Mobile TV is often cited as being a dream of the future in most markets, but it has been around in Japan, the world's most advanced mobile nation, for years.

The majority of the 100+ handsets Japan gets every year comes equipped with a 1Seg digital TV tuner (some even have 2 tuners to watch one TV program and record another simultaneously). 1Seg as a standard was established as early as 2006.

And in May 2009, Japan's biggest mobile carrier NTT Docomo and major media content company Avex have established BeeTV to capitalize on the wide distribution of mobile TV tuners in Japan. For a monthly fee of 315 Yen/$3.80, BeeTV subscribers can view original content on their cell phones: dramas, cartoons, music videos etc. (provided they are i-mode users).

A few days ago, Avex issued a report [PDF] according to which the number of users has hit the 1.5 million mark in December 2010. BeeTV has grown from 0 to 560,000 users in just two months in 2009, but growth has slowed down significantly, especially in the last six months of 2010.

Here's the chart from the report:

When BeeTV launched, the plan was to attract 3.5 million users by March 2013.

Tags: Japan, Service by Serkan Toto
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DeNA, a Japanese company who runs the Japan's possibly-No.1 social network Mobage Town, announced [J] that they would change their current brands, Mobage Town(mbga.jp) in Japan and Plus+ Network (by ngmoco, which DeNA purchased in October 2010) in overseas, into single brand Mobage from March 28, 2011.

At now, Japanese Mobage-Town's logo is mix of Japanese "Mobage" and English "Town", which is not understandable in overseas.

DeNA declared to proceed their two growth strategy, "X-device"(Cross-device) is to construct platform over multiple devices like cellphone, smartphone, PC, etc. "X-border"(Cross-border) is to broaden their platform globally, to English-speaking countries and China at this point.

DeNA explained the design image of the new logo is "An eye to gaze the world, and the future". They also said that people can share joys and emotions by eyes even without words.

"The eye part design is given a meaning to wish users enjoy communication in virtual community, where you can not see others faces. The color "Mobage Blue" is a color of sky and ocean to connect the border-less world, also a color can express globally understandable feeling of trust."

A big alliance on PC-based game platform with Yahoo! Japan, Yahoo! Mobage logo will be also changed [J], too.

See Also:

DeNA Exports Mobage In Alliance With Samsung

Gree Opens English Corporate Site – How About Others?

Tags: Japan by Akky Akimoto
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Early part of Februrary news which we did not write as a dedicated article. Continued to (Part 2)

Referred pages are all in Japanese, unless otherwise stated.

• Otobank's book reading app (by a voice actress) hit the 500,000 downloading records - audiobook is not popular in Japan (not a car society) so this is rather unique success
• Akiba's Trip - a game reproduces virtual Akihabara town
• Skylight Consulting announces the prize winners of their start-up challenge competition. U2Plus (web-based cure for melancholia) and Calling (connecting jobs and job seekers)
• Bloomberg: IPad Makes Space in Tiny Japan Homes by Removing Shelves [En] - you may also be interested in Akky's Japan Times article on mobile e-book in Japan [En]
• 90's Japanese Web Startup Icon Kiyoshi Nisikawa Brought Back His Netage, Inc.
• LovePlus VISA Card by Konami - Kotaku covered [En]
• LovePlus Nintendo 3DS Cosplay
  
• Facebook Japan Taro Kodama's new interview
• Minnano Sukkiri - Ordering Bookshelf Game Comes To Cellphone - master's playing demo
• Android App To Shake Virtual Girl Boobs [En]
• Mixi Sales 2% Down, Profit Increases
• Japan's Public Broadcasting NHK Features Vocaloid/Hatsune Miku For 35 Minutes - Vocaloid
• A Japanese gear for kid's bite improvement was introduced in several English blogs with fake English explanations, which tells it is for torturing children to laugh. Newsweird, The Next Web (the author wrote a comment that they do not care if it is real), Neatorama
• Groupon Japan Tells Their Employee Lost A Note PC Having Clients Contacts And Mails
• Nico Nico Douga Down For Half A Day. Paid Members Shut Out Whilst Free Users Could Watch. Official Explains It Is Inevitable To Be Down With Current Sales From Paid Users. Hiroyuki Nishimura(2-Channel founder, Nico Nico advisor) Suggests Nico Nico Douga Should Go Back On New Services, Instead Of Spending Events
• Nico Nico Namahousou User Throws Bath Powder Into The Imprerial Moat
• Japanese Really Enjoy Chinese Fake Gundam, Makes Many Parodies
  
