A partner from one of America’s top law firms uses his regular column to write about the geographic discrepancies in online pornography consumption, and notes some startling facts:

It is an open secret: some Americans do visit pornographic Web sites as part of their use of the Internet. However, it is not well known whether there are differing degrees of online porn consumption based on U.S. geographic regions. A recent study titled “Red Light States: Who Buys Online Adult Entertainment?,” by Harvard Business School Professor Benjamin Edelman, digs in an attempt to find answers…

[T]he largest relative online porn purchasing state was Utah, which averaged 5.47 adult content subscriptions per 1,000 home Internet broadband users. Montana, on the other hand, came in last as an adult entertainment purchasing state, with 1.92 adult content subscriptions per 1,000 home Internet broadband users.

The author doesn’t say that “all Mormons are perverts!”, but implies this is on the reader’s mind by noting that “other” factors could be at play, without stating what the main factor before the “other” factor could be. Before you too think that the Church of Latter Day Saints is full of perverts, consider:

there could be other unaccounted for factors at play. For example, it has been reported that hard copy pornography tends to be more difficult to obtain in Utah than other states, and that many adult entertainment companies will not ship materials to Utah based on tough state and local laws. As a result, it is possible that a greater percentage of people in Utah than other states who seek adult content will turn to the Internet, because other sources are less available…

Bottom line, while there may be some minor differences between states in terms of online porn consumption that may be caused by differing variables, Americans generally have a fairly large appetite for Internet adult entertainment and that industry, even though subject to certain legal regulations, likely will not disappear any time soon.

There’s plenty of content regarding “weird Japan” on the internet. From goth lolita schoolgirls to humorous “Engrish” to tentacle anime porn, Japan has plenty of material for rubbernecking gawkers. As a long-term resident of Japan, I only post local material that I think is truly original and weird. Typically this tends to concern the grotesque preparation of seafood, such as George Curzon and the Temple of Doom, how to prepare a squid and most recently “uni muki“.

I snapped the two pictures below near the end of 2008 and felt they were just too weird not to share with readers.

1. Obama Legos

This generic lego set is supposed to be the face of President Elect Barack Obama of the United States. The “Change” slogan of Obama’s campaign has been heard in Japan and has become a fad in a similar way to how it has taken off in the United States. This was on display at the Hobby section of the Shibuya Tokyu Hands.

2. 21st Century Japanese Vomitorium

Recently, while consuming cheap food and brew at a downscale drinking establishment in the Shinjuku neighborhood of Tokyo, I relieved myself in a bathroom… that had two sinks. See the photo above. The small sink to the left is assumed to be for washing hands. The “tub sink” to the right is explicitly designated with the sign above as the sink to be used for vomiting.

(At the time, the sink was as of yet unused—but the night was very young…)

SIDENOTE: Alas, the term “Vomitorium” was not actually a Latin word for a place where Romans would go to spew their guts, but there is evidence that vomiting was a standard part of the fine-dining experience in ancient times.

Weird Japan indeed.

This was forwarded from a friend, and while a number of the sites have since become defunct, but nonetheless this is a fun list of legitimate companies that didn’t spend quite enough time considering how their online names might appear… and be misread.

1. “Who Represents” is where you can find the name of the agent that represents any celebrity. Their Web site is:
www.whorepresents.com

2 . Experts Exchange is a knowledge base where programmers can exchange advice and views:
www.expertsexchange.com

3. Looking for a pen? Look no further than:
www.penisland.net

4. Need a therapist? Try Therapist Finder at:
www.therapistfinder.com

5. There’s the Italian Power Generator company:
www.powergenitalia.com

6. And don’t forget the Mole Station Native Nursery in New South Wales:
www.molestationnursery.com

7. If you’re looking for IP computer software, there’s always:
www.ipanywhere.com

8. The First Cumming Methodist Church Web site:
www.cummingfirst.com

9. And the designers at Speed of Art await you at their wacky Web site:
www.speedofart.com

By the way, that’s an animated gif file—how quaint.

After every flight, UPS pilots fill out a form, called a ‘gripe sheet, which tells mechanics about problems with the aircraft. The mechanics correct the problems, document their repairs on the form, and then pilots review the gripe sheets before the next flight. Here are some actual maintenance complaints submitted by UPS pilots (“P”) and the solutions by maintenance engineers (“S”).

