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"Animator Skill Test Textbook” was written in concert with a test created and administered by the Nippon Anime & Film Culture Association since 2024. The test was designed to help set a baseline for those studying animation, and so that animation studios can get a better idea of applicants' current skill level.
CULTURE / Books
Sep 4, 2025

English textbook targets a skills gap in Japan’s growing anime industry

From "dōga" to “lip flap,” the Nippon Anime & Film Culture Association’s "Animator Skill Test Textbook" teaches aspiring animators how to talk like the pros.
AI can amplify the long-known ability to implant false memories, with new MIT and University of California, Irvine, research showing that chatbots, misleading summaries and altered images or videos can distort what people recall.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 4, 2025

AI doesn’t just lie — it can make you believe it

Memory manipulation, notes Pat Pataranutaporn, a researcher with the MIT Media Lab, is a very different process from fooling people with deep-fakes.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and Liberal Democratic Party Secretary-General Hiroshi Moriyama attend the LDP’s plenary meeting in Tokyo on Aug. 8. Once dominant, the ruling party is now struggling to maintain control amid calls for Ishiba to step down.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Sep 4, 2025

Dragging on the LDP’s political drama does little for Japan

From dominance to doubt, the ruling party struggles to maintain control.
Smoke billows from a makeshift displacement camp at the Yarmuk Sports Stadium during Israeli strikes on Gaza City on Thursday.
WORLD
Sep 5, 2025

Israeli military says it controls 40% of Gaza City, with plans to expand operation

Gaza health authorities said Israeli fire across the enclave had killed at least 53 people, mostly in Gaza City, where Israeli forces are now a few kilometers from the city center.
People watch as leaflets dropped by the Israeli military, urging evacuation south to Al-Mawasi, land in Gaza City on Tuesday.
WORLD
Sep 9, 2025

Israeli military evacuation order triggers panic in Gaza City

Residents of the city, home to a million Palestinians before the war, have been expecting an onslaught for weeks.
A worker sprays Holstein-Friesian cows from Australia with water at a dairy farm managed by Laras Ati milk cooperative in Kuningan, West Java province, Indonesia, on June 25.
BUSINESS / Economy
Sep 9, 2025

Indonesia presses businesses, their licenses at stake, to import a million cows

Program aims to provide free meals to 83 million children and expectant mothers, calling for the dairy cows to be imported over five years at a cost of nearly $3 billion.
David Ha, the head of AI tech company Sakana AI, points at his laptop during an interview at the company's office in Tokyo on Aug. 28.
BUSINESS / Companies
Sep 10, 2025

Top Japan startup Sakana AI touts nature-inspired tech

Sakana aims to merge existing and new systems, large and small, to develop what it calls "collective intelligence."
Actor and World Athletics special ambassador for the local organizing committee Yuji Oda (front, fifth from right) poses with athletes at Tokyo's National Stadium during an open practice on Sept. 4.
MORE SPORTS / Athletics
Sep 11, 2025

Broadcaster TBS taps Hello Kitty and Yuji Oda in bid to sell World Athletics

TBS has provided televised coverage of the World Athletics Championships since the 1997 event in Athens.
"I don't want to scare a company from ever hiring a blind person again,” said Emeline Lakrout. But she and others want change.
BUSINESS / Companies
Sep 13, 2025

‘PowerPoint broke me’: The challenges for blind professionals

"I don't want to scare a company from ever hiring a blind person again,” said Emeline Lakrout. But she and others want change.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with head of the Agency for Strategic Initiatives (ASI) autonomous non-profit organization at the Kremlin in Moscow on Thursday.
WORLD / Politics
Sep 15, 2025

Russia targets billionaire’s empire over alleged Ukraine links

The case shows how asset seizures in Russia are surging since the invasion of Ukraine, as the Kremlin cracks down on perceived enemies of the state.
Chinese migrants intent on reaching the United States walking in the jungle of Panama’s Darien Gap on March 3, 2023.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Sep 16, 2025

He risked everything to leave China for the U.S. Then he was sent back.

Tao was not a Chinese dissident, just an ordinary worker who wanted freedom. Deportation did not stop him from trying again.
Finance Minister Katsunobu Kato takes part in an online meeting of Group of Seven finance ministers on Friday.
BUSINESS
Sep 17, 2025

Japan pushes back on U.S. call for tariff hikes over Russian oil

Tokyo is cautious about joining efforts to raise tariffs on countries trading with Russia as Japan itself has continued importing LNG from its neighbor.
The RAF Red Arrows perform a flyover at Windsor Castle in the U.K. on Wednesday.
WORLD
Sep 18, 2025

Apple and Citi CEOs join Trump and King Charles at state dinner

The guest list of the event nodded to the work that Trump and Prime Minister Keir Starmer face as they attempt to bring the special relationship back onto stronger footing.
In the “Kojiki,” the origins of the Japanese archipelago are attributed to the coupling of Izanagi and Izanami, two kami from the Plain of High Heaven.
JAPAN / History / The Living Past
Sep 20, 2025

Humanity's tales of creation, cataclysm and kami

Cultures the world over have invented their own distinctive creation myths since antiquity. In Japan, the “Kojiki” offers insight into premodern perspectives on the nation.
Otherwise common sights in Japan's supermarkets, the country's fruit and veggie boxes can hide surprising symbols of local pride.
LIFE / Style & Design
Sep 19, 2025

Behold the glory of Japan’s fruit boxes

Watermelon mountains and onion parades: The everyday cardboard containers for fruits and veggies are a designer’s delight.
“Between Currents and Bloom,” an eye-popping crocheted seascape by Indonesian artist Mulyana, dazzles with Instagram-ready cuteness while recalling a vibrant ocean now threatened by warming seas.
CULTURE / Art
Sep 22, 2025

