Some people think entrepreneurship is dead in Japan. They may change their tune if they watched the variety show "Medekin" (Fuji TV, Sun., 4:05 p.m.). The title is a play on the Japanese word "demekin," which refers to a bug-eyed goldfish, but the operative morpheme is "kin," meaning "money." The show profiles people who have come up with ideas that made them instantly rich.
The main story this week concerns a man who, while golfing one day, sliced his shot into a water hazard. Despairing that the ball had cost him ¥800, he waded in to fish it out and had a brainstorm. His company makes ¥150 million a year retrieving lost golf balls.
In another segment, comedian Dandy Itano travels to the U.S. to visit an amusement park where patrons can operate heavy machinery, including bulldozers, steam shovels and backhoes. The park is nothing but 20,000 sq. meters of dirt, and it's hugely successful.