tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64800895972264275092024-03-08T01:09:57.679-08:00Tsuruaki Yukawa Official English BlogA tech book author in Japan covering technology and ZenTsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.comBlogger29125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-338566577922756262013-08-24T21:43:00.001-07:002013-08-24T21:44:41.237-07:00From Cry Baby to Bully Kazuo Inamori Story 2<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Even on the first day of the elementary school, Kazuo Inamori cried. He wrote "the moment I realized that my mother would leave me behind at school, tears welled up in my eyes and I couldn't stop crying." His mother had to stay in the classroom till the end of the day because he didn't stop crying.<br />
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He continued to be a cry baby. His family tried convincing him to go to school by himself, but to no avail. They often had to put crying Kazuo on the back of a bicycle and carried him to school.<br />
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It took him a while, but he eventually got used to the school life. He even liked studying. At the end of his first year, he got straight As.<br />
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Kagoshima, the area Inamori grew up in, is known for a strong samurai tradition. At the end of Japan's feudal times, many Kagoshima samurai's fought the Shogun government in Tokyo to bring Japan to modern age. As Inamori was raised in the culture. he became interested in the role of leader. He became a bully, he says.<br />
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He was not just a bully. He knew physical strength alone would not earn respect from his peers. He realized he had to have a strong will and a warm heart. He sometimes gave his subordinates medals of decoration made of road side weeds. He even divided his own afternoon snacks and gave them to his peers.<br />
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Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-44643303800255164292013-08-23T19:23:00.000-07:002013-08-24T21:44:13.700-07:00Cry Baby Kazuo Inamori story 1<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Kazuo Inamori is a founder of KYOCERA Corporation, which has more than 200 subsidiaries in its group. The KYOCERA group employes more than 70,000 people all over the world. <br />
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Inamori was born on January 21, 1935 in Kagoshima city. Kagoshima is located in Kyushu island. He was born as the second son among seven brothers and sisters. Around the time Inamori was born, Kesaichi, his father, started his own small printing shop. Kesaich was a quiet and honest worker, whose motivation was to do just good jobs. He was not interested in earning more than he needs to barely support his family. Inamori's mother, Kimi, on the other hand, was very energetic and cheerful person. Kimi was the one who managed everything in the house and housewives in the neighborhood who helped the print shop.<br />
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Kazuo Inamori says he inherited his fathers prudent personality. During the WW Ⅱ, Kesaich lost his print shop after many bombing which attacked Kagoshima city. Although Kimi wanted Kesaich to restart his print shop, he was reluctant to spend money to invest on new machinery. Kazuo Inamori says he is also prudent just like his father. His management style without bank borrowing shows that he took after his father.<br />
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At the same time, Kazuo Inamori, says he took after his mother's optimistic personality. He never gives up under any circumstances, and stays always cheerful even in time of trouble.<br />
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It is hard to imagine from his present success, but Kasuo Inamori says he was a cry baby when he was a boy. He followed everywhere his mother went tugging on to her Kimono sleeves. When she was busy doing her chores and leaving him alone, he just cried. He cried and cried, Kazuo Inamori says. His mother used to complained to others that once Kazuo started crying, crying lasted three hours, Kazuo says.</div>
Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-45931632991372038142013-08-23T16:39:00.000-07:002013-08-23T16:39:13.031-07:00I started reading on Kazuo Inamori, the founder of Kyocera<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I'm thinking about writing an book on zen-like spirituality among Japanese tech companies' CEOs in English. <br />
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I have started reading biographies of Japanese tech companies CEOs, and now I am reading a auto-biography of Mr. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazuo_Inamori" target="_blank">Kazuo Inamori,</a> the founder of <a href="http://global.kyocera.com/index.html" target="_blank">Kyocera</a>. It is quite an interesting story. I'd like to introduce some episodes from the book which reflect his spirituality on this blog.<br />
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Mr. Inamori was born in Kagoshima prefecture, Japan in 1932. According to his auto-biography "My resume: Kasuo Inamori, Bulliy's auto-biography," he was quite a bully when he was a boy. As he grew up, he went through many hardships; bombing during the WWⅡ, flunking, failing school entrance exams, suffering tuberculosis, and so on.<br />
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"I lost everything during the war. I couldn't get a job after the war. Nothing goes the way I want, I thought, " wrote Inamori. There are many ups and downs in life. Some people are blessed with good fortunes, others with bad fortunes. Yet kinds of events the life serves you doesn't really matter, says Inamori. What matters is how your heart handle those life events. "Through hardships you should never forget hope for bright future. When you succeed, you should never forget to thank people and to be humble," wrote Inamori.</div>
Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-85503947539814827782013-08-18T01:44:00.001-07:002013-08-18T01:44:09.082-07:00Translation of Morning Words of Tempu Nakamura<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The following words are those of Tempu Nakamura, a Japanese philosopher who have influenced many Japanese business people and politicians in the 20 century.<br />
These words to be read in the morning to energize your spirit.<br />
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Now I am born again with power, brave heart, and strong belief, in order to prove that I am such a person who is connected with the Universe by doing what such persons would do.<br />I will do my daily work with overflowing passion. I will progress with joy and appreciation.<br />I will set all my goals and all my purposes with what are definitely right.<br />I will stay always in good moods and happy and try to become somebody useful to the world.</blockquote>
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Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-59741399526874161942013-08-16T00:11:00.000-07:002013-08-16T00:11:07.783-07:00Start over again<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
It's been a while since my last post. A lot has changed. I am no longer the editor of chief of TechWave.jp, one of the leading tech blog media in Japan. Since I quit TechWave, I have been reading a lot of books on Zen and other topics. Technology is not the only field I am interested now. I am interested in any mechanism that changed the world.</div>
Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-34175943920877111332009-08-30T11:35:00.001-07:002009-09-04T14:12:14.381-07:00Japanese electionLDL lost big time! I wonder if Japan is gonna change<br />Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-27528237394224598552009-06-08T02:15:00.000-07:002009-06-08T02:17:11.716-07:00presentaion for geeks on a plane eventI'll make a brief speech at Geeks on a Place event in Tokyo tomorrow.<br />The below is the presentation file.<br /><br /><iframe src='http://docs.google.com/EmbedSlideshow?id=dgpghfd2_511f7nkq5fm' frameborder='0' width='410' height='342'></iframe>Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-89750651386195574802009-06-01T21:59:00.000-07:002009-06-02T00:46:30.519-07:00Now in Silicon ValleyI did a presentation in front of a small group of Sillicon Vally venture capitalists today. I enjoyed the conversation with them very much. It was a lot of fun. I want to do it again. The below is the presentation file I used.<br /><br /><iframe src='http://docs.google.com/EmbedSlideshow?id=dgpghfd2_470dzrbv9cp' frameborder='0' width='410' height='342'></iframe>Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-60048590349420695132009-04-01T18:41:00.001-07:002009-04-01T18:44:58.189-07:00Mobile Industry in ChinaYusuke Tanaka is one of a few Japanese who know what it is like to do mobile business in China. A member of board of executive of Fractalist, a mobile solution and mobile marketing company in Japan, Tanaka has been tackling with the rapidly changing Chinese mobile market. Fractalist established itself in Japan in 2000, and Fractalist China in China in 2003. Fractalist China's business model is rather simple, according to Tanaka, "we aim to learn from successful contents, services, technology businesses in the Japan's mobile industry and localize the business models so that they would work in China," says he. Japan is arguably the most advanced mobile market, and China is the biggest mobile market in the world and seems certain to become the center of the world mobile Internet industry in the near future. Tanaka's job is to bridge the two markets and create the world's leading mobile market within the region.<br /><br />According to iResearch inc., there are 605 million mobile phone accounts in China. Around 2000, there were only 20 million accounts but since then the number is growing steadily. Last year alone, 50 million new mobile accounts were newly created. Total population of China is vast 1 billion 300 million; only half the population own mobile phones. That means there are still plenty more room for the mobile market to grow.<br />"Some people say that the Chinese mobile market is close to saturation because the recent market growth is propelled by purchasing of second and third phones by wealthy people. it is true to some degree. I see some rich people own two phones; one regular cell phone and one smart phone. But, considering the huge total population of China, I still think there are more room to grow." says Tanaka.<br /><br /><br />Reorganization of China's mobile market<br /><br /><br />The Chinese mobile market used to be ruled by a 800 pound gorilla called China Mobile, the world largest mobile operator. However, in order to spur more competition and innovation, the Chinese government shuffled the key telecom players into three main operators. "Perhaps decreasing number of land line phone users in China made the government realize the urgent needs of fostering a healthy mobile phone industry in China," says Tanaka.<br />China Mobile merged China Tietong, formally called China Railcom, the third largest fixed-line operator in China. According to Wikipedia, China Tietong's main areas of business are providing ADSL and dial-up Internet services and selling back haul on their nationwide backbone network.<br />China Unicom has been the number 2 mobile operator in China. The company had two mobile networks base on two different mobile technologies; one is called GSM and the other is CDMA. According to its annual report, as of Jun 30, 2008, China Unicom had 127.60 million GSM subscribers and 43.17 million CDMA subscribers.<br />China Unicom sold the CDMA business to China Telecom, the nation's number one fixed line operator, and instead merged with China Netcom who has fixed-line networks in northern China.<br />China Telecom, which was formally a state-owned monopoly but transferred its assets in China's 10 northern provinces to China Netcom in 2002, now has a fixed line business in 21 southern provinces and the CDMA businesses transferred from China Unicom.<br />China Mobile, China Telecom, and China Unicom; now they all have both fixed line and mobile operations.<br /><br /><br />new China Mobile = China Mobile(mobile operator) + China Railcom(land line operator)<br />new China Telecom = China Telecom(land line operator in southern China) + China Unicom's CDMA business(mobile)<br />new China Unicom = old China Unicom(CDMA + GSM) - CDMA business + China Netcom(land line + satellite)<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />In January 2009, the Chinese government formally awarded 3rd generation mobile operators licences. "As a matter of fact, I haven't met a single person who has a 3rd generation mobile phone in China yet, except a few governmental workers whose jobs are related to 3rd generation phones," said Tanaka. As of today, most Chinese mobile market is still based on 2nd generation technologies.<br />However it will be a matter of time before the Chinese mobile phone market will be dominated by 3rd generation mobile phones. In 2008 Chinese government had China mobile start a trial service of home grown 3rd generation technology called TD-SCDMA to be showcased in Beijing Olympics which took place the same year. After the Olympics, <a title="China Mobile continues to deploy TD-SCDMA services in eight cities" href="http://wirelessfederation.com/news/6872-td-scdma-rollout-ongoing/" id="fpji">China Mobile was formally awarded the licence and continued to deploy TD-SCDMA services in eight cities</a> such as Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Shenyang, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Qinhuangdao and Xiamen. Some observers thought the Chinese government was hoping to make TD-SCDMA as the world's de facto standard of 3rd generation mobile technology. With China's more than 6 hundred million mobile users which is still growing steadily, making TD-SCDMA as the world standard is not such a far-fetched dream. Still in January 2009, China decided to licence competing 3G technologies to remaining key mobile operators; China Unicom got licenced to operate a 3G network with a technology called W-CDMA in 252 places in the nation from May, and China Telecom got awarded a licence to operate with another technology called CDMA2000 in Beijing and other places.<br />The reason why the Chines government didn't to mandate all the mobile operators to use the home grown TD-SCDMA is unknown. Perhaps, the government may not be confident enough of this newly developed technology's maturity and stability. "How prevalent TD-SCDMA will be in the world market depends on how much the Chinese government push the technology. It still remains to be seen," said Tanaka.<br /><br />According to Research data Mr. Tanaka has seen, China Mobile has a market share of about 60 to 70 percent. China Telecom has a 10% share which is the CDMA business it has just purchased from China Unicom. China Unicom in turn has a remaining GSM business which accounts for about 20% of the market. With new 3G services starting, these market shares might change drastically. Especially China Telecom which just entered the mobile market, is very aggressive about its new data services, said Mr. Tanaka.<br /><br />With its large mobile user base, the mobile paid-contents market in China is sizable also. Paid contents such as ring tones, pictures, ring back tones consists of 100 billion Chinese yuan market. Especially ring back tones are very popular in China. According to some research, in 2008 160 million people are said to be using ring back tones.<br /><br />Fractalist establish a local subsidiary called Fractalist China in 2003.<br />It was one of many Japanese mobile contents/services companies who tried to enter the Chinese market which already seemed very promising. They were the companies which enjoyed pretty profitable successes in Japan's the i-mode Internet service. Most of the companies thought they can simply duplicate in Chinese market what they did successfully in Japan.