Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

wired.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 51 posts

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#31

Post by chc »

w1ntermute wrote: post #22
SunShiranui wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, he's speaking English, not Japanese. Do you refer to multiple pizzas as pizze?

Actually, you're wrong. The plural of "kanji" in English is "kanji": http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/kanji

That was not the basis of FreezerburnV's complaint, which was based on how it's done in Japanese, not English. So I don't believe SunShiranui's point is wrong. The fact that the plural of "kanji" is "kanji" in English does not establish a blanket rule that every word must be pluralized according to its language of origin. (And that is good, because pluralizing "cherry" would be a nightmare! It's an over-singularized form of the already-singular French "cherise.")

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#32

Post by blt »

josephschmoe wrote: post #6

"built a new system—known as a software “framework,” in engineering speak" Hearing the words "engineering speak" bothers me. Wired knows a significant portion of its readers are engineers, right? Saying just software framework would have probably been fine. Humans are pretty good at inferring the meaning of words from context...

or just "system."

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#33

Post by capisce »

ibisum wrote: post #26
w1ntermute wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can't, nevertheless, help to feel very sorry for my old California associates who I know, even now today twenty years later, still spend a really inordinate amount of time on the freeway. You should feel more sorry for your Japanese associates, who spend 12-14 hours at the office every day and never see their families, even though they probably could've gotten their work done in half that time.

> You should feel more sorry for your Japanese associates, who spend 12-14 hours at the office every day and never see their families, even though they probably could've gotten their work done in half that time. I don't know about that .. they spent more time doing things that mattered to them - like, work, or associating with work colleagues/blowing off steam - and less time doing things that were highly destructive…

Maybe a daily walk in a park and/or 30 minutes of meditation could be better for their health than spending 12 hours in the office with a break of having a few beers each day. Seems like you're posing a false dilemma between spending the full day in the office and having a two hour commute each day - it's possible to choose neither of those. Are you sure your colleagues are so happy about their situation?

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#34

Post by ibisum »

capisce wrote: post #33
ibisum wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You should feel more sorry for your Japanese associates, who spend 12-14 hours at the office every day and never see their families, even though they probably could've gotten their work done in half that time. I don't know about that .. they spent more time doing things that mattered to them - like, work, or associating with work colleagues/blowing off steam - and less time doing things that were highly destructive…

Maybe a daily walk in a park and/or 30 minutes of meditation could be better for their health than spending 12 hours in the office with a break of having a few beers each day. Seems like you're posing a false dilemma between spending the full day in the office and having a two hour commute each day - it's possible to choose neither of those. Are you sure your colleagues are so happy about their situation?

Oh, I missed that part out - certainly, my Japanese associates at the time got a lot more walk in the parks than you might think. For many of them it was a vital part of the way home.

I just don't think the city planners of America in the 20th Century were as sensitive to these issues as they should have been. We cannot deny that the automobile-economy made America very unhealthy, and it wasn't until the era of the gym that this became lesser of a health issue. Even still today, though, by direct personal (thus: anecdotal) evidence, I can say without a doubt that my American friends are far, far less healthy than the Japanese side. Alas, its just a fact - even if we factor in the binge-work and alcoholism. Not a popular perspective, but I think Americans need to get some humility about this factor and stop building such monstrous cities with such dependencies.. okay, this is now outside the scope of the original article, which was fundamentally about the differences between cultures and how it affects technical deployment decisions, but - after all - this is fundamentally an Architectural problem as much as it is a cultural one (and the two cannot be dissociated, really..) In the end, could the Twitter difference really boil down to just how well the space of the two countries is utilized? I think it does, ultimately, play a role in this discussion.

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#35

Post by Natsu »

nrinaudo wrote: post #23
FreezerburnV wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know it's such a tiny point, and very much off topic, but please don't "pluralize" words such as Kanji, Katakana, etc. As someone who has spent a lot of time learning Japanese, and who knows that Japanese words don't change between singular/plural (with certain exceptions, such as attaching "-tachi" to a word), seeing you write "Kanjis" or "Katakanas" so many times in a row really bothers me. I'll go back to my cor…

I apologise, I was not aware you could not pluralise these words. My only excuse is that english is not my first language. I'd go back and edit my comment, but that'd just make yours seem weird...

English has many anomalies and plural forms are often strange. That said, in the texts I've read, they did not add an 's' to kana, kanji, katakana or hiragana, but used them as their own plural forms.

I wouldn't have guessed that you were not a native speaker, though. You write well.

Just for information, be aware that you should not write 'softwares' or 'informations' either. Those aren't words.

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#36

Post by chc »

epaladin wrote: post #30
SunShiranui wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, he's speaking English, not Japanese. Do you refer to multiple pizzas as pizze?

It's more like the plural of 'deer' being 'deer'. I don't think I've ever heard anyone attach an 's' to 'kanji' for pluralization when speaking English. Like how it might be odd to say 'sushis' or 'wasabis'. Whenever I need to stress plurality i would say 'kanji characters' or something like that. Oxford English Dictionary lists 'sushi', 'kanji', 'shinkansen', 'katakana' all as being mass nouns or having the plural f…

Most of those are the sorts of nouns that wouldn't normally be pluralized in English. "Sushi" is like "rice" — specifies what the roll is made of rather than the roll itself. We don't pluralize the name of a rail system like Shinkansen because there is only one of it (similarly, "the L" but not "the Ls"). But there are many Japanese loanwords that are commonly pluralized differently in English. For example, futons, tycoons, typhoons, tatamis, ninjas and kimonos.

