China
Renren.com Launches Two New Developer Products
(Wed, 16 May 2012)
Chinese social networking company Renren.com has launched two new mobile products: REST API and Mobile Plugins. Renren.com's REST API follows the standard REST protocol, including a content service interface, message service interface, friendship information interface, and LBS service interface. It supports the OAuth2.0 authentication. Mobile Plugins, which are social networking components, include login and registration [...]
>> read more
China's Huawei Hires Consulting Company For Expansion In U.S. (Wed, 16 May 2012)
Huawei has reportedly hired Jack Morton Worldwide, a global brand consulting company, aiming to promote its marketing activities in the U.S. market in the second half of 2012. According to reports in local media, Huawei has limited brand awareness among consumers outside of China. To change this situation, the company is planning a large marketing [...]
>> read more
UCWeb Plans Operating Platform In America In 2012 (Wed, 16 May 2012)
UCWeb, a leading provider of mobile Internet software technology and browser services in China, plans to establish its operating platform in America in 2012. Yu Yongfu, chief executive officer of UCWeb, claimed in a speech that UCWeb's browser product has gained over 50% market share in China, including 60 million active users from the Android [...]
>> read more
China Mobile To Build Two New Data Centers (Thu, 10 May 2012)
According to a tender project from China Mobile, the telecom operator plans to build two new data centers in Hohhot and Harbin, respectively, covering a total area of 185 hectares. This represents China Mobile's two new major construction projects, following its southern base and international information port construction commencement in Beijing. According to the files, [...]
>> read more
Kingsoft Network Begins Recruiting Beta Testers For Chinese Web Browser (Thu, 03 May 2012)
Kingsoft Network has reportedly launched its Web browser initiative and the new product is currently undergoing beta testing. According to reports in Chinese local media, Fu Sheng, chief executive officer of Kingsoft Network, has published a post on the company's internal forum, saying that Kingsoft's browser will soon start recruiting testers. This is reportedly the [...]
>> read more
Chinese social networking company Renren.com has launched two new mobile products: REST API and Mobile Plugins. Renren.com's REST API follows the standard REST protocol, including a content service interface, message service interface, friendship information interface, and LBS service interface. It supports the OAuth2.0 authentication. Mobile Plugins, which are social networking components, include login and registration [...]
>> read more
China's Huawei Hires Consulting Company For Expansion In U.S. (Wed, 16 May 2012)
Huawei has reportedly hired Jack Morton Worldwide, a global brand consulting company, aiming to promote its marketing activities in the U.S. market in the second half of 2012. According to reports in local media, Huawei has limited brand awareness among consumers outside of China. To change this situation, the company is planning a large marketing [...]
>> read more
UCWeb Plans Operating Platform In America In 2012 (Wed, 16 May 2012)
UCWeb, a leading provider of mobile Internet software technology and browser services in China, plans to establish its operating platform in America in 2012. Yu Yongfu, chief executive officer of UCWeb, claimed in a speech that UCWeb's browser product has gained over 50% market share in China, including 60 million active users from the Android [...]
>> read more
China Mobile To Build Two New Data Centers (Thu, 10 May 2012)
According to a tender project from China Mobile, the telecom operator plans to build two new data centers in Hohhot and Harbin, respectively, covering a total area of 185 hectares. This represents China Mobile's two new major construction projects, following its southern base and international information port construction commencement in Beijing. According to the files, [...]
>> read more
Kingsoft Network Begins Recruiting Beta Testers For Chinese Web Browser (Thu, 03 May 2012)
Kingsoft Network has reportedly launched its Web browser initiative and the new product is currently undergoing beta testing. According to reports in Chinese local media, Fu Sheng, chief executive officer of Kingsoft Network, has published a post on the company's internal forum, saying that Kingsoft's browser will soon start recruiting testers. This is reportedly the [...]
>> read more
New Tag Results, from Technorati and Ingboo
(Fri, 05 Mar 2010)
Technorati and Ingboo have partnered together to provide an all new kind of subscription experience for Technorati content, including tagged posts. Look for a blue Ingboo icon for a full range of subscription options. Feeds are also available for: Hottest Blogosphere Posts Latest Original Articles from Technorati The Technorati Blog We also have channel feeds, writer feeds, and editorial tag feeds, which can be found on their respective pages.
>> read more
Technorati and Ingboo have partnered together to provide an all new kind of subscription experience for Technorati content, including tagged posts. Look for a blue Ingboo icon for a full range of subscription options. Feeds are also available for: Hottest Blogosphere Posts Latest Original Articles from Technorati The Technorati Blog We also have channel feeds, writer feeds, and editorial tag feeds, which can be found on their respective pages.
