Toilets of Japan - Talking toilets? Water and air jet toilets? Toilets that guard your health and report your vital statistics to a central location? It's all in the cards, and some of it is already in place. This story is a must read: Japanese Masters Get Closer to the Toilet Nirvana

This quote is especially funny:

Toilet jet sprays, which sometimes confuse foreign visitors with disastrous results, are now in nearly half of Japanese homes, a rate higher than that of personal computers.

To some, this is a sign of a nation gone perilously soft. They worry that the cosseted Japanese youths of the future, sitting dreamily on air conditioned thrones, will be no match for their squat-toilet neighbors — the worker bees of industrial China or the spartan soldiers of North Korea.