MOBINODE

Events: Google DevFest APAC

Gang Lu — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 02:28:35 +0800

Google Hackathon Tour in China and Southeast Asia will kick off very soon, and the first stop will be in Shanghai. Starts from 17th of this month. A group of Google engineers will visit Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore, Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh City and Manila. The so called DevFest event will cover the tech topics such as OpenSocial, App Engine, Google Maps API etc. If you are interested in the web technology Google is driving, please make sure you register online (17th for Shanghai and 24th for Beijing).

MWorld, The Next Chinese Virtual World

Gang Lu — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 22:45:11 +0800

Chinese Virtual World has been very quiet for a while, but quiet does not mean the market is dead. Old virtual worlds are re-thinking of their strategies, and new ones are emerging. ChinaQ is one of new virtual worlds recently hit the market. Although it is surprisedly operated by the giant, China Mobile, we are not really interested in talking about it at this stage. Insiders told us ChinaQ actually highly benefits from Second Life’s open source project.

MWorld owned by Shanghai-based Sunny Multimedia Co. Ltd is the one truly impressed us. SNS is very hot in China, and MWorld, unlike other virtual worlds, calls itself 3D SNS which might be a smart strategy suitable for Chinese entertainment-centric market. In this post, we believe the virtual second life must be merged with the real first life, and the 3D SNS proposed by MWorld seems a good practice of it. Around 70 staff are now working on MWorld and managed by a strong team, led by its CEO, Frank Chan who was the Director of Sale & Marketing of SEGA.

Thanks to a friend who is working for MWorld, he agreed to share some screenshots with our readers. We were also been told that the private test is scheduled in this November. If you are a fan of Virtual World, I do suggest you keep an eye on it. (click on the image for larger size.)

Kisekae: The Dress-up Handset

Sho Tabata — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 22:18:10 +0800

Today, the mobile phone is not just a device with functionality but is also a fashion accessory. We see many boys and girls who decorate their handsets with stickers, cover cases and beeds. Besides the device’s physical appearance, people also customize their wallpaper (main display on handset) with their favorite pictures. That same trend can be found in Japan, but in a more advanced stage: Japanese people once desired to personalize all interfaces in their handset, including SMS sending/receiving screens, outgoing/incoming call screens, menu interfaces and so forth. This desire gave birth to what is now called “Kisekae”.

1. What’s Kisekae?

Kisekae literally means “change what is being worn to something else” in Japanese (i.e. the Barbie doll is called “Kisekae” doll in Japan), though for our purposes the common software application term of “skin” may be appropriate, as in “change the skin (interface appearance) to another”. With the Kisekae tool provided by mobile operators, third parties can develop content for all handset interfaces with images and Flash Lite files and provide it as a package, and consumers can change all interfaces simply by installing it with a single click (NTT Docomo has a introduction to its Kisekae tool in English on its website).

2. Customizable Interfaces

The interfaces that are customizable with Kisekae content include:
•   the Menu Screen
•   the Main Display
•   the Screensaver
•   SMS Sending/Receiving screens
•   Phone Call screens
•   Signal and Battery Icons

3. Wide Variety of Content Available for Purchase/Free

A large number of third parties already provide hundreds of varieties of Kisekae content packages. Users mainly download the content from mobile operators’ content portal sites and/or third parties’ websites. Both buyable and free Kisekae content is available, and consumers primarily prefer content with the following themes:
•   Fictional/Comic characters
•   Animals
•   Brands
•   Celebrities
•   Athletes

4. Content Distribution As Branding Strategy

While the majority of Kisekae content providers aim at profiting by selling their content or making advertisement revenue, some companies distribute Kisekae content with a branding strategy in mind. Chanel for example distributes its Kisekae content at some stores in Tokyo. A consumer can install the content simply by connecting the handset to a machine for this purpose and letting it download. The majority of companies are like Shiseido however, a Japanese cosmetics company, who provide their Kisekae content online just as many other brands have marketed in the same manner to increase brand recoginition in their respective markets.

Kisekae Content by Chanel/ Photo by Sakuran

5. Market Facts

Almost all recent phones from the main operators (NTT Docomo, AU by KDDI and Softbank Mobile) have Kisekae enabled. Here are some market facts:
•   Kisekae content was first introduced on Sharp’s V501SH handset by Vodafone Japan (now Softbank Mobile) in 2005.
•   30% of male and 50% of female mobile users in Japan customize handset interfaces with the Kisekae content (MMD-Labo).
•   Market scale of Kisekae content jumped from 2.7 million in 2006 to 21 million dollars in 2007 (The study by Mobile Content Forum).
•   CA Mobile forecasts that the market size will reach 45 to 55 million dollars within 2008.

6. What’s Next in the Market?

There is no doubt that more and more users will enjoy Kisekae content as more varieties are added. What is frustrating developers is that as of today only one mobile operator, Docomo, allows third parties to develop Kisekae content; the other two major players (KDDI and Softbank) do not publicly provide any guidelines or tools for development. This hopefully will change soon, which will increase third parties’ participation in the development and therefore increase the penetration of Kisekae content usage in Japan.

