Those Japanese toilets are available for purchase in America as well but usually only Japanese buy them and not many at that. The cell phone thing is true, they completely live off of it. The system of money and credit and the trend of PCs developed different in the West and Japan so I think that's why so much is integrated into mobile phone culture in Japan. For example, there's little square marks, like bar codes, but for phones, on all sorts of posters in Japan and if you use your cell's camera on it, it jumps you to the web page. The other thing I have yet to see in USA is unlocking the cell phone with your fingerprint. There are some devices to lock your PC like that but it never really got popular in America. Also, there are remote controls for everything and this has been true since I noticed it in the 80s, maybe longer. Remotes for things I rarely or never see in America. Example, in my uncle's car in the 80s, we'd sit in the back and control the radio with the remote. Or we can't use the air conditioning at my grandmother's house anymore because someone lost the remote.