>> read more
Baidu To Release a New Mobile OS and A New Phone With a Secret Partner
(Wed, 16 May 2012)
Baidu the leading Chinese search engine seems to be determined to enter the smartphone market. The company was said to release a new mobile operating system Baidu Yun next week with a hardware vendor to jointly announce a device based on the OS. Rumors said that the partner is ZTE (a leading Chinese telecom equipment provider), although Wang Jin, vice-president of Baidu only revealed that they are working with a “global manufacturer”. Earlier last year, Baidu released a mobile operating system called Baidu Yi, which is modeled on Google’s Android system and later cooperated with Dell’s mobile devices. According to the performances in the Street, Baidu seems to be faced with a bearish trend. The future growth seems to depend on its attempt to grow business in the mobile space. While facing stiff competition from several well-established companies each specializing in different product and services, it is still uncertain a simple smartphone offering will help the company to increase the market share. The piece was written by Charlie Sheng, a nerd born in the 90s with interests in tech, innovation and art. Related posts: Live Blog: Collide – Powering the China Cloud Microsoft China Director: Windows Phone Has Chance To Win in [...] Related posts: Live Blog: Collide – Powering the China Cloud Microsoft China Director: Windows Phone Has Chance To Win in 3–5 Years in Mobile Over 65% Chinese App Developers Are Newcomers To The Business
>> read more
Beijing Start-up, CloudAcc Can Save Online Video Streaming Sites Like Youku and Hulu 50% on Bandwidth Costs (Wed, 16 May 2012)
China indeed has a fiercelycompetitiveonlinevideomarket. Last month it was reported that the number one video site, Youku acquired the number two video site Tudou. Shortly after, news broke out of the newly formed alliance between Tencent’s v.qq.com, tv.Sohu and Baidu’s iQiyi. A big reason for the flurry of M&A activity has been the difficulty to make profit due to rising operating costs, forcing some players to succumb to stronger players. To win in the long run, companies must achieve profitability and notjustburnmoneyformarketshare. To become profitable, these video sites must dramatically reduce operating costs. In operating an online video site that supports thousands of simultaneous videos being watched, two major costs are contentlicensesandbandwidthcosts. According to Bloomberg, Youku incurred a net loss of 49.6 million yuan ($7.9 million) in the fourth quarter of 2011. Bandwidth costs rose to 109.7 million yuan, or 35 percent of sales, from 34 percent a year ago. Content costs were 20 percent of revenue in the quarter, up from 17 percent in the same period of 2010. Knowing that bandwidth costs make up a large and growing proportion of costs, how do video sites reduce it? One young ambitious Beijing start-up called CloudAcc has the answer. In [...] Related posts: Live Blog: Competition Session 2: Growth-Stage Pitches Ushi – the making Chinese Linkedin Umiwi Founder Wang Lifen: When CCTV-Style Content Doesn’t Serve Well Online, We Shift Strategies
>> read more
Tencent Weixin’s Open Platform Launched (Tue, 15 May 2012)
Once you built your brand and reached certain good amount of users, the next to-do might be to launch an open platform to integrate various services from third-parties. If you can manage this open platform well and make it the no.1 choice for third parties, you will see a brilliant future ahead. That’s what Facebook taught us. And Tencent’s Weixin, is following what Facebook has done in the mobile space. We reported that Weixin’s to launch its open API. About 1 hour ago, the official site for Weixin’s open platform has been launched. The introduction, the documentation and the SDK (for iOS) are all available on the site. With current API, content from third-party services can be shared to users’ Weixin contacts and Weixin Circle (group). So Tencent wants Weixin to be the No.1 distribution channel for any content on the mobile. I might be wrong, but my understanding of the ultimate goal for Weixin on the open platform is that any third party can integrate their service into Weixin (like Plugins), i.e. Weixin’s users can play with various third-party service without leaving Weixin. Think about you playing FarmVille on Facebook. I don’t see that feature, yet, but no doubt [...] Related posts: Tencent Launched Open B2C ECommerce Platform, the Battle With Taobao is On Tencent Announced “Eight Choices” to Stress Its Open Platform Policy Baidu Launched Open Platform for Mobile
>> read more
Qihoo Phone to Continue the Same Profit-Making Story on Mobile Front (Tue, 15 May 2012)
Like I said, don’t claim yourself to be a major Internet company in China now if you haven’t come up with your own brand smart phone. With Tencent, Alibaba, Baidu and so on all debuted their device for quite a while, Qihoo 360 the digital world‘s safeguard unexpectedly made public its smartphone scheme lately in the wake of a rumor asserting that gaming operator Shanda would announce a Shanda phone in next month. So either you have a smartphone in the plate or at least in the plan. Otherwise it’s not convincible enough that you’re a mainstream Chinese Internet company. Joke aside, so what’s the fuss with Qihoo 360’s phone, since there’re already a swath of similar offerings in the market. At the company’s media conference held yesterday, Zhou Hongyi, CEO and chairman of Qihoo said that the firm’s smartphone will be priced at up to RMB 1999 (US$ 316) whereas it’ll be worth between RMB 3000 and 4000 (US$ 475 ~ 633). The phone’s specification will be read as: 4 inches (if not bigger) high-def display, 1GHz (if not higher) CPU and high-def camera. It seemed that Zhou didn’t held his peers in high regard, according to him, Qihoo [...] Related posts: Innovative Digital Marketing Campaign- Win a Trip to Sydney Sina’s LBS, WeiLingDi, targets 1 million users by June 2011 Tencent to Release Super B2C platform in Q4
