The world’s No.1 PC vendor Hewlett-Packard(HP)’s Japan branch is running a new campaign “Maid in Tokyo” [J], featuring two girls from Japanese idol unit Aidoringu(made up from “Idle”+”-ing”) in maid costume, to appeal that the HP’s PC are “made in Tokyo”. According to the HP site [J], since 1999 they have been producing PC in… Continue reading Hewlett-Packard Japan’s “Maid in Tokyo” Campaign
KLab Releases Amazon Kindle Compatible Emulator In Open Source
Japanese mobile system/application developer KLab Inc. [J] announced that they had developed a clone of Kindle Developer’s Kit (KDK) and Kindle Emulator. The official KDK has been available for limited beta developers since February. Klab release said that they could not wait approval so that they built the emulator from Amazon’s specification documents. Currently, not… Continue reading KLab Releases Amazon Kindle Compatible Emulator In Open Source
Japan’s No. 1 Social Network Mixi Now Boasts 20 Million Members
Japan’s No. 1 social network Mixi [JP] just announced [JP] its member base surged past 20 million, meaning the site added 1.4 million users since the end of last year [JP] and 2.6 million registered users since June 2009 (the last time Mixi issued a press release about its member base). By way of comparison:… Continue reading Japan’s No. 1 Social Network Mixi Now Boasts 20 Million Members
Google Abolishes Japan Local President. Koichiro Tsujino Resigns This Month
Nikkei reported [J, subscription required, not permitted] that Google Japan President Koichiro Tsujino resigns at the end of this month, April 2010. Also, Google is reported to erase out the local president position from Japan branch. Google basically does not appoint a local president in other countries and Google Japan’s one was an exception. Their… Continue reading Google Abolishes Japan Local President. Koichiro Tsujino Resigns This Month
NHN Japan Buys Livedoor By $67 Million
Both NHN Japan and Livedoor confirmed NHN Japan’s purchase Livedoor from Livedoor Holdings. NHN Japan and Livedoor’s press conference starts 6:05 p.m. Japan Standard Time, broadcast also on Ustream. Video streaming by Ustream NHN Japan president Akira Morikawa(on your left) and Livedoor president Takeshi Idezawa. Morikawa explained that NHN Japan group runs Hangame and Naver… Continue reading NHN Japan Buys Livedoor By $67 Million
Pankaku Increases Capital By Allocating New Shares To Cyber Agent
Pankaku[J], a tech start-up whose iPhone game app LightBike has recorded the 1st rank in the number of paid app downloading at the U.S. AppStore, announced it had increased capital by approx. USD536,000 through the allocation of new shares to a third party accepted by Cyber Agent last month, which means Cyber Agent has taken… Continue reading Pankaku Increases Capital By Allocating New Shares To Cyber Agent
Two Twitter-related Services Introduced Last Week
User Local[J], a tech start-up who is well-known for having developed a web-based access statistics tool using heat map visualization, released “Machi-Tsui[J]” (Machi stands for a city or a town. Tsui is a Japanese abbreviation for Twitter) on Friday, which allows you to find which part of Japan or which part of a prefecture your… Continue reading Two Twitter-related Services Introduced Last Week
Video Artists To Hold Japan’s First Festival Of Movie Clips Filmed With iPhone
Now we can easily capture every frame of every scene at any time at any place with the iPhone. A variety of the iPhone apps allow us to complete high-quality video clips including adding music and sound effects. Japan’s six video artists will have an event called “iPhone 3min Movie Festival[J]” this Saturday afternoon at… Continue reading Video Artists To Hold Japan’s First Festival Of Movie Clips Filmed With iPhone
March 2010 Japan-IT Links
March news which we did not write as a dedicated article. Referred pages are all in Japanese, unless otherwise stated. Napster Japan To End Its Service At The End Of May Softbank Telecom Sells 1,200 iPhone 3GS To Uniqlo Korean BBS gathers 100,000 users for attacking 2 channel to protest Olympic figure skate critics on… Continue reading March 2010 Japan-IT Links
Less Talk, More Music. Automatic Aircheck Radio Sanyo Xacti Sound Recorder
Sanyo’s new portable FM/AM radio recorder ICR-XRS120MF [J] lets you record music. By detecting different frequency between DJ talk and songs, you may just collect music from radio wave into few giga-bytes SD card. The weight of the radio is 66g, which is the world lightest as an IC recorder with AM/FM tuner. Unfortunately, DJ… Continue reading Less Talk, More Music. Automatic Aircheck Radio Sanyo Xacti Sound Recorder