Editorial Standards

The Japanist (thejapanist.net) is operated by Snack Software, LLC, a Delaware limited liability company. These are the rules we hold our pages to. If something we publish falls short of them, please tell us.

What we publish

• Long-form articles on the blog: explainers on Japanese culture, society and rule changes that affect visitors and residents.
• Curated festival and fireworks guides: one page per festival, each listing the sources it was checked against and the date of that check.
• Live data tools: the earthquake tracker, event calendars, and cherry blossom and autumn foliage forecasts. How each one works is on the methodology page.
• Traveler guides such as trip planning, etiquette and transportation.

Sources

• We prefer primary and official sources: government bodies such as the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA), ministries and the Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO), and the official pages of shrines, temples, cities and event organizers. Most articles link the sources they rely on.
• A curated festival guide is only published as an indexable page once it has at least 350 words and cites sources on at least two different websites. Each guide shows when it was last verified.
• Where an official source and a popular secondary source disagree, we follow the official source and say so. For example, JMA stopped publishing cherry blossom forecasts in 2010, so we attribute sakura forecasts to the private forecasters that issue them.

Dates and precision

• We never turn a vague phrase such as “early August” into an exact date. Until an organizer announces dates, we give the typical timing.
• Year-specific festival dates are refreshed from official sources each January.
• Dates and times are Japan Standard Time (UTC+9) unless stated otherwise. Japanese terms are given with romanization.
• When an article is substantially revised, its updated date changes; minor fixes to typos or formatting do not.

Automated listings are labeled for what they are

Alongside the curated guides, our event calendars include listings compiled automatically from event websites, and some of their descriptions are machine-generated. These listings have not necessarily been reviewed by a person. We keep them out of search indexes and our sitemaps on purpose, and you should confirm details with the organizer before you travel.

No republished news

The Japanist does not republish third-party news. A former section of syndicated news briefs was retired in October 2026 and its pages now return “410 Gone”.

Partners and independence

• Some links go to commercial partners (currently Akiya X and Arigato Travel). Those links are marked as sponsored, and articles about a partner disclose the relationship.

Safety information

The Japanist is not an official warning service. For earthquake, tsunami and weather warnings, follow JMA and local authorities.

Corrections

When we get a fact wrong, we fix it and record significant corrections on the corrections page. To report an error, use the contact form and include the page URL.

Citing The Japanist

Cite “The Japanist” with a link to the specific page. A curated index for answer engines is at /llms.txt, with full text at /llms-full.txt.