Adam Greenfield of v-2.org offers his observations on the state of Japanese design and aesthetic:
The Japan That Should Say No
Where Japanese culture used to be expert at finding the one element in a situation that bore psychological meaning, at manipulating the tension between what is made explicit and what is left unsaid, it now contents itself with wallowing in the banal.
This is as true of technology (and associated domains like information design) as it is of, say, J-pop. As recently as the 1960s, Japan produced as a matter of course train schedules, tourist maps, and newspaper weather reports so carefully devised that master information designer Edward Tufte chose them as particularly exquisite examples of the use of line and color to carry data.
Similarly, up until the 1980s, Japanese technology led the world in simplification, miniaturization – refinement. More recently, manufacturers seem engaged in a race to bombard the user with the most extraneous features. It’s trumpeted as innovative when the new model keitai comes with interchangeable faceplates.
Like I say: banal.
During my brief time in Japan, I haven’t seen a lot to dispute his observations. Take my mobile phone, for example…
As Greenfield mentions, Japanese mobile phones are not all they’re cracked up to be. Supposedly among the world’s most advanced (or so the popular conception goes), the typical keitai is all bells and whistles, and, frankly, not much fun to use after about ten minutes of gee-whiz gawking at the color screen and built-in camera.
In terms of form, you have two options: the clamshell and the brick. Neither are particularly innovative nor appealing. When it comes down to it, your typical keitai is about as visually appealing as a Dell computer.
Function doesn’t rate much higher. The phones are loaded with features, most of them aimed at 16-year-old school girls. The camera that seems so flashy turns out to capture small, grainy shots. And one of the reasons people here seem to be staring at their phones so much is that pretty much any task on the phone takes a ridiculously long time to execute.
I’ve found myself missing my simple, small, elegant Nokia 8200 series phone. Add to that phone the ability to send and receive longer e-mail messages and I’d choose it over my current keitai in a flash.