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Externally, Japan, the world’s third-largest economy after the United States and China, is one of the most technologically complex corporations in the world. Within the country, its government and corporations still use floppy disks.
But that’s very likely to end soon, as Taro Kono, the hope of the social media-savvy prime minister who appointed virtual minister in last month’s cabinet reshuffle, has declared war on disk storage that is still applicable only in most Western countries. limited to the use of your virtual symbol as a backup icon.
https://twitter. com/konotaromp/status/1564767072554745856
According to Kono, about 1,900 government procedures still require the commercial network to use floppy disks to send programs and other forms. A popular 3. 5-inch floppy disk can hold about 1. 44 MB of storage, or about 10 seconds of 480p video.
With the advent and lifestyles of cloud storage, Kono seeks to eliminate the 40-year-old technology, which is still used in Japan due to the country’s strict rules on how knowledge can be transferred within the government bureaucracy.
“Japan’s virtual firm wants to replace those regulations so you can use them online,” Kono tweeted.
At a press conference last week, Kono also criticized the country’s continued use of other replaced technologies. “I’m going to get rid of the fax machine, and I still intend to do it,” he said.
The urgency to update the floppy disk and fax arises as Japan works to identify a virtual national identity system, which citizens can use to electronically sign tax returns online, apply online for other government services, and use for online banking connections and signage transactions.
Kono argued in his blog that a virtual identification formula is needed as municipalities have struggled to distribute emergency benefits to citizens due to the COVID-19 pandemic; citizens had to attach a copy of their passport and bank account details to get the benefits.
Japan’s malicious reliance on faxing about the COVID-19 pandemic has been criticized by doctors who have had to fill out documents by hand about each new coronavirus infection. A doctor launched a tirade on Twitter and called the practice “Showa-era stuff,” referring to the imperial era that stretched from 1926 until emperor Hirohito’s death in 1989.
Kono also argued that Japan’s reliance on faxing and the long-standing practice of stamping your call with a hanko stamp has been a “barrier to telecommuting” during the COVID-19 pandemic.
When the remains of the house were ordered in April 2020, the staff still went to the house to physically seal the contracts and papers with traditional hanko stamps.
https://twitter. com/konotaromp/status/1557554908575870977
Kono’s biggest challenge in revising Japan’s technological formula will likely be an aging population. Japan has the oldest society in the world, with 28. 7% of the population over the age of 65. The population amounts to more than 80,000 people over the age of one hundred. in addition to a declining birth rate, according to a 2020 ECU Parliament report.
Japan’s cybersecurity minister, Yoshitaka Sakurada, admitted in 2018, when he was appointed to the post, that he had never used a computer. And when most Westerners shrugged after Microsoft announced it would end Internet Explorer, Japan panicked; about 49% of corporations in Japan were still using the browser in March 2022.
Kono asked at a press conference on Tuesday, “Where do you buy a floppy disk these days?”
This is true because there is almost no company that still manufactures them. One of the largest floppy disk manufacturers, Sony, ended its floppy disk production more than a decade ago, in 2010.
No manufactured computer has a port to enter a floppy disk and, according to a YouGov report, two-thirds of young people in the UK under the age of 18 don’t even know what a floppy disk is.
This tale originally appeared in Fortune. com