White Rabbit Press

In today’s Japan Times travel section, Rough Guides author Simon Richmond explores Tokyo’s sub-culture capital with Tokyo Realtime: Akihabara.

“…there is always something new to discover in the dense, multilayered, eternally evolving metropolis that is Japan’s capital. And so up on the sixth floor of Akiba’s famous Radio Kaikan, I find myself in Volks, marveling at beautiful — but creepily realistic — Super Dolfie dolls that are priced at over ¥100,000. In an adjacent case a miniature figurine of a limping, black-eyed girl with a hand inching its way out of her emaciated chest is displayed beside a pop band of perky, innocent-looking teenage schoolgirls. I had passed through the rabbit hole and, like Alice, emerged in a wonderland where anything is possible.”

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TOKYO – Apr 19th, 2010

White Rabbit Press is pleased to announce that the first volume in its Tokyo Realtime guided audio tour series has been nominated as a finalist in the 15th annual Audie Awards.

This prestigious competition, organized by the Audio Publishers Association, celebrates the best in spoken word entertainment. Tokyo Realtime: Kabukicho has been selected as one of five finalists in the Package Design category, where it is up against industry heavyweights such as BBC Audiobooks America.

Tokyo Realtime audio tours provide a new way to explore the city’s most interesting neighborhoods. Interweaving narration and insider interviews within a soundscape of location ambience and music, they deliver a seamless mix of adventure and cultural insight while navigating real-world spaces. In addition to the 65 minute mp3 CD, the nominated package includes a waterproof map and a full-color booklet of area photography.

White Rabbit Press Creative Director and Tokyo Realtime producer Max Hodges created the series out of a desire to make Tokyo more accessible to visitors. Seeing a market for personal tours provided by experts, Max assembled a team of local insiders, passionate about their neighborhoods, and worked with them to create these unforgettable augmented reality audio adventures.

Uninspired by off-the-shelf options, Max worked with local printers to design an elegant new packaging form that is low- waste, yet substantial enough to earn a spot on customer’s bookshelves. This prototype was then passed to Tokyo-based designers AQ, who developed a striking, easily recognizable look for the series.

“We worked really hard with Max to make sure every element, from photography to typography, paper stock to ink, came together to express the unique culture of Kabukicho and delight the user, from the first time they crack open the case to when they’re actually taking the tour.”

Jake Adelstein, author of Tokyo Vice, praised the tour: “A decade ago as a police reporter for Japan’s largest newspaper, I was assigned to the 4th district, home of Kabukicho, and never forgot some of the crazy things I saw there. For a behind- the-scenes look at Japan’s seedier side, without getting mired in the sleaze, you can’t do any better than this tour. A wonderful insight for strangers into a very strange land.”

About White Rabbit Press
With customers in over 80 countries, Tokyo-based White Rabbit Press is widely recognized for producing outstanding Japanese language products. With the launch of the TOKYO REALTIME audio tour series, White Rabbit Press continues to receive praise for making Japanese language and culture more accessible to the world.

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IDG News Service in Tokyo produced this review of our Tokyo Realtime tour of Akihabara for their monthly online TV show, Akibatteru, which focuses on the worlds of Japanese anime, manga, figures, robots and gadgets in and around Akihabara.

Jump to 3m09s for the Tokyo Realtime segment.

To find out more about Tokyo Realtime, please visit www.tokyorealtime.com

Japan’s No.1 free English language magazine, Japanzine, recently published a review of White Rabbit Press’ Tokyo Realtime audio tours.

“Getting to know Tokyo’s most interesting wards is one of the great pleasures of living in Japan, though it can be a haphazard process that takes years of trial, error, more error and disorientation (not to mention stacks of ichi-man-en bills).

Enter Tokyo Realtime Audio Guided Walking Tours, an ingenious new series of products designed to introduce you to areas of the capital – beginning with Akihabara and Kabuki-cho – by means of the spoken word and simple English-language maps.”

You can download your own copy of Japanzine from the Seek Japan website.

The New York Post recently reviewed White Rabbit Press’ Tokyo Realtime guided audio tours.

“If everything you know about Tokyo you learned from a Ranma ½ marathon, you need help. And it’s here, in the form of mp3-player-friendly audio.

Tokyo Realtime ’s guides (order on CD or download directly) give you a serious insider’s walking tour of the 東京’s wackiest, seediest and geekiest hoods. The first in the series, narrated by a researcher of otaku (anorakism) at Tokyo University, explores Akihabara — a k a “electric town” — the city’s top stop for all things gamer, manga and cosplay related (this being Tokyo, that’s saying something).

Packing in even more of the awesome, though, is the tour of the Kabukicho area, Tokyo’s red-light district. Interviews with bar owners and a bondage artist, among others, take you through a world populated by Yakuza, hookers and pay-per-hour hotels — makes Bangkok look like Salt Lake.

Besides the hour-long audio, each $12/$18 Tokyo Realtime guide comes with a map and photo book. Order online here.