Search - people

 
 
The tradition of koromogae, which involves changing storage spaces for clothes according to the season, is becoming less common, largely due to the increasing adoption of Western-style closets that accommodate all clothing year-round.
BUSINESS
Aug 13, 2024

Mothball makers innovate amid shrinking market

The market has been diminishing as synthetic fibers, which are resistant to insect damage, have become widely used in clothing.
Elon Musk held a conversation with Donald Trump on the tech mogul’s X platform on Monday.
WORLD / Politics
Aug 13, 2024

Musk pitches White House role in glitchy Trump conversation on X

The conversation gave Elon Musk an opening to increase his influence with Donald Trump if the former president returns to power.
Visitors take selfies at Kinkaku-ji Golden Temple in Kyoto.
BUSINESS
Aug 13, 2024

Overtourism isn’t the conundrum it’s made out to be

142 countries are projected to exceed their pre-pandemic tourism performance this year, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council.
France President Emmanuel Macron and International Olympic Committee         President Thomas Bach before the closing ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympics on Sunday.
OLYMPICS
Aug 13, 2024

Paris Olympics average 30.6 million U.S. viewers, a 82% bump from Tokyo

The BBC said the Games were streamed 218 million times on its platforms, more than doubling Tokyo's figures.
Former economic security minister Takayuki Kobayashi says changes in the international balance of power, along with deepening economic interdependence, have led some countries to attempt to use their economic power to impose their will on others.
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 13, 2024

Economic security is about strengthening and sustaining growth, former minister says

The nascent concept goes beyond more regulations and restrictions, says Japan's first economic security minister, Takayuki Kobayashi.
The destruction left behind by the Borel Fire near Lake Isabella, California, on July 29
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 13, 2024

Wildfires are getting weirder. Case in point: 'firenados.'

Sometimes fire thunderstorms even create their own lightning, which spawns new blazes miles away.
South Korea's League of Legends player Lee Sang-hyeok (center) reacts after winning a gold medal in esports at the Asian Games in Hangzhou on Sept. 29, 2023.
OLYMPICS
Aug 13, 2024

Many young Japanese believe esports has a future in the Olympics

More than 40% of people in their 30s and younger in Japan think that esports will be an Olympic sport in the future, a survey has found.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida speaks during a news conference Wednesday at the Prime Minister's Office in Tokyo.
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 14, 2024

Kishida to step down in September in bid to show ‘LDP has changed’

The surprise move came amid growing criticism from rank-and-file party members and bad poll numbers.
Botswana's Letsile Tebogo, who the men's 200 meters at the Paris Olympics, holds his gold medal as he arrives for a welcoming ceremony in Gaborone on Tuesday.
OLYMPICS / Athletics
Aug 14, 2024

Flags and dancing as Botswana welcomes home Olympic gold

Families with children, elderly people and young supporters waved Botswana's flag as the Olympic team, including sprinter Letsile Tebogo, arrived home.
In the past 11 months, health minister Keizo Takemi has been charting his own path, seeking to make Japan's health care policies more global and digitalized.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Aug 14, 2024

Global mindset crucial for reform of Japan's health care, minister says

International strategies and domestic health care reform are inextricably linked, says health minister Keizo Takemi.
A Palestinian mourns those killed in Israeli strikes, amid Israel-Hamas conflict, at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Aug 14, 2024

Extreme heat poses new challenge for aid agencies in Gaza

Aid trucks in Gaza often spend hours under the sun waiting for clearance due to Israeli restrictions.
Yuzuki Komiya (left) competes in the first national high school sumo tournament for girls in Tachikawa, western Tokyo, on Saturday.
SUMO
Aug 14, 2024

Women's sumo takes big step forward with first high school championships

Athletes from all over the country took part in the historic meet, with many expressing hope that the tournament would lead to greater exposure for women’s sumo.
Popular commentator and journalist Akira Ikegami speaks about investment fraud on social media at the Aichi Prefectural Police in Nagoya in July.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Aug 14, 2024

Japanese celebrities raising alarm over social media fraud

The amount of money stolen in social media investment fraud schemes between January-June rocketed about seven times from a year earlier, according to police.
The central square of the Czech town Roznov pod Radhostem, which has about 16,000 inhabitants
BUSINESS / Tech
Aug 14, 2024

The sleepy Czech town helping Europe compete in the global chip war

In Roznov, about 2,200 Onsemi employees make 10 million chips a day for car, industrial and telecommunications customers.
Officials of JR Kyushu Jet Ferry bow at a news conference in Fukuoka on Wednesday.
JAPAN
Aug 14, 2024

JR Kyushu ferry unit found covering up leak problem

The jet ferry service has been suspended since Tuesday, seen affecting about 22,000 people in the middle of the Bon summer holiday season.
A ward for heatstroke patients at a hospital in Chennai, India, in May. The country experienced a severe heat wave over the spring and summer, raising concerns about the long-term impact of climate change-induced extreme heat on human health.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 14, 2024

