{"id":4318,"date":"2021-01-24T13:43:42","date_gmt":"2021-01-24T20:43:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/?p=4318"},"modified":"2021-08-31T16:52:14","modified_gmt":"2021-08-31T23:52:14","slug":"rent-a-person","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/2021\/01\/24\/rent-a-person\/","title":{"rendered":"Rent a Person"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Technology can help us do a lot of things, but some things require a human touch. Though social media increases connectivity, it is also isolating. A market is emerging for renting people that uses mobile connectivity to find those willing to lend a helping hand or just an ear. The market is growing the most quickly in Japan, home to many odd and niche trends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some services are private and really seem heartwarming and like a tribute to humanity. For example, Shoji Morimoto, a 37-year old man can be hired via Twitter to “eat, drink and hang around.” He basically can be hired to do seemingly nothing, but the service he provides is really human company; he can sit on a bench with you in a park and listen for hours. In Japan, You Can Rent a Person To Do Nothing (vice.com)<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other services are specialized. There are individuals and companies who offer services like the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. Hire someone to come wipe away tears, for those who want to be comforted but don’t want anyone to know that they are suffering.<\/li>
  2. Hire someone to court a cheating partner’s lover to convince them to leave your partner, for those seeking non-confrontational solutions.<\/li>
  3. Hire a sibling or a parent for a day, for those who are bullied at school and parents who are looking for a role model to educate their children.<\/li>
  4. Hire a date, for those who want to practice going on dates.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Although there are many positive, affordable, and benign examples, there are also extreme cases with significant implications. Here is an article from BBC detailing such a service: The saboteurs you can hire to end your relationship – BBC Worklife<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    This trend has inspired anime (Rent-a-Girlfriend (TV Series 2020\u2013 ) – IMDb<\/a>) and TV shows (People Who Do Not Rent (TV Series 2020) – IMDb<\/a>) alike. It mirrors problem solving trends in society today, that when there is a problem, the first thing we do is to turn to the internet on our mobile devices. Rather than having an open discussion with our partners, for example, we would rather hire a shoulder to cry on or get someone to solve the problem for us. The trend is a symptom of our growing disconnectedness with each other and connectedness with our devices.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Technology can help us do a lot of things, but some things require a human touch. Though social media increases connectivity, it is also isolating.…<\/p>\n

    Read moreRent a Person<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":83467,"featured_media":4329,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobileculture","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83467"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4318"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4318\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4330,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4318\/revisions\/4330"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec523\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}