A Conjoint Analysis of Demand for the Japanese Mobile Phone Market

The Japanese mobile phone market is 55.8% of the total market in the telecommunications industry. This paper is a conjoint analysis on Japanese consumer preferences for Japanese mobile phones. The analysis in this paper is presented after a questionnaire survey was given to 3,412 Japanese mobile phone users over 15 years old. The results of this analysis show that a decline in the price of mobile phone sets, an increase in transmission speed, the application of family discounts, and the continuation of contracts with the same telecommunication companies, all raise demand for mobile networks. In addition, the author found that user groups of NTT DOCOMO, au (KDDI), Softbank, and MVNO have different utility functions. According to the estimation of Mean Willingness to Pay (MWTP) in this paper, suppliers of mobile phone networks may be able to optimize and maximize demand by adjusting attributions and their levels.     

A Statistical Analysis Between Consumer Behavior and a Social Network Service: A Case Study of Used-Car Demand Following the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami of 2011

When a large-scale disaster hits a community, especially a water-related disaster, there is a scarcity of automobiles and a sudden increase in the demand for used cars in the damaged areas. This paper conducts a case study of a recent massive natural disaster, the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami of 2011 to understand those car scarcities and demand in the aftermath of the catastrophe. We analyze the reasons for the increase in demand for used cars and how social media can predict people’s demand for used automobiles. In other words, this paper explores whether social media data can be used as a sensor of socio-economic recovery status in damaged areas during large-scale water-related disaster-recovery phases. For this purpose, we use social media communication as a proxy for estimating indicators of people’s activities in the real world. This study conducts both qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis. For the qualitative research, we carry out semi-structured interviews with used-car dealers in the tsunami-stricken area and unveil why people in the area demanded used cars. For the quantitative analysis, we collected Facebook page communication data and used-car market data before and after the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami of 2011. By combining and analyzing these two types of data, we find that social media communication correlates with people’s activities in the real world. Furthermore, this study suggests that different types of communication on social media have different types of correlations with people’s activities. More precisely, we find that social media communication related to people’s activities for rebuilding and for emotional support is positively correlated with the demand for used cars after the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami. On the other hand, communication about anxiety and information seeking correlates negatively with the demand for used cars.     

Designing an Interactive Visualization to Explore Eye-movement Data

For many user applications large data sets may be collected passively and unobtrusively in the flow of their activity, and on scales ranging from the individual to increasingly larger communities. Large data sets, however, bring a concomitant need for tools to help understand what the data indicates. With the emergence of smart eyewear and the availability of sophisticated but affordable eye-tracking devices, eye movement data becomes a source of detailed information about a user’s focus and indirectly about their cognition and attention. Visualizing this usefully in terms meaningful for diagnosis however, remains a challenge. In this paper we report a new data representation from significant data sets generated by a gaze-controlled digital reading application for second language speakers. Current tools provide data sets aimed primarily towards statistical analysis of patterns: our focus is on end-user exploration of data sets in domain terms, so that practical implications can be readily identified. The visualization of horizontal eye movement data allows rapid diagnosis of problem areas in texts, informing educators immediately of individual or wider issues. The general applicability of this visualization to other applications is discussed.     

中文在线：用数字出版传承中华文明

科技与文化的融合，在诸多产业掀起了无数朵美丽的浪花，如果有一朵能第一眼就吸引你的眼球。那一定是浪高最高的数字出版业这一朵。最新数据显示，2011年中国数字出版产业总产值达到1400亿元，占新闻出版业总收入10％左右。根据新闻出版业“十二五”发展规划，“十二五”期末我国数字出版业营收将占国民收入的12％左右，成为当之无愧的支柱产业。     

Research Note: Analysis of the Characteristics of Victims in Information Security Incident Damages: The Case of Japanese Internet Users

In this article, the authors investigate the attributes of victims in information security incident damages for the purpose of reducing the damages. The Information-Technology Promotion Agency, Japan, in 2010, conducted an Internet survey targeted to Japanese Internet home users entitled, “Survey of awareness toward information security incidents” that is used in this article. Using micro data collected from this survey, they employed multinomial logit regression analysis to show factors affecting the user’s experience of the incidents of damage through particular incidents. They concluded that the overconfidence regarding information security knowledge increased the probability for phishing and spoofing.     