<br />"It was a little too early," said Tanaka. The i-mode is a closed network, but it looks like the PC web; information was transmitted not via email but through browsers. Chines paid-contents market was consisted mostly of sales using SMS. Users order ring tones and images on web site using personal computers, and receive them as mobile phone's short message attachment. Browser based network like the i-mode was available at that time, but the network technology was still very slow 2nd generation. Rich contents which Japanese companies made might have been sold well in Japan, but were too big in data size for the slow connection in China. Japanese companies, therefore, resorted to create smaller size contents with a limited creative expression. As a result, there weren't any notable difference between Japanese and Chinese contents.<br />"The difference in the levels of contents were not big enough for Chinese users to chose Japanese contents over Chinese contents," analysed Tanaka.<br />"Almost all Japanese contents makers closed shop in China around 2005."<br />Fractalist at first wanted to operate a contents aggregation site; a site which showcase array of Japanese creators' contents. Realizing the difficulty of recreate Japan's success in mobile contents business in China, however, Fractalist decided to concentrate on mobile marketing business. Around 2001 and 2002, a new type of mobile marketing using QR codes sprung up in Japan. QR codes are two dimensional bar codes. For it is two dimensional, QR codes are able to contain bigger data than traditional bar codes you find on consumer products. Many mobile phones with camera capability in Japan are equipped with QR code readers. When you activate the camera on your mobile phone, usually you can select QR code reader capability in the menu selection. Then you hold the phone close enough to a QR code printed on paper, so that the camera lens can capture a clear image of a QR code. After the camera capability of the phone adjust the focus automatically, QR code reader capability decodes the QR code into an alphanumeric data, which usually is an URL of a web site. When you click the URL, then, the browser of the phone gets booted up and shows the web site on mobile phone's screen.<br />In Japan, you can find QR codes on posters, magazine advertisement page, and business cards. QR codes on business cards usually lead you to the company web sites.<br />The type of mobile campaign using QR codes which started around 2002 is cold "must buy campaign," or "serial closed campaign" among marketers. One of the early practitioner of this type of mobile campaign was a Japanese soft drink maker, Kirin Beverage. The soft drink maker printed QR codes on coffee cans and urged consumers to access the company web site to apply for an campaign. The campaign turned out to be a great success, and many other consumer product manufacturers follow suit and tried similar QR code campaign.<br />Borrowing a page from the book, Fractalist approached Chinese companies with similar marketing plan utilising QR codes, and Chinese soft drink makers and other companies decide to try out the approach in China.<br />"Usually a consumer products company tries out this type of campaign hoping to increase customer loyalty and its brand power," says Tanaka. "Interestingly, however, we found out there are additional merits in this type of campaigns when you execute them in China."<br />It is said that copy cats and pirates products are a big problem in China. Microsoft says<br /><br />QR code campaigns can counter attack piracy problems says Tanaka. By including a product serial number in QR code's data. consumer who purchased genuine products can only apply for the campaign. Usually serial numbers are allocated based on some inside rules. Outsiders and piracy manufacturers have no way of knowing the inside rules. Applicants with serial numbers which dd not follow the inside rules and already used numbers would be disqualified from the campaign.<br /><br />Additionally, QR code campaigns could give manufactures some valuable marketing data. In China, sales channels can be very complex and manufacturers do not always have clear understanding of when, where, and how many of which products are being sold. During QR code campaigns, however, people apply for the campaign usually right after they purchased the products. From the past experience, Fractalist knows for a fact that a certain percentage of people who purchased a certain type of products apply for QR code campaign. With this knowledge, a manufacturer could tell about how many products are being sold this right minutes in which part of China.<br /><br />Even though SMS was one of the main reasons why Chinese users would use mobile data services at that time, eventually users would start accessing mobile sites more, thought Tanaka. So Fractalist approached a company which operates China's number one mobile portal site; China Mobile. Fractalist has become the media representative of China Mobile. "People ask me why a start-up like Fractalist got to have become the China's number one mobile portal's only one media rep," Tanaka smiled, "I guess China Mobile got interested in our ability of creating tremendous amount of data traffic through off line campaigns."<br /><br />Today, as the media rep of China Mobile, Fractalist negotiate with ad agencies and large advertisers and sell all the ad spaces in China Mobile's portal site. Fractalist also advise China Mobile on promotional campaigns and provide ad server and other ad related technological support. Fractalist and China Mobile co-develop media sites also, Tanaka says.<br />"As a rule, we sell China Mobile site's ad spaces through ad agencies. Sometimes though, we talk directly to large advertisers, because some advertisers still do not know how effective mobile ads are, and it is better we explain to them directly instead of talking through ad agencies," Tanaka says.<br />Today, in addition to China Mobile's portal, Fractalist has become one of the two media representatives of China Unicom's portal site and the portal site of Nokia, which has the top share in China's mobile handset market.<br />Tanaka proudly declare "through Fractalist you can reach a large mobile population in China."<br />But what about other sites? What happens to sites other than portals, one may wonder.<br />Traditionally, sites other than portal couldn't receive meaningful amount of page views with out large portals help in the mobile web, because there haven't been good enough mobile search technology availabe.<br /><br /><br />Google's famed Page Rank technology basically rates the importance and relevance of a web page based on how many other important pages link to that page. The technology works only when there were a large number of pages linking to each other. The freely linking culture was established on the PC web in the relatively early days of the Internet, but on the mobile web links were usually limited within the same sites. It is because, in mobile space, the sender of information and the receiver of information have been two different groups and the two rarely have merged.<br />Until recently even in Japan, a country arguably is most advanced in terms of mobile applications, most mobile users activities are limited to exchanging emails and reading web sites. Blogs and SNSs have been popular on the mobile web for some time now, yet most mobile phones don't have the HTML authoring ability. Even today mobile blogs usually consist of text and pictures; no links.<br />Without the mutually linking culture you witness on the PC web, the mobile search tools don't work as well. Search result pages often filled with a list of irrelevant pages, so that users prefer portal site's directories over search tools.<br />Since many people have been relying on mobile portal's directory listings, portals have been literally the "portal" to the mobile we. At one point, portals have become very powerful over contents providers because portals can decide the orders of contents providers listings within certain categories. Portals literally can decide which contents providers to live, and which to die.<br />However, with a gradual advancement of mobile search technology and a sheer power of word of mouth, sites which are not even listed on portal sites began to be popular among mobile users. Those sites which have not received portal's approvals or blessings are called off-deck sites; in China they are called "free WAP site."