geekosystem

Do you enjoy a good slice of melon with your breakfast, but can't stop wishing it was branded with the face of the world's most adored cartoon cat? Well, the weirdest problem in your life has just been solved, as a Japanese food company has just released a very special Furano melon with the visage of Hello Kitty etched into it, and it will only run you $50.

Remember when you were a kid and your mom demanded that you go outside and get some fresh air and sunshine, seemingly unaware that both of those things would prove astonishingly disruptive to the Metroid session you were so deeply immersed in? This video is pretty much just like that, but with way more panda, and thus more adorable than you ever were. Kohin, a panda cub at Japan's Adventure World theme park does not think that going outside to play is a very good idea, no matter how insistent his trainers are on the matter.

Other countries have varying laws when it comes drinking ages, but I think most places agree that sixth-grade is a little young to get served in a bar. That didn't stop a pub in Yokohama City, Japan from serving a group of children alcohol. Despite legal action, the bar seems pretty blasé about the whole thing, with staff saying, "We kind of knew they were kids, but didn't bother checking their IDs."

A team of researchers is making the best of a bad situation and trying to use the lasting effects of radiation at Japan's Fukushima nuclear reactor to help environmental conservation efforts. In the years since the meltdown, marine biologists have found traces of radiation from the meltdown in bluefin tuna as far afield as California. That radiation, though, could help marine biologists map the ill-understood migration routes of the tuna. That better understanding of the life cycle and habits of the bluefin could be brought to bear in efforts to protect the valuable food fish from overfishing, a growing concern for pretty much every tuna species.

Sex sells, and apparently, Japan is buying. The latest advertising trend in the nation is turning women's legs into billboards, thereby finally correcting a frankly criminal waste of high value advertising space that has gone on too long. Now, if we could just start the new trend of branded masks that ensure we don't have to look at one another, but at products we might want to buy, we'd really be on our way to a brave new world.

You'd better think twice before you illegally download files from Japan. The Japanese government has started using the old bait-and-switch method of getting the word out about their new anti-piracy laws by planting messages in fake files. You might think you're downloading the latest episode of Ninja Warrior, but you could really be downloading a stern talking to.

Pop quiz, hotshot. You're running a zoo and an earthquake strikes. Cages break open, and panicked animals are roaming the streets. What's your first move? If you said "Secure the zebra at all costs," you're...well, we don't know if you're right, but you're at least of a mind with staff at this Japanese zoo. In a recent emergency drill, zoo staff practiced their zebra-wrangling skills, in case the unthinkable should happen. They didn't want to risk loosing an actual zebra on the unsuspecting public, though -- that's exactly the worst-case scenario they're trying to avoid! -- so instead used a man in a zebra suit to stand in for a zebra running wild and terrified through the streets. The result, of course, is pure comic gold.

Researchers at Japan's National Institute of Genetics believe they've captured a world first video -- images of a thought making it's way through the brain of a zebrafish. It's not a particularly complicated thought -- essentially 'Hey, that looks like it could be food.' -- but the fact that the team has imaged the very stuff of even simple thought for the first time is really kind of amazing -- not unlike magic. Keep reading to see the video of this unprecedented look into the mind of a zebrafish.

Have you ever thought to yourself that, thanks to our ability to form intelligible sentences and verbalize our current emotional state, we lost touch with those simpler primal days when such interactions were accomplished with visual cues? No, of course not, we're humans and evolution's divine providence saw to it that we ditch any superfluous appendages like tails for our own sake. One individual -- a self-proclaimed inventor by the name of Shota Ishiwatari -- seems to have a dissenting opinion on this matter since he has already begun soliciting financial backing on Indiegogo for his latest product called Tailly: A wearable tail that wags in relation to one's heart rate. We have no doubt in our minds that it will catch on in Japan, but for Western markets, Ishiwatari has plenty of convincing to do.

After the 2011 disaster that shut down it's main reactor, Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant simply isn't going to make a comeback. Like several other reactors across the island nation, it's been shuttered and will likely remain so, leaving authorities there with a problem -- how do they continue to provide the energy that the plant once produced and that residents in the region depend on? This week, we got their answer: rather than reopening the nuclear plant, Japan is looking off their shores, announcing plans for a massive wind farm ten miles off the coast of the area affected by the Fukushima reactor meltdown.

When they're not ripping out each other's circuits or trading histrionic catchphrases back and forth, even the mightiest of Autobot and Decepticon warriors enjoys kicking back and letting all their troubles and PTSD melt away on the comfort of their living room couch. Sadly, never has this piece of home furnishing been made in the same scale as Transformers figures of our youth, forced to remain standing and never experience the simple pleasure of reclining back or laying their metallic heads on an armrest -- until now! Takara Tomy, the Japanese manufacturer of Transformers toys, has finally heard our incessant pleas for a practical, yet stylish, couch fit for Optimus Prime and is currently offering printable papercraft furniture on the their official website. So if you're handy with a pair of scissors and tape, this is something you owe it to yourself to check out.

People, people, please, we all knew this day was coming eventually. 13 years after making its debut in Japan in 2000 and becoming the most overwhelmingly popular game system of that decade, Sony is no longer shipping PlayStation 2 units to Japanese retailers. It's definitely the end of an era in the gaming industry, but take solace in the fact that not since the olden days of the original Nintendo Entertainment System has a video game console endured for so long.

If you're one of those folks who is always on the lookout for the latest and greatest new advance in home security technology, we've got you covered -- or at least, we know who does. Japanese security firm Secom is preparing to launch a new service that will let home and small business owners rent a quadcopter drone that the company claims will launch automatically in the event of a burglary, snapping pictures of the invaders and even capturing live video of them as the crime is in progress.

The expression "don't negotiate with terrorists" certainly didn't exist in sixth century Japan, but something more along the lines of not trying to reason with volcanoes is a likely possibility. Archaeologists uncovered the preserved remains of a man clad in armor, at a site they've dubbed the "Pompeii of Japan," who they believe died attempting to beseech an erupting volcano to maybe, y'know, not rain down fire and ash on his people. Going by what he was wearing at the time of his death, analysts guess that the man counted himself among the upper castes of Japanese society, though they're still debating whether he was an incredibly brave soul or just one of the many people throughout recorded history that have made huge mistakes.

Put down those mangas and listen up, anime fans sadly living on the western side of the world! Namco Bandai Group has recently announced that Japan will be playing host to a Weekly Shonen Jump indoor theme park in the summer of 2013 -- a veritable Xanadu for the avid otaku, featuring attractions and costumed mascots based on the manga anthology's most popular franchises: Naruto, Dragon Ball Z, and One Piece. Buying a one-way plane ticket to Japan may mean cutting back on your ramen and exorbitantly overpriced anime collectibles budget, but getting the chance to embrace an apathetic minimum wage park employee dressed as Monkey D. Luffy will be worth the trip!