“投票”退学是民主与教育的双重悲剧

7月2日．网友“蝈蝈”发帖称，河南省洛阳市第12中学一位学生在同班同学全体参与的“民主投票”中被强迫退学，此帖很快引起网友关注。洛阳市教育局回应称，投票是学生发起的，对于退学，其解释称，实际情况是因为学生“不适应寄宿生活”。而被家长自愿接走。（7月5日《南方都市报》）     

An Advertising Strategy Using Consumption Externality and Forgetting in the Case of Japanese Electronic Books

We construct a two-period model in which a consumer recognizes the existence of goods after advertised by firms, and total sales of the first period affect the utility of each consumer’s purchase in the second period, indicating a consumption externality. Some consumers see advertisements in the first period and remember the product, whereas some forget the product in the second period. We show that the advertising volume changes given the differences in the forgetting rate. In particular, we apply our method to the data on Japan’s electronic books obtained through a conjoint analysis survey to clarify that a better strategy is to sell a product to a small number of people at a low price or to lower the price to a certain level during the early period, and then to sell the product to a specific consumer segment at a higher price after reflecting the externality.     

Defect Detection Using Unanimous Vote Among Mahalanobis Classifiers for Each Color Component

In manufacturing industries, product inspection is automated and the use of image data is increasingly being employed for defect detection. A manufacturing company in Japan produces an item and inspects the produced products using image data. Reducing the error rate is important in product inspection because poor inspection of products might lead to the delivery of defective products to consumers (consumer’s risk) and strict inspection increases production cost (producer’s risk). To reduce the error rate, we highlighted fault points using a two-dimensional moving range filter and discriminated defect production through a unanimous vote among Mahalanobis classifiers for each color component. For results, we achieved a lower error rate than the current system. This research is an empirical study of how to use image data in defect detection.     

An Approach to Security for Unstructured Big Data

Security of Big Data is a huge concern. In a broad sense, Big Data contains two types of data: structured and unstructured. Providing security to unstructured data is more difficult than providing security to structured data. In this paper, we have developed an approach to provide adequate security to unstructured data by considering types of data and their sensitivity levels. We have reviewed the different analytics methods of Big Data to build nodes of different types of data. Each type of data has been classified to provide adequate security and enhance the overhead of the security system. To provide security to a data node, and a security suite has been designed by incorporating different security algorithms. Those security algorithms collectively form a security suite which has been interfaced with the data node. Information on data sensitivity has been collected through a survey. We have shown through several experiments on multiple computer systems with varied configurations that data classification with respect to sensitivity levels enhances the performance of the system. The experimental results show how and in what amount the designed security suite reduces overhead and increases security simultaneously.     

新元科技园：传统国企成功转型现代科技服务

传统国企转型办园区、以园区聚集产业、并以产业聚集带动企业跨越发展的”新元经验”，已经成为国有企业以市场化手段统筹科技资源、加快产业化发展的一条新途径。     

银发市场的金色机遇

中国＂人口红利＂时代即将终结。中国的劳动力人口日益老化并逐渐步入退休年龄。到2050年,60岁及以上人口将从2010年的约1.65亿激增至近4.4亿,将占中国人口总数的34%左右。     

王丽方：心灵的设计师

无论是西子湖畔的林徽因造像,还是弥漫着淡淡青草味的情人坡,抑或是那座儿童天地——清华附小……虽然王丽方的作品不是很多,但每一件都是她的心灵之作。     

Personal Authentication Using a Kinect Sensor

This article proposes a new approach to personal authentication by exploring the features of a person’s face and voice. Microsoft’s Kinect sensor is used for facial and voice recognition. Parts of the face including the eyes, nose, and mouth, etc., are analyzed as position vectors. For voice recognition, a Kinect microphone array is adopted to record personal voices. Mel-frequency cepstrum coefficients, logarithmic power, and related values involved in the analysis of personal voice are also estimated from the voices. Neural networks,support vector machines and principal components analysis are employed and compared for personal authentication. To achieve accurate results, 20 examinees were selected for face and voice data used for training the authentication models. The experimental results show that the best accuracy is achieved when the model is trained by a support vector machine using both facial and voice features.     

Globalization of Information Services and the Industrial Structure of the Japanese Economy

Since the late 1990s, ICT has rebuilt organizational networks by connecting value chains and providing communication networks. This made certain types of services tradable, including information services. This change raised the public concern in terms of the effect on employment and innovation capacity in developed economies. The fragmentation of the production network of information services has been led by US firms, but is spreading to East Asia, typically in outsourcing from Japan to China, India and the ASEAN countries. This study empirically assesses the effect of offshore outsourcing on employment in Japan, specifying trading partners. The results show that information services outsourcing affects employment in the manufacturing sector in Japan, but the effect is different depending on trading partners. This study discusses the implications from the viewpoint of industry policy, relating the results to outsourced business processes.     