>> read more
Baidu to Launch Cloud-Powered Photo Sharing Service: Baidu Xiangce (Tue, 15 May 2012)
A new photo sharing service Baidu Xiangce (translates to Baidu Album) was launched secretly by Baidu lately. This is part of the broad strategy of the search giant to expand its business into cloud forefronts. According to Wang Jing, the vice president of its engineering division and head of mobile, “We have a few partnerships coming up and will announce it in a week.” Two months ago, Baidu just released its cloud storage service Baidu Netdisk. The new service is still in beta testing and looks similar to Baidu Netdisk for they both provide the service of storing files and pictures on a cloud platform. However it is said that Xiangce will differ in its ability to manage and edit pictures. SNS features are also added to it and users can share their favorite pictures with friends. In general, Baidu Xiangce offers these core functions: a)uploading pictures without surrendering to compression, b)sharing without scarifying privacy with privacy control, c) cloud-based back-up technology to make sure the pictures won’t get lost, d) apps for PC and mobile devices. In the future, Xiangce will have open access to Motu (an InnovationWorks incubated mobile app focusing on picture-processing, acquired by Baidu earlier last [...] Related posts: Innovative Digital Marketing Campaign- Win a Trip to Sydney Sina’s LBS, WeiLingDi, targets 1 million users by June 2011 Tencent to Release Super B2C platform in Q4
>> read more
Baidu the leading Chinese search engine seems to be determined to enter the smartphone market. The company was said to release a new mobile operating system Baidu Yun next week with a hardware vendor to jointly announce a device based on the OS. Rumors said that the partner is ZTE (a leading Chinese telecom equipment provider), although Wang Jin, vice-president of Baidu only revealed that they are working with a “global manufacturer”. Earlier last year, Baidu released a mobile operating system called Baidu Yi, which is modeled on Google’s Android system and later cooperated with Dell’s mobile devices. According to the performances in the Street, Baidu seems to be faced with a bearish trend. The future growth seems to depend on its attempt to grow business in the mobile space. While facing stiff competition from several well-established companies each specializing in different product and services, it is still uncertain a simple smartphone offering will help the company to increase the market share. The piece was written by Charlie Sheng, a nerd born in the 90s with interests in tech, innovation and art. Related posts: Live Blog: Collide – Powering the China Cloud Microsoft China Director: Windows Phone Has Chance To Win in [...] Related posts: Live Blog: Collide – Powering the China Cloud Microsoft China Director: Windows Phone Has Chance To Win in 3–5 Years in Mobile Over 65% Chinese App Developers Are Newcomers To The Business
>> read more
Beijing Start-up, CloudAcc Can Save Online Video Streaming Sites Like Youku and Hulu 50% on Bandwidth Costs (Wed, 16 May 2012)
China indeed has a fiercelycompetitiveonlinevideomarket. Last month it was reported that the number one video site, Youku acquired the number two video site Tudou. Shortly after, news broke out of the newly formed alliance between Tencent’s v.qq.com, tv.Sohu and Baidu’s iQiyi. A big reason for the flurry of M&A activity has been the difficulty to make profit due to rising operating costs, forcing some players to succumb to stronger players. To win in the long run, companies must achieve profitability and notjustburnmoneyformarketshare. To become profitable, these video sites must dramatically reduce operating costs. In operating an online video site that supports thousands of simultaneous videos being watched, two major costs are contentlicensesandbandwidthcosts. According to Bloomberg, Youku incurred a net loss of 49.6 million yuan ($7.9 million) in the fourth quarter of 2011. Bandwidth costs rose to 109.7 million yuan, or 35 percent of sales, from 34 percent a year ago. Content costs were 20 percent of revenue in the quarter, up from 17 percent in the same period of 2010. Knowing that bandwidth costs make up a large and growing proportion of costs, how do video sites reduce it? One young ambitious Beijing start-up called CloudAcc has the answer. In [...] Related posts: Live Blog: Competition Session 2: Growth-Stage Pitches Ushi – the making Chinese Linkedin Umiwi Founder Wang Lifen: When CCTV-Style Content Doesn’t Serve Well Online, We Shift Strategies
>> read more
Tencent Weixin’s Open Platform Launched (Tue, 15 May 2012)
