We’ll check it out y’all.
We got what you need.
We’re all living in
apartments, condos, vans.
Well, dude, even you can have a studio.
The studio in a box.
Yes, we can help you with that
right here at Blind Knowledge.
We work on your budget and
we figure out your measurements.
We’ll get you the best
sound for the best price.
Let me know.
877-237-1143 or at Blind Knowledge.com.
Yup.
It’s got a lot of updates.
Before I actually do that, we
have just started my summer break.
The kids around summer
break for like a month.
My work is me two weeks off.
So next week, this is the first day.
So I was able to record today
because basically nothing’s happened yet.
We haven’t organized anything yet.
But next week, I don’t
know if I’m going to get
an episode out or I
might get one out later.
I’m going to try.
I don’t know.
It’s a holiday and I don’t
feel obligated to entertain you.
That’s just the straight-up truth.
Now if I can entertain
you, I would love to do that.
The reality is, am I not?
Anyways, two weeks from now,
there will be a regular episode.
It will be back on.
It will be all awesome.
I’ve actually just inadvertently
implied that the holiday episode
I record will not be awesome,
but I’m sure it will be fine.
So let’s get to some updates.
I’m just letting you
know that maybe your
free entertainment may
not be available next week.
It may be.
Maybe if you pray
hard enough to the right
God, I will have enough
time to do the thing.
And then record it for you.
Now I don’t want to start.
I want to berate you in a
weird way to the point where
you now feel obligated
to pray to some annoying…
You’ve been playing Assassin’s
Creed Valhalla, so I think Odin.
Odin might be the guy before.
I’ve always been a big fan of Thor, both
the original version and the MCU version.
God, Chris Hemsworth’s body.
I know it’s all fake
because he’s he’s Jack
downstairs, but I’m damn
with that man takes his shirt off.
I respond and I’m a heterosexual male.
Still kind of respond to that in a
positive way if you know what I’m saying.
Alright, so I actually do the podcast now.
That wasn’t too much of a distraction.
I got to put on updates,
which I’m pretty happy about.
Last week, I talked about barbinheimer.
So that was the hashtag
that they came out
because Barbie and the
Oppenheimer movie are
coming out the same day and everyone’s
like, “Oh, we’ll make a double feature.
It’s so quirky and
ironic because one’s
super light comedy fun movie, the
other one’s very heavy and serious.”
I created the barbinheimer hashtag.
Now, Barbie is coming out in Japan.
Oppenheimer currently is not
slated to be released in Japan.
The Warner Brothers Japanese account issued
an apology for the barbinheimer hashtag as
it being relatively, you know, instant, not
instant seer, insensitive to, you know, the
historical reality of
what’s happened in Japan.
The Internet being the Internet, Internet
citizens were not super happy about that.
Internet people are always classy.
Let’s put it that way.
I spent a lot of time on the Internet,
stream, video games, do podcasts.
I spent a lot of time on
the Internet just for fun.
Yeah, I’ve run across some of
the joyous aspects of the Internet.
Always classy, always fair, always honest.
So in retaliation to
the lack of apology from
the American Barbie account, that’s
very specific is what they’re doing.
Because the Japanese account apologized
and they said, “That’s not good enough.
The American Barbie account is still
not acknowledging that this is insensitive.
It’s still not acknowledging
how gross this is.”
So because what they
were doing, if you go
in search barbinheimer,
you will find Barbie.
The one I found the first one,
which I did actually think was
pretty solid, was Barbie with
her hair as a mushroom cloud.
Okay, and it’s all pink.
The Internet was like, “Japanese” and
it was like, “We could play this game too.”
So they started shopping?
I guess shipping might
not be the right word.
I was about to say photo
shopping, which is the right word.
But then I thought maybe they’re
shipping to use some younger parlance.
9/11 images in Barbie
pink or with Barbie
overlaid or things like that, creating
their own memes in retaliation.
I don’t know how I feel about that.
I didn’t care about
barbinheimer because, sure,
whatever, people are putting
two disparate things together.
Whatever.
I didn’t take it too seriously,
but again, I’m not Japanese.
I mean, people are also like,
“You gotta be able to talk about it.”
But again, I guess it
is for them, it’s serious.
My feelings on it, I’m
torn, is what I’m saying.
I find the 9/11 memes they’ve made in
portace, but at the same time I find the whole
barbinheimer thing in
sort of in portace as well.
I do understand the marketing of it.
Those people jumping on, like,
“Hey, this memes happened.
It’s promoting both our films.
Let’s get on that.”.
I get why that happened.
I guess I just live in a real
world where gross things happen
and you kind of just let it go so
you can move on, move past it.
Not so for Japanese people in this case.
Not, I don’t want these people to
say that this is Japanese people.
They don’t represent all of Japan.