Aichi Triennale’s message to the art world: Free Palestine

At Aichi Triennale 2025, Hoor Al Qasimi, the festival’s first foreign artistic director, takes a stand in support of Palestine.
A U.S. Secret Service agent near a security checkpoint outside the United Nations headquarters in New York on Monday.
WORLD
Sep 23, 2025

Secret Service breaks up ‘imminent’ telecom threat in New York

Agents discovered more than 300 SIM card servers and 100,000 SIM cards at several locations within a 35-mile radius of New York City.
“Archipelago of the Sun” by Yoko Tawada is part of a trilogy billed as a dystopian future under threat of climate crisis.
CULTURE / Books
Sep 24, 2025

Yoko Tawada’s wandering trilogy concludes search for the 'land of sushi'

In “Archipelago of the Sun,” the merry band of polyglot friends board a boat crossing the Baltic Sea, still vaguely in search of a disappeared Japan.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to reporters while leaving the White House on Friday morning. Trump on Friday cheered the indictment of James Comey, the former FBI director and predicted more indictments were on the way, even as he denied that he had a list of perceived enemies he wanted to see prosecuted.
WORLD / Politics / ANALYSIS
Sep 27, 2025

Comey indictment escalates Trump's campaign to chill opposition

Experts say the U.S. criminal case against former FBI Director James Comey shatters norms of independence in federal investigations and will face significant hurdles in court.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro addresses pro-Palestinian demonstrators, through a translator, at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza outside United Nations headquarters, during the U.N. General Assembly in New York City on Friday.
WORLD / Politics / FOCUS
Sep 28, 2025

Colombian leader’s call to defy Trump amplifies rifts in region

Trump’s confrontational approach to Latin America, which is still scarred by U.S. interventions before and during the Cold War, will be tested in a string of upcoming elections.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov listens a question during a news conference after addressing the United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters in New York City on Saturday.
WORLD / Politics
Sep 28, 2025

Russia tells West: Any aggression will be met with 'decisive response'

As war rages in Ukraine, tensions have mounted along NATO's eastern flank.
Ryan Gander’s “The Find” transforms Okayama into the site of a scavenger hunt for coins that anyone is free to take home.
CULTURE / Art
Oct 5, 2025

Artists turn Okayama into Murakami-esque city of wonder

The fourth edition of the triennial Okayama Art Summit transmutes the sensibility of Haruki Murakami’s “1Q84” into an urban art program.
A banner of U.S. President Donald Trump on the Department of Labor in Washington, on Thursday
BUSINESS / Economy / FOCUS
Oct 6, 2025

Fake job scams cost U.S. job seekers $12 billion as labor market tightens

Employment-related scam cases rose by over 1,000% from May through July, when new graduates typically search for jobs, according to McAfee.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (center right) and Papua New Guinea leader James Marape pose with officials after the signing of the Pukpuk Treaty at Parliament House in Canberra on Monday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics / ANALYSIS
Oct 6, 2025

With eye on China, Australia and Papua New Guinea ink mutual defense pact

The agreement is mainly intended to offset China’s expanding military clout in the South Pacific and prevent Beijing from projecting power through Australia’s northern approach.
A worker feeds shrimp in Pandeglang, Banten province, Indonesia, on July 29.
ENVIRONMENT
Oct 9, 2025

Indonesia says no to scrap metal after shrimp radiation scare

Environment Minister Hanif Faisol Nurofiq said the pause aims to ensure that the local steel-recycling industry meets radiation safety standards.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent speaks during the Federal Reserve Board Community Bank Conference in Washington on Thursday.
BUSINESS / Economy
Oct 11, 2025

Bessent’s big gamble on Argentina has a narrow road to pay off

For the Treasury secretary's $20 billion bet to pay off, a lot of things have to go right — things that in the past, in Argentina, have tended to go wrong.
A giant inflatable basketball promoting NBA preseason games held at Venetian Arena in Macao on Friday.
BASKETBALL / NBA
Oct 12, 2025

Treading fine line, NBA money machine kicks into gear on China return

The preseason games heralded the NBA's return to China for the first time since being effectively frozen out of the country in 2019.
Alleged victims of Myanmar's scam centers in the process of repatriation on Feb. 12. Fraud factories in Myanmar blamed for scamming Chinese and American victims out of billions of dollars are still in business and bigger than ever.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Oct 14, 2025

Myanmar scam cities booming despite crackdown — using Musk's Starlink

China, Thailand and Myanmar had pressured militias into vowing to "eradicate" the compounds in February, releasing around 7,000 people from a brutal call center-like system.
Developers work inside the office of AI startup LimeChat in Bengaluru on Aug. 19.
BUSINESS / Tech
Oct 16, 2025

India's IT sector faces seismic shift as AI displaces call-center workers

The outcome of India's gamble carries weight far beyond its borders — a test case for whether embracing AI-driven disruption can elevate an economy or render it a cautionary tale.
Sora 2, a short-form video app made by OpenAI, enables users to create realistic AI videos with text prompts, but critics say that there are insufficient guardrails — from a lack of copyright consideration to families of public figures upset by the reanimation of their loved ones.
BUSINESS / Companies
Oct 16, 2025

Japan’s government asks OpenAI to seek permission amid Sora 2 copyright concerns

Sora 2 enables users to create realistic AI videos with text prompts, but critics say that there are insufficient guardrails.

Longform

Rock group The Yellow Monkey played K-Arena Yokohama in June as part of a nationwide tour. Concerts are increasingly popular in the age of social media as users value in-person experiences.
Inside Japan’s arena boom: Sports, sound and city-building