Once you built your brand and reached certain good amount of users, the next to-do might be to launch an open platform to integrate various services from third-parties. If you can manage this open platform well and make it the no.1 choice for third parties, you will see a brilliant future ahead. That’s what Facebook taught us. And Tencent’s Weixin, is following what Facebook has done in the mobile space. We reported that Weixin’s to launch its open API. About 1 hour ago, the official site for Weixin’s open platform has been launched. The introduction, the documentation and the SDK (for iOS) are all available on the site. With current API, content from third-party services can be shared to users’ Weixin contacts and Weixin Circle (group). So Tencent wants Weixin to be the No.1 distribution channel for any content on the mobile. I might be wrong, but my understanding of the ultimate goal for Weixin on the open platform is that any third party can integrate their service into Weixin (like Plugins), i.e. Weixin’s users can play with various third-party service without leaving Weixin. Think about you playing FarmVille on Facebook. I don’t see that feature, yet, but no doubt [...] Related posts: Tencent Launched Open B2C ECommerce Platform, the Battle With Taobao is On Tencent Announced “Eight Choices” to Stress Its Open Platform Policy Baidu Launched Open Platform for Mobile
>> read more
Qihoo Phone to Continue the Same Profit-Making Story on Mobile Front (Tue, 15 May 2012)
Like I said, don’t claim yourself to be a major Internet company in China now if you haven’t come up with your own brand smart phone. With Tencent, Alibaba, Baidu and so on all debuted their device for quite a while, Qihoo 360 the digital world‘s safeguard unexpectedly made public its smartphone scheme lately in the wake of a rumor asserting that gaming operator Shanda would announce a Shanda phone in next month. So either you have a smartphone in the plate or at least in the plan. Otherwise it’s not convincible enough that you’re a mainstream Chinese Internet company. Joke aside, so what’s the fuss with Qihoo 360’s phone, since there’re already a swath of similar offerings in the market. At the company’s media conference held yesterday, Zhou Hongyi, CEO and chairman of Qihoo said that the firm’s smartphone will be priced at up to RMB 1999 (US$ 316) whereas it’ll be worth between RMB 3000 and 4000 (US$ 475 ~ 633). The phone’s specification will be read as: 4 inches (if not bigger) high-def display, 1GHz (if not higher) CPU and high-def camera. It seemed that Zhou didn’t held his peers in high regard, according to him, Qihoo [...] Related posts: Innovative Digital Marketing Campaign- Win a Trip to Sydney Sina’s LBS, WeiLingDi, targets 1 million users by June 2011 Tencent to Release Super B2C platform in Q4
>> read more
Baidu to Launch Cloud-Powered Photo Sharing Service: Baidu Xiangce (Tue, 15 May 2012)
A new photo sharing service Baidu Xiangce (translates to Baidu Album) was launched secretly by Baidu lately. This is part of the broad strategy of the search giant to expand its business into cloud forefronts. According to Wang Jing, the vice president of its engineering division and head of mobile, “We have a few partnerships coming up and will announce it in a week.” Two months ago, Baidu just released its cloud storage service Baidu Netdisk. The new service is still in beta testing and looks similar to Baidu Netdisk for they both provide the service of storing files and pictures on a cloud platform. However it is said that Xiangce will differ in its ability to manage and edit pictures. SNS features are also added to it and users can share their favorite pictures with friends. In general, Baidu Xiangce offers these core functions: a)uploading pictures without surrendering to compression, b)sharing without scarifying privacy with privacy control, c) cloud-based back-up technology to make sure the pictures won’t get lost, d) apps for PC and mobile devices. In the future, Xiangce will have open access to Motu (an InnovationWorks incubated mobile app focusing on picture-processing, acquired by Baidu earlier last [...] Related posts: Innovative Digital Marketing Campaign- Win a Trip to Sydney Sina’s LBS, WeiLingDi, targets 1 million users by June 2011 Tencent to Release Super B2C platform in Q4
>> read more
techblog86: Chinese government launches its own Google, "powered by" People's Daily, communist party newspaper. No tanks. http://is.gd/cX0QC #techblog86
(Mon, 21 Jun 2010)
>> read more
techblog86: WordPress 3.0 in simplified Chinese, thanks to @roamlog. It's here: http://is.gd/cWZPs #techblog86 (Mon, 21 Jun 2010)
>> read more
techblog86: RT @judyrey: Notice the Trending Topic's has a "Promoted" Tweet for Toy Story. Is Twitter finally making $$$? (Thu, 17 Jun 2010)
>> read more
techblog86: RT @DavidFeng: Shanghai’s Apple Store: Good For Mid-July? http://bit.ly/aXmDG6 on @techblog86 — @faytoday 用了「阿拉儂上海」的啦，哈 :-P 陸家嘴要開果子店了! (Thu, 17 Jun 2010)
>> read more
techblog86: RT @DavidFeng: Great stuff! RT @ricowyder: Singapore's getting 1GBit/s. I like! http://nyti.ms/bIR0g8 (Thu, 17 Jun 2010)
>> read more
>> read more
techblog86: WordPress 3.0 in simplified Chinese, thanks to @roamlog. It's here: http://is.gd/cWZPs #techblog86 (Mon, 21 Jun 2010)
>> read more
techblog86: RT @judyrey: Notice the Trending Topic's has a "Promoted" Tweet for Toy Story. Is Twitter finally making $$$? (Thu, 17 Jun 2010)
>> read more
techblog86: RT @DavidFeng: Shanghai’s Apple Store: Good For Mid-July? http://bit.ly/aXmDG6 on @techblog86 — @faytoday 用了「阿拉儂上海」的啦，哈 :-P 陸家嘴要開果子店了! (Thu, 17 Jun 2010)
>> read more
techblog86: RT @DavidFeng: Great stuff! RT @ricowyder: Singapore's getting 1GBit/s. I like! http://nyti.ms/bIR0g8 (Thu, 17 Jun 2010)
>> read more
I will Create an Animated Mother’s Day Greeting Video for $5
(Mon, 07 May 2012)
Details
>> read more
I will add 1000+ Facebook Likes to your Website, Blog [like button] Social Plugin within 24 Hours for for $10 (Wed, 25 Apr 2012)
This gig is only for the [Like Button] located on your website, blog, wordpress etc. (Any Facebook social plugin on any URL) It is NOT for [Facebook Pages]! For [Facebook Pages] please see our other gigs… Please order only ONCE per URL/Link Likes will be coming from Real Facebook accounts BUT NOT from Real Active [...]
