Before Windows dominated the world, Japan possessed TRON, a revolutionary operating system.
Political pressure and corporate obstruction crushed it, altering the global technology landscape forever.

Young people in particular likely never knew these facts,
but I know them well because I lived through that era myself.
2016-01-05

Readers encountering my commentary for the first time—
especially younger readers—
probably had no knowledge of what I am about to describe.

This was before Microsoft’s Windows conquered the world.
After all, the world of personal computers and the internet
has existed for no more than about forty years.

One of my close friends from university,
a graduate of Tohoku University,
used to boast until recently,
“I don’t touch PCs.”
Another close friend,
a classmate from Yuriage Junior High School
and a graduate of Tohoku Gakuin University,
whom I met again after a very long time,
said in Sendai dialect,
“I don’t look at computers, I don’t use them.”

That was how early this era was.

At that dawn of computing,
a genius named Ken Sakamura emerged at Keio University.
The Japanese government—
then a nation with the world’s highest level of intellect and technology—
naturally recognized the brilliance and advanced nature
of the TRON revolution he proposed.

The government decided to install computers powered by TRON,
invented by Sakamura,
in elementary and junior high schools across Japan,
and to use them for education.

At that moment,
Bill Gates—
a man who can fairly be described as a miser or a mass of monopolistic desire—
recognized TRON as the greatest threat
to his plan for global domination through Windows.

He launched various obstruction efforts against the Japanese government.

At the forefront of those efforts was Masayoshi Son,
who at the time not only ran a PC software company,
but had also, by methods bordering on fraud,
passed U.S. university entrance examinations,
lived as a student in the United States,
and moved freely in and out of Silicon Valley.

With his characteristic persistence,
Son relentlessly pressured officials in the Ministry of Education.
His stated reason was absurd.

“To run a PC,
you don’t need two pieces of software.
It’s wasteful.”

If I recall correctly,
he even dragged in irrelevant examples,
such as the Beta versus HD video format dispute,
which had nothing whatsoever to do with the essence of Sakamura’s invention.

Needless to say,
none of these arguments had anything to do
with Ken Sakamura’s work.

And because Sakamura was a true scholar,
he offered this genuine world-class invention
free of charge to Japan and to the Japanese people.

To be continued.

---

次に進めるなら、

• TRON潰しと文部省決定の時系列整理
• 坂村健という人物の思想と学者像に特化した章
• 若い世代向けに噛み砕いた解説版（教育用）

すぐ続けられます。