7. Availability of Kisekae Content in The Rest of The World

It is currently impossible to use Kisekae content on the handsets available outside of Japan (wallpapers might be available on Flash Lite enabled phones outside of Japan though). However, the dramatic penetration increase of Kisekae content culture in Japan tells us that there’s strong potential in the mobile content customization and personalization market. I hope there will be a day when all phones are completely customizable in terms of both functionality and design.

10% Discount To Open Web Asia 08 Conference

Gang Lu — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 09:03:28 +0800

This is a self-promotion post, but I do hope some of the readers will like it.

OpenWebAsia 2008, the first pan-Asia web industry event is only One week away!! If you have not registered but wanted to go, here is the possibility to save some money. We are offering 10 tickets with 10% discount. To register it, please visit http://www.amiando.com/owa08.html, and use the promotion code: OWA2discounted-FXO5QBRR. Thank you very much and looking forwards to meeting you in Seoul!

If you have not heard of Open Web Asia 08 event, here is the brief:

OpenWebAsia 2008, the first pan-Asia web industry event will be held on October 14th in Seoul Korea. It will bring together Asian tech entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and industry people.

The event will feature a full day of presentations and discussion panels with time during the breaks for networking with other attendees.

The sessions will focus on Asian web case studies and success stories. Speakers include some of the most experienced and knowledgeable people from the Asian internet industry and a selection of business leaders and thinkers from outside the region including representatives from Friendster, Seesmic, Alibaba, FeliCa Networks, Nexon Corporation, Perfect World, Comsenz, Mahalo, Storyblender, CIC, eBay, ngi group, NHN Corporation (Naver), Ohmynews, Infinity Ventures, Opera and 51.com.

For full details and registration see http://www.openwebasia.com/

China Unicom Is Promoting iPhone 3G

Gang Lu — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 16:09:33 +0800

iPhone is stepping closer to China. A very interesting finding in China Internet Conference is that China Unicom is promoting its 3G (WCDMA) with iPhone and Blackberry.

The evidence is found on a leaflet for promoting China Unicom’s WCDMA service. We reported several days back Apple is recruiting in China for iPhone business, the guess we made China Mobile will be the partner of Apple now apparently is wrong. Apple’s negociation with China Unicom must be easier than with China Mobile. China Unicom can give a better offer to Apple since iPhone can help it win a better market share in China 3G market.

AOL China Brings Yourminis and Goowy, Aiming At Chinese Widget Market

Gang Lu — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:36:37 +0800

Yourminis, a well-known widget platform and Goowy, a desktop widget technology have been brought to China by AOL China. The team has been set up in Beijing, and they told me that their mission is to kick off the widget market in China.

Netvibes first took its UWA widget technology to China, together with Sohu, AOL is now the second foreign company wants a share in Chinese widget market which is yet a virgin market.

The Chinese version of AOL is not doing well in China, but this time it seems that it found a very promising market in China. Don’t expect widget market will boom in near future, but if you are aware that Open Platform is a very hot topic right now in China web, for a long term plan (if AOL China has enough patience), widget, aka web app, could mean a huge business.

Here is Yourminis’ online widget gallery, and you can also follow the step by step tutorial to have a taste of its widget solution.

Yahoo! GuanXi is China’s new SNS

zibin — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 00:39:37 +0800

SNS has been blossoming in China and Yahoo! wants a piece of it. Yahoo launched its own SNS called Yahoo! GuanXi. According to reports, the SNS was launched as a public beta, but only to be retracted to a private beta. At the time of visit by Mobinode, it is now open to registration.

The site is still pretty beta, with rough edges. For example, jpeg is not recognize as a image file but jpg is. The site spots a glaring default red theme, a departure from the blueish Xiaonei. Also, Yahoo! GuanXi still does not support invite via QQ. Clearly, if Yahoo! GuanXi wants to gain traction is China, it will need to be built based on strong localization(including support for QQ invites) and differentiation from the curent crop of SNSes.

Tonchidot in TechCrunch50: A presentation worth learning from

zibin — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 21:05:02 +0800

TechCrunch50 was successfully held. We know who the winners are. But today let’s talk about one of them that didn’t win. Tonchidot generated alot of fanfare in TechCrunch even though they didn’t end up on the podium.

Well, to start with, the idea is awesome. Geotagging and using the broad viewport of iPhone as the tool to geotag and view geotagged objects. However, the thing that caught my attention the most was the spirit of the presenter.

The Japanese presenter had to overcome the language barrier, but it was exactly that that allowed passion unfiltered. He stood out so much that the crowd was roaring. After the presentation, he even started jumping and spreading his hands, hr went on shaking the hands of the panelist even before the panelist started quizing. And because he had so much spirit and had the excuse of not speaking english well, the panelists were literally giving the question and helping answer some of them, the host lent a helping hand too. And what the japanese presenter had to do was to occasionally give his uber confident short answer such as “join us”, “we have patent”. It was a show-stopper.