>> read more
I will manually add 1000+ R E A L followers in 5 days or less for $10 (Sun, 22 Apr 2012)
During 10 days I will add 1000+ followers to your twitter account. When adding I will look for followers who are REAL HUMANS (not bots or or real looking followers) and active in tweeting.To do this I would need your username and password. I promise not to use your account for anything else except for [...]
>> read more
You Can Possibly Make An income On the internet Participating in Odd “Virtual” Tasks (Thu, 22 Mar 2012)
You practically realize that you can possibly make cash flow working on many different odd tasks round your area. However, do you know that you are able to make cash completing odd “virtual jobs” also? We’re not at all saying seriously competitive sites, but through listing site like Gigbucks. This popular web site will let [...]
>> read more
Freelancers Make Money Online (Wed, 22 Feb 2012)
Are you a writer by hobby? Or do you enjoy graphic design or web design? Do you dream of getting paid online and working at home instead of continuing the daily grind? Indeed, there are plenty of perks that come from working at home. You can set your own schedule, spend more time with your [...]
>> read more
Details
>> read more
I will add 1000+ Facebook Likes to your Website, Blog [like button] Social Plugin within 24 Hours for for $10 (Wed, 25 Apr 2012)
This gig is only for the [Like Button] located on your website, blog, wordpress etc. (Any Facebook social plugin on any URL) It is NOT for [Facebook Pages]! For [Facebook Pages] please see our other gigs… Please order only ONCE per URL/Link Likes will be coming from Real Facebook accounts BUT NOT from Real Active [...]
>> read more
I will manually add 1000+ R E A L followers in 5 days or less for $10 (Sun, 22 Apr 2012)
During 10 days I will add 1000+ followers to your twitter account. When adding I will look for followers who are REAL HUMANS (not bots or or real looking followers) and active in tweeting.To do this I would need your username and password. I promise not to use your account for anything else except for [...]
>> read more
You Can Possibly Make An income On the internet Participating in Odd “Virtual” Tasks (Thu, 22 Mar 2012)
You practically realize that you can possibly make cash flow working on many different odd tasks round your area. However, do you know that you are able to make cash completing odd “virtual jobs” also? We’re not at all saying seriously competitive sites, but through listing site like Gigbucks. This popular web site will let [...]
>> read more
Freelancers Make Money Online (Wed, 22 Feb 2012)
Are you a writer by hobby? Or do you enjoy graphic design or web design? Do you dream of getting paid online and working at home instead of continuing the daily grind? Indeed, there are plenty of perks that come from working at home. You can set your own schedule, spend more time with your [...]
>> read more
Japan
Domains with .tokyo could be available next year
(Wed, 11 Jan 2012)
From next year, Internet users may be able to have domain names ending with .tokyo, .sendai or .canon in e-mails and Web sites, according to sources. At least five local governments and two Japanese companies--Canon Inc. and Hitachi Ltd.--have indicated they plan to register their names for top-level domains under a plan to massively increase the number of available domains on the Internet. Domains are a set of Internet addresses that come after an "@" mark. The ones installed in the root zone of e-mail and website addresses are called top-level domains. There are only 22 top-level domain categories, including one for countries, such as Japan's .jp. Companies typically use the .com category, while .org is for nonprofit organizations. In 2008, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a U.S. nonprofit organization that manages domains across the globe, decided to liberalize the usage of top-level domains. It will begin receiving applications for the new domains from Thursday to April and then examine whether it will allow them to be registered ahead of their expected use next year. (Yomiuri)
>> read more
Japan developing cyber weapon (Sun, 01 Jan 2012)
Japan has been developing a virus that could track down the source of a cyber attack and neutralise its program, the daily Yomiuri Shimbun reported on Sunday. The weapon is the culmination of a Y179 million ($A2.28 million) three-year project entrusted by the government to technology maker Fujitsu Ltd to develop a virus and equipment to monitor and analyse attacks, the daily said. The United States and China are reported to have put so-called cyber weapons into practical use, Yomiuri said. Japan will have to make legal amendments to use a cyber weapon as it could violate the country's law against the manufacture of a computer virus, the daily said. (MSN)
>> read more
Used bookstores turn to Internet sales for a lift in turbulent times (Fri, 30 Dec 2011)
When talking about books, there are not as many polarizing issues as the
contrast between chain bookstores and independent booksellers. Many people blame the former group for the gradual disappearance of the latter. Without demonizing the big chains, independent shops
have traditionally been an important part of the local community. This is particularly true for the English-language used bookstores which for many years have been serving the expatriate community
across Japan. The two only surviving shops in Tokyo - Good Day Books and The Blue Parrot - are devoted to their mission and plan to stay around for many more years to come. (Japan Times)
>> read more
Softbank, Alibaba seeking partners to take over Yahoo (Wed, 09 Nov 2011)
