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It's a culture and people rooted in efficiency. For them, function comes light years ahead of form. For example, I remember reading an article, a few years ago
by kumarvvr 6y ago
It's a culture and people rooted in efficiency. For them, function comes light years ahead of form.
For example, I remember reading an article, a few years ago, about the cup holders in Honda / Toyota cars sold in America. The author noticed a small, hinged notch, deep inside the cup holder. Initially thinking it was some loose part. But then he realized it's function is to automatically drop when the car is on an upward slope and hold the cup in place. The notch automatically retracts (due to gravity) when the car is on normal roads.
The attention to detail, at such a small level, is prevalent at every level in their society.
- ahartmetz 6y agoI think a better explanation is that buildings have traditionally been seen as temporary in Japan because of earthquakes and wood construction. There is actually a lot of inefficiency, like people standing there waving batons to warn about construction sites. In other countries you'd have signs. But it's debatable if that is plain inefficiency - maybe it gives people with no other abilities something to do, which can be positive. No argument about attention to detail and especially customer service - it feels like the Japanese wouldn't even know how to do bad customer service or a bad product. (You can find examples of both if you go looking, though.)