Son said that as SoftBank’s leader, it makes him feel uncomfortable to hear that disaster victims and their friends and relatives have trouble in connecting and obtaining information. And while he was at it, he also promised that the orphans won’t be charged any communication fees until they reach the age of 18.

via Japan’s SoftBank To Offer Free Phones, Waive All Communication Fees For Quake Orphans.

Nice to read about mobile operators doing good.

So far we’ve covered mobile 2.0 apps from all over the world from Mig33 in Australia, Itsmy in Germany, Mocospace in the US to ebuddy and Nimbuzz in Holland and this week we’re going East with Mobamingle - the international version of THE SMASH HIT Japanese mobile service Mobile Game Town.

What is it?

Mobamingle or Mbmgl was launched in Q4 last year by the Japanese mobile internet giant Dena as an attempt to repeat the success of Mobile Game Town in the US and Europe.

For those who don’t know Mobile GameTown is one of the world’s most successful mobile internet services.  The site is based around a mobile avatar community with the usual chat and social features.  However, Mobile Gametown (or Mobage Town for short) also provides a range of flash games and other services like mobile story telling – a new kind of mobile user-generated content format.  The site has:

- 10m plus users

- 15 bn monthly page views

- $200m in annual revenues from a mix of advertising/ affiliate deals and sales of its internal currency

Mobamingle provides a very similar service aimed at the US and other countries including the UK, and Europe.  All the main features are there including all the community elements (groups, forums) as well as the mobile story-writing feature.

The main big difference is that Mobamingle doesn’t yet offer the huge range of flash-based free mobile games that have been key to growing traction for the service in Japan.  Even today, support for, and awareness of flash in mobile handsets is pretty low in the West.  However, Mobamingle DOES feature the full-on cutesy Japanese style avatars!

Why is it interesting?

Mobamingle heralds a new wave of Japanese mobile businesses expanding internationally.  The first wave was all about big acquisitions, such as the service provider itouch being acquired by For-side in 2005, or the string of acquisitions that Index made between 2004-5 (123 Multimedia, Mobliss).  The second wave is going to be different – sites and services which have worked in Japan are going to create international versions and use the learnings and technologies they’ve developed to succeed.

Having Japanese players enter the market is going to mean local players have to really RAISE THEIR GAME.  Dena is reportedly investing $3m in the international launch of mbmgl and the site is amazing usability-wise with some great design touches and a BEAUTIFUL mobile UI.

These new services could also help to spread new mobile business models in the US and Europe.  For example, Mobile Game Town’s use of virtual currency is already being adopted by US and European mobile startups like Heysan, Itsmy and Flirtomatic.  If sites like Mobamingle can help get consumers used to the idea of paying for mobile services beyond ringtones and other personalisation content then the whole industry could see a huge boom in revenue.

The launch of Mobamingle can only be good news for the mobile web – it’s a massive bet that mobile internet is taking off in the US and Europe and that consumers are ready for mobile-only social services like this.  We have been waiting nearly a decade for the success of Japanese mobile internet to be replicated over here and it looks like it might finally be happening.

You can find Mbmgl on mjelly, which is a directory of the top mobile sites and other stuff at mjelly.com (PC) and m.mjelly.com (mobile)

Two Japanese companies have unveiled a security robot that can be commanded from a mobile phone to hurl a net that traps suspected intruders.

The prototype T-34 was developed jointly by robot firm Tmsuk Co and security firm Alacom Co.

It moves at up to 10km/h (6mph), and can be controlled by someone seeing real-time images on a mobile phone.

That has to be one of the best ‘mobile applications’ I’ve seen in a while

I’ll have two please.

So reports Reuters.

And Nokia is now, officially, outta Japan. It’s hardly been in the States either, to be fair.

China’s a nation of Nokia-knock-offs although they’ve got a reasonable presence in India.

Quitting Japan does, alas, makes sense for Nokia. Whilst the company offers some simply stunning devices (tested to within an inch of their mechanical lives), they don’t cut it Japan. Not when your average Japanese handset can make the dinner, wash the dog and read bedtime stories to your kids without breaking a sweat. Not when your average Japanese handset can store the Library of Congress archive 16 times over and transmit all the data on the planet, point-to-point in 10 seconds.

Ok. So I exaggerate.

But for the reverse reason as NEC don’t bother doing anything much with mobile consumer handsets in Europe (we’re simply too far behind for them to bother fitting out their factories with ’3G’ equipment), Nokia might as well stick to the knitting.

I would, ordinarily be giving the Big Finnish Blue Giant a right royal kicking at the moment. Just think of the rant you could get out of this news.

