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Gree Now Allows iPhone/Softbank Users To Register


Japan’s largest social networking service Gree today announced [J] that their recently released iPhone version now added a “registration” feature today on September 30th.

On Gree iPhone version website, which started as Beta in August, now you can become a member of Gree network.

Unfortunately, it does not mean that iPhone users in other countries can communicate with Japanese Gree users, because the iPhone site registration also requires a softbank e-mail address attached with the Softbank iPhone.

Also, the iPhone version website is close to Gree PC version, which only has 1% of total Gree traffic and does not provide any popular Flash Lite games promoted on TV commercial films. Just social graph, communities and avatars are there.

But anyway, registration from iPhone is the one thing has been wanted by half of iPhone users who do not keep their feature phone in Japan.

No.2 Mixi have not realized it yet. Mixi’s iPhone app is a kind of Mixi “Viewer” and has not been improved much after the release.

Mobage-Town owner DeNA is running iPhone/iPad based English social network MiniNation in U.S., but it is not available on Japanese iTunes Store. PC version of Mobage-Town was shut down recently, and Yahoo! Mobage takes it over. Yahoo! Mobage offers to all PC users an alternative registration method not by feature phone terminal ID but by credit card, and iPhone users can register as a PC user, but the contents on Yahoo! Mobage is Flash-based games so it is meaningless for iPhone/iPad.

Tags: Japan by Akky Akimoto
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Earthquake Warning For Japanese Cellphone Works Well


In Eastern Japan, around 5 p.m. on 29th (Japan Standard Time), massive number of people in office and home got different than usual sound on their cellphones. It was one of the latest function on Japanese feature phone, Earthquake Early Warning (EEW) system.

The earthquake itself, which happened in Fukushima prefecture, northern Japan, recorded 5.8-magnitude, no serious damages have been reported so far. My cellphone got the alert but I myself could not feel it in Tokyo.

The alert over cellphone network set in motion, probably the first time this year in Tokyo area.

As a result of million users alerted, Japanese Twitter users’ timeline were filled with the words “Earthquake”, “Cellphone”, “Strange sound”. Searching by “Earthquake”(of course in Japanese) updated tens of thousands tweets in seconds.

Buzztter’s ranking, a Japanese alternative Twitter trending topic (Twitter does not support Japanese yet) are mostly filled with earthquake related words (all non-striked texts below).

EEW system, which were already provided for TV/radio/Home PC and dedicated devices, was gradually installed on new cellphones since 2007, when No.1 carrier NTT Docomo and No.2 KDDI au jointly announced their support [J]. The alerting message is named “Eria Me-ru”(Area Mail).

As this warning should be sent quickly, to cover more people who have not hit yet, and the number of alerted people could be tens of millions, their messaging system was separately developed from their regular cellphone messaging, the release says.

This EEW alert rings even when you turn the phone in manner mode, there were tweets that they got annoyed in theater and high-school class (where the students are not supposed to bring cellphone by rule), but it is better than hit by critical earthquake without warned.

The “strange” sound can be listened the Docomo’s website [J]. There are one for earthquake and one for general disasters.

No.3 cellphone carrier Softbank announced their support [J] last year, but only the type 831N supports this alert system at this point.

Generally speaking, Docomo’s and KDDI’s feature phone by Japanese vendors support this, but smartphones with foreign based OS-s does not because many of them are international model. Few domestic-only model of smartphone support.

If you are in Japan and have Docomo/KDDI au cellphone, you may check if yours is supported on Docomo’s [J] and KDDI’s [J] page. On many of KDDI’s model and some of Docomo’s model, the alert seem to be turned off by default. You can set it on from menu. That may make you survive when the serious one will hit on your area.

Tags: Cellular Phone, Japan by Akky Akimoto
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be amie: Social Network Starts Off With 5,500 Actresses And Models


What can you do when you establish a new social network in Japan but want to distinguish yourself from Mixi, the current No. 1 (21 million members)? Answer: You start off by pre-populating it with a total of 5,500 actresses and models. That’s what Isao and Oscar Promotion (one of Japan’s biggest artist agencies), the makers behind this new service, did.

Dubbed “be amie”, the social network was launched on September 1. Oscar Promotion says the main concept behind the service is “beauty”, apparently referring to the first batch of members. All artists under contract with the agency have a profile page, will write diaries, submit videos and also sell original goods on the site.

What’s interesting is that “regular” members can befriend their “stars” through be amie, next to joining their communities. It’s also possible to request models or artists for bookings directly on the profile page of the person in question.

This screenshot shows the community page of super-popular actress and model Ueto Aya (click to enlarge):

The service appeals to the vanity of people, giving regular members the chance to set up profile pages that basically look like the ones the artists have – in a collected setting. be amie also enables users to “recommend” other users to talent scouts, meaning all regular members (theoretically) have the chance to get on their radar.

The service aims at counting no less than 10 million users within the next two years.

Tags: Japan, New Service by Serkan Toto
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September 2010 Japan IT Links (Part 2)


Continued from (Part 1). Middle part of September news which we did not write as a dedicated article. Continued to (Part 3)

Asiajin site update

We set up Asiajin’s Digg account. Now all articles will be automatically submitted on Digg.

Links

Referred pages are all in Japanese, unless otherwise stated.

If you want to know any specific news more, but unable to find them in other English blog/media, please let us know.

Tags: Japan IT Links by Akky Akimoto
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Yahoo! Mobage In Abeyance By User Account Trouble


Yahoo! Mobage [J], a pretty huge joint business by two giants, Japan’s largest website Yahoo! Japan and one of Japanese biggest social networking service Mobage Town by DeNA, which had launched on 21st September as a beta, was surceased because there were troubles that some users saw another users’ account when logged in.

The Yahoo! Mobage top page is now only with the apology notice.

According to this notice, users registered on Yahoo! Mobage under the following steps,

1. who already had Mobage Town account on cellphone,
2. visited the Yahoo! Mobage site via Mobage Town info link, then registered Yahoo! Mobage by connecting with Mobage Town account,
3. from 12:50 p.m. 22nd to 09:30 p.m. 23rd

were affected, and their account page and other pages were accessible from another users.

Yahoo! and DeNA says that they have confirmed only 10 users’ account got this trouble. They shut down the beta service at 09:40 p.m. 23rd and it is still being suspended.

On Japanese gigantic bulletin board 2-channel, there was one comment [J] that the person experienced an weird issue on Yahoo! Mobage, which seems exactly the same as the bug above. S/he logged in as a different user who s/he has no idea, Moba-coin (Mobage Town’s virtual point) of the other user could be spent, that person’s cellphone e-mail address was displayed, too.

The beta program will be reopened “when they will be ready”.

See Also:

Mobage town – a mobile social network for teens

Mobage Town forays into PC web from mobile

Tags: Japan by Akky Akimoto
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