Japan Enacts High-Tech 'Super City' Bill Where AI, Big Data and Other Technologies Are Utilized To Resolve Social Problems (japantimes.co.jp) 35
The Diet enacted a bill Wednesday to create "super cities" where artificial intelligence, big data and other technologies are utilized to resolve social problems. The Japan Times reports: The bill revising the national strategic special zone law passed the House of Councilors by a majority vote with support mainly from the ruling coalition. The revision stipulates procedures to speed up the changing of regulations in various fields to facilitate the creating of such smart cities. The government hopes to utilize cutting-edge technologies to address issues such as depopulation and the aging of society. In such cities, data-linking platforms to collect and organize various kinds of data from administrative organizations and companies will be established for autonomous driving, cashless payments, telemedicine and other services.
Under the revised law, local governments to be selected will launch forums with the central government and private companies, draw up city development plans and make applications to the state after winning understanding from local residents. The government hopes to realize such city development plans swiftly after discussions at related government agencies.
Under the revised law, local governments to be selected will launch forums with the central government and private companies, draw up city development plans and make applications to the state after winning understanding from local residents. The government hopes to realize such city development plans swiftly after discussions at related government agencies.
Oh sweet, sweet corporatocracy (Score:3)
Purchasing the government was the best investment you ever made.
Re:Oh sweet, sweet corporatocracy (Score:4, Informative)
Japan isn't like the US in that sense. Big corporations just ask nicely, say they have a business need and would the government please accommodate them. Campaign and finance laws are actually really, really strict in Japan.
Anyway this is more likely a response to the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami. After that they started looking at the response and how it would scale if say Tokyo was hit by a major earthquake and it wasn't great. They noticed that taxis were getting around a lot faster than ambulances, for example, because taxis had better data and local knowledge.
More over the Japanese love data and statistics. A lot of policy is data driven and numbers are reported more often than by Western media.
I hope Musk is involved (Score:2)
The name: (Score:1)
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Gotta start with the right word first, that's an odd way to spell Sybil.
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Walk quickly and don't look back (Score:5, Funny)
This has what-can-possibly-go-wrong written all over it
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I'm pretty sure this is a prologue for a post-apocalyptic anime series.
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I'm pretty sure this is a prologue for a post-apocalyptic anime series.
Speaking of which, they should probably start fixing the society by banning anime
Didn’t they try this in Toronto? (Score:2)
And it failed miserably.
I guess this time the government being the one initiating it means the population must accept it (“after ‘winning’ understanding from local residents”)
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And it failed miserably.
Ok, so it didn't even get the chance to fail [slashdot.org], technically, but it wasn't exactly welcomed by the locals. [slashdot.org]
"After winning understanding from local residents" (Score:2)
and not "after getting approval from local residents"
Gotta love the passive aggressive 'you must comply' stance by the government here...
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Some of the ideas for the future cities are so out there that retrofitting existing infrastructure isn't going to be any less expensive.
Re: "After winning understanding from local reside (Score:1)
Because companies care about one and only ONE thing. MAXIMUM. PROFIT.
The onl reason a company would ever build a city, is to leech-mine off an much profit of its human "resources" as literally physically possible.
If that means mass-murder, turning the planet to scorched concentration camps, total personality control, global death-rape squads, eating babies alive, then the only question is not "Is this morally OK? or "Is this advancing humanity well-being?" but exclusively "Will we get away with it?.
The only
Have any of them bothered.. (Score:2)
Re: Have any of them bothered.. (Score:1)
No, you don't get east-Asian culture.
People *want* a dominant leader to bow to. Individualism is a very western thing. (And I too am western in that regard.)
Same reason why the US failed in the middle east. Nevermind installing yet more puppet leaders when the old ones stopped obeying... I remember a US general saying the first thing the Iraqis asked for, after the US invasion, was "Where are the Bush statues? We want Bush statues!". They didn't want democracy. They wanted a strong leader! And if the US won
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How about we work on faxes first... (Score:5, Interesting)
Every time I get to hear about some new super high techy thing coming out of Japan I have to remind myself about 3 factoids about Japan.
1) ATMs still have hours of operation (and holidays)
2) Half of this country still lives or dies by FAX machines. Hell, some people were bitching about his just recently because laws still required doctors to handwrite documents and fax them about covid cases.
3) They still haven't gotten around to implementing a debit card system; in fact, they pretty much went from cash to contactless NFC/RFID, skipping debit cards altogether. So if you want to pay for something with money in your bank account, better hope that ATM isn't shut down so you can get your cash out.
