>> 1) Is this unique to Japan? Most other countries have not developed world-dominating software industries. That is true, but most other countries did not ente

>> 1) Is this unique to Japan? Most other countries have not developed world-dominating software industries. That is true, but most other countries did not enter the PC era after spending several disrupting and dominating multiple global industries. So, expectations of Japan were much higher. Indeed. Read any US computer magazine c. 1980 +- four years, and the one assumption/expectation in the background of every article discussing the industry is that the "Japanese are coming". This belief directly caused several things to occur in the US industry, notably Commodore's pivot from a seller of high-priced desktops sold to schools and European companies to a focus on low-priced home computers starting with the Commodore 64.