<br />Fractalist provide ads to those off-deck site through systems called ad networks.<br /><br />Types of advertisers<br /><br />According to Tanaka, the largest mobile advertisers in China is the automotive industry. Tanaka says, "It is probably because that people who own mobile phones are wealthier than people who don't own mobile phones, therefore the mobile users are deemed more prone to purchase cars."<br />Next to the automobile industry which consist of about 20% of the Chinese mobile market, financial industry, such as online bank, and online stock, are big ad spenders with about 15% of market share, followed by cosmetics, digital products, and drinks.<br /><br />cautions before entering the market<br /><br />Although there is no doubt Chinese mobile market has a potential to be a lucrative market. There are risks that oversee players need to consider before entering the market, Tanaka cautions. For example, in order to be a Internet contents provider in China, a foreign company needs to acquire a licence called Internet Contents Provider licence from the Chinese government. After joining WTO, Chinese government gives foreign companies equal opportunities to receive the licence, yet it is not a simple task for foreign companies which are not familiar with the process. On top of that, if a company wants to charge for their contents, it needs to apply for a online charging licence which is not easy licence to acquire even for local Chinese companies since one of the requirement for the licence is companies need to have a capital of 10 million yuan or larger. Even if a company acquire these two licences from the government, it still need to negotiate with mobile portals in order to be listed in one of their content categories.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-64127077869024397822009-02-24T17:04:00.000-08:002009-02-24T23:45:47.366-08:00Is Asia the center of mobile universe?I wonder if Asia is the center of the world's mobile industry. Many mobile industry people I talk to tend to think that way, but is it really so? When it comes to handset makers, Japan indeed has more than its share of manufacturers. We have many internationally know consumer electronics brands, such as Sony, Panasonic, and Sharp, just to name a few. Yet the biggest mobile handset manufacture in the world right now is Finland's Nokia. According to IDC, the US research company, Nokia has a lion's share of 39.1% of the world's mobile handset market in the fourth quarter of 2008. Korea's Samson is the distant second with 18.3% share. Also Korea's LG Electronics came in third with mere 8.9%. Japanese consumer electronics big names, as a matter of fact, are grouped together as "the rest"; they don't have a meaningful presence in the world's mobile handset market.<br />All right, forget about handsets. Let's look at mobile operating systems.<br />Personal computers have operating systems such as Windows, Apple's OS X, and Linux. Just like PCs, mobile phones have the operating systems also. Traditionally, handset manufacturers have their own home grown operating systems, but in order to cut cost, the industry has been desiring the common operating system so that they would not have to develop the whole software from the scratch. If the basic functionalities, such as making phone calls or sending emails, are handled by the operating system, the manufacturers can concentrate their resources to develop other functionalities to differentiate from competitors. Indeed, some manufactures get together to form industry wide consortiums to develop an operating systems as a common platform. LiMo is one of those endeavours that the industry players working on. Symbian is another operating system, developed by Nokia; but Nokia made the operating system as open source so that anyone in the industry can use the software.<br />On November 5, 2007, Google, the US Internet giant, sent a shock wave across the mobile industry, announcing that they were going to develop an open source mobile operating system and would make it free of charge for any mobile handset makers to install on their handsets.<br /> Again, no Asian companies playing major roles in the mobile operating systems space.<br /> So why some Asian mobile players still think that Asia is the center of the mobile industry.<br /> There are two reasons I think: sheer numbers and advanced functionalities.<br />In developing counties, it is said more people access the Internet via mobile phones rather than personal computers. Owning a PC for occasional information gatherings may not be very cost effective for not so wealthy people in redeveloping countries. Compared to PCs, mobile phones are affordable and offer great utility even for people who are not technologically savvy. Anyone who purchases a mobile phone can talk with land line phones users from day one. Therefore it make more sense for a person with not much disposable income to own a phone rather than a PC. Even voice communication is what prompts people to purchase a mobile phone, today's most mobile phones are equipped to access the Internet. Though the person at first may not realise the significance of the Internet functionalities, eventually he or she would find out that the mobile phone is something that is able to open up the window to the world way beyond the every day life .<br />Richard Robinson who attended the Infinity Ventures Summit 2008 Fall in Miyazaki, Japan, and spoke in a panel discussion titled "Asia is the center of mobile universe" knows the potential of Asia's mobile market. He has been working in the Internet, mobile industry in China more than twelve years, travelling constantly from a city to a city in Asian countries. <a href="http://kookypanda.com/">Kooky Panda</a>, his company, develops Flash based contents for mobile web sites almost all countries in Asia. Still the company doesn't have a foothold in either Korea or Japan. "Korea and Japan are two markets that are extremely advanced and attractive but I don't think that many companies are able to crack the markets. So we didn't even attempt to enter Korea or Japan, " said Richard. "The rest of the Asia Pacific, if you look at the sheer numbers, is quite attractive. Almost half of global population is in Asia. Almost half of the world Internet population is also in Asia. So you can't ignore it," says Richard. According to Robinson, Indonesia is a country with the third largest mobile market in Asia besides China and India. As the world's fourth-most populous nation with some 238 million total population, of which about 150 millions are mobile users. In comparison, there are only 25 million PC Internet users. "5 to 1 ratio," said Robinson. "And there are very limited domestic development, not a lot of fore players in the market. We enter the market last year, this year we are number one player in the market. "<br /> Bin Liu, CEO of <a href="http://www.yicha.cn/">Yicha Online</a>, China's number one mobile search engine company thinks that number is power. Liu, who spoke in the same panel of Infinity Venture Summit as Robinson, says that Asia is leading mobile Internet space with its big user base. According to Liu, mobile viruses are infecting many mobile phones in China. "Perhaps, mobile viruses are something unheard of in the US or Europe," he said. Because of the large user base, problems such as viruses emerges first in China. Yet then in turn, solutions for problems also emerge first in China: There is a mobile security company in China now. The name of the company is <a href="http://www.netqin.com/english/">NetQin Tech. Co., Ltd</a>. "NetQin is a biggest mobile security company in the world," said Liu .<br /><br />On top of sheer number, Asia, especially Japan, has advanced technologies also. In fact, Japan has been introducing many new mobile applications to the world. NTT docomo, Japan's largest mobile operator, has started the "i-mode" service in 200 . It has become the world's first successful mobile Internet service. Camera phone was first deployed by J-phone, another mobile operator in Japan. J-phone was purchased by Softbank, Japan's Internet conglomerate, and now has become Softbank Mobile.