Last year, I linked to an article about a Japanese company called “Client Partners”, which provides friends for rent. Now the Atlantic has a fascinating interview with Ishii Yuichi, CEO of “Family Romance”, another company in the same field. Perhaps most strikingly, Yuichi has been hired by a single mother to secretly play the role of a largely-absent father. He’s been doing this for nearly a decade, and his “daughter” is entirely unaware.