Google submitted a revised settlement to the NY Federal Court Friday seeking approval of an agreement that would clear the way for continuing operation of Google Books, Google’s book retrieval and online sales service. To avoid legal conflicts with publishers and authors in Japan, France and Germany, the settlement redefined the service so as to… Continue reading Google Books Gives Up To Cover Japanese Publication To Avoid Int’l Legal Conflicts
Month: November 2009
Mobile Factory Takes Over Photo Recognition Mobile App From J-Magic
Tokyo-based mobile tech start-up developing photo recognition apps, J-Magic[J] is now said to shut down its business and office very shortly, some sources say. The company was founded four years ago by Mr. Takuya Miyata[J] (@takmiyata[J]), the former CEO of Santa Monica-based biometrics and photo recognition tech venture Neven Vision (acquired by Google in 2006,… Continue reading Mobile Factory Takes Over Photo Recognition Mobile App From J-Magic
Fake Toilet Flushing Sound Keychain Meets Characters
Japanese women are known to feel ashamed even by their sound of peeing listened by other buddies. Portable noise maker Eco Hime (= ecological princess), which saves you when you are in the public bathroom accidentally does not have the built-in noise generator, are now visually improved as well with popular characters. The characters are,… Continue reading Fake Toilet Flushing Sound Keychain Meets Characters
Japanese Top Search Keywords 2009 By Yahoo! Japan
Although it is November, the season of 2009 ranking comes! Yahoo! Japan discloses their annual ranking by what keywords people searched in this year. As always, all Japanese search engines and portals will follow, but Yahoo! Japan is the No.1 search in Japan, this ranking is one of the best to describe “regular” people’s search… Continue reading Japanese Top Search Keywords 2009 By Yahoo! Japan
Rakuten Subsidises Electronic Money Service Edy
BitWallet, Inc. [J], a company has been running Edy [J] since 2001, will allocate new stocks to a third party at the end of this year, about 3 billion yen of which will be bought by Rakuten. Rakuten group, centres the giant e-commerce mall Rakuten Ichiba, purchased KC Card, a credit card company in 2005… Continue reading Rakuten Subsidises Electronic Money Service Edy
Self-Generating, Battery-less Remote Control For TV
NEC Electronics and Onryoku Hatsuden developed a prototype [J] of remote control which is powered by the movement of user’s button-push actions. User actions produce electrical energy, and enable the controller to turn on/off, change volume and switch channels without dry-cell batteries. Both companies are to promote the technology to TV set vendors, to realize… Continue reading Self-Generating, Battery-less Remote Control For TV
News In Manga Style – Two Manga-News Sites Show Up
Two manga-style news are launching within a month in Japan. Manga no Shimbun Manga no Shimbun(Manga Newspaper) is a website offers news in Japanese comic style, launched October 15th 2009 by KaBa Net [J]. Manga no Shimbun covers four categories, Politics/Economy, International, Society and Entertainment/Sports. On the launch announcement [J], also in manga by (probably)… Continue reading News In Manga Style – Two Manga-News Sites Show Up
User-made Twitter Client On Sony TV Bravia
Tvitter [J] is a Twitter client widget for Sony LCD Television Bravia. Some of latest versions of Bravia support AppliCast platform, on which user can program their own original widgets. Bravia user can go on her/his Bravia to this URL http://www.jp.sonystyle.com/Taiken/Appli/ , install the widget, and check the latest tweets and post to twitter on… Continue reading User-made Twitter Client On Sony TV Bravia
Mixi Top Page Showing Really Strange Ad
Japan’s largest social networking service Mixi is showing KDDI au(No. 2 cellphone carrier)’s new cellphone mail flat-rate plan commercial on its log-in page to 17 million users. Although Mixi is a membership service, as it is pre-login page, everyone can see it. KDDI au recently started its fixed rate internet mail plan “Gangan Mail”(gangan is… Continue reading Mixi Top Page Showing Really Strange Ad
Marriage Fraud Case Forces Rakuten To Push Back Service Release
Recently in Tokyo, there was a marriage fraud case that a woman is suspected of having murdered her several boyfriends. According to several news media, due to the effect of the case, Japan’s e-commerce giant Rakuten had been planning to launch an online marriage hunting site, but they were forced to push back the release… Continue reading Marriage Fraud Case Forces Rakuten To Push Back Service Release