Softbank Corp. and China's Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. are talking with private-equity funds about making a bid for all of Yahoo Inc. without the company's blessing, sources said. Alibaba and Softbank, in an effort to buy back stakes owned by Yahoo, have grown impatient with a lack of progress in direct talks with the firm, said the sources, who asked not to be named because the negotiations are private. The two companies aim to work with partners that haven't signed nondisclosure agreements circulated by Yahoo that can make it harder to bid for the whole company, the sources said. Yahoo prefers to sell a smaller stake, rather than cede complete control, they said. (Japan Times)
>> read more
World's biggest blog obsession (Mon, 05 Sep 2011)
Internet users in Japan spend more time reading blogs than any other country in the world, according to a recent study from comScore, a research company measuring the digital world. The average Japanese user spent 62.6 minutes reading blogs during June of this year, when the survey was conducted. That was far more than second-place South Korea with an average of 49.6 minutes and third-place Poland with 47.7 minutes. Japanese may appear busy and overworked, but they manage to squeeze in a lot of blog time. (Japan Times)
>> read more
From next year, Internet users may be able to have domain names ending with .tokyo, .sendai or .canon in e-mails and Web sites, according to sources. At least five local governments and two Japanese companies--Canon Inc. and Hitachi Ltd.--have indicated they plan to register their names for top-level domains under a plan to massively increase the number of available domains on the Internet. Domains are a set of Internet addresses that come after an "@" mark. The ones installed in the root zone of e-mail and website addresses are called top-level domains. There are only 22 top-level domain categories, including one for countries, such as Japan's .jp. Companies typically use the .com category, while .org is for nonprofit organizations. In 2008, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a U.S. nonprofit organization that manages domains across the globe, decided to liberalize the usage of top-level domains. It will begin receiving applications for the new domains from Thursday to April and then examine whether it will allow them to be registered ahead of their expected use next year. (Yomiuri)
>> read more
Japan developing cyber weapon (Sun, 01 Jan 2012)
Japan has been developing a virus that could track down the source of a cyber attack and neutralise its program, the daily Yomiuri Shimbun reported on Sunday. The weapon is the culmination of a Y179 million ($A2.28 million) three-year project entrusted by the government to technology maker Fujitsu Ltd to develop a virus and equipment to monitor and analyse attacks, the daily said. The United States and China are reported to have put so-called cyber weapons into practical use, Yomiuri said. Japan will have to make legal amendments to use a cyber weapon as it could violate the country's law against the manufacture of a computer virus, the daily said. (MSN)
>> read more
Used bookstores turn to Internet sales for a lift in turbulent times (Fri, 30 Dec 2011)
When talking about books, there are not as many polarizing issues as the
contrast between chain bookstores and independent booksellers. Many people blame the former group for the gradual disappearance of the latter. Without demonizing the big chains, independent shops
have traditionally been an important part of the local community. This is particularly true for the English-language used bookstores which for many years have been serving the expatriate community
across Japan. The two only surviving shops in Tokyo - Good Day Books and The Blue Parrot - are devoted to their mission and plan to stay around for many more years to come. (Japan Times)>> read more
Softbank, Alibaba seeking partners to take over Yahoo (Wed, 09 Nov 2011)
Softbank Corp. and China's Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. are talking with private-equity funds about making a bid for all of Yahoo Inc. without the company's blessing, sources said. Alibaba and Softbank, in an effort to buy back stakes owned by Yahoo, have grown impatient with a lack of progress in direct talks with the firm, said the sources, who asked not to be named because the negotiations are private. The two companies aim to work with partners that haven't signed nondisclosure agreements circulated by Yahoo that can make it harder to bid for the whole company, the sources said. Yahoo prefers to sell a smaller stake, rather than cede complete control, they said. (Japan Times)
>> read more
World's biggest blog obsession (Mon, 05 Sep 2011)
Internet users in Japan spend more time reading blogs than any other country in the world, according to a recent study from comScore, a research company measuring the digital world. The average Japanese user spent 62.6 minutes reading blogs during June of this year, when the survey was conducted. That was far more than second-place South Korea with an average of 49.6 minutes and third-place Poland with 47.7 minutes. Japanese may appear busy and overworked, but they manage to squeeze in a lot of blog time. (Japan Times)
>> read more
New Tag Results, from Technorati and Ingboo
(Fri, 05 Mar 2010)
Technorati and Ingboo have partnered together to provide an all new kind of subscription experience for Technorati content, including tagged posts. Look for a blue Ingboo icon for a full range of subscription options. Feeds are also available for: Hottest Blogosphere Posts Latest Original Articles from Technorati The Technorati Blog We also have channel feeds, writer feeds, and editorial tag feeds, which can be found on their respective pages.