It's ambiguous whether "kanji" is a mass noun referring to the character set as a whole or a singular noun referring to a character in the set. I think it's both. So it seems hard to blame someone for being unclear on the matter.

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#37

Post by Liuser »

ibisum wrote: post #26
w1ntermute wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can't, nevertheless, help to feel very sorry for my old California associates who I know, even now today twenty years later, still spend a really inordinate amount of time on the freeway. You should feel more sorry for your Japanese associates, who spend 12-14 hours at the office every day and never see their families, even though they probably could've gotten their work done in half that time.

> You should feel more sorry for your Japanese associates, who spend 12-14 hours at the office every day and never see their families, even though they probably could've gotten their work done in half that time. I don't know about that .. they spent more time doing things that mattered to them - like, work, or associating with work colleagues/blowing off steam - and less time doing things that were highly destructive…

I did the whole 12-16 hr work day for nearly half a decade out of school, including the weekend. I even skipped out on vacation for 3 years. I really enjoyed what I was doing.

Having lived that life style, it doesn't leave you with much free time. Dinner with kids and spouse? Exercise? Cooking? Errands? Creative hobbies? 7-8 hours sleep / night?

My commute last for 30 minutes on a bicycle, I would like everyone to have the option to leave at a reasonable hour to live their life. If they want to continue working, that's cool too. But the impression I get from the Japanese culture is that it isn't so free to do so. It is 'expected'. I heard that Japanese employees don't leave until their boss leaves, which could be an ungodly hour. Having lived the extreme, my personal opinion is that balance is best.

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#38

Post by unsignedint »

ibisum wrote: post #26
w1ntermute wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can't, nevertheless, help to feel very sorry for my old California associates who I know, even now today twenty years later, still spend a really inordinate amount of time on the freeway. You should feel more sorry for your Japanese associates, who spend 12-14 hours at the office every day and never see their families, even though they probably could've gotten their work done in half that time.

> You should feel more sorry for your Japanese associates, who spend 12-14 hours at the office every day and never see their families, even though they probably could've gotten their work done in half that time. I don't know about that .. they spent more time doing things that mattered to them - like, work, or associating with work colleagues/blowing off steam - and less time doing things that were highly destructive…

The truth is, majority of worker stay very long hours in the office, because leaving on-time gives you the notion that you are not getting enough work; hence you would be treated as you are slacking off.

Also, there's often unspoken rules, for example, someone leaving earlier than their boss being rude.

When they were in growth (back prior to 1980) where lifetime employment and salary increase by age were common, there was at least some incentive to put up with that, but they are now gone as the thing in the past, they are just getting the short end of the stick, as losing your current job might mean that there aren't any other jobs. (Getting hired in Japan outside of new hire -- that's something other than right after graduating, can be very tough.)

Now, having said that, of course, there are people out there who have more liberty in deciding how much they should work each day, and doing it as their choice, but considering this being nationwide issue, I wouldn't think that's a majority.

Note: If you are someone from outside of Japan, you will get some perk as a foreigner, that you are not expected to go along with the above. Merely appearing like the Japanese would lock me into same expectation as Japanese. (Which I envy "foreigners" every time I visit Japan, as my mindset is as foreign from Japanese.) Japanese people usually don't really discriminate foreigners, but they do have different social expectations. (Just you never can be "one of them.")

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#39

Post by Crito »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #13
josephschmoe wrote: post #6

"built a new system—known as a software “framework,” in engineering speak" Hearing the words "engineering speak" bothers me. Wired knows a significant portion of its readers are engineers, right? Saying just software framework would have probably been fine. Humans are pretty good at inferring the meaning of words from context...

Just be glad it wasn't "boffin speak" as the contemptuous British press are so fond of.

I like the word "boffin". It seems like it is used to denigrate others less frequently than similar words (including "engineer" itself, which in some circles and situations is implicitly understood to be an insult).

Re: No One Tweets Like the Japanese, and That Was a Problem for Twitter

#40

Post by capisce »

ibisum wrote: post #34
capisce wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe a daily walk in a park and/or 30 minutes of meditation could be better for their health than spending 12 hours in the office with a break of having a few beers each day. Seems like you're posing a false dilemma between spending the full day in the office and having a two hour commute each day - it's possible to choose neither of those. Are you sure your colleagues are so happy about their situation?

Oh, I missed that part out - certainly, my Japanese associates at the time got a lot more walk in the parks than you might think. For many of them it was a vital part of the way home. I just don't think the city planners of America in the 20th Century were as sensitive to these issues as they should have been. We cannot deny that the automobile-economy made America very unhealthy, and it wasn't until the era of the g…

I absolutely agree that long commutes are bad, but I still don't think that excuses Japan's overwork (Karoshi) culture. According to surveys Japanese employee satisfaction ranks relatively low compared to other countries: http://www.nhk.or.jp/bunken/english/reports/summary/200906/0...
Post reply on HN