Japan is here trying to jump into the future while keeping horse and buggies on the road basically. One day they'll have androids that will assist old people with sending faxes or going to to the ATM to get cash before shit shuts down. Watch.
Re:How about we work on faxes first... (Score:4, Interesting)
Those behaviours are directly tied to conformity within the society as a shared goal, the accepted forms of social behaviour. Once a new set method of interaction has be established, it is hard to change because a first group must choose to 'NOT' conform and by action create friction within the society.
They are also a society that pursues public safety and constraint to limiting hours of operation of ATM, ensures drunk salary man does not empty out the family account at a late hour ;D.
The error implicit in the law is that 'PEOPLE' are the problem, 'NO', the environment in which we force people to live is the problem, left to run around on their wild in nature, people are less problematic, forced into capitalist socio-economic structures where the establishment does most emphatically keep the majority down to exploit them, social problems are created en masse. The focus should be on mentally healthier environment, in terms of access to the resources of 'ENJOYABLE' living, not living in misery because it is more profitable for those who create the situation and profit by it.
Exploited, impoverished citizens who a the excess consumption of their 'BETTERS' shoved in their face, do not make for happy content citizens, they might be able to hide it for a while, until it explodes out of them unpredictably. The laws should be about better evirons not driving their citizens even crazier, with tighter constraints, until citizen break down and lose control (where it will spread like a contagion across a society exposed to the violence action - counter action).
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Things have changed in the past decade. There are lots of 24/7 ATMs now, for example. Fax machines are still common but the big thing holding people back - the ability to stamp their names on documents (like signatures in the west) - has been resolved via software so they are now dying out.
The debit card thing is interesting. Their credit cards work differently, when you buy something you agree the time period you are going to pay it off in at the checkout. This often catches foreigners out because the cler
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I'm glad somebody somewhere is doing it so we can all see how it unfolds. There was talk of doing something like this in a section of Toronto. However, the instigator was Alphabet/Google. There was pushback, and then Covid came, and Google lost interest.
I care about how many COVID cases there are in my country. Not whether there are enough billionaires.
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> Most consumer routers can't even use 1/10th of it and some literally melt if you try.
Holy shit 0_o
So you can melt the router, if you send enough packages to the router, or do they melt only, when the clock speed and voltage is incsreased as well?
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The really crappy ones don't have CPU thermal control so they just get hotter and hotter until the cheap plastic starts to melt. If you are lucky they crash first but I've seen one that didn't.
Actually it's surprising how many consumer grade routers do crash if you put even moderate load on them. 100Mb+ and some heavy torrenting can do it. Actually 250Mb/sec and heavy torrenting caused a Samsung SSD to freeze up for 30+ seconds at a time too, I guess while it shuffled and consolidated writes.
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HIPAA requires document transmission to be secure.
Email is not secure.
Everyone and their brother wants to sell encryption software to doctors that is HIPAA compliant for secure email attachments.
Problem with 100% of these products: how does recipient open attachment?
Answer: "Oh, well they just download and install...."
NO, THEY FUCKING DON'T.
The same HIPAA
Re: How about we work on faxes first... (Score:1)
I'd say they are less secure than 40 years ago, due to changes in telecoms, which means your call can transit multiple territories. A minor point. Do agree in some scenarios they are still good enough and practical.
The problem... (Score:2)
>"Japan Enacts High-Tech 'Super City' Bill Where AI, Big Data and Other Technologies Are Utilized To Resolve Social Problems"
Except when "AI, Big Data, and Other Technologies" *ARE* the social problem. Perhaps this will work out in countries where people don't appreciate, understand, expect, or demand personal liberties, privacy, and freedom. To me it sounds much more like a nightmare than a panacea.
Academy City? (Score:2)
It makes it sound like next time I am in Japan I can meet Misaka Mikoto.
Do you want A.M.? (Score:1)
Because that is how you get A.M.
Sociopaths "solving" human problems with the perfect psychopath/machine...
Literally the dumbest thing I have ever heard. Yes, even beating what you're just thinking of.
Yet so typical for Japan's society.
soon (Score:2)
most sci-fi anime will be a reality.
It'll be good-o! (Score:2)
The Diet enacted a bill Wednesday to create "super cities" where artificial intelligence, big data and other technologies are utilized to resolve social problems.
Click clack. The 10 foot tall robot straightened up as its arms unfolded into odd looking things. "You now have 20 seconds to apologize for using that word."
Whs is this Al guy? (Score:1)
His name appears a lot in the news.