Malarkey is Andy Clarke, a creative designer with a passion for accessibility and web standards. This is his personal website.

Turning Japanese

Back in November I was approached for an interview by a very nice chap from Japan, Yasuhisa Hasegawa, who was writing a book on design and web standards.

I’m sure that Yasuhisa won’t mind me quoting a little bit from his email to me. It was this paragraph that made me interested in participating.

I think the job web designer isn’t well defined in some extent. In Japan, we have a web director, web producer, web developer, web programmer, and coder. I think that’s pretty confusing.

I was fascinated that all the way around the world, similar distinctions are drawn.

Web Designer 2.0

Well it seems that Yasuhisa’s book, Web Designer 2.0 has beaten Dave’s book to the Amazon book stands and I hope to receive my copy in the mail. You can get your sticky paws on Web Designer 2.0 at Amazon.co.jp.

(Ed: But it’s in Japanese!) Does anyone know what that page says (as I flunked my Japanese exams at school ;) ).

Or, if like me you have no idea, maybe it might be fun to read what you think it says! (Almost) anything goes.

Replies

  1. #1 On March 2, 2005 06:28 AM Yasuhisa said:

    Ah, thanks for mentioning in here.
    … and your comment on my site. I wish you could read
    Japanese too ;-)

    The first chapter of the book is all about your site. So,
    I guess it’s pretty obvious that my book didn’t complete
    without your contribution. Thanks.

    Hope to see you at SXSW!

  2. #2 On March 2, 2005 07:29 AM nikki said:

    Malarkey-san omedetoo gozaimasu!

    I have my beginners’ Japanese exam tomorrow - seems the world is telling me I need to do some more revision…

    Congratulations to both yourself and Yasuhisa.

  3. #3 On March 2, 2005 09:15 AM Matthew Pennell said:

    Wise man say: a website of a thousand pages, begins with a single DOCTYPE.

  4. #4 On March 2, 2005 09:18 AM Martin said:

    At least your Japanese journalists keep in touch with you! Mine at Web Designing magazine won’t respond to my email about the article they wrote about me. Are the book and the magazine related?

  5. #5 On March 2, 2005 09:39 AM Kate said:

    I’ve been taking Japanese on and off for nearly 15 years now, and yet none of the computers I use have the language.

    Whoops.

  6. #6 On March 2, 2005 09:55 AM Andy Budd said:

    I love the "Display in English" button on the Amazon site. It basically just turns the add to cart and wish list button to English. Everything else is still in Japanese!

  7. #7 On March 2, 2005 10:49 AM Robert Wellock said:

    It is probably because the character encoding is iffy; have any of you heard of as a "small, yellow and leechlike fish?" The text becomes much clearer then. ;-)

  8. #8 On March 2, 2005 06:12 PM Schultzy said:

    Just like to annoy you all and say how great Turning Japanese is.

    Well if its a great book they should translate it shouldnt they?

  9. #9 On March 3, 2005 08:59 AM Malarkey said:

    @ Nikki: Malarkey-san omedetoo gozaimasu! ? Does that mean that I look like Tom Cruise?

    Anyone remember Turning Japanese by The Vapours?

  10. #10 On March 3, 2005 06:09 PM Schultzy said:

    Yes thats why I said it.
    Well i dont but Im always listening to it.

  11. #11 On March 6, 2005 02:07 AM Jorge Laranjo said:

    Is there any preview about the translation to english of this book?
    When and where ? Thanks.