Dutch designers MVRDV are being called “Al Qaeda lovers” for mocking 9/11 with what that looks like a freeze frame of the Twin Towers exploding. Dubbed “The Could,” the towers are connected halfway up by a 10-floor-tall pixelated cloud that houses common areas such as gardens, fitness center, pool, and shops. MVRDV initially feigned ignorance to any similarities between the buildings. “It was not our intention to create an image

Nothing quite sets the season like Christmas cards of Santa, or as he’s known in Japan “American Christmas Devil.” Brad McGinty received this unique card from his grandfather. “These aren’t personal Christmas cards, but rather leftover cards from my grandfather’s failed attempt at starting a greeting card company a few years after WWII,” claims McGinty. A few years after my Grandfather returned from the war he decided to start a

As part of its effort to become a world leader in robotics, South Korea will start using robot prison guards next spring. Unlike the deceptively cute Jailbot featured in Superjail!, these R2-D2s with smiley faces are genuinely benign. Creator Lee Baik-Chul programmed the robots to monitor inmates for abnormal behavior. “But the robots are not Terminators. Their job is not cracking down on violent prisoners. They are helpers. When an

Aimi Eguchi seemed to come out of nowhere. The 16-year-old went from “trainee” in the Japanese idol group AKB48 to spokesmodel for Glico candy. Too good to be true. Aimi is actually a computer-generated composite of 6 of the group’s most attractive members. Glico released a video showing the face tracking software used to create Aimi, along with an online idol maker but the results are on par with that

In China, chain gangs are going high-tech. Liu Dali alleges that he and 300 other prisoners at Jixi labor camp in Heilongjiang province were forced to play online games in 12-hour shifts. They collected virtual money to trade with other players for real money, an illegal practice known as gold farming. The Prison reportedly made upwards of $900 a day, which was not shared with the prisoners, but when they

That a single person can change history is a very dangerous idea so it’s not surprising that China is anti-time travel. The General Bureau of Radio, Film and Television is banning all time travel stories, calling them “disrespectful to history.” Chinahush.com translated the original story: “The time-travel drama is becoming a hot theme for TV and films. But its content and the exaggerated performance style are questionable. Many stories are

Doctors from around China gathered at Jinan Chest Hospital to treat 53-year-old Guo Qingpo, who was suffering from a severe case of gynecomastia, more commonly known as man boobs, or moobs. “I had never seen anything like it in 40 years. There has never been such a case in China, or anywhere in the world,” asserts Director Dr. Zhang Jianhua. It took two teams working side-by-side on each breast over

Designed to looked like actual X-rays these bare bones calendars are actually a brilliant marketing campaign by EIZO, a Japanese company that manufactures medical displays for the examination and diagnosis of radiographs (i.e., X-rays). EIZO says their intention is to break the taboo that pin-up calendars are only for craftsmen. If the models seem similar, it’s because they were pieced together from individual bone X-rays since receiving full-body X-rays would

Kristen Dunst got all dolled up last summer to sing a cover of “Turning Japanese” by The Vapors. The film titled “Akihabara Majokko Princess” was part of the “Pop Life: Art in a Material World” exhibit at London’s Tate Modern museum. Co-creator Takashi Murakami explains “I believe that real art is centered in entertainment and I wanted to show that with this piece.” I may not know much about art

Instead of worrying about whether Barack “Hussein” Obama was a secret Muslim, maybe we should have been worrying whether he was a secret blasian (black Asian). President Obama’s kowtowing goes way beyond blatantly bowing down to the Prime Minister of Japan. Japan & China are already the two largest creditors of U.S. debt but now we’re just throwing money at them. More than half of the $3 billion that we

Japanese toilet manufacturer Toto likes to asks customers “How far should toilets evolve?” Their newest model the Neo 2 may go a little too far. Say hello the world’s first talking toilet. The prominent armrest has loads of audio buttons including functional ones like Otohime (Sound Princess), which masks unpleasant bodily sounds to not-so-functional ones like reciting Senryu (Japanese poetry). Not surprisingly, the toilet likes to talk crap. It’s particularly

What was once a dubious internet meme is now so ubiquitous that it’s being marketed to children by online stores like pedobearstore.com & pedobearplush.com. Now I like child molesting anthropomorphic bears as much as the next guy, but putting Pedobear on an infant creeper is just wrong, although you gotta admit the Pedobear plush is adorable (in a grisly kind of way). Now that kids have become sufficiently comfortable around

In the land of Godzilla and contorted ghost girls, perhaps the scariest thing in Japan is its new First Lady. Miyuki is outshining her newly elected husband Prime Minister Yukioi Hatoyama with the revelation that she likes to “eat the Sun.” She demonstrated this ability on a Japanese talk show by grasping at the air and tearing pieces off the sun that only she can apparently see. So how does

Leave it to the Japanese to take something as simple as a smile and turn it upside down with technology. Everyday before punching in for work, employees of the Keihin Express Railway get in line to have their smiles analyzed by a computer. Smile Scan measures the curve of the mouth and gives a score ranging from 0% to 100%. Sourpusses get feedback like “you still look too serious.” There’s

Humanity just got a little closer to Judgment Day thanks to the Japanese. Researchers at Waseda University recently unveiled Kobian, a emotional robot that’s more man than machine. Kobian uses 48 actuators to express up to 7 different emotions, including: happiness, surprise, sadness, disgust, and anger (read: bloodlust). It’s also got a double-jointed neck to give it more expressive postures (read: sass). Kobian’s creators say its expressiveness will help it