On the Year of SFC's 20th Anniversary | Jun Murai (Dean, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies)
2010.01.07
Happy New Year.
The year 2010 marks the 20th anniversary of the founding of SFC. At SFC, we are planning a ceremony on April 4 to welcome new students. Furthermore, let's approach most of our annual events this year, such as the Tanabata Festival, Autumn Festival, and ORF, with a special spirit under the theme of the "20th Anniversary." It's going to be exciting!
Anniversary projects should be an opportunity to think about the next departure. As SFC celebrates its 20th anniversary, it is time to think about the "next 10 years" and the "next 20 years."
The New Year is a big season for sports. There is a succession of major tournaments and final matches. There are also competitions where Keio University performs, and the cheering gets very enthusiastic. I imagine quite a few people have gone to sports events held across the country. The highlight of New Year's sports recently is the ekiden relay race. There is the All-Japan Corporate Team Ekiden Championships on New Year's Day, and on the 2nd and 3rd, the Tokyo-Hakone Round-Trip University Ekiden Race, also known as the Hakone Ekiden. Each is a competition of about five hours, covering over 100 km each day. The first Hakone Ekiden in 1920 featured four universities: Meiji University, Waseda University, Keio University, and Tokyo Higher Normal School (now the University of Tsukuba), so many people would probably like to see our own Keio University perform even better (Keio University has won the championship before and has recently performed well as part of the Kanto Region University Select Team). Regarding this Hakone Ekiden, I was recently with the president of a certain private university in the Kansai region, who chided me, saying, "It's strange that only universities from the Kanto region can participate anymore." Although it is a competition hosted by the Inter-University Athletic Union of Kanto, its immense popularity, with viewership ratings exceeding 27%, gives it a nationwide influence on university management and the development of long-distance runners.
Looking ahead 10 or 20 years, the landscape of media, including sports broadcasting, will likely change dramatically. At the end of last year, I had the opportunity to participate in an international conference where public broadcasters from around the world gathered, and it seems that 3D television, an area SFC has also been working on, is poised to blossom this year after several attempts. 3D (three-dimensional, stereoscopic) and CG (computer graphics) are areas where SFC students excel. While anime and movies will become viewable in 3D in our living rooms, live sports broadcasting is considered the killer content for this stereoscopic television in real time. Depending on the type of sport, camera positions will differ, and performing stereoscopic calculations will require immense real-time processing speeds and data volumes, posing significant challenges for networking and computer science. On the other hand, a major challenge for 3D television is its effect on the body, such as the eyes, and on psychology. Media that forms the foundation of a new society must develop while correctly assessing its impact on people. Media that captivates people, such as television, the internet, and Twitter, has a major influence on the very foundations of social systems like business and elections.
Early in the New Year, no matter what we think about, we are surrounded by problems, but tackling and solving each of these problems is the SFC way. Because this is a year full of abundant challenges to be solved, let's start it off by dreaming joyfully!
(Date Published: 2010/01/07)