>> read more
Technorati and Ingboo have partnered together to provide an all new kind of subscription experience for Technorati content, including tagged posts. Look for a blue Ingboo icon for a full range of subscription options. Feeds are also available for: Hottest Blogosphere Posts Latest Original Articles from Technorati The Technorati Blog We also have channel feeds, writer feeds, and editorial tag feeds, which can be found on their respective pages.
>> read more
反省する犬：Guilty dogs
(Tue, 15 May 2012)
>> read more
戦艦大和の米PBSドキュメンタリー:Yamato - Sinking the Supership 6/6 (Sun, 13 May 2012)
>> read more
IPO前にフェイスブック共同創設者サヴェリンが米国籍放棄、税減らしでシンガポールに高飛び：Facebook's Saverin Renounces US Citizenship Renounces US Citizenship Prior To IPO (Sat, 12 May 2012)
>> read more
戦艦大和の米PBSドキュメンタリー:Yamato - Sinking the Supership 5/6 (Fri, 11 May 2012)
>> read more
シリコンバレーのトリビア50：Silicon Valley Trivia Quiz 50 (Mon, 07 May 2012)
>> read more
>> read more
戦艦大和の米PBSドキュメンタリー:Yamato - Sinking the Supership 6/6 (Sun, 13 May 2012)
>> read more
IPO前にフェイスブック共同創設者サヴェリンが米国籍放棄、税減らしでシンガポールに高飛び：Facebook's Saverin Renounces US Citizenship Renounces US Citizenship Prior To IPO (Sat, 12 May 2012)
>> read more
戦艦大和の米PBSドキュメンタリー:Yamato - Sinking the Supership 5/6 (Fri, 11 May 2012)
>> read more
シリコンバレーのトリビア50：Silicon Valley Trivia Quiz 50 (Mon, 07 May 2012)
>> read more
Korea
Moved
(Fri, 29 Jul 2011)
Moved: This blog is only for archiving purposes Check out:
My Google+ page My new blog My homepage
>> read more
Open Web Asia is Here Again (Wed, 07 Jul 2010)
Open Web Asia, the conference that I created together with some good folks, was last held in October 2008. In 2009, we nearly held the Open Web Asia '09, but the plan faltered as the main sponsor backed off at the last minute (and besides I was too busy having my freshman year at Google.) But the good spirit lives on, and a group of energetic and capable folks in Malaysia rekindled the pulled off the South East Asia version of Open Web Asia -- dubbed "Open Web Asia South East Asia" or "OWA-SEA". It's a very long name, but as I expect the future Open Web Asia conferences to take place in various cities in Asia, I think it makes more sense if we just go with the city-as-the-postfix system, a la TEDx. Open Web Asia SEA will be held in KL, Malaysia next week. The conference will host great local speakers (and some foreign ones including myself, and Serkan Toto over at Techcrunch), and the conference has already seen 270+ registrants. (You can register here.) I'm really hoping this to become yet another successful Open Web Asia conference. The guy who is doing the bulk of heavy-lifting for this conference is Daniel CerVentus. Daniel and I exchanged many emails and I'm really looking forward to meeting him in person finally. He and I have a lot to catch up, as we both know what it takes to pull off a conference of this scale. Another heads-up for the Open Web Asia conference is that Dr. Gang Lu and his gang (no pun intended ;-) are preparing another Open Web Asia in Taiwan, hopefully to be held this year. Yet another good news is that we have started talks for sponsorship for Open Web Asia Seoul 2011, and it looks very promising so far. (It's too early to share any plans at this point though.) For any future Open Web Asia's, I will check back and share any progresses; For the upcoming one in Malaysia, I will try to cover any interesting companies that catches my attention. But I'm sure Serkan will do a much better job spotting and introducing interesting services anyway.
>> read more
Recapping Geeks on a Plane (Wed, 07 Jul 2010)
Sorry about the long blogging silence -- ever since I became the main product manager at Google's Blogger, I've been too swamped. I am learning tons of new stuff these days, and those are definitely worth a separate post later on. I figured a good place to pick up from where I left off with my blogging was recapping on the Geeks on a Plane Seoul, a conference held about a month ago in Seoul. About 20 "geeks" from Silicon Valley and the rest of the world flew all the way to Asia and spent nearly three weeks learning about Asia's IT and Web (while at it, of course, doing lots of social drinking and friendship building.) I organized the Seoul leg of the conference and it was a blast. Given the short time we had (only one full Sunday), Geeks on a Plane Seoul was squarely focused on startup pitches. Though some companies left room for improvement in their deliveries (Korean startups should hone their elevator pitch skills!), in general the pitches were very good. Thanks to our brave journalist Serkan Toto, we had a very good coverage on Techcrunch. If you are a startup in Seoul Korea, you don't get to be featured on Techcrunch every day. Especially, John Kim of Paprika Lab had the honor of having his big headshot featured on the Techcrunch post. I met with one of the startup CEOs that pitched in GOAP, and he said his company has seen a new, increased level of interest from investors and other folks after the Techcrunch post. There is also a blog with detailed introductions to some of the companies that presented in the GOAP Seoul. The blog is here, and it's running on none other than Google's Blogger platform (what a coincidence! :-) Hope the next year's GOAP will stop by Korea too - next time, hopefully with more folks (so we can have a bigger party!)
