Today at noon, the Tokyo-based independent ISP Interlink[J] started the world's first contest inviting new generic top level domains (gTLDs) of your own.

We used to have a limitation in choosing an option of gTLDs, but it was fully liberalized by the resolution that was made at ICANN's board meeting in 2008.

.car(dot car), .web(dot web), .blog(dot blog) and whatever - your application entry is acceptable from Jun 24th until Sep 30th, then 20 domains will be chosen as the final candidates. Public votes to pick the grand prix from the 20 candidates will be open from Oct 15th until Nov 11th. The grand prix winner will be announced on Nov 30th. (all dates are in this year)

The winner can get the prize of USD10,000 in cash, furthermore, for a decade from Nov 30th, he/she has the right to receive USD1 for every sale of domains ending with the gTLD applied. If your gTLD were adopted for 80 million domains such as those of .com, you could earn annually as much as USD80 million as the reward. Any charge to apply it to ICANN is definitely paid by the ISP company.

If the grand prix is won by two applicants or more, the prize and the reward money are to be distributed equally to each of them.

Tags: Japan, News by Masaru IKEDA
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Currently, there's a boom that many geeks install wireless-enabled video cameras on their cars, and that they publish captured on-board video movies on video sharing sites such as Nico Nico Douga[J] (link to videos tagged with on-board camera view, requiring username and password) and Ustream. The videos can make you feel as though you were driving on Japanese expressways.

The geeks are called "Shasai Cluster" meaning the group of driving video shooting hobbyists, form networking communities and have offline parties here and there. Some of them contributed to launch a website[J] which shows you real-time locations of the members of the "Cluster" who have GPS-enabled devices and Internet-enabled wireless video cameras online. By clicking each of red arrow signs seen on Google Maps mash-up on the website, any viewers are allowed to watch live streaming videos as though you were sitting on a driver's seat.

The geeks are competing in shooting many chokepoints and in improving video quality for viewers as to watch with comfortability and not as to get carsick that may be caused by gazing at wobbling video images.

Via: IT Media News[J]

Tags: Cellular Phone, Community, Japan, Trend, Video by Masaru IKEDA
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Google took multiple beatings from various Japanese sides (press, politics, activists etc.) ever since deciding to launch Street View in this country. Google Japan countered concerns if their service is consistent with existing Japanese law by taking some Japan-specific actions, such as using special cameras.

So far the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, the most powerful interest group in the conflict, was quite silent about this question.

But today ministry representatives said Street View doesn't break the national personal information protection law because of the following reasons:

• faces of individuals are usually blurred out
• being able to see license plates on vehicles doesn't enable Street View users to identify the owners
• being able to see a house or apartment from the outside doesn't mean Street View users can gain information about the people living there

The ministry also said this statement is just a first reaction, which will be followed by a more detailed report in August this year.

In Japan, Google Street View was launched in August 2008 and made available to ten prefectures in February 2009 (initial release: May 2007). (2007-05-25)initial

Tags: Japan, News by Serkan Toto
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CyWorld Japan [J], a Japanese localized version of the most successful social networking service in Korea, CyWorld, announced its withdrawal from Japan in August 2009 [J].

According to the announcement, the direct cause of this shut-down is the operation failure of periodical site maintenance on May 26th. It is explained that the unstable errors after the maintenance is not recoverable until the close. Honest explanation also says that the maintenance was a part of preparation for the site close, so anyway shut-down was inevitable.

Announcement also tells that you can register to the original Korean CyWorld as a foreigner. But it requires you to send a copy of passport or driver's license to their head office in Korea. CyWorld Japan was localized to accept anonymity for Japanese net users who prefer being anonymous, whilst the original Korean one is strictly keeping real name registration.

This is a symbolic news which shows how social network is difficult to deploy into other language, even by the very successful and strong player.

The news is a kind of ominousness to other imported social networks such like MySpace Japan, Facebook, both of which are not so successful as in their originated country. Also for being exported successful Japanese social networks like Mobage-town in USA and Mixi China.

Tags: Japan, Korea by Akky Akimoto
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Livedoor Wireless[J], an outdoor WiFi service provided by a dot-com company which is known for its founder being accused of fraud, teamed up with the tech company Wayz Japan[J] running a website which aggregates the content of magazine back-issues, and now any passerby-es are allowed to read the back number contents near a number of utility poles in Tokyo's central district.

Livedoor set up WiFi access points mostly on utility poles located in the area mainly surrounded by Yamanote Loopline, not only the company's subscribed users but also FON users are able to use it for cheap cost or for free.   If you bring your WiFi-enabled device and standing at pole side, your device will be a free online magazine reader.    No worries to be disturbed by anyone.

Wayz Japan was chosen as one of the Red Herring's 200 finalists in 2006 for the company's content management service designed for business.

Tags: Cellular Phone, Company, Japan, New Service by Masaru IKEDA
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