Today, Slashdot reported that a Japanese company has found a way to write characters on standing water. According to Engadget, it’s “difficult to coax a standing pool of water into forming recognizable shapes and characters.” Pink Tentacle tells us that the device is called, “Advanced Multiple Organized Experimental Basin,” or AMOEBA for short (Japanese article at FujiSankei).

One Slashdot poster wondered what practical applications this device might have. For one, still water sits all over Japan. Such a device might generate advertisements in the sento (pubic bath), onsen (hot springs) or even a urinal (place where men pee while standing). Public ponds or swimming pools could be transformed into wonderfully offensive floating advertisements.

And with the spread of Google Earth and the viewership of satellite imagery in general, wouldn’t creating advertisements within bodies of water seem like a good idea right now? Imagine if you could take out ad space in Lake Michigan near Chicago or inside of Tokyo Bay. How much might such ad space be worth? How many millions of people might see such a promotion on Google Earth? What if they could click through that ad and get to your website?

What other practical purposes do you see?

Thanks to Gen Kanai weblog for some interesting links concerning Mozilla’s marketing campaign in Japan. Naturally, the main Spread Firefox marketing page in Japanese is almost identical to the original English one.

Here’s the banner for “Spread Firefox in Akihabara.” Of course, Akihabara has become famous not only for its plethora of computer and electronic shops, but also for the ubiquitous ‘Maid Cafes‘ that have sprung up in the neighborhood. Here we have some images of girls dressed like maids hawking free CD-ROMS of Firefox. I do find it curious that the CD-ROM has ‘trial’ written on it, given that the software is freely available to download.

The “Spread Firefox” campaign has taken place in Akihabara, Shibuya and Kamakura, according to Mozilla’s Japanese events page.

According to onestat.com, Firefox’s global share of the browser usage market stands at 12.93% (Japanese article | English article). Although this is up 1.14% since the beginning of June 2006, Firefox’s Japan share still hovers around a paltry 4%. Blogger Himazu has some interesting thoughts concerning why Firefox’s penetration into the Japanese market has not yet been successful.

His is a post well worth reading, and Firefox’s Japan marketing a case well worth further examining…