Image: Keitai Watch

Japan is gearing up for the roll out of digital cellphone TV. A consortium of major public and private broadcasters announced Tuesday (27.9.05) that service over much of the country would start April 1, 2006 and would be called “One Seg(u)”. The name stands for "one segment" of the 13 segments of the 6 Megahertz of spectrum allocated to terrestrial broadcasting of digital television.

The service will be offered without charge to anyone with a special tuner-equipped cell phone, personal computer or car navigation system.

from Japan Media Review

Not really related:
Nokia and CHT jointly organize first Mobile Film Festival in Asia Pacific

The Meaning of Keitai by Prof. Kenji Kohiyama

In brief, the families in which the house space, up until now, played a large part in family bonding are now starting to bond outside of the household. As a result, there is a possibility that due to the keitai causing strengthened emotional ties among the family that this will creep into other social relationships and bring about an “age of the family.” This means in comparison with the past where from the time one left the house to the time one returned there was no contact with the family, now the networking with the family is maintained at the workplace or at school and as a result, the family relationship is infiltrating the society. From examples such as these it has been concluded that most likely the “age of the family” and the “age of the absence of the family” are going to move forward in parallel fashion. In any age there are families that have strong family bonds and there are families with weak family relationships, however the keitai will speed up this dichotomy and the strong families will influence even the society around them and the weak families will become weaker.

See also:
The Future of Keitai

‘Scan my skin.’ Newest way to pick up a Japanese babe

This barcoded booth-babe has a QR code (the block with lots of dots) on her back, and she wants you to use your cam-phone to scan for her personal information.

Via Smoothplanet

More links:
QR Code Generator
QRcode Perl CGI & PHP scripts ver. 0.50
More QRCode fun

Mobile Broadband

Mobile broadband is a broadband connection (such as the always-on, high-speed broadband Internet services offered through ADSL) that is available at anytime and anywhere. [...] Mobile broadband is the next generation of mobile communications with both advantages of "ubiquitous access" and "high speed".

As one of the priority plans of the e-Japan (u-Japan) strategy, Japan is aiming to achieve the world's first cutting-edge mobile communications environment. eAccess' corporate mission is to provide "broadband connection to all," and the Company is working towards establishing a broadband service in a mobile environment.
eAccess is currently preparing to obtain a mobile license using the FDD(Frequency Division Duplex) system in the 1.7GHz band.

According to Forbes Goldman Sachs is prepared to invest quite some money in eaccess.

PS: The e-mobile logo and Edy, isn't there some similarity in the design approach?

Mobile operators fear the Google effect

The doom scenario for mobile operators is illustrated by the faillure of internet providers in competing with search portals. Provider portals have become worthless now that their customers are using independent search engines such as Google and Yahoo. They have been reduced to a provider of network connections.

"We are keen to avoid being reduced to a dump pipe," explained Matt Dacey, head of Content for O2.

The O2 manager pointed out that in Germany and Austria T-Mobile has already given up the battle against Google, where the engine has become the default search provider on T-Mobile's network.

Google's mobile search technology either works by sending a text message to the search engine with a query, or by visiting a specially formatted version of the engine on the Google website.

Vodaphone's Ferguson however argued that Google Mobile for now is mainly a marketing offensive. "Google is very aggressive, but they don't have a product."

After the mobile novel, now the mobile manga...


Image: Oishinbo, from The Japan Times

One of the latest sectors experiencing the dizziness of the TIMBER! effect seems to be Manga comics in Japan, according to Japan Times. Putting Manga on mobiles only started in 2003, spurred by 3G availability, and already is showing signs of killing its paper based parent.

Paper-based publishing is actually experiencing a double whammy onslaught from mobiles. Even before Manga was available on phones, sales had started to decline in line with the growth of mobiles. This is attributed to young people spending their disposable income on their phones, communication and content. But now the phone itself has become a publishing channel, this effect is accelerating.

See also:
The Japan Times: 'Manga' publishers see cell phones as the future

PS: Here you can test if mobile manga works for you too.

Image: The Register

Sony Upgrades PSP Firmware

In addition to launching a new service called "Portable TV" which will provide Japanese consumers with downloadable video content for the PlayStation Portable, Sony has also added the ATRAC3plus music format to the PSP in today's 2.00 firmware upgrade - which will enable users to purchase music from Sony's Connect Music Store for playback on the PSP.

[...] However, users can't browse the music store on their consoles yet, but that functionality could be added in the near future. The convergence of gaming and free/paid multimedia content on the same portable device is here folks...Depending on consumer uptake, Sony could be positioning itself to hit big initially in the Far East.

Music in the air...;)
Another Cell Phone Audio Deal, from CNET

For $6.95 a month, people nationwide with a Sprint phone (specifically, with Sprint PCS Vision Multimedia Service) can sign up and listen to several different radio stations or Internet podcasts, as well as gain access to videos, music news or freestyle rap service “Beats N Breaks

iTuneMyWalkman

iTuneMyWalkman is an iTunes script that will help you synchronize the contents of iTunes playlists with you Sony Ericsson Walkman phone. The playlists can be either regular or smart ones. The script can also automatically detect when you connect your phone, and will ask you if you want to synchronize. When the files have been copied, you can Eject the phone.

See also:
Push Pause On The Mobile Music Revolution

I just finished downloading the korean mobile game Skipping Stone from I-play apparently one of the most critically acclaimed mobile title to launch this year. We'll see...

What you get, effectively, is a game that combines the powerbar timing skills of, say, a golf game or Hyper Sports-style sports sim, with the timing requirements of a rhythm action romp. It's a strangely compelling and utterly immediate concept. And like those instant-gratification minigames that make up the genius of Wario Ware Inc., anyone can grab the concept and run with it. This is inclusive gaming par excellence.

[...] You might, for example, encounter a whale, which blasts you upward on a water spurt from its blowhole. There's also an octopus and a strange superdeformed man in what appears to be a chicken outfit (later he turns up again as a reindeer).

From Gamespot Review