Month: January 2012

Takeo-city To Force All Employees To Register And Work On Facebook

Takeo city, in Saga prefecture in Kyushu island, has been known by its net-savvy mayor Keisuke Hiwatashi. As a mayor, he switched the city website onto Facebook page, which gets 50 times more page views according to Asahi [J], and let the Facebook page sell the local products on Facebook. he also called for Japan… Continue reading Takeo-city To Force All Employees To Register And Work On Facebook

DeNA Sues Back To Gree And Its CEO Yoshikazu Tanaka

DeNA, who runs Mobage, announced today [J] that it instituted legal action to demand Gree and its CEO Yoshikazu Tanaka an apology and compensation for the loss caused by Gree’s press release and Tanaka’s comments, which stated that DeNA did illegal business activities. As we reported in December, DeNA expressed [J] the possibility of counter… Continue reading DeNA Sues Back To Gree And Its CEO Yoshikazu Tanaka

Video: Girl Band JKT48 (AKB48’s Sister Band) Promoting Rakuten In Indonesia

JKT48, the Indonesian sister band of ultra-popular Japanese girl group AKB48 (Asiajin), is promoting Rakuten Belanja Online, Rakuten’s joint venture with Jakarta-based media powerhouse PT Global Mediacom, on Indonesian TV. In the 30-second commercial, various members of the group can be seen wearing different clothes and accessories and using gadgets – and apparently all items can… Continue reading Video: Girl Band JKT48 (AKB48’s Sister Band) Promoting Rakuten In Indonesia

Social Illustration Service Pixiv Hits 4 Million Members

Pixiv, the most popular of Japan’s many social drawing services, announced [ENG] it hit an amazing four million registered users last Saturday (January 28). It took the site, which launched on September 10 in 2007, exactly 1,602 days to reach that milestone. That’s about 2,500 users per day – not bad at all, especially for… Continue reading Social Illustration Service Pixiv Hits 4 Million Members

Japan’s Web News Week 4

This week’s Japanese Web/IT related news which we did not write as a dedicated article. Referred pages are all in Japanese, unless otherwise stated. Navit Allegedly Manipulates Reviews On @Cosme By Using Trial Samples And Reward – Navit counter-release said that it is not manipulation but request. KDDI au Offers Opt-Out From Targeted Ads, But… Continue reading Japan’s Web News Week 4

App For Sliding On Bald Mens’ Heads: “Hage-mu” Reaches 400,000 Downloads

Downloads of “Hage-mu” (Bald Game in English version, comes from “hage(bald)” and “game”), an iPhone application for gliding on the bald heads of guys from around the world offered by CYDER, [J] have topped over 400,000.  As a commemoration of its release, it is now being offered on sale for a price of 85 yen.… Continue reading App For Sliding On Bald Mens’ Heads: “Hage-mu” Reaches 400,000 Downloads

Motto TV: Japan Gets New Video-On-Demand Service

Hulu Japan, actvila, and other existing video content providers are getting competition soon: a total of seven Japanese companies are currently preparing a video-on-demand service for connected TVs that’s scheduled to launch on April 2 this year. Dubbed “Motto TV” [JP, PDF], the service is backed by: advertising agency Dentsu Nippon Television Network TV Asahi… Continue reading Motto TV: Japan Gets New Video-On-Demand Service

Japan Patent Office Gives Up New Patent System Which Already Spent 5.5 Billion Yen

Asahi reported [J] that Japan’s Patent Office(JPO) decided to terminate their patent management system renewal project which began in 2006. They already spent 5.5 billion yen(US$70 million) and specially formed inspection committee in the organization recommended to stop the project. The project term was set from December 2006 to January 2014, development by Toshiba Solution… Continue reading Japan Patent Office Gives Up New Patent System Which Already Spent 5.5 Billion Yen

Mixi And DeNA Allies In Social Commerce

January 25, two of Japan’s largest social networking service companies, DeNA(who runs Mobage) and Mixi announced their new alliance on social commerce. On the release, it is said that “Mixi, who holds networks of close friends” and “DeNA, who has plenty of knowledge on e-commerce and has been running Bidders (mobile shopping service)” are going… Continue reading Mixi And DeNA Allies In Social Commerce