>> read more
Are You Kidding Me? A Bizarre Story About Online Gaming (Thu, 04 Mar 2010)
A bizarre, sad story related to online games. A married couple in Suwon, Korea has been arrested by the police for negligence of their parental duties. The couple left their three month old baby starve to death, because they were "too obsessed with online gaming." Ironically enough, it turned out that the online game they were playing to their baby's death was themed around, well guess what, raising a virtual avatar. So in short, the couple were too busy taking care of their "virtual baby" that they kept their "real baby" completely unattended and starved to death. The game is called "Prius Online" and the players can adopt an avatar and grow it. Game players can also buy the avatars virtual items such as clothes, or even write a blog about their avatars, much resembling a parenting diary. The parents in charge are said to have been under great parenting stress, presumably due to their financial difficulties, and as their parenting stresses mounted, they became more and more obsessed with the game -- their "escape" from the real world. This is really unheard of, but I'm afraid the world might see more incidents like this as games become more real and blur the lines between the real world and the virtual world. Unlike packaged games, online games and MMORPGs often do not have a clear ending, forcing users to put in endless amount of time and energy into the game. Some players become seriously obsessed with the game and play it for days straight without a wink of sleep. After days of immersive gaming, they might get to confuse the real world and the virtual world, like the way the characters in the movie Avatar gradually became more familiar with the virtual world.
>> read more
1forME is Korea's Etsy (Tue, 23 Feb 2010)
1forME is a newly launched Korean e-commerce site that sells hand-made, artists-produced goods. That's quite a mouthful, but long story short: 1forME is Etsy of Korea.
Etsy saw a gross merchandise sales of about
US$ 180M last year, showing some 105% year-over-year growth. This shows that the handmade goods e-commerce is a proven business model, and for every proven business model there's always an Asia
opportunity, especially if the model is culture-neutral. Well, both e-commerce and the love for handmade goods seem to be pretty universal concept, I guess.
But according to the company's heatmap, Etsy doesn't seem to have a big Asia presence. This
leaves plenty of room for Asian startups to grab the opportunity. 1forME has just thrown hat in the ring, a move that's expected to be followed by many others in the region.
>> read more
Moved: This blog is only for archiving purposes Check out:
My Google+ page My new blog My homepage
>> read more
Open Web Asia is Here Again (Wed, 07 Jul 2010)
Open Web Asia, the conference that I created together with some good folks, was last held in October 2008. In 2009, we nearly held the Open Web Asia '09, but the plan faltered as the main sponsor backed off at the last minute (and besides I was too busy having my freshman year at Google.) But the good spirit lives on, and a group of energetic and capable folks in Malaysia rekindled the pulled off the South East Asia version of Open Web Asia -- dubbed "Open Web Asia South East Asia" or "OWA-SEA". It's a very long name, but as I expect the future Open Web Asia conferences to take place in various cities in Asia, I think it makes more sense if we just go with the city-as-the-postfix system, a la TEDx. Open Web Asia SEA will be held in KL, Malaysia next week. The conference will host great local speakers (and some foreign ones including myself, and Serkan Toto over at Techcrunch), and the conference has already seen 270+ registrants. (You can register here.) I'm really hoping this to become yet another successful Open Web Asia conference. The guy who is doing the bulk of heavy-lifting for this conference is Daniel CerVentus. Daniel and I exchanged many emails and I'm really looking forward to meeting him in person finally. He and I have a lot to catch up, as we both know what it takes to pull off a conference of this scale. Another heads-up for the Open Web Asia conference is that Dr. Gang Lu and his gang (no pun intended ;-) are preparing another Open Web Asia in Taiwan, hopefully to be held this year. Yet another good news is that we have started talks for sponsorship for Open Web Asia Seoul 2011, and it looks very promising so far. (It's too early to share any plans at this point though.) For any future Open Web Asia's, I will check back and share any progresses; For the upcoming one in Malaysia, I will try to cover any interesting companies that catches my attention. But I'm sure Serkan will do a much better job spotting and introducing interesting services anyway.
>> read more
Recapping Geeks on a Plane (Wed, 07 Jul 2010)
Sorry about the long blogging silence -- ever since I became the main product manager at Google's Blogger, I've been too swamped. I am learning tons of new stuff these days, and those are definitely worth a separate post later on. I figured a good place to pick up from where I left off with my blogging was recapping on the Geeks on a Plane Seoul, a conference held about a month ago in Seoul. About 20 "geeks" from Silicon Valley and the rest of the world flew all the way to Asia and spent nearly three weeks learning about Asia's IT and Web (while at it, of course, doing lots of social drinking and friendship building.) I organized the Seoul leg of the conference and it was a blast. Given the short time we had (only one full Sunday), Geeks on a Plane Seoul was squarely focused on startup pitches. Though some companies left room for improvement in their deliveries (Korean startups should hone their elevator