<br />Today, Japan has the largest user base of 3G phones in the world. Average phones in Japan have camera, TV, bar code reader, and Internet browser capabilities, and many advanced phones have GPS and electric money functions.<br />It is true that Apple's i-Phone and Google's Android based phones are technologically very advanced. Yet, basic technologies in those phones have been well into use by Japanese phones some years ago. i-Phone 3G sale was reported with such a fanfare by the Japanese press, yet it hasn't necessarily swept the Japanese market.<br /><br />"Asia is cell phone centric," said Bin Liu, of <a href="http://www.yicha.cn/">Yicha</a>, "neither iPhone or Android has made any big progress." "Japan and China are largest mobile Internet countries in the world," said Liu.<br /><br /><br /><br />This article is a part of the draft for a book I am writing in English right now. Please let me know if there is any misspelling or factual errors.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-4491033252348355432009-02-02T18:58:00.000-08:002009-02-02T23:21:57.853-08:00SoundCode: URL as a sound"I drive my wife to the train station everyday. While driving, we listen to the radio. Sometimes the radio says, 'for more information, please access the following URL,' and starts spelling out the entire URL starting with 'www. ' What are they thinking? It's impossible to jog down the entire URL while driving!," says Taka Tsukuma of<a href="http://www.fieldsystem.co.jp/field/jpn/index.html"> Fieldsystems</a>, a Japanese mobile content company.<br /> "I wanted to develop something like QR code with sound. I wanted a sound version of QR code," says Tsukuma.<br /> QR code is a two dimensional bar code, that is widely used in Japan. Usually less than a square inch, QR codes can be printed on various surfaces. Advertising pages in magazines, and posters on subway wall sometimes have QR codes printed also. Some business people print QR codes on their business cards prompting people to access their company's' web sites.<br /> Most mobile phones in Japan have cameras equipped, and the cameras double as QR codes readers. You activate the camera and hold the cell phone over a QR code. If the camera successfully recognizes the QR code, the cell phone convert the code into a URL. Then using the cell phone's web browser, you can access the <span class="misspell" suggestions="UR L's,UR-L's,URLs,Erl's,El's">URL's</span> web page. With QR codes you don't have to type in a long URL while typing a long URL can be quite a hassle using cell phone's only ten keys.<br /> Since with QR codes the camera of the cell phone has become an inputting device for the cell phone's web browses, could not the microphone of the cell phone be also an inputting device? All the cell phones are equipped with microphones any way. If a sound has become a convertible code, accessing web can be a much easier task using cell phones, Tsukuma thought to himself.<br /> His company, Fieldsystems is one of the successful cell phone web creators in Japan. Specializing on FLASH technology, the company is well known for user-friendly cell phone web pages. It runs 10 successful cell phone specific web sites under Japan's three major cell phone operators.<br /> After putting some time and effort, Tsukuma and his company developed a technology that converts a text into a sound. They name the technology SoundCode. According to Tsukuma the technology can convert a text message that can be up to 2048 alphabet letters long into a sound. When converted into a sound, a message of 2048 letters is about seven tenths of a second long. Considering most URLs are less than 40 letters long, typical SoundCode can be about one hundreds of a second.<br /> SoundCode itself is audible to human ears. However SoundCode can be hidden between other sounds such as human voices and music. In order to recognize a SoundCode, a special software needed to be installed onto cell phones This special software can recognize a SoundCode as small as minus 30 decibels of surrounding sounds. In other words, you can input a SoundCodes as a very small sound in-between regular conversational voices, and the software can still recognize the small sound as a SoundCode and convert it into a URL.<br /> Although SoundCode is a analog sound, it has many digital sound characteristics, according to Tsukuma. For instance, it is as easy to find the beginning of the SoundCode as an digital sound. SoundCode also has an ability to revise itself just like a digital sound can. Even the cell phone can recognize only broken parts of a SoundCode, by repeating the SoundCode several times the cell phone collects unbroken parts of the SoundCode and combine them into a whole code.<br /> In order to broadcast SoundCode, the broadcast station needs a special encoder software installed onto a personal computer. The process of generating SoundCode is very simple. You type in a URL into the PC, then the software generates a SoundCode. The software also is capable of mapping the SoundCode to hide in between the broadcast sound, so that the listeners don't realize the existence of the SoundCode.<br /> It may be a good idea to announce the airing of the SoundCode, in order to prompt the listeners to activate the software on their cell phones in time.<br /> "I want every cell phone to have a capability of SoundCode someday. For that goal, first I want to develop the decoder software download-able by any cell phones. But in the end, I want SoundCode technology to be embedded onto the cell phone IC chip, " says Tsukuma. "I look forward to the day that every cell phone has a SoundCode hardware button. With one push of the button, the SoundCode decoder and microphone are activated and pick up a SoundCode in the air, and convert it into a URL," says Tsukuma.<br /> There are many possible applications of SoundCode. Broadcasting SoundCode, something that made Tsukuma to develop the technology in the first place, is just one of those possible applications.<br /> You can broadcast SoundCode at shopping malls between background music, said Tsukuma. You can program speakers at a different location within a mall to air a different SoundCode, so that the shopper can download the near-by shops sales information over the cell phone.<br /> SoundCode can be almost inaudible therefore you can broadcast it in quiet places such as museums. Museum goers can access to web pages which explain the near-by displays.<br /> SoundCode can be embedded in TV dramas. If a viewer happen to like what an actress is wearing, by activating the cell phone microphone and receiving a SoundCode, the viewer may access the shopping site that sells that particular dress.<br /> As a matter of the fact, with SoundCode you can send a URL to consumers in any type of environments where there is a speaker.<br /> SoundCode has won a I*deal competition, a mobile business model idea contest sponsored by Mitsui Ventures on January 20, 2009.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-77799617247895379422009-01-13T22:27:00.001-08:002009-01-13T22:27:42.957-08:00Google doesn't intend to monopolise the mobile OS Market with AndroidMr. Takeshi Natsuno, one of the key persons who created i-mode, Japan's NTT Docomo's famed mobile Internet service, said something very interesting at Japan's Broadband Association's panel discussion the other day.<br /> The following is his comment.<br /><br /> Most Japanese people misunderstand what Google is trying to do. If Google wants to monopolise the mobile OS market with Android, why is it that Google supplies their web services such as gmail and Google maps to iPhone and other competing platforms.<br /> Google's intention is simple, I think. They just want to advance the mobile Internet to the level of PC Internet.<br /> Nokia has a wonderful share in the world cell phone market. Yet average Nokia phones' Internet ability is nothing Japanese users regard as an acceptable level. Except for the high end handsets which has the functionalities similar to Japanese handsets, the majority of Nokia phones are not easy to use for Japanese users.