By the way, UPS is the only major airline that has never had a flight crash.

P: Left inside main tire almost needs replacement.
S: Almost replaced left inside main tire.

P: Test flight OK, except auto-land very rough.
S: Auto-land not installed on this aircraft.

P: Something loose in cockpit
S: Something tightened in cockpit

Read the rest of this entry »

Having spent the past ten years split between Canada and Japan, I feel as if I have been somehow living between cultures. I am confident many of you have experienced a similar feeling. Here I would like to explore this phenomenon through my personal experience, and contextualize it in terms of today’s globalization. Read the rest of this entry »

It has been a whirlwind week for me, hence the lack of posting. I am currently in an airport waiting room on my way to see Lady Younghusband. I will be spending a few weeks in Japan while I wait for my master’s thesis defense to be arranged. Yes, after 6 long months, I finally submitted my opus on Japanese strategic culture and energy security policy. Well, not so much an opus. In fact, more like a red-headed stepchild I would like to drown. Anyways, I am stress free except for all the stress related to career search, working in Japan, travelling back to Canada where I have no place to live, etc.

Recently I have been thinking a lot about the reconciliation of disparate political priorities in representative democracies. I have been reflecting on my years as a grad student and found that the more I study history, politics and philosophy the more politically “moderate” I become. Nothing is worse than dogmatism (natch!). I plan on doing a proper post on that as soon as I do some more personal reconciliation. Check out this intriguing article on Anglo-Saxon attitudes

Here is what I have been reading online for the past couple of days:

• NZ’s FTA with China and geopolitical alignment in Oceania
• Shlok is thinking about a war podcast
• Jun Okumura weighs in on the JapaIn issue of The Economist
• Heil Dönitz!

Oh this is a brilliant concept (EDIT: An updated post here at Zenpundit) that Münzenberg picked up and got me thinking. I have a small stack of to-read books but it has remained small because I am often on the road. When I was younger a personal library seemed a worthy goal, but considering the moving I do from country to country it is just not practical. I have a few dozen books that I have hauled back and forth overseas, plus a few dozen more in the basements of friends and parents all over Canada that I plan on consolidating one day. But for an itinerant like me, an Umberto-esque library is not possible.

The digitization of information and organizational power of the internet are extremely helpful in this regard. For one thing my personal library includes tons digital (pdf) and audio books on my that are in various read/un-read states. PDF management and annotation software has been a huge boon for my personal research. Reading on screen is still a pain, granted. If I lived in the US I would absolutely own a Kindle.

My antilibrary basically consists of my Amazon wishlist. Applications like Shelfari help to keep track of books that I have borrowed and read, or plan on reading in addition to the books I actually own. The only problem is that at least with a dead tree system shelf space is limited. Digital antilibraries have infinite potentiality and thus infinite menace.

Friends of CA have been sending in some links in the past couple of weeks that I have neglected to share. Each of these deserve its own post I know, but I am busy as all hell. So I will introduce them each below:

First up is longtime CA friend Ken who has started up a Digg-like social news aggregator for news related to Iraq called OIFTalk. Only currently in beta, OIFTalk could turn into the ideal clearinghouse for news on the Iraq front. All those that closely follow Iraq should make a profile and start contributing.

Next, Adam Wolfe, formerly of PINR, has started his own blog: On Political Risk. I will be keeping an eye on this as I am always interested in political/country risk. I hope he does some posts about methodology.

Also, Grendel drew my attention to another new blog by four agents of Israel’s secret service Shin Bet. It’s an “official” endeavour, so might be not much better than the TSA blog. I would love to find out, but I don’t read Hebrew.

Lastly is frequent commenter Michael, who submitted a link for a UN statistical database with some seriously advanced functionality. I think this is in reaction to my post on easy access to UN data. Always good to add another resource to your bookmarks.

I encourage you all to correspond with the CA crew through our contact form if you have any off-topic comments or suggestions.

Taken by my sister during our Christmas trip to Australia.

I’m not sure what to think of the fact that the rack is empty—is it a sign of no supply or lots of demand?