Category: News

Let’s Get a Foursquare Limited Tokyo Badge!

The smartphone location sharing service Foursquare has added the “Sakura Badge,” limited to the Tokyo area.  This is the first appearance of a limited badge from Foursquare in Japan. The conditions for opening a “Sakura Badge” are to follow the “Sakura Badge List” [J] with 62 spots carefully selected by Foursquare within the capital, and… Continue reading Let’s Get a Foursquare Limited Tokyo Badge!

Not Only Tokyo – Twitter Japan Adds 6 More Japanese Cities On Trending Topics

Twitter added more choices of cities on its trending keywords in Japan on February 2. There were only all-Japan and Tokyo rankings before. 6 cities, Osaka, Nagoya, Sapporo, Kyoto, Fukuoka and Sendai are the new ones. View Twitter Trends On New Japanese Cities in a full screen map There are many bigger cities than Sendai,… Continue reading Not Only Tokyo – Twitter Japan Adds 6 More Japanese Cities On Trending Topics

Nobu-nyaga’s Ambition Steps Into Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau

Koei Tecmo [J] has made a contract with Taiwan’s Cayenne Entertainment Tchnology and have announced that they will develop their currently offered social game “Nobu-nyaga’s Ambition” for Yahoo! Mobage and Mobage in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao. Koei Tecmo has also until now been developing joint service under management license contract for “Age of Discovery… Continue reading Nobu-nyaga’s Ambition Steps Into Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau

CyberAgent’s “Ameba” Tops 20 Million Users

CyberAgent [J] announced on December 30th of 2011 that the number of users of their “Ameba” [J] community has topped 20 million.  To commemorate this momentous development of the “Ameba” service, they held the 20 Million Member Breakthrough! Thank You Campaign [J] between January 10th and 23rd. Since the Ameba service opened in September of… Continue reading CyberAgent’s “Ameba” Tops 20 Million Users

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

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