HUMOUR—Kazuo Furuya, Japan’s CEO (Cuteness Engineer Operator) has published a report stating Japan’s plan to increase their mascots’ cuteness efficiency by 30 per cent by 2015. Japan is well known for their mascots, such as the popular Pikachu from Pokémon, who has been chosen to represent Japan as a mascot in the FIFA 2014 world cup.
“Our country loves our mascots,” states Furuya. “With this cuteness increase, we hope to quell citizens’ concerns, thus increasing morale and increasing country-wide profits from citizens’ increase in consumption.”
According to Furuka, cuteness scientists have been working around the clock, trying to find the key to cuteness. Rokuro Hiraoka, head scientist of cuteness, stated in an interview that for the past year they’ve been week in and week out trying to figure out the illusive formula for cuteness.
“We’ve been watching cat videos day and night, while wearing Hello Kitty pyjamas, and listening to nothing but Alvin and the Chipmunks albums. We take our work very seriously,” said Hiraoka. “I wasn’t even able to talk to my wife unless it was in a cute baby voice. She almost divorced me, but lucky for me we weren’t able to find any divorce papers that were Hello Kitty brand.”
But all this excruciatingly tedious work has paid off, as Furuya’s team believe they have the formula they were looking for.
“We have narrowed it down to four factors,” said Furuka, “large eyes, tiny ears, soft lines, and small torsos. With this formula now created, we can look forward to more efficient levels of cuteness, followed by a more efficient Japan.”
According to the report, scientists will start by altering existing mascots to make them more cute and follow up by creating new mascots.
“We are making new mascots for anything that hasn’t been done yet, such as Infuruenza-kun, the new mascot for colds.”
Furuya’s team is planning to show Infuruenza-kun, a giant flem ball with huge eyes and tiny arms, going to work even though he is sick, to up work morale during flu seasons.
“We see a 20 per cent dip in productivity during this time. We hope Infuruenza-kun will help with that.” Furuya’s team hopes to launch Infuruenza-kun by September 2014.
