Wireless Watch Japan
Search Results for: manga

Search Results for: manga


YAPPA Rolls MagaStore iPhone App

The good folks over at YAPPA have launched an interesting platform, in conjunction with Dentsu, for browsing and purchasing magazines. The MagaStore, initially targeting the iPhone but eventually available for other mobile platforms, debuts with 30 titles provided by 20 mainstream publishers including Asahi Shimbun, ALBA, Kodansha, Shogakukan, Shinchosha, SONY, Hankyu and Fuso.

Innovation in Japan – Taking on the Economist

We just could not let This Article go un-challenged – hence see our ++ respond inline below.

The most important factor that led to America’s stunning success in information technology was not the free market but government regulation. Federal trustbusters made AT&T lease its lines to others and eventually broke up the giant telephone company.

++ The Japanese government made similar moves with NTT. Perhaps a more valid point passed over is how the respective governments historically manage and allocate the public wireless spectrum. Results clearly show a "Regulated" Japan approach enabled the mobile industry here to significantly trump the progress of a so-called "Free Market" USA (highest bid auctions) model.

Later they forced IBM to separate its hardware and software businesses. These actions opened the door to competition and lower prices. More important, they changed the industry’s structure, replacing monoliths with smaller, specialised companies which have to work with others with complementary skills. The result has been tremendous innovation. …**Counterintuitively, fragmenting these industries helped common standards to emerge, they say.

++ All of the major vendors have smaller spin-off suppliers here doing the piece work.. often the deepest source of innovation is coming from bottom up to the likes of NEC, Fujitsu and Panasonic et all. **Yet standards in Japan – especially for mobile as mentioned below – are somehow less relevant? Continued after the jump>>

Japan's Soft Power for Global Business

Of course this stunt was bound to get a few tongues wagging, however the meat within, indicating the Feds renewed push for moving domestic digital content into markets overseas, is apparent if not politically motivated. Prime Minister Aso, a well-known manga maniac, was recently quoted as suggesting his government would like to create 500,000 new jobs in the music, fashion and media space by 2020.

Obon in Japan = Slow News Cycle

For those of you who don’t know, the middle of August is Obon season in Japan and traditionally the slowest news cycle for the year. Most folks plan their vacation – to beat the heat – around this time and your loyal WWJ team is looking forward to catching up on some outstanding projects behind the scenes. Meanwhile, here are a couple of interesting notes we missed recently from the Nikkei related to the continued growth trend of mobile manga and the iPhone launch results.