One thing I have noticed in Japan this week is how everyone seems to have the latest and greatest mobile phone, but how the Japanese will hold onto ancient laptops. When I took the train from the airport to my hotel on Monday evening, everyone seemed to be on their phone and either listening to music or playing some sort of game. All of the phones looked to be the latest and greatest offerings from Apple or Sony. I'm not sure what market share Samsung has in Japan, but based on a very informal non-scientific survey, it can't be much.
I have continued to watch as people around me remain entertained by their phones and the trends I noticed on Monday night seem to be holding. I contrast that with the laptops I see people using around me at the office. Now it could just be the company I work for, but my Japanese coworkers seem to keep their laptops forever. I sort of understand this as my current laptop is about 3 years old and even though company policy allows me to replace it after 2 years, I am fine keeping it for now. There is a lot of work required to transfer all of my files to a new computer and I don't want to take the time to do it. Here they take it to the extreme though as some resort to taped on keys to keep them running.
As I travel through Japan it is very clear that natural resources are very scarce in this highly populated country. Nobody drives cars as everyone takes the train. Houses and apartments are small and in tall buildings because usable land is minimal. There is also no such thing as a regular garbage can. All garbage is sorted into various recycling bins so it can be efficiently processed and reused. It makes me wonder if this effects the thinking of the people here and so they hold onto certain items longer. Laptops require more resources than phones which means phones can be replaced more often. Perhaps this is a lesson we should all learn.
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