Most people in Japan
probably don’t even
know this is going on because
it is very much an Internet thing.
I talked previously about a YouTuber who
was playing essentially a visual novel, a
Stein’s Gate visual
novel and he spoiled the
ending and they sued
him because they’re saying
that this is giving away
the ending of a story.
Therefore people are
going to be less likely
to pay for that story
in the future if you
spoiled the ending
because people the whole
point of doing one of these
things is to get to the ending.
He wants two years in prison plus
like a million years or something.
And they said that
he must be punished
severely to prevent the
decline of the content industry.
The verdict came out yesterday,
but hasn’t been announced yet.
I was looking for it this morning.
It being August 8th as I recorded this.
So the verdict was supposed
to be brought down August 7th.
I don’t think he’s going
to get two years in prison.
But I could see a hefty fine.
Prosecutors being
prosecutors, they always ask
for massive, massive punishments
and they’re going to get less than that.
I think that’s kind of the strategy.
But yeah, it is
interesting that this visual
novel has had such an impact because to
me visual novels are really small things.
But again, it’s a whole industry in Japan.
People pay a lot of money for these things.
So ruining it for other people,
you’re ruining it for the company.
They’re going to take you to
court and I think they’re going to win.
So this was a very interesting development.
Over the last, it’s probably
like five, six months.
Sushi terrorism has been an ongoing theme.
There was the kid and he drank
from the soy sauce bottle directly.
So he licked it and stuff.
Then you put it back.
Other people use that
disgusting that went viral.
His friend recorded it
put it on the Internet.
Now these were just kids.
They were doing dumb stuff and recording
it and putting it on the Internet.
There was some other
kids who were licking and
touching the Sushi that was
going by on the conveyor belt.
Sushi, the conveyor
belt Sushi company is
saying like we had to change
our entire system because of this.
Our stocks dropped billions of yen.
This has cost us so much money.
We’re suing the kid.
They wanted they were suing
the family because he’s underage.
So they actually have to
sue the mom for 67 million yen.
I can guarantee that this person does not
have 67 million yen just in liquid assets,
they were able to spend on the fact
that his son licked a soy sauce container.
They have reached a settlement but
released no details, which is killing me.
Because I think what’s
happened is the company,
Sushi, they wanted
to make a lot of noise.
They wanted to make
sure everyone knows that
if you do this and we
catch you, we’re going
to come after you and they
took it all the way to the limit.
Then they said, look,
we don’t actually want
to ruin this lady’s
life for the fact that
her son, a teenager,
is just a bit of an idiot.
Every teenager is,
I was, might still be
sometimes, but I absolutely
was a bit of a dick and
an asshole in a dummy when
I was like 16, 17 years old.
The boy admitted
responsibility and they
have reached a reasonable
agreement, is what they’ve said.
I do want to know what the
reasonable agreement is, but because
he’s underage, I bet no
details are going to be released.
But I’m betting they got
to pace enough money
that it hurts the family, but
doesn’t ruin them completely.
Or there’s a payment
plan or something like that.
They’re not going to
take all 67 million yet.
This was just a show to stop other
people from doing the same thing.
I think.
And I think that’s
actually a fair thing to do
because Sushi does, they
got lawyers on retainer.
They can do this forever.
They can try, if she tried to
fight back, they could ruin her life.
Not being reasonable, normal human beings.
They decided not to
go that far, but they
still want to get the
message out there that
if this happens again,
we will go that far.
Try to think is a very
fair thing to be able to do.
It’s got to add on.
I’m actually quite happy
Sushi Rho didn’t fuck him.
They could have.
And you think of corporate people.
I think this is again a
Western image of corporate
people just being like absolute
bastards, ruining people’s lives were fun.
In Japan, yeah, they’ll go far,
but I think the level is different.
The attitude is different
and people are people still.
Like I’m sure there are
massive corporate assholes.
We actually have some other stories
going on that I didn’t actually write down.
There’s a car company
and they killed all the
trees outside of their
car dealership because
they were basically the trees were
obstructing your ability to see the cars.
Of course, all that’s illegal.
And then they got pulled up on getting in
trouble for scamming and lying and stuff.
That’s pretty standard
car dealership stuff.
It’s a bit shady as far
as an industry goes.
It has a reputation for a reason.
But I would say the
average executive maybe
is dumb in the way executives
are, but is not a complete asshole.
From what I’ve seen on the
Internet, I don’t know these people.
I don’t run in those circles.
I know that the president of JAL for the
last like 10 years has not taken a salary.
He literally said, I’ve made enough money.
I can survive for the rest of my life.
I will not take a salary.
I just want to make this business
the best business it can be.
You’ll support the workers and stuff.
So all the money he
would have made went
back into the company
into the employees and stuff.