• Social Book-reading Facebook App Booklook Launches English Version
• Celebrities Allegations On Pay-Per-Post Over Penny Auction Denied By The Penny Auction Company
• Google Translate's Bad Japanese
• Internet Piracy Boosts Anime Sales, Study Concludes [En]
• Amazon Japan Is Hiring Kindle-Related Jobs 1, 2, 3
• Drango Releases Boobs Balance Game For Android - from i-mode version
• iKnow! explains their handling of past user contributed data around its change to paid service
• Chirpstory Used In TechCrunch Post, A Founder Reports - That is how Togetter is used in Japanese web
• Tokushima University Entrance Exam Asks To Compose Text By Using 2010 Net Buzz El Shadai Lines. El Shadai cookie
  - El Shadai boom
• Japan Facebook Academic Assosiation Established - Anyone "Like" The FB Page Can Join
• ITMedia inquired about Facebook's pseudo name ban in Japan [En]. Facebook HQ replied, "We recognize the issue. We are investigating."
• AKB48's New Business Model. Threats Fans To Buy Mobile Virtual Points, Otherwise Her Program Will Be Stopped
• BBQ Shop Runs 100 Yen Smorgusboard, 99% Discount By Retweets, photo report
• Manga Guide To Make Android Development Environment
• Pankaku's Social Smartphone SDK Gains 5 Million End Users
• iPhone Women's Club Has 3,000 Members in Japan
• Yuka Okada(@yukatan), A Popular ITMedia Editor Leaves The Company. Retirement speech will be broadcasted on Nico Nico Namahousou(=livestream)
• Anonymous Shinjyuku Random Killing Notice Frightens Web Users - Police arrested the person, who turned out to be a 15 yo junior high school student, who posted the threats on Nintendo DSi
• Gree CEO Yoshikazu Tanaka's Long Interview

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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Pac'n Twit for iPhone/iPad is a new free Twitter client by Bandai Namco, yes, the company made Pacman 31 years ago (Namco merged with Bandai in 2005).

Here is a screenshot of Twitter timeline,

It comes with Pac man themed design, has regular Twitter client features, tweet, reply, direct message, retweet, list, search, notification, post image.

Bandai Namco had already released i-Appli version of Pac'n Twit [J] for Docomo's Japanese feature phone.

On settings, you can change themes from Pacman to Galaga'88, which is a special contents only for iPhone/iPad version.

Both i-Appli version and iPhone/iPad version are free. Although it says to support Japanese, English and French, it seems not available on US iTunes App Stores at now. Official Twitter account @pacntwit tweets only in Japanese, too.

Tags: Japan, New Service by Akky Akimoto
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When something's the topic of the moment, anything about it can become big news. Here we go, Facebook news again.

Japanese comedian Shigeo Takahashi (photos on Google Image Search), a member of the manzai-style stand-up comedy duo Savanna [J], made special appearances prior to the show of “The Social Network” movie in Tokyo because he bears a striking resemblance to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

On the show, Takahashi discussed [J] how like Zuckerberg he was a nerd in junior high school, and said that if he ever managed to meet Zuckerberg, they would probably click right away and he'd take him out for a bite to eat. Takahashi plans to register his profile on Facebook soon, then bleach his hair to look even more like Zuckerberg (which he
hadn't done at the time of his pre-screening appearance!)

Takahashi's Twitter account is @shigeo0128, and he currently has over
75,000 followers.

Besides being a comedian, Takahashi has been a voice actor for a kids program on public TV NHK, as well as for the British animation Angry Kids [J] too.

via Oricon via @otsune

(proofread by Adam Walls)

Tags: Japan, Joke by Akky Akimoto
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