March 11, 2016

FIVE YEARS AFTER: Amazon marks 3/11 anniversary with digital media archive

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/business/AJ201603110037

By MARI FUJISAKI/ Staff Writer

Internet retail giant Amazon Japan KK published a web archive on March 10 documenting the 3/11 disaster and its aftermath in visual, audio and written digital media.

The website, called “Kioku no Keisho” (the remembrance project), was launched to mark the fifth anniversary of the 2011 East Japan Earthquake and tsunami.

The archive--part of Amazon’s online bookstore--currently contains three audio recordings of people talking about their experiences around the disaster, and six Kindle e-books including photography documenting the events.

One audio file includes a recital of part of “16-sai no Kataribe,” (16-year-old storytellers), a book about three high school students that experienced the disaster at the age of 11, and the five years of their lives since.

The file also includes an interview with the book’s editor, Toshiro Sato, a former junior high school teacher.

Sato lost his second daughter in the tsunami at Okawa Elementary School in Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture, where 84 pupils and teachers were killed.

Amazon will be expanding the archive collection in future. The contents are available for free download for the time being at http://www.amazon.co.jp/kioku