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Comment by goodpoint | Hacker News Reader

Where the katanas and other Japanese cultural artifacts really necessary?

Not everything needs to be flat and sterile, as is common in modern design. Wacky, goofy and peculiar user interfaces are a deeply rooted part of digital synth culture.

That's not my point.

What's your point then? That someone might use cultural artifacts from another culture in a respectful non-offensive way, and that is bad?

Speaking as a person with synth experience, the UI is already cluttered and confusing with the needed symbols. Adding unnecessary stuff makes it more cluttered, hence my question.

Furthermore the choice of symbols and the amount makes it a bit cliche'.

This has nothing to do with respect. I don't see anything offensive, just unnecessary.

That's a really fair assessment, even if I disagree with it, so I appreciate you replying.

Apologies for being a bit aggressive in my earlier reply, I was just struggling to figure out what else it could've been, given your original comment didn't give much in terms of "why", so I jumped to a strong (and, in retrospect, incorrect) assumption. I totally understand your issue with it now.

Imo it looks pretty clean and tasteful for its intended purpose, but this one is very subjective and a certain "we can agree to disagree" point, because I can easily see why it could feel too cluttered to some.

It’s a noise generator. It’s funky and having a noisy interface adds to the appeal for me.

Some of the illustrations actually support the signal flow diagram, such as the katana for cutting frequencies in the filter, or the wave crest for filter resonance. The daruma is purely decorative, however.

Per the excellent explainer/demo video, this is inspired by the Japanoise scene. The creator makes art. It'd be interesting to ask any artist if a specific part of their work was really necessary. I imagine you'd get quite a range of answers.

https://www.theglow.jp/guides/a-brief-guide-to-japanese-nois...

"This era saw noise channelled as an output for political commentary and primal instincts; motives ranging from ferocious anti-consumerism and heedless nonconformism to compulsive, exploratory introspection".

https://youtu.be/pfdja2OQKFY

How dare you culturally appropriate online millennial behavior? You can’t complain about cultural appropriation unless you have an arts degree from 2019.

Were*, and does it matter? You seem to try to white knight for the Japanese and Japanese culture, but they're perfectly capable of doing so themselves and trying to speak for others like that is infantilizing them.

> white knight for the Japanese

I wasn't. That's not what I said and you seem to have an axe to grind here.

> trying to speak for others like that is infantilizing them

I cannot help but see the irony in you speaking for others.

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