And I thought, man, that’s awesome.
That is a completely
different form of corporate
thinking, which I can
get on board with.
And I guess maybe that’s also not
called, I don’t know which is more common.
Although Sushi Do in
this case didn’t go out
of their way to destroy a family just
because a kid was being a fucking idiot.
They did want to get a message
out, which I think they did successfully.
I’m going to have to
run my transition sound
again because I have
to get to the next story.
World Heritage Sites being
vandalized, is that like an Internet trend?
So we had the guy
vandalized the call of CO.
And then we had a kid named
Justin vandalized a temple in Japan.
And now I’ve read about two
more instances at the call of CO.
And the call of CO once, you
can get five years in prison for that.
Well, one of the most
famous temples, super
famous because I know
the name of the temple.
That’s how famous it is.
Not like I’m like a temple fan.
Toadaiji Temple was
vandalized with a picture
of a fairly poorly rendered cat, believed
to be scratched into a door by a finger.
Now, this is wood that is
literally thousands of years old.
So pushing your finger into
it is going to leave a Mark.
You don’t even have to use a nail.
Justin that little shit before, he actually
used his nail to scratch his name in.
Now I do want to give us some
credit to the vandal this time.
They didn’t write their name.
Actually, one of the
previous episodes I
was like, what you
should do is you’re going
to vandalize something
is don’t write your name.
Someone else’s name and then they’ll
be like, hey, Chuck, the beef chest.
Did you vandalize this?
I’m like, well, no, that says Brad Pitt.
So Brad Pitt must have been
here vandalizing it, not me.
So they drew a cat.
So unless a cat did
it, no, here’s the thing.
The height of the cat had like where
they did it was about 180 centimeters.
So I’m going to say,
let’s say someone who’s
slightly under six foot lifted
their arm up and drew a cat.
That’s how they got to 180 centimeters.
So the best we could say is this is someone
who is approximately six feet or so.
Because either they’re
six feet and they were
drawing at eye level
or they were less than
six feet and they were
drawing a little bit of
bum or they were like seven
feet and drawing but elite them.
Woo.
So we could have a seven
foot vandal on our hands.
They’re not doing the
CSI stuff where they’re
taking footprints and
then calculating by
the impression of the footprint and
how heavy the person isn’t stuff like that.
But it seems like
because of those initial
reports, it’s now in the
mindset of people visiting
these places and it’s
being, it’s like a thing.
But the fines for this are hardcore.
So like again, the ones
in Italy, five years in
prison, a couple million
dollars or whatever.
I actually think it was like
a few hundred thousand
dollars, but a few
hundred thousand dollars.
I don’t have that.
I can’t pay that.
No one’s in the Japan.
It’s the same.
It’s like millions of yen
and possible jail time.
Absolutely not worth doing.
Like again, I want, if
I’m going to do a crime,
I want them to be a benefit
for me and my legacy is not it.
Like I want money.
If I’m going to commit a
crime, it’s going to be for money.
It’s not going to be so
that I become famous
because that kind of
fame isn’t what I need.
I need money.
I should have started
dropping in like ways
you could donate money
to you right after that.
I need money and then do the donation.
That actually would make sense.
Still not doing it.
I’m not going to come out here and beg.
Look, okay.
So you want to support the
engineers Japan, tell other
people to listen to it, get
other people to download it.
The rate review thing that actually
helps with algorithms and stuff.
I would love that.
I’m not even going to ask for that.
All I want is people who
are interested in it to listen.
And if you really, really want to make
me happy, send me questions and stuff.
So I have more things
to I can gain Gauge with.
So I can follow up on
stories or answer questions
about being in Japan or
my opinions or whatnot.
Your questions and
comments are easily the most
motivating factor to doing an
engineer’s Japan and see me.
So if you want to support the
podcast, don’t send me money.
I mean, send me money, but don’t
send me money by a see me B T shirt.
That would be all right.
Because then you get
something out of it too.
But send me stuff that I can talk about
or react to or we can have an interaction.
That to me is the peak.
You can go to speak pipe.com/chocolateweefchest
and leave a voicemail, which I can
then drop into the episode
and then use as a segment.
So now that I’ve said that,
we’re going to move on.
This is maybe my pre
holiday begging for interaction.
Just a bit sad, isn’t it?
I’m so lonely.
16, 99% of people in their
30s and 40s never watch
Vtubers, which to me is
a surprisingly low number.
I actually would have thought hardly
anyone in their 30s and 40s never
watches Vtubers just because
Vtubers became a thing fairly recently.
So I would assume older
people aren’t aware of them.
It’s not like they hate them or something.
I consider doing this podcast as a
VTuber, but I just didn’t have anything
set up and by the time I started doing
video on Twitch and stuff, there was no
point and going through
another process to set it up.
