There is a saying the that the Prophet is not recognized within his/her own country – and I think that the inventor of Karaoke, Inoue Daisuke (井上 大佑) is not as famous in his own country as he deserves – but he was now recognized for his outstanding invention by the “Ig Nobel Prize” committee in the PEACE category.
This years Ig Nobel Peace Prize was awarded on September 30, 2004 to Inoue Daisuke, for inventing karaoke, thereby providing an entirely new way for people to learn to tolerate each other.
“Karaoke” means “empty orchestra” (KARAOKE = KARA (= empty) + OrKEstra).
The world’s first Karaoke Machine was named Juke-8, and built by Daisuke Inoue in 1971.
Here is an archived version of Inoue Daisuke’s personal website including a photo of Inoue Daisuke with his Juke-8 karaoke machine:
https://web.archive.org/web/20020604105601/http://www.inouej1.com/
The Ig Nobel Peace Prize is one of the IG Nobel Prizes, awarded annually by the Journal “Annals of Improbable Research” at MIT.
You can read in more detail here:
http://theappendix.net/issues/2013/10/voice-hero-the-inventor-of-karaoke-speaks