<br /> It is because Nokia is a hand set maker. Selling hand sets is their business goal. Whether or not the user access the Internet with the phone has little to do with their bottom-line. Europe's mobile Internet usage in terms of the average user's total data packets usage is very low compared to that of Japan. <br /> I think many people misunderstand Google. Google developed Android because of frustration. Google is frustrated by the status of today's mobile Internet. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, once said that he wished what is happening in the Japanese mobile Internet space would happen world wide also. Google looked around to see where the bottle neck of the mobile Internet, what is wrong with mobile Internet system. And they found out the mobile operating system is what hinders the mobile Internet from advancing itself. So they decided to develop the operating system themselves and give it to anybody for free. <br /> If monopolising the mobile OS market is their goal, they would have charged for the OS licencing, I think.<br /> They give out the OS free, and they supply their services for the competing platforms as long as there are strong user bases in order to advance the mobile Internet environment. They do so because advancing mobile Internet environment is also good for Google's advertising businesses. In order to fight back the threat from Android, Symbian decided to give out their own version of Symbian OS for free. But, that is also good for Google, because the more users access the Internet, the more people probably use Google's search and other services, that in turn would benefit the Google's advertising businesses.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-34423394953525310422008-12-15T21:48:00.000-08:002008-12-15T22:01:56.416-08:00Manga GetI have written about the mobile novel <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">phenomenon</span> in Japan and how it is not a birth of new <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">genre</span> of novels but is a birth of a new form of communication.<br />Authors write stories using cell phones, upload them onto novel sites. As soon as a new story or a chapter is uploaded, readers read it and leave comments. The authors read comments and fine-tunes the story lines. Thus, mobile novels are written through this collaboration between authors and readers. This is why I say that it is a new form of communication. It's a form of communication centered around contents called mobile novels.<br /><a href="http://author.mang.jp/"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Manga</span> Get</a> is a service which promotes a new form of communication, this time, centered around cartoons.<br />The service provides<a href="http://author.mang.jp/"> a PC based Web site</a> for uploading cartoons, and a mobile site for viewing the cartoons.<br />The authors draw cartoons on a piece of paper, scan the paper, and upload the data to the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Manga</span> Get PC site. The site automatically cuts up the cartoons into indivisual frames which then are optimized for the cell phones' small screens.<br />Once all this is done, readers can view the cartoons using their cell phones. Readers can become fans of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">particular</span> authors, leave comments, or communicate with other fans using <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">bulletin</span> board systems(BBS). In effect, it is a social-networking-service(SNN) type community which centers around cartoons. <br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Mang</span> Get is run by a Japanese start-up called <a href="http://www.spicysoft.com/"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Spicysoft</span></a>.<br />Like other online communities, advertisement is the base of their business model. They also sell members virtual goods such as clothes and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">accessories</span> for the members avatars.<br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Spicysoft</span> said they plan to share the revenue with popular authors. With magazine market in Japan is shrinking fast, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Spicysoft</span> hope to create a new marketplace to mach authors and readers.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-27767855605990913982008-12-14T19:56:00.000-08:002008-12-14T20:03:04.273-08:00Next book is on mobile and AsiaI have started collecting information on the Internet business in Asia. Especially I am interested in mobile space. I can collect information on Japanese mobile business without a problem, but I think it will be a bit harder to collect Korean and Chinese information. Any help on collecting Korean and Chinese information would be greatly appreciated.<br />This time I am going to write a book in English, and English only. I don't plan to write a book on this topic in Japanese.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-65313595102378614672008-12-10T17:36:00.000-08:002008-12-10T17:39:05.545-08:00mobile p2p framework "Spear"<a title="Yoshidakamagasako Inc" href="http://www.yoshidakamagasako.com/" id="dc6t">Yoshidakamagasako Inc</a>.'s mobile p2p framework "Spear" would make cell phones to communicate data without going through the cell phone operators' central servers.<br />Data from one cell phone is routed to the other at the local router level instead, therefore it takes much less time to communicate data between two phone sets.<br />While the response time of going through the central server is around a few seconds, by routing at the local level data travels almost real time to the other phone.<br />Yoshidakamagasako Inc also developed multi-cast framework called "Spear Multi." With Spear Multi, time lag doesn't increase as much even the number of the cell phone increases. With other typical P2P framework, it takes four times longer to finish sending data as the number of cell phone increases.<br /><div id="fsi2" style="padding: 1em 0pt; text-align: left;"><img style="width: 310px; height: 300px;" src="http://docs.google.com/File?id=dgpghfd2_387gzbsqjf5_b" /></div>This near real time data communication enables quick response multi-player games such as table tennis.<br />Although you can do the similar games using blue tooth technology, with Spear p2p framework you can play with way beyond the blue tooth signal range which said to be around 10 meters.<br />First applications of this technology are games, of course. P2P games are already available to the general public in Japan through NTT docomo, au and other cell phone operators. Square-Enix just released a game called "<a title="Demon Chain" href="http://www.square-enix.co.jp/mobile/sem/demon_chain/vs-battle/index.html" id="x7_u">Demon Chain</a>" using Spear.<br />Other application may be real time handwritten chat on touch screen smart phones. After display the same map on two smart phones touch screens, one users' handwritten messages and images such as arrows on the map would show up on the other users screen. Sharp started a handwritten chat software called "<a title="Tegaki Chat" href="http://tegakichat.jp/" id="x-.:">Tegaki Chat</a>" on smart phones using the Spear technology.<br />Demonstration video can be downloaded <a title="here" href="http://www.yoshidakamagasako.com/demo/SpearMulti_Demo2.mpg" id="vvuf">here</a>.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-48947951675614807972008-11-12T16:15:00.000-08:002008-11-12T22:09:55.812-08:00Infinity Ventures Summit Fall 2008 and Jason CalacanisI am attending Infinity Ventures Summit Fall 2008 in Miyazaki. This is my second IVS to attend. This time more than 300 start-up entrepreneurs from Japan, Asia, the US, and Autralia.<br />Before IVS, I was honored to have a chance to interview <a href="http://calacanis.com/">Jason Calacanis</a> of <a href="http://mahalo.com/">Mahalo</a>.<br />Here are videos of the interviews.