get the feeling that a nationally inefficient infrastructure is made to be perceived as a stable one through a single JR mark. Privatization forces people to bear inefficient and high train costs due to misguided policies, but the value of a well-designed brand logo and branding offsets all of that. Looking at the content of the article itself, there are some unsettling points, the dissolution…
This is not the time to grind your axe against privatization and inequality.
>'Rail transport in Japan was originally run by Japanese National Railways (JNR). Like many state-owned corporations, it was starting to struggle in the 80s with mounting debt. JNR was losing its advantage over other transport, in both passenger and freight. In the ’80s, the Japanese government began pushing to privatize its state-run monopolies — to reduce the national deficit and improve efficiency across these sectors.'"
The article mentions 'improve efficiency,' and that's the part I was looking at. Then it goes on to explain the strength of the brand logo. So the overall point here is, 'How can something that has been broken apart still appear as one?' And I was simply saying that, despite the inefficiencies in that process, the fact that it still comes across as so stable shows that the branding strategy is good.
Reading this article, I get the feeling that a nationally inefficient infrastructure is made to be perceived as a stable one through a single JR mark. Privatization forces people to bear inefficient and high train costs due to misguided policies, but the value of a well-designed brand logo and branding offsets all of that. Looking at the content of the article itself, there are some unsettling points, the dissolution…
This is not the time to grind your axe against privatization and inequality.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the west the employee / employer social contract died sometime in the 80s. It's rare, especially in tech, to have employees with decades of tenure. You see Microsoft trying to buyout older employees recently.
Pre-Carly Fiorina Hewlett-Packard was a great example of an old-school Silicon Valley company, long before the era of “move fast and break things” and of Zuck, Elon, and Altman. I used to work for a Japanese company until I left a few years ago to teach, and when I read about the HP Way, it reminds me in many ways of life at my former employer: https://www.hp.com/hpinfo/abouthp/histnfacts/publications/me...
The U.S had the greatest rail network and then we built the Interstate Highway system and abandoned rail. Truth is that nobody funds multiple competing transportation network. Japan chose rail, we chose highways.
The U.S had the greatest rail network and then we built the Interstate Highway system and abandoned rail. Truth is that nobody funds multiple competing transportation network. Japan chose rail, we chose highways.
Germany has both the Autobahn and rail.
A factor not mentioned is Japan's cultural sense of duty and honour. I don't think employees in the West generally feel such dedication or perfectionism towards their company but in Japan it helped make all these efficient and meticulous changes possible, and avoids issues of privatisation like neglecting maintenance / short term profit maximisation.
Here a link to the best recent HN-featured long-form article on Japan rail network. Probably spent more time with this than any other item posted here in months. “Why Japan has such good railways” https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47815395
https://culturecompiled.com/p/strong-state-capacity-is-a-pro...