Climate change: A health emergency in the making

Global warming's impact on health is an increasingly urgent issue — just look at excess deaths caused by extreme heat. But are health care systems well-equipped enough?
What began as a nonviolent student protest against Bangladesh’s highly politicized system of public-sector job quotas quickly escalated into an anti-government Gen Z revolution.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 14, 2024

The fall of Bangladesh’s iron lady

What began as a student protest against the country’s highly politicized system of public-sector job quotas quickly escalated into an anti-government Gen Z revolution.
Srettha Thavisin in Bangkok on Wednesday. He became the fourth Thai prime minister to be ousted by the Constitutional Court in the past two decades.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Aug 15, 2024

Thai political upheaval shows royalists still firmly in charge

The difference this time is that former leader Thaksin Shinawatra is now in an alliance with his former conservative adversaries as part of a deal struck last year.
Christian Musema, a laboratory nurse, takes a sample from a child declared a suspected case mpox — an infectious disease caused by the monkeypox virus that spark-off a painful rash, enlarged lymph nodes and fever; at the the treatment center near Goma, North Kivu province, Democratic Republic of the Congo, on July 19.
WORLD / Science & Health
Aug 15, 2024

WHO calls mpox outbreak in Africa a global health emergency

The WHO last called mpox a public health emergency of international concern in May 2022
An Apple Store in New York on July 29
BUSINESS / Tech
Aug 15, 2024

Developing new tabletop home device, Apple pushes ahead with robotics shift

The company now has a team of several hundred people working on the device, which would offer a twist on products like Amazon’s Echo Show 10 and Meta Platforms’s Portal.
Former Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi visits Yasukuni Shrine on Thursday in Tokyo.
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 15, 2024

Kishida clears the way for ministers to campaign in LDP election

Prospective candidates are weighing whether they can gather the necessary endorsements and rake in enough votes to have a decent shot at winning.
An electronic signboard at Tokyo Station displays information about a megaquake alert last Saturday. The government lifted the alert on Thursday but urged continued vigilance.
JAPAN / Society
Aug 15, 2024

Japan lifts megaquake alert after no major seismic activity detected

Authorities note that although the alert is lifted, a large-scale earthquake remains a possibility.
For centuries, Japanese people have been scaring themselves with horror stories as a way of cooling down during the stifling summer months.
CULTURE / Books
Aug 16, 2024

New tales in translation to give you chills and thrills this summer

Recent fright-filled releases with supernatural creatures, shrewd sleuths and creepy killers provide welcome relief from the sweltering heat.
Pheu Thai party leader Paetongtarn Shinawatra greets members of the media at local news outlet Voice TV in Bangkok on Friday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Aug 16, 2024

Thaksin’s 37-year-old daughter becomes new Thai premier

Paetongtarn Shinawatra will become the youngest Thai prime minister and only the second woman to occupy the position, after her aunt.
Yamazen has released a portable air conditioner with a solar panel.
JAPAN / Society
Aug 16, 2024

Japanese companies aim to help prevent nighttime heatstroke

To combat this summer's heat waves both day and night, companies are encouraging people to utilize products and services aimed at helping them avoid heatstroke while sleeping.
Tourists at a water fountain at the Acropolis archaeological site during extreme hot weather conditions in Athens in July 2023.
BUSINESS
Aug 16, 2024

Extreme weather drives travelers to cooler destinations this summer

Cruise operators, hotel companies and airlines are adding trips and accommodations to meet rising demand for temperate destinations.
Palestinians inspect the damaged following overnight Israeli bombardment of a house at the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Aug 16, 2024

Gaza cease-fire negotiations extend another day as death toll exceeds 40,000

This round of negotiations opened on Thursday, and the talks would resume on Friday for a second day, Qatari and U.S. officials said.
The parliament building in Tokyo. With concerns about summer heat rising and many elections taking place in summertime, it may not be tenable to conduct campaigns as in the past given health risks to candidates, their staff and voters.
JAPAN / Politics / Boiling Point
Aug 17, 2024

Hotter summers pose a threat to Japan's tradition of stump speeches

Balancing health concerns with legal restrictions as well as candidates' desire to be as publicly visible as possible, even in super hot weather, might be tricky.
Only two other class of persons were treated with anything like the merciless ferocity meted out to lovers: subversives and Christians.
JAPAN / History / The Living Past
Aug 17, 2024

Love was a most subversive affair in Edo Japan

As the shogunate required order in society, love was seen as a threat to rational thinking — something that you might die for.
Casey Harrell, who is diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and observers react as a brain-computer interface system developed by University of California, Davis, works on the first attempt.
WORLD / Science & Health
Aug 16, 2024

Brain tech breakthrough restores ALS patient’s ability to speak

The brain-computer interface developed by University of California, Davis, is aimed at restoring movement, but its improvement of speech underscores its broader promise.

Longform

Japan's growing ranks of centenarians are redefining what it means to live in a super-aging society.
What comes after 100?