<p>Japan is renowned for its robots and bullet trains, and has some of the world’s fastest broadband networks. But it also remains firmly wedded to a pre-Internet technology – the fax machine – that in most other developed nations has joined answering machines, eight-tracks and cassette tapes in the dustbin of outmoded technologies.<br /><br /></p>.<p>Last year alone, Japanese households bought 1.7 million of the old-style fax machines, which print documents on slick, glossy paper spooled in the back. In the US, the device has become such an artifact that the Smithsonian is adding two machines to its collection, technology historians said. <br /><br />The Japanese government’s Cabinet Office said that almost 100 per cent of business offices and 45 per cent of private homes had a fax machine as of 2011. Yuichiro Sugahara learned the hard way about his country’s deep attachment to the fax machine, which the nation popularised in the 1980s. A decade ago, he tried to modernise his family-run company, which delivers traditional bento lunchboxes, by taking orders online. Sales quickly plummeted.<br /><br />Today, his company, Tamagoya, is thriving with the hiss and beep of thousands of orders pouring in every morning, most by fax, many with minutely detailed handwritten requests like “go light on the batter in the fried chicken” or “add an extra hard-boiled egg.” “There is still something in Japanese culture that demands the warm, personal feelings that you get with a handwritten fax,” said Sugahara, 43.<br /><br />Aging nation<br /><br />Japan’s reluctance to give up its fax machines offers a revealing glimpse into an aging nation that can often seem quietly determined to stick to its tried-and-true ways, even if the rest of the world seems to be passing it rapidly by. The fax addiction helps explain why Japan, which once revolutionised consumer electronics with its hand-held calculators, Walkmans and, yes, fax machines, has become a latecomer in the digital age and has allowed itself to fall behind nimbler competitors like South Korea and China.<br />In Japan, with the exception of the savviest Internet startups or internationally minded manufacturers, the fax remains an essential tool for doing business. Experts say government offices prefer faxes because they generate paperwork onto which bureaucrats can affix their stamps of approval, called hanko. Many companies say they still rely on faxes to create a paper trail of orders and shipments not left by ephemeral email. Handwritten messages have long been a necessity in Japan, where the written language is so complex, with two sets of symbols and 2,000 characters borrowed from Chinese, that keyboards remained impractical until the advent of word processors in the 1980s.<br /><br />Faxes continue to appeal to older Japanese, who often feel uncomfortable with keyboards, experts say. At the same time, clinging to old ways also forces Japan to accept higher levels of inefficiency. At 114 Bank, a midsize company with an office in the center of Nihonbashi, Tokyo’s answer to Wall Street, most small-business customers still prefer to do their banking by fax.<br /><br />To ease their concerns about theft of personal information, the bank introduced a high-security system that occupies an entire table in the center of its busy office. The setup includes a 2-foot pole with a red light on top to warn of a transmission error. “The long history of the fax just makes it seem safer in a world of hackers and viruses,” said Kiichiro Yoshii, the bank’s deputy branch manager.<br /><br />Japan’s love affair with the fax began during the nation’s economic heyday in the 1980s, when the machines became a household appliance more common than automatic dishwashers. Japan quickly dominated global fax production, making 90 percent of the tens of millions of machines built, according to the Communications and Information Network Association of Japan, an industry group that includes fax makers. But its very success has made the fax a hard habit to kick. The demographics of aging have also played a role, because the generations that lived through the nation’s glory years have clung to their faxes. In fact, until 2009, the number of fax machines in private dwellings was still rising, a reflection of the dwindling numbers of young people embracing new technologies, experts say.<br /></p>
<p>Japan is renowned for its robots and bullet trains, and has some of the world’s fastest broadband networks. But it also remains firmly wedded to a pre-Internet technology – the fax machine – that in most other developed nations has joined answering machines, eight-tracks and cassette tapes in the dustbin of outmoded technologies.<br /><br /></p>.<p>Last year alone, Japanese households bought 1.7 million of the old-style fax machines, which print documents on slick, glossy paper spooled in the back. In the US, the device has become such an artifact that the Smithsonian is adding two machines to its collection, technology historians said. <br /><br />The Japanese government’s Cabinet Office said that almost 100 per cent of business offices and 45 per cent of private homes had a fax machine as of 2011. Yuichiro Sugahara learned the hard way about his country’s deep attachment to the fax machine, which the nation popularised in the 1980s. A decade ago, he tried to modernise his family-run company, which delivers traditional bento lunchboxes, by taking orders online. Sales quickly plummeted.<br /><br />Today, his company, Tamagoya, is thriving with the hiss and beep of thousands of orders pouring in every morning, most by fax, many with minutely detailed handwritten requests like “go light on the batter in the fried chicken” or “add an extra hard-boiled egg.” “There is still something in Japanese culture that demands the warm, personal feelings that you get with a handwritten fax,” said Sugahara, 43.<br /><br />Aging nation<br /><br />Japan’s reluctance to give up its fax machines offers a revealing glimpse into an aging nation that can often seem quietly determined to stick to its tried-and-true ways, even if the rest of the world seems to be passing it rapidly by. The fax addiction helps explain why Japan, which once revolutionised consumer electronics with its hand-held calculators, Walkmans and, yes, fax machines, has become a latecomer in the digital age and has allowed itself to fall behind nimbler competitors like South Korea and China.<br />In Japan, with the exception of the savviest Internet startups or internationally minded manufacturers, the fax remains an essential tool for doing business. Experts say government offices prefer faxes because they generate paperwork onto which bureaucrats can affix their stamps of approval, called hanko. Many companies say they still rely on faxes to create a paper trail of orders and shipments not left by ephemeral email. Handwritten messages have long been a necessity in Japan, where the written language is so complex, with two sets of symbols and 2,000 characters borrowed from Chinese, that keyboards remained impractical until the advent of word processors in the 1980s.<br /><br />Faxes continue to appeal to older Japanese, who often feel uncomfortable with keyboards, experts say. At the same time, clinging to old ways also forces Japan to accept higher levels of inefficiency. At 114 Bank, a midsize company with an office in the center of Nihonbashi, Tokyo’s answer to Wall Street, most small-business customers still prefer to do their banking by fax.<br /><br />To ease their concerns about theft of personal information, the bank introduced a high-security system that occupies an entire table in the center of its busy office. The setup includes a 2-foot pole with a red light on top to warn of a transmission error. “The long history of the fax just makes it seem safer in a world of hackers and viruses,” said Kiichiro Yoshii, the bank’s deputy branch manager.<br /><br />Japan’s love affair with the fax began during the nation’s economic heyday in the 1980s, when the machines became a household appliance more common than automatic dishwashers. Japan quickly dominated global fax production, making 90 percent of the tens of millions of machines built, according to the Communications and Information Network Association of Japan, an industry group that includes fax makers. But its very success has made the fax a hard habit to kick. The demographics of aging have also played a role, because the generations that lived through the nation’s glory years have clung to their faxes. In fact, until 2009, the number of fax machines in private dwellings was still rising, a reflection of the dwindling numbers of young people embracing new technologies, experts say.<br /></p>