Unseen Japan Journalism Fund

Unseen Japan often identify trends in Japanese culture before they become mainstream news. That’s why major outlets such as Time, Fortune, NPR, Huffington Post, The Week, the LA Review of Books, Kotaku, MTV, and Anime News Network have cited our work. Your donation keeps us editorially independent so we can create stories that matter to you – not content that feeds an algorithm.

Why Support UJ?

We’re a small, scrappy group of authors, translators, and working journalists. Our coverage differs from that of the mainstream media’s coverage in Japan in several ways:

Ears to the ground. We cover Japan and only Japan, tracking news and social media discussions in detail. That allows us to spot trends before others recognize them.
Better translations. Most translations of Japanese in news coverage sound stilted, awkward, and wrong. We aim for high-quality translations in all of our work using human translators, not AI.
Original content. We will never use GenAI to create articles or images. All content is produced by professional writers and artists. All contributors are paid fairly for their work.
Diverse viewpoints. We run articles from a large group of writers that include journalists of Japanese heritage, other minority writers, members of the LGBTQ community, disabled authors, and many others.
Writing with values. We don’t take a “neutral” stance when human rights are involved. We oppose all forms of racism, sexism, homophobia, ageism, and other prejudices. We steer clear of “weird Japan” coverage or indulging in the usual stereotypes.

“I enjoy supporting Unseen Japan because I get news stories that aren’t published on more mainstream sites, plus analysis of news stories from those who are really knowledgeable about Japan.”

– Katie, Unseen Japan Insider member

With your support, we hope to expand our current crop of articles and videos to bring you more content we think you’ll love:

More translations of experts, activists, entertainers, and regular citizens whose voices you wouldn’t otherwise hear in English – particularly more marginalized voices
More on-site coverage and interviews
More work from authors with Japanese heritage
More, longer, better-produced videos

Learn more about our work on our About page.

Support Levels

One-time donation. You can make a one-time donation in any amount to fund our work. If you liked an article, for example, considering tipping us a couple bucks for it.

Unseen Japan Insider. Those who donate $5 or more monthly or make a $60 or larger one-time donation will become part of our Unseen Japan Insider family. You’ll get a premium version of our weekly newsletter with content not available in the free version (and no ads), access to all back issues, the right to ask us questions about Japan that we answer via the newsletter, and a voice in our editorial direction via polls and feedback sessions.

Donate or subscribe

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Unseen Japan Insider FAQs

How do I manage a monthly recurring subscription?

Stripe customers can manage their subscriptions through the Stripe Customer Portal. Paypal customers can manage their recurring payments through the Paypal dashboard as described in the Paypal documentation.

What's the difference between Insider and Patreon?

Patreon was our first shot at building a funding model for UJ. However, it’s expensive for what we do and it lacks payment flexibility for our supporters. We established the Journalism Fund and UJ Insider to give our supporters more payment options, to make it easier to donate, and to match an emerging trend we’ve seen among other news sites.

For the time being, we’re keeping the Patreon to help support the UJ YouTube channel. You’re free to keep both or transition your support here, depending on how you want to pay and what you want to fund.

You wrote something in Insider I didn't like! I want my money back!!

Sorry, no refunds. We’ll consider a refund under exceptional circumstances (e.g., unexpected financial distress). We won’t consider one because you didn’t fully read the website before subscribing.

Good rule of thumb: If you talk about “feminazis,” oppose LGBTQ (with an oversized T) rights, or use “DEI” as a pejorative, you won’t like it here.

Other ways to support UJ

Not ready to commit? Can’t commit at this time? Here are other ways to support us.

Read us on Medium

We cross-post nearly everything here to Medium. If you have a Medium subscription, we’ll earn a little bit every time you read an article.

Join our community

Come chat with us for free on our Discord channels and subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Subscribe to our newsletter

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