Get with the #times

One of the first things I was surprised by working in technology in Japan was the prevalence of “#times channels”. Channels named after individuals in which they (and others) will post more-or-less whatever they like. Reader, I have come to really love them, and I think you might too. OK I'll bite, what is a #times channel? Times channels are personal channels (on Slack, but sometimes in Discord or other systems), and they are somewhere between a personal log, water-cooler chat and a back channel. Nobody is obliged to read them and nothing official happens in them, yet they weave together to form a useful social fabric. The first times channel was probably #times_suin, and it was created as a complement to daily reporting: The cadence of daily reports (日報) meant that hours spent on a problem would not be visible to the colleagues and experts who might be able to help, and so #times_suin was created as an experimental "minute report" (分報) to allow for in-the-minute interventions. The…