This sums up how entrepreneurs should pitch. Simple, confident and avoid details. Who says presenting as a non-native speaker is a handicap?

Note: For readers in China that can’t stream the video (cases reported), try viewing in YouTube. The earlier part of the presentation was not capture on this YouTube video. It is also coarser , but did capture the audience’s reaction more.

Unveiling The Japanese Mobile Market

Sho Tabata — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 09:08:28 +0800

Welcome to the world of the Japanese mobile market, where mobile Internet usage is more popular than on the PC.

Watching TV, playing music, listening to FM radio, browsing rich web content on your mobile for a few hours every day, playing high quality games, emailing instead of SMS text messaging, enjoying online shopping, making payments at convenient stores, doubling as train tickets, etc. Yes, it’s all on mobile, and it’s not a new story; Japanese people have been used to it for years. We can find many interesting uses of mobile phones and corresponding unique products and services in Japan. I would like to introduce them to you one by one, but I think it would be great to understand some background of the Japanese mobile market first before getting into specific topics.

Market Scale

Japan, which has a population of 130 million, has a uniquely immense mobile market. Its mobile content market has reached a 3.8 billion dollar scale, while the mobile commerce market hit 6.6 billion according to research by Japan Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication. In addition, research by Dentsu-Souken indicates the mobile advertisement market scale jumps to a billion dollars in 2008, which was only 0.4 billion dollars in 2006.

(Source: Japan Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication)

3G Infrastructure

The Japanese mobile industry has grown up rapidly, and one of the main factors in this tremendous growth has been its high-speed Internet connection infrastructure. The current highest speed offered by carriers is 7.2Mbps. Docomo, the biggest mobile operator in Japan, has also been experimenting with the 1Gbps (4G) speed, which is expected to be in commercial use in four years. The world’s first 3G connection was launched by Docomo in Japan in 2001. A study by TCA indicates that almost 90% of Japanese mobile users have 3G or 3.5G handsets today, and 2G and 2.5G handsets are no longer available in stores according to JEITA’s analysis on July. Many of them sign up to unlimited data usage plans since all mobile operators offer them at reasonable prices. Research by Info-Sharing Business Institute, Ltd also says that 50% of the mobile subscribers in Japan will have 3.5G within 2008. In such a country with high 3G and 3.5G penetration, it is perfectly normal for them to search on Google, read news, log into SNS’s and write blogs on their mobile. Teenagers spend an average of two hours on mobile Internet daily, according to a study of domestic Internet usage in 2007 by The Cabinet Office, government of Japan.

(Source: Plus Eight Star and comScore)

Phone Specs

In addition to 3G, the usage of cameras on handsets has increased the amount of time users spend on their mobiles. Today, it is very hard to find a handset without a camera in Japan. Users can record video with it, and the quality of cameras is high enough for daily usage (better than 2M pixel in all models). Handsets also normally have an external memory slot so that users can save pictures and videos to a micro SD card. It’s commonplace to see people taking pictures or videos in many scenarios including at a restaurant or tourist spot. They send their photos to their PC, share them with friends via email, and/or upload them to SNS or photo sharing services. It is easy to visualize Japanese people as very used to a life full of camera snapshots if we imagine the high quality camera that is in everyone’s pocket at all times and in all places.

Flash Lite

Flash Lite is the mobile version of Adobe’s Flash technology. It is available on more than 80% of the handsets in Japan according to research in 2006 by Groove Promotion. The combination of high Flash Lite and 3G penetrations in Japan enables rich content use on the mobile web, and Flash Lite technology is accepted by users and is used in many ways. For example, we can see Flash Lite use in the main display wallpapers of devices, menu interfaces for OS’s, web interfaces, online games, and so forth (there are so many unique Flash Lite uses in Japan. I am going to introduce them in upcoming articles). Flash Lite 3 is also available on some handsets, which enables playing of YouTube or any other .flv videos.

Conclusion

The various developments detailed above have brought to bloom many mobile web services in Japan. Yes, there are cultural differences between Japan and other countries, especially Western countries, but I believe that understanding the mobile culture in Japan could help us bring new ideas to the rest of the world and engender new mobile cultures which have never been seen before. It would bring me great pleasure if my upcoming articles could contribute to this at least a little bit.

Apple Is Recruiting In China, Preparing For iPhone Launch

Gang Lu — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:54:02 +0800

Reports say Apple nears the Chinese iPhone deal, and the latest news I heard today: Apple is actually recruiting technical staff in China, preparing for the iPhone launch in China.

A friend’s friend who actually went to the interview said, Apple clearly mentioned the job is for the iPhone business in China, but Apple also said they were not 100% sure that the job would be eventually available since the contract with Chinese ISP (which most likely will be China Mobile) had not been signed yet.

So there is some uncertainty, but iPhone surely is one step closer to China, the biggest mobile market.