But I’ve modified my viewpoints, particularly after seeing the way they test their handsets.

Brilliant handsets. Your average Nokia at least can make phone calls (I’m spending my days telling folk ‘Sorry, I’m, er.. I’m on a Blackberry.. can you hear me?).

Rubbish rubbish user interfaces. Decrepid shitty rubbish peice-of-shite interfaces.

Bring me a Nokia with a decent interface and you can have my Kingdom.

For a few minutes. Leasehold.

So Nokia’s out of Japan and I don’t think that’s much of an arse really. Neither dos IDC Japan analyst, Michito Kimura in that Reuters piece: “I’m not very surprised by the decision.”

Are you?

Ridiculous. Vodafone you really need to sort this out.

Posted by email from MIR Live (posterous)

The particular type of wallet phone tech they’re talking about here is FeliCa, developed by Sony and very popular in Japan, which is apparently now easier than ever to integrate into devices destined for the overseas market.

Rather disappointingly, the article doesn’t say just how the Japanese plan on encouraging take up. Despite the fact that NFC and it’s related technologies really are rather good, and the likes of Nokia have been pushing it reasonably hard, there just hasn’t been the interest in the UK and elsewhere. Some people attribute that to problems with the ecosystem – it will be interesting to see if Sony can succeed in sorting them out where quite a few others have failed.

Says Toshiba:

“Since its establishment, Mobile Broadcasting Corporation has provided diverse services in an attempt to build a subscriber base and enlarge its business. However, the number of subscribers has not reached a sufficient level to sustain operations and, following a thorough review of operations, the company has decided to cease broadcasting.”

The service will be closed down by March next year. However, it doesn’t look like Japan has lost its enthusiasm for mobile TV in general – rather, it just wasn’t that keen on this service: other reports say that there are 20 million mobile TV watchers on a rival offering in the land of the rising sun.

And, as a sweetener for anyone thinking of ditching the mova service and switching to its 3G equivalent FOMA, DoCoMo has said it will waive the usual 2,100 yen fee for the upgrade.

There’s no official timeline on when mova will be officially turned off, with DoCoMo saying it will depend on when users make the transition. While the death of 2G is quite exciting in itself, what’s more interesting is what the company will do with the spectrum that gets freed up – potentially recycling it for new services like machine-to-machine communications or use it for boosting in-home wireless VoIP with femotcells.

DoCoMo is now working on testing handover from one base station to another, and how LTE performs in both indoor and outdoor environments, carrying out the trials near its R&D labs in Yokosuka.

It’s great to see companies making bigger and bigger leaps in bandwidth – good news for efficiency as much as anything. The only downside? DoCoMo expects it won’t finish testing the technology til 2009, so we’re still years away from actually getting our hands on devices and networks that can deliver this speed. Why do operators keep teasing us like this?!

Gizmoz said it will use the cash to will invest into Asian expansion, starting with work in Japan, and also announced today that its service will be compatible with AOL instant messaging service for the first time. However, with DoCoMo Capital as a backer, I’m guessing we’ll be seeing Gizmoz moving more towards mobile offerings. Gizmoz itself is strongly hinting at the same direction highlighting of its Japanese move it’s “a market that leads the world in mobile internet adoption” and stresses its interests in cross-platform services.

According to the paper, DoCoMo is trying to get the disputed device withdrawn from sale, after the operator and its partner Fujitsu filed a request for an injunction with a local court. A number of reports say DoCoMo believes the Softbank mobile looks like its own range of devices targeting older users, with easy-to-read menus.

After February saw the start of a price war in the country, it looks like the Japanese market is only getting tougher.

AFP also notes that Japan is second country to stop shipping 2G handsets after South Korea, with nearly 85 percent of Japanese users now sporting 3G mobiles. It puts North America and Western Europe in the shade at 50 and 10 percent respectively. Meanwhile, according to other reports suggest DoCoMo is stopping signing up users wanting 2G mova subscriptions.

I guess in Japan the death of 2G was always on the cards in the short term for Japan and it’s no great surprise either that South Korea has gone before it. Hands up if you think the iPhone will be 3G for its Asian launch…

Earlier reports had suggested that Sony Ericsson would stop supplying devices to DoCoMo altogether, but Sony Ericsson has been denying this and the AFP quotes a spokesman as saying the company has no plans to ditch the Japanese market.

I’ll be interested to find out how NTT DoCoMo and Sony Ericsson will change their plans, but I can’t see the attraction in cutting ties completely – Japan might be a tough market right now, but it’s still practically the centre of the universe for mobile developments.