<br /><br /><div class="flipclip"><script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.flipclip.net/js/d7a801f588d6917f61b253ee94f398a8" ></script><noscript><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/d7a801f588d6917f61b253ee94f398a8/popup" title="FlipClip - JasonTrust" target="flclpopup"><img src="http://www.flipclip.net/thumbs/clip/tsuruaki/d7a801f588d6917f61b253ee94f398a8.jpg" alt="JasonTrust" border="0" /></a><br />Powered by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/" title="動画共有・動画投稿 FlipClip">FlipClip</a></noscript><br /><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/d7a801f588d6917f61b253ee94f398a8">JasonTrust</a><br />by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki">tsuruaki</a><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/videos/tsuruaki/d7a801f588d6917f61b253ee94f398a8.mov"></a></div><br /><br /><br /><div class="flipclip"><script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.flipclip.net/js/b56dca15a87b274e515da3680f5c4314" ></script><noscript><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/b56dca15a87b274e515da3680f5c4314/popup" title="FlipClip - jasoncloud" target="flclpopup"><img src="http://www.flipclip.net/thumbs/clip/tsuruaki/b56dca15a87b274e515da3680f5c4314.jpg" alt="jasoncloud" border="0" /></a><br />Powered by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/" title="動画共有・動画投稿 FlipClip">FlipClip</a></noscript><br /><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/b56dca15a87b274e515da3680f5c4314">jasoncloud</a><br />by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki">tsuruaki</a><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/videos/tsuruaki/b56dca15a87b274e515da3680f5c4314.mov"></a></div><br /><br /><br /><br /><div class="flipclip"><script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.flipclip.net/js/2489afeeafe02c942db8cc3d7bf8ec66" ></script><noscript><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/2489afeeafe02c942db8cc3d7bf8ec66/popup" title="FlipClip - riff-off" target="flclpopup"><img src="http://www.flipclip.net/thumbs/clip/tsuruaki/2489afeeafe02c942db8cc3d7bf8ec66.jpg" alt="riff-off" border="0" /></a><br />Powered by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/" title="動画共有・動画投稿 FlipClip">FlipClip</a></noscript><br /><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/2489afeeafe02c942db8cc3d7bf8ec66">riff-off</a><br />by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki">tsuruaki</a><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/videos/tsuruaki/2489afeeafe02c942db8cc3d7bf8ec66.mov"></a></div>Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-78482614231150844192008-06-19T22:01:00.000-07:002008-06-19T22:04:20.221-07:00story on Nico Nico DougaWired runs an interesting story on Nico Nico Douga and Hiroyuki.<br /><a href="http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/magazine/16-06/mf_hiroyuki">Meet Hiroyuki Nishimura, the Bad Boy of the Japanese Internet<br /></a>Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-26417510228515772512008-06-05T19:25:00.000-07:002008-06-05T19:30:22.902-07:00Infinity Ventures Summit Spring 2008 in Sapporo, JapanI am attending Infinity Ventures Summit Spring 2008 in Sapporo, Japan. It is an invitation-only technology conference for technology start-ups. This year, about 320 CEOs and COOs of Japanese technology start-ups are attending. According to Mr. Masashi Kobayashi, a well-known venture capitalist who organizes this event, attendants from overseas more than doubled to 35 this year. US web 2.0 companies such as meebo, seasmic, admobs and others are here, and established tech companies from Taiwan, mainland Chine, and Korea are giving speeches. I spoke with a couple of Chinese entrepreneurs; they are SOOO interesting! One of them told me that the US companies will not be able to "rule the Chinese markets." According to him, a Chinese search company is way ahead of Google China in terms of search market share, and some top management in Google China left the company already. One Korean attendee told me that the US companies don't understand the local markets. "They hire English speaking local people who have had no experience in local tech industries, just because their English speaking ability. So most of them fail miserably." One Taiwanese company said Apple's iTunes have no significant presence in Chinese market. What matters in online businesses is community, and in order to establish self-sufficient communities in local markets, you have to understand the local culture, he said.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-57151241010584640632008-05-22T18:32:00.000-07:002008-05-22T19:18:03.362-07:00DoubleClick Interview<div class="flipclip"><script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.flipclip.net/js/bfa5fec74a1e64c2c1147d84b9d12d05"></script><noscript><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/bfa5fec74a1e64c2c1147d84b9d12d05/popup" title="FlipClip - ダブルクリック" target="flclpopup"><img src="http://www.flipclip.net/thumbs/clip/tsuruaki/bfa5fec74a1e64c2c1147d84b9d12d05.jpg" alt="ダブルクリック" border="0" /></a><br />Powered by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/" title="動画共有・動画投稿 FlipClip">FlipClip</a></noscript><br />[<a href="http://www.flipclip.net/tags/%E3%83%80%E3%83%96%E3%83%AB%E3%82%AF%E3%83%AA%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF">ダブルクリック</a>]<br /><a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/bfa5fec74a1e64c2c1147d84b9d12d05">ダブルクリック</a><br />by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki">tsuruaki</a><br /><br />The interview took place last year in Tokyo. The above video is a digest version. You can listen to the entire interview by clicking the download botton below.<br /><p>「DoubeleClick interview MP3」 <a href="http://it.blog-jiji.com/0001/files/itblog_0215.mp3" target="_blank"><img src="http://neom.cocolog-nifty.com/img/content/btn_download.gif" border="0" /></a><br /></p><br /></div>Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-61098777858583211872008-05-21T18:03:00.000-07:002008-06-05T19:28:47.888-07:00<br id="v73g0"> <div id="o::h0" class="flipclip"> <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/clips/tsuruaki/f6abf23c3cf43feb05fd5c92bb4abf3f/popup" title="FlipClip - Josh James" target="flclpopup"><img src="http://www.flipclip.net/thumbs/clip/tsuruaki/f6abf23c3cf43feb05fd5c92bb4abf3f.jpg" alt="Josh James" border="0" /></a><br /> Powered by <a href="http://www.flipclip.net/" title="動画共有・動画投稿 FlipClip">FlipClip</a><br id="fp6_0"><br id="fp6_1">This is a video clip I took when I interview Josh James, CEO of Omniture, in March.<br id="fp6_2"></div> Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-34582198124918029272008-05-07T17:32:00.000-07:002008-05-07T17:41:08.434-07:00digital Signage blogMy good friend <a id="iuwa0" href="http://www.dailydooh.com/contributors#Manolo_Almagro">Manolo Almagro</a> let me know about this blog, <a id="iuwa1" href="http://www.dailydooh.com/">Digital Out of Home.</a><br id="iuwa2">Digital Signage is one of the fields that Japanese large electronics makers are interested in.<br id="iuwa3">The blog will be a good source of information! Thanks Manolo-san.<br id="iuwa4">Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-2500379762352946162008-05-01T17:38:00.000-07:002008-05-07T17:52:49.460-07:00Old and New merge on Nico Nico Douga<iframe width="312" height="176" src="http://www.nicovideo.jp/thumb/sm2965330" scrolling="no" style="border:solid 1px #CCC;" frameborder="0"><a href="http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm2965330">【ニコニコ動画】 ポリ幾三 </a></iframe>This is an example of Nico Nico Douga. What's different from YouTube is that you can post messages on screen. See the example above. Traditional Japanese song is mixed with techno-pops music. Nico Nico Douga is way more popular han YouTube among Japanese teenagersTsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-86541116289341623722008-04-30T18:04:00.000-07:002008-05-01T17:43:50.565-07:00Moba-ge-town<img id="o6in0" style="margin: 1em 1em 0pt 0pt; width: 102px; height: 402px; float: left;" src="http://docs.google.com/File?id=dgpghfd2_193hdqdpccm_b" /> I have been saying that cell phones are the ultimate form of SNS because the phonebooks being real social graphs. If that's the case, all the development we see in the PC based web are going to apply to the cell phone space in the near future, especially new types of ad technologies such as social ads. What's more, cell phone being a bridge between virtual and real worlds, possibility of the cell phone web can go well beyond the PC web. That' why I have been keeping an eye on new developments in the cell phone SNS space.