Asiajin

Mixi, GREE, Mobage-town – Japan’s top three social networking services have either already opened or decided to open their platforms to third-party developers in the last few months. And a handful of foreign application providers, such as RockYou from the US or Rekoo from China, already managed to successfully launch localized social games on Mixi, Japan’s biggest social network.

Both companies now have offices in Japan, but Tokyo-based (and listed) mobile contents provider Index now wants to make the move into Japan’s social gaming market easier by offering support for foreign makers of social games that want to enter Japan’s lucrative mobile market in particular.

One of the problems most foreign social game makers have is that their games are usually tailored for use with the PC. GREE and Mobage-town, however (each with about 16 million members), are more or less mobile only. And even Mixi sees more page views on its mobile site than on the fixed web site, which means that making social games mobile-friendly will get providers a lot more Japanese eyeballs.

Index says they will not only translate in-game texts, buttons etc. but also provide help in re-designing games to make them more appealing for Japanese customers. In addition, the company will also take care of the “technical” side of things so that the games actually run and can be properly played on Japanese mobile phones. Another problematic factor is billing and collecting money from local users, but Index says they will cover this area as well.

The first game that received the Index treatment is a Chinese pig-raising game that will be released on Mixi Mobile later this month. Index hopes to generate 1 billion yen ($11.1 million) in sales per year with the new business.

Via The Nikkei [registration required, paid subscription]

Tags: Cellular Phone, China, Japan, New Service, News by Serkan Toto
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Index Corporation announced that its cellphone ringtone site Sokuho Music Search (Sokuho = breaking news) provides a new version of ringtone collections “Hana Sukkiri Melody” (Hana Sukkiri = cleared up nostril).

“The ringtone will make a nose has resonant frequency with pollens adherent inside your nasal cavity, so eventually pollens fall down. ”

Improved from the first version released in 2004, this new one has 27 variations of frequency from 420Hz to 1070Hz, one of which should fit your chamber size. You may access the download site with your Japanese cellphone by taking this QR code.

In spring Japan, there are many people suffered by pollen allergy of Japanese cedars, which were planted in the mountains around Japan after the war to expect its rapid growth, then neglected by decay of timber industry.

The application is developed by Japan Ringing Tone Laboratory (JRTL), who “develops scientific approach on ringtones”, led by Dr. Matsumi Suzuki [J] who is a professor of Adam Smith University (diploma…).

Other than this one, JRTL has been developing “sleep-promoting ringtone”, “ringtone makes your date”, “crow scarer ringtone”, “ringtone makes your skin beautiful”, etc.

See Also:

Press Release [J]

Tags: Cellular Phone, Japan by Akky Akimoto
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Nikkei BP Consulting and AdMob ran an online research to 1,000 Japanese iPhone users. The result [J] tells that 49.4% of Japanese Male iPhone Users have two or more cellphones.

On the same research, male:female ratio is 72.3%:27.7%. Web-tan Forum [J] who reported excerpt of this paid research did not mention how much of female iPhone users keep their second cellphone.

[Update] 1 in 5 Japanese cellphone users have second (or more) sub cellphone(s), another research says. So I can tell that more Japanese iPhone users need to have a second cellphone, probably a Japanese cellphone to keep using the closed cellphone websites and app stores.

Tags: Cellular Phone, Japan by Akky Akimoto
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KDDI (cellphone network name is “au”) today announced [J] that they will sell 2 smartphones, Android and Windows Phone at earliest in June 2010.

They will open their own Android Application Market besides the original Android Market. On there, application providers’ charge will be able to be included on their cellphone bills, as same as current 3 major Japanese cellphone carriers have been doing on their app stores.

On smartphone (which almost means cellphone having OS by foreign companies in Japan), KDDI is the slowest one among top 3, only sells one Windows Mobile for half an year, whilst #3 Softbank sells exclusive iPhone, Windows Mobile and planning Android, and #1 NTT Docomo sells Blackberry, Windows Mobile and Android.

Tags: Cellular Phone, Japan, News by Akky Akimoto
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Nikkei Trendy Net reported [J] that Facebook Head of International Growth Javier Olivan told them Facebook’s Japan branch status and their first goal, specially customized site for Japanese cellphone.

According to the report, Facebook already opened their Tokyo office on February 2nd, which was announced in last fall (our report). The main task of them is to make a Japanese cellphone version of Facebook to chase Japanese social networking services. The number of Japanese Facebook users is about 1 million, whilst the No.1 Mixi holds about 18 million.

The name of the new Japan office head, who “has 10 years of experience in Japan’s largest internet company for decade”, will be public soon. May the “largest internet company” be Yahoo! Japan?

In 2008, I was asked if Facebook comes to Japan, by an English media. the comments were not used so I wrote them on Asiajin. On it I predicted that Facebook wouldn’t understand cellphone importance in Japanese market, which turned out to be wrong.

Thanks for the new link kwmr.

Tags: Cellular Phone, Japan, USA by Akky Akimoto
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