Enka singer Sachiko Kobayashi cooperated with Nico Nico Douga in music TV show of the last day of the year

Happy New Year! In Japan, new year began and passed for 2 hours. Japanese public broadcasting company NHK broadcasts a music TV show "Kōhaku Uta Gassen(紅白歌合戦)" every year on the last day of the year. Japanese Enka(演歌) singer Sachiko Kobayashi(小林幸子) appeared in it and cooperated with Dwango's popular video sharing site Nico Nico Douga(ニコニコ動画).

Sachiko Kobayashi is the great singer, but she is more famous by gorgeous dress.

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Because her dresses were too gorgeous and huge, she became a popular person among Japanese netizens. She is often compared to final boss monster(of games). Now, she also accesses netizens. She became a premium user of Nico Nico Douga, sang numbers of VOCALOID, uploaded those video in Nico Nico Douga, She sold indie CDs in Comic Market(Comiket) of the summer of 2014. This is exceptional as a great singer having 52 years career. She is 62 years old, but is active like totally young Youtuber.



At the yesterday's TV show, she sang VOCALOID number "Senbonzakura(千本桜: 1,000 cherry blossoms)" with the popularity in Nico Nico Douga. And she wore a dress of 5 tons weight and  5.5 meters.

Her back had radial feathers, and they transformed in it real time. Comments of posted by users were displayed on them by a live streaming program which was broadcasted in Nico Nico Douga in time same as a TV show. These comments are big characteristics of Nico Nico Douga. This is collaboration of Internet video sharing site and the TV show.

Twitter added emoji for Japanese New Year

Twitter started the offer of the New Year version of Twitter emoji. It expresses Japanese New Year. They are available until January 3.

When Twitter users input hashtags "#あけおめ"(Akeome: Slang of the abbreviated form of greetings of a New Year), "#あけましておめでとう"(Akemashite Omedetou: Greetings of the New Year) and "#謹賀新年"(Kinga Shinnen: Literary style of "I wish you a happy New Year"), emoji of Mount Fuji and the first sunrise of a new year are displayed. This is a classic image of New Year to be used for a New Year's card well.

When Twitter users input hashtags "#初詣(Hatsumoude: First Shinto shrine visit of the Japanese New Year)", emoji of Torii(鳥居: Gate of Shinto shrine) are displayed.

Furthermore, Mount Fuji is displayed in hashtags "#富士(Fuji)", a hawk is displayed in hashtags "#鷹(Taka: Hawk)", and eggplant is displayed in hashtags "#茄子(Nasu: Eggplant)". Mount Fuji, a hawk and a eggplant are good omens to appear in the first dream had in the new year.

Twitter produced these emoji for the Japanese who respected New Year more in comparison with other countries. I do not know whether you can use this in an overseas region. However, they are displayed on the timeline of Japanese Twitter users as emoji if you input them exactly.

In addition, fireworks are displayed in hashtags "#HappyNewYear". This is available throughout the world.

Crossing the Red Sea of Moses became the mobile game in Japan

Christians are minority in Japan, and they are around 1% of the total population. Therefore the Christ newspaper company(キリスト新聞社), the publisher of Christianity newspaper "The Christ Weekly" practices interesting propagation methods only in Japan. They are games. They released the mobile puzzle game of Exodus of Moses on Christmas Eve. The downloading is free and English support available (iOS/Android).

This is an action puzzle, players move puzzle panels, make ways and guide Hebrews to the opposite bank. However, players must move puzzle panels in real time quickly because many Egyptian soldiers interfere with them. This is the puzzle that instantaneous power and judgement are necessary.

Each level have missions, and players can clear levels by accomplishing them. In the critical situations, prophets with various skills help players. For example, Daniel from Book of Daniel summons lions and sends away Egyptian soldiers.

This is the first game of their mobile game label "Bible collection Ω". Players can know the contents of the Bible with playing. This is important in Japan. Because there is not opportunities to read the Bible in both the everyday life and the school in Japan.

This is not the first their interesting propagation. They released card game "Bible hunter" and baseball game "Bible league" about the Bible...

And they publish comics Pyuuritan(Puritan) which personified Christian religious sects serially in The Christ Weekly.

(Kotaku places a detailed article about this)

http://kotaku.com/christian-schoolgirl-manga-debuts-in-japan-1696445391

Of course they are not kidding. They are  serious. Clergymen supervise these, and contents do not have the mistakes. But these are very Japanese.

Japanese Ingress agents cooperates with blood donation

From 2 to 24 on January in 2016, Japanese Ingress agents hold event "Red Faction" cooperating with blood donation.

During the period of the event, blood donation rooms of districts of Kanto(関東), Koshinnetsu(甲信越), and Kinki(近畿) become the portal of Ingress, and special battles of the point system and missions are performed. When the agents participate in these and donate blood, they can get Ingress original card. Japanese Red Cross and Niantic cooperates with this event totally.

Blood donors decrease every year in winter because it is cold. Therefore the significance to hold this event daringly in January is big.

via https://plus.google.com/102892242902424181780
     https://plus.google.com/107527136630715624310

Dwango released VR apps of their popular video sharing site Nico Nico Douga for Gear VR

Japan's Dwango released VR video apps "niconicoVR" of their popular video sharing site Nico Nico Douga for Samsung's Gear VR.

niconicoVR is the free VR apps that users can watch videos posted to Nico Nico Douga in VR space. A characteristic of Nico Nico Douga is that the comment that users wrote on the video are displayed, and of course these are displayed in VR space, too. Furthermore, this has the function that users can see their hands while attaching Gear VR. This is very convenient. Because we can see video while eating snacks and drinks.