<br /> One of the fascinating success stories in the space is Moba-ge-town run by DeNA, a net auction company in Japan. The site started as a free game site. Isao Moriyasu who is in charge of the site, told me that he had known Moba-ge-town would be successful. He knew users would flock to the site, because at that time most game sites in the cell phone space charged a fee to play a game. "But I didn't expect we would be this popular at such an early stage," said Moriyasu. <br /> Moriyasu made a couple of fantastic moves. The first is that he made a site a SNS. Atracting young users with free games, Moba-ge-town then let users form communities. After establishing one of the largest SNS in the cell phone space, Moriyasu is transforming the site into a portal. "Rival is Yahoo!" says Moriyasu.<br /> Another fascinating move he made was having both contents and a monetization process ready from the beginning. DeNA, being an auction and affiliate service provider, had a cell phone affiliate service called "Pocket Affiliate" ready and going when Moba-ge-town opened in 2006. Therefore form the first year of operation, Moba-ge-town was in black. Many contents providers I know tend to think "You build it, then money Will come." But usually it won't. <br /> The third fascinating move is TV ads. Some Internet moguls criticised Moba-ge-town when it started running TV and magazine ads, saying the mobile users and TV viewers are demographically different. All the Internet businesses that run TV ads in the past lost their ad money, they said. However Moriyasu said advertisement pays off in terms of gaining new users. Also one online ad executive hails it is a marvelous move. "More and more national ad clients know that legacy media cannot reach teenagers. Even the Internet portals cannot reach them. They know teenagers' main medium is the cell phone. But they know nothing about cell phone web, except Moba-ge-town. National clients know the name because of Moba-ge-town's TV ads. Moba-ge-town is getting almost all the ad money that national clients have for the cell phone space" he said.<br /> <a title="DeNA' financial statement of 2007 Q3" target="_blank" href="http://www.dena.jp/en/ir/pdf/FY2007_Q3_Operating%20Results.pdf" id="v1b2">DeNA' financial statement of 2007 Q3</a> confirmed the ad executive's contention. "Advertisement by national clients growing continuously," the statement says.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-67324334618264085622008-04-29T18:49:00.000-07:002008-04-29T18:54:05.953-07:00cell phone novelCell phone novels are getting really popular among Japanese teenagers. They have become a phenomenal success!<br /> Cell phone novels are a type of novels which are written by regular cell phone users using cell phones as both writing and reading devices. Since cell phones have been the most popular medium among Japanese high school and junior high students surpassing "legacy" mass media such as TV, magazine, and newspapers, cell phone novels are widely read mainly byteenagers. <br /> Cell phone novels have become popular first on a cell phone web site called Magic Island. The site offer free web sites creating and maintaining platform since March 2000. At first, many users were writing blog type posts, but some started writing novels using the platform. According to Magic Island, the number of novel titles is well over one million now.<br /> Naturally, some novels become more popular than others. One such novel titled "Koisora" which means "Love Sky" in Japanese has become a smashing hit. The total number of the access to the novel's cell phone web site has been around 39 million. It was so popular, a publishing company decided to publish a paper book version of the novel. So far close to 5 million copies of the book version were sold and it became the best selling book in Japan in 2007.<br /> As a matter of the fact, top 3 of the last year's best sellers were cell phone novels turned real paper books. Among top ten, 5 books are reprint of cell phone novels.<br /> Why cell phone books are so popular? I don't know.<br /> My friends at publishing house kept telling me it is hard to sell books these days. One famous author once told me "10 years ago whenever I write a new book, I could sell 100,000 copies easily. Now I am more than happy when I sell 10,000 copies."<br /> He also told me he has read one of the cell phone novels to see what this phenomenon is all about. "It has a really simple story line. Nothing isinnovative. It has no literary value," he said. He lamented the readers lack of artistic sense. <br /> However, if you think about it, maybe it is not the literary value that readers are looking for these days.<br /> The story lines are simple like the famous author said they are. Almost all the cell phone novels are love stories. The maincharacters are usually high school or junior high students. The stories are something the readers can relate to. The situation that is "real" to the readers.<br /> In that everyday situation, something peculiar or sensational happens. Something unusual happens; such as homosexuality, suicide, or prostitution. In tha sence, the stories are similar to soap operas.<br /> I guess that young readers want something they can relate to. At the same time, they want something sensational. They want excitement in their life but they don't want to mess up their lives.<br /> Maybe they want something they can gossip about. Young readers may treat cell phone novels almost as their friends stories. Stories of friends who have gone into wilder side of teenage lives. Teenage readers simply want to gossip with friends about the wild stories. Cell phone novels maybe a new medium of communication among teenagers. <br /> If that is the case, we must not judge them by literary value. Cell phone novels' real value must lie in how well readers can communicate and reach the sense of sharing among users. Cell phone novels created a new space of communication, or a new genra of novel.<br /><br /><br /><iframe src="http://rcm-jp.amazon.co.jp/e/cm?t=itblogjijicom-22&o=9&p=8&l=as1&asins=4883810453&fc1=000000&IS2=1<1=_top&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr&npa=1" style="width:120px;height:240px;" scrolling="no" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" frameborder="0"></iframe>Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480089597226427509.post-7050933077500823482008-04-23T17:28:00.000-07:002008-04-23T17:51:00.954-07:00OPAST-mobile ad exchange<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://it.blog-jiji.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/04/23/op_logo_color_2.gif"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;" src="http://it.blog-jiji.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/04/23/op_logo_color_2.gif" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /> Searchteria, a Japan's mobile key word ad frontier, started a mobile ad exchange called OPAST. OPAST has a direct offering function in which advertisers pick mobile sites and offer the price and duration of ad serving. Also, it has an ad serving optimization function which can maximize the effect of ads by using the past data analysis that Serchteria has, and by pilot testing the ad serving in a limited way at first.<br /> OPAST is the second mobile ad exchange opened in Japan following Admob which started operation in Japan early this year. Admob, a Silicon Valley company, has a long tail strategy that appeals to small site operators at first.<br /> In contrast, Hikaru Miura, managing director of Searchteria, said Searchteria will keep working closely with ad agencies.<br /> A couple of people in the industry told me that in Japan major ad agencies still has strong foothold in the ad market. "Without agencies help, you cannot get ads. I heardAdmob is having a hard time in Japan," one ad industry veteran said.Tsuruaki Yukawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01016308428883633273noreply@blogger.com0