Although I still think a
VTuber, a super cute anime girl
and me not changing my voice
at all would have been funny.
And then every time I say
that, people get this like shitty.
I had to lose been done before.
You want a list of things
that have been done before?
It’s fucking everything, man.
The only thing I can claim to be completely
original was Montana, L.D.A.B.L.O.
The audio podcast
choose your own adventure.
And the only thing, the only reason I think
that was original is because I may have
just been the first person to
organize it and put it together.
And it was a huge pain in the ass.
I have tentatively started working on
a second one, which hopefully would be
better, but sitting down and just writing
for hours and hours and hours is pretty.
Pretty hard to find that time in my life.
But that is probably, and then
even then, people will like, you know,
choose your own adventures
have been done before.
Adult ones that are supposed to
be funny have been done before.
It’s like, if you actually went by
things that have been done before,
there would be no reason to do anything.
And let’s face it, Montana, L.D.A.B.L.O.
It’s fucking better than
all the other ones anyways.
All right.
No, no, I’m not going to, I was going to
do this sound again and restart the story.
I’m not going to do that.
I’m just going to keep going.
I’m going to power through.
Okay, so people in their 30s
and 40s, one to two times a week,
13% watch V2 or three to four times
a week, four percent, every day, 14%.
It’s more men than women.
I think that’s just
generally on the Internet,
you tend to find more
men doing dumb shit.
watching V2 versus isn’t dumb.
It’s fine.
V2 versus are great.
That’s it.
I just, I actually
thought 69% they’re like,
whoa, it’s, it’s,
that’s not a surprise.
I thought it would have
been the 80s or 90s.
Because again, just older
people, not that in tune
with what’s going on on
the Internet and the stuff.
A 14 year old Turkish boy was arrested for
throwing a smoke bomb at security guards.
And what he said was, uh,
okay, so let’s give it a story.
He claims that he had been scolded before
with his friend, oh, but not his friend.
So his friends and him were
sitting outside this building.
They were playing loud
music and smoking cigarettes.
He’s 14 years old.
So he’s not supposed to be doing that.
Uh, and then he came and then a security
guy came out and scolded him specifically,
but not his friends, but
he claimed was discriminate.
discrimination.
So he said, don’t
discriminate against foreigners.
I’ll blow you up and then
through a smoke bomb.
And if I can give you a list of things
you should not do, smoking is number one,
uh, being playing loud
music in public is not great.
But I guess I’d give a pass on that
because there’s no law against it.
Claiming discrimination is possible, but
you’re not going to improve your case.
by throwing a smoke bomb at someone right
after saying don’t discriminate against me.
I’ll blow you up.
I’ll blow you up is a threat of
violence, which again is illegal.
So he’s committed multiple crimes.
Now he’s 14 again.
He’s underage.
He’s not going to be
going to jail or anything.
But he was arrested for our favorite
crime, forcible obstruction of business.
All right.
This is, I don’t know if
this is Saturn at 10 years
in a row, the demand for
rice has dropped in Japan.
It is 100,000 tons down to 6.81 million
tons of rice needed or wanted this year.
It’s the lowest since they
started keeping track in 1996.
It’s weird that they only
started keeping track in 1996.
I don’t know why that was one of
the bits to suck out on me in this story.
In 1996, they started keeping
track of how much rice they eat.
I think that would
have been like ancient
times, how many barrels
or bushels or whatever.
I don’t know how rice is measured.
Grains of rice, I guess just wait.
Tons of rice.
People eat.
Like it’s sort of one of those things.
It’s a staple of the country.
The Ministry of Agriculture
is encouraging farmers
to switch to other crops like soybeans or
wheat because they are more in demand.
So I’m wondering this is partially because
of the population of decline in Japan.
So it’s representative of
there being less people overall.
It is also partially demonstrating a
change in dietary wants or needs.
So people generally are eating less rice.
I would like to see a breakdown.
This didn’t give me enough information.
I would be really interested in
what the breakdown of that is.
Is it because there
are just less people and
therefore less people
eating rice or is it because
there are more people eating other
diets than just a rice-based diet.
Like is keto taken off in Japan?
I kind of looked at that a
little bit but didn’t find anything.
particularly demonstrable of what’s
actually happening with the diets in Japan.
But it’s a weird thing to see.
You think of Japan, you
think of Asia, you think of rice.
And Japan is a country
just eating less rice overall.
It’s very interesting.
That’s it.
I’m going to go eat some rice now.
I don’t know.
I’ll try to pop up the country.
I, again, just at the end, I want
to make sure everyone knows.
It’s summer holiday.
I’m going to try to get an episode
out next week if I have time.
It might be late.
It might not happen at all.
So I’ll see you in two
weeks worst-case scenario.