（前編はこちら）

視点を増やすリベラルアーツ、価値を見出すアート

Ito:

I think it's really hard to acquire the ability to notice problems as a skill. Experience is also necessary, and it is very important to learn a wide range of things from the basics of academics to applications and beyond specialized fields, and see things from various angles. Therefore, the advantage of studying at a comprehensive university like Hokkaido University, where various fields are concentrated, is great.

Wada:

As you say. Hokkaido University has a wide range of faculties and majors. I feel that the school provides a wonderful environment for students to master the liberal arts. By the way, Tokyo Tech, where I am from, only has a science department, but the graduate school also has a liberal arts department and emphasizes liberal arts. I think it's important to have a sense of looking at things from various angles.

Ito:

However, I think the piece that Hokkaido University lacks is art. There is no art department.

Wada:

There are many places where there are no comprehensive universities in Japan. Kyushu University has merged with the University of the Arts, but this is a rare case. I really want to learn art.

Ito:

You can't learn art as a whole at a university in Hokkaido. The reason why talking about business in Hokkaido doesn't come to mind is that there is little ability to create value-added functions, so-called art that reaches people's hearts.

Hokkaido ranks first by far in terms of agricultural output by prefecture in Japan, but it ranks 44th in terms of added value ratio. Overwhelmingly, fish is shipped as fish, meat is meat, and added value is added to make it a souvenir that makes people happy to receive it, or shipped as a processed product, or restaurants and wineries jointly plan wine tourism So, there are few ideas for added value, such as making a tour that will make you like Hokkaido food along with memories.

One of the reasons for this is that there are few art universities, and it is a natural result that there are few managers and local governments that try to hire people who have studied art in the first place. I thought the piece that was missing the most right now was art. That's why I wanted to launch NoMaps so that citizens can start to feel proud of their community through art, and to spread new values and forms of culture.

Wada:

surely. Great effort, isn't it? I also participated in NoMaps and gave a talk titled "The Future of Data Science in Hokkaido". After all, I do not have enough knowledge and sense of data science, and I felt that I wanted you to realize its value.

Ito:

In data science, I think that the sense of finding out where there is a point is connected to art.

Wada:

Recently, the term “STEAM education” has become popular. STEM was the first to spread, with Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, but now Art has entered and STEAM. After all, everyone is starting to realize that Art is important.

I'm not in favor of the recent programming education for elementary school students, but I think it's better to let them do arts and crafts more seriously. I had never done programming until I got a job, but I loved arts and crafts, I used to do oil painting when I was a kid, and I liked making various things out of wood. If you don't nurture your sense of making things, you won't grow, and I think it's actually a human work, or rather, it will lead to added value.

Hatsune Miku wouldn't have become the kind of movement it would have had if it had put its functionality as a Vocaloid into the world as if it were a fish. Hatsune Miku is already a mass of added value, otherwise it probably wouldn't have been able to compete with the world. After all, I think that competing with the world is adding value.

データサイエンスが牽引するパラダイムシフトへ

Wada:

The same applies to data science, for example, what kind of added value can be created using data for agriculture in Hokkaido.

Ito:

For example, if you look at this cup and think it's a cup, you'll notice that it actually has a different function. So, what kind of mechanism is hidden, make a hypothesis, investigate and find it. Is this a sense...

Wada:

I'd like to have someone with that kind of sense in my group, but when I think about what kind of experience and education it takes to become that kind of person, they've probably had a lot of different experiences...

Ito:

たぶんものすごくいろいろ失敗している人（笑）。

Wada:

yes! The fact that you have failed in various ways means that you have tried so much. It is no good if we only ask young people for the correct answer. Data science alone cannot solve this problem.

Ito:

People tend to think that data science is based on a textbook way of thinking, but surprisingly, sense and intuition are being tested.

Wada:

Moro I think so.

Ito:

I think people with strong passion are suitable for becoming data scientists. Someone with an artistic sense.

Wada:

I feel like it's necessary. Actually, Google's engine is created by data scientists, but the amazingness of Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who tried to do that in the beginning, is already an art. By reorganizing the existing large amount of information by searching, you have added a tremendous amount of added value.

Ito:

It's cool to be able to say "this can be said" with a formula.

Wada:

After Larry Page and Sergey Brin set up the problem, there are people who work hard to improve the accuracy of it, but Brin and Paige who came up with that first are the coolest.

Ito:

When you find value in data, everyone tries to convert it into money. It's fine as an index, but I've always felt uncomfortable with that kind of sense of values. In data science and AI, if you put in something that can't be quantified with money, it will come out, and humans will be convinced by seeing it. For example, change this photo into a picture of the wind, make it into a melody of the wind, and then it will come out migny, and people will feel good when they see it and hear it. You can't do it if you don't catch it.

Wada:

Of course, in that process, it's digitized and functionized, but recent technology turns ordinary landscapes into Van Gogh-style paintings, isn't it? Suddenly, "money" is an old story, and I think it's okay to evaluate something different from "money" by saying "something fun." It may be a new value.