中国现代国防建设进行时

进入新世纪新阶段特别是党的十七大以来，国际局势风云变幻，安全环境日益复杂。改革发展攻坚推进。以胡锦涛同志为总书记的党中央，团结带领人民战胜来自经济、政治和自然领域的风险考验，开创了中国特色社会主义事业新局面。在党的坚强领导下，我军和武警部队扎实推进部队建设改革和军事斗争准备，全面履行党和人民赋予的使命任务，为捍卫国家主权安全、维护国家发展的重要战略机遇期作出了突出贡献，谱写了国防和军队建设科学发展的崭新篇章。     

车库咖啡，为创业者飘香

这是车库咖啡里常见的一景。来自不同公司、不同行业的人在这里相互碰撞，开阔眼界。有的还达成了合作。车库咖啡的前世今生创新、创业是中关村的“主旋律”。而中关村西区，更是一块风水宝地，新浪、微软、创新工场、木瓜移动等等科技创新型公司走集聚于此。它和清华、北大等知名高校也就是半小时的路程。     

Simulation Analysis of a Dynamic Reallocation-based Routing Functionality for SAGE Application

A large amount of scientific data is generated through computation and analysis. Also, today’s scientific research necessitates an aggregation of diverse expertise from experts with different backgrounds. Therefore, visualizing and sharing these data among scientists in an intuitive and easy manner is of more importance in scientific collaborative research than ever. We have focused on SAGE, a middleware that realizes a large-scale remote visualization leveraging network streaming technique as a promising building block technology. However, no advanced network control function for efficient use of the network is equipped with SAGE although SAGE relies on a network streaming techniques. Our previous research integrated a functionality that detected network failures avoided such failure by rerouting network flows of SAGE into the functionality. Nonetheless, a network congestion avoidance functionality to adapt a collection of network flows generated by SAGE to the underlying network has not been developed yet. In this paper we explore the feasibility of a reallocation-based dynamic routing functionality for SAGE, with which all network flows on the network are rearranged. For feasibility research, we perform simulation experiments to observe the behavior of the functionality. The evaluation confirms that our proposed functionality works correctly and brings better throughput for each flow.     

Facebook e-Portfolios for Career Education Focused on Japanese Employment Practice: A Case Study

The authors propose the effectiveness of Facebook functions in the promotion of career education. In recent years, career education in Japanese universities has differed slightly from that in other countries. Japanese students are trained to be competitive in the job-hunting process; they need to obtain the technical skills and knowledge necessary to pass a company entrance examination or a university oral interview. This practice is in stark contrast with the intrinsic meaning of vocational/career education, which is the process by which students acquire the abilities and independence required by a certain industry. This meaning is manifested in the purpose of the career education program of Hokkai-Gakuen University’s Faculty of Business Administration. The program’s purpose is to foster independence in its students rather than the acquisition of skills for the job-hunting process. The professional independence of every student is important to their career development after graduating from the university. On the other hand, it is known that e-portfolios generally encourage students to record and assess their activities. To promote the activities that students tackle in the program, we introduced an e-portfolio using Facebook. This study shows the characteristics and achievements of our e-portfolio.     

黑马曹甦是北漂

曹鞋是谁？名不见经传。为什么他的首次画展却在澳门艺术界引起轰动？《澳门日报》二月上旬、中旬连续三次大幅报道“多彩中国——曹甦油画展”开幕式，刊发多幅照片、作品、人物采访特稿和评论文章。澳门基金会的梁华全先生说：“小澳门身后有个大中华，澳门基金会办展入选标准不低，即便是著名书画家，这种情况也少见”。主办方澳门基金会行政委员会主席以及中联办、外交部、     

Are Depositors Aware of the Governance of their Banks?1

In the discussion of corporate governance from the standpoint of economists, it is common for economists to pay more attention to the stockholders of a corporation (as stakeholders) than to the creditors. However, the behaviors of depositors as creditors should not be neglected in the management of banking institutions. The purpose of this paper is to analyze statistically the decision factors of depositors in opening an account at a particular bank with respect to corporate governance variables. My result shows that depositors with risk aversion consider banks well managed based on the following: a lower rate of external auditors, a longer time of service by the bank’s president, and the existence of a simultaneous promotion system of the bank’s president and chairperson.