Ito:

In the history of human transactions, if someone does something good for you, you should give something good in return, and money has become easy to understand.

でも、サイエンスやテクノロジーでモニョモニョとした状態のものをモニョモニョとしたまま扱えるようになって、いちいちお金に換算しなくなったら、「なにかいいこと」が本来の人間の感覚に帰ってくるんじゃないかって思うんです。それが社会実装されるには膨大な配列を解くみたいな裏側の世界が必要だろうけれど、人間にとって柔らかい価値になっていく気がする。そんなパラダイムシフトが必ず起きると思います。

Wada:

yes. I know what you mean. Creating such a society should be our goal, and that is our responsibility.

札幌、博多が東京を変える

Ito:

Everyone knows that an earthquake will hit Tokyo directly. People live in Tokyo, and the government is in place. That's why I have to think on the premise that the day will come when things that I think will never change will change.

Hokkaido is a little far from Tokyo, and assuming that catastrophic damage like Tokyo is unlikely to occur, I think it is very important to consider what kind of society Hokkaido can open up.

Wada:

It could be Tokyo, it could be the Nankai Trough, or something could happen in Sapporo, but what kind of society would one be able to survive in wherever it happens...

Ito:

For example, Kyushu is part of Kyushu, and Hokkaido is part of Hokkaido's economic zone. Now the central government has decision-making power over everything, including the budget, so Japan is very weak. This is because the regions are not independent because they rely on the central government.

Wada:

そうですね。弱いですね。東京に生まれた時から住んでいる身としても、東京になんでも集まってきちゃうことが非常に東京を住み難くしています。私がデータサイエンスの拠点を札幌や博多でやりたい理由って、「もう東京に集まらなくていいよ」って気持ちがあったからです。

On the other hand, I don't want to give up thinking that if an earthquake hits Tokyo, it will be devastated.

Ito:

If Hakata and Sapporo are independent and healthy at a time when Tokyo is in a pinch, they can help save Tokyo. However, if we continue to rely on Tokyo, we will all collapse.

Wada:

Kyushu and Hokkaido will become more prosperous, and the value of living in Tokyo will decrease.

Ito:

Rather than leaving Tokyo because of the earthquake, I would like people to think that they want to go there because there is an attractive city.

Wada:

I think a good scenario would be to prepare for the earthquake when Tokyo is a little empty. Anyway, I will not concentrate on Tokyo any more. So if you can do business in Sapporo or Hakata, Japan will change.

In order for Sapporo and Hakata to become more attractive, young people must learn problem-solving skills, creativity, and art sense so that they can stay in their respective regions. You have to have a business for that. I have to create a job.

自らシゴトを創るマインド

Wada:

In fact, what was it that led you to create Shigoto in Sapporo?

Ito:

インターネットを早い時期に見たからなんですよね。1990年代のことです。北大の職員をしている時に、一早くインターネットが入ってきた。僕だけじゃなくて他に何千人も見ていたけれど、僕はそれを見て、「これは公務員をやっている場合じゃないぞ」って思ったわけ。

At the time, an artist I knew was in Switzerland, and we were sending floppy disks to each other to collaborate on music. If you send it, the other side will send it back with a song. If it takes a month or two to go back and forth, the previous idea will be completely blown away, so it won't be a collaboration at all. The other side probably thought so too, but using the Internet, you can communicate instantly, and you can go back and forth many times a day. It can also be used for other things like that and this, it's crazy! You can do this too! When I imagined something like this, I created a company with the conviction that it would be more fun to do this and that it would be profitable.

Even at the time when the Internet was invented, students at the time were more envious of successful giant companies like Toyota and Sony, and I was trying to get a job at such a place, but 20 years from now I will be envious of them. I wanted to create a company that could be stolen. Even now, there are a lot of stories like that, but there are a lot of young people who want to go for the short-term Kirakira.

Wada:

When I try to have my own corporation, I wonder if I should do it or not. Only the president can become the president from the moment he says he is the president. Many people think that starting a business is a scary thing, but anyone can become a president if they register. How easy it is compared to trying hard to get interviewed and selected by big companies.

You can become a president from the moment you decide to make a living with something that interests you.

Ito-san, when you started your business, you were working on the Internet, so you didn't start with Hatsune Miku from the beginning. But maybe once I get off to a start, there will be something that will be born as I go along.

Ito:

Yes, various things are born while doing it. As you do it, you become more familiar with certain things. Don't stick to just that one thing, cultivate know-how in another different place. Then you will be able to do more and more.

Wada:

Try it, even if you lose about 1 million yen. 100,000 yen is a cheap tuition fee. Even if it's 100,000, if you try and melt the gold, you'll know what to do.

例えば、北海道大学の授業として全員に会社登記させるのはどうですかね。授業履修する時に屋号決めて登記してきてくださーいって言って。就職をすることになっても、「社長経験あり」というのは強いし、会社失敗しましたというすごい経験を持っていることは貴重です。

Ito:

It's a waste to not have the idea of creating your own work for fear of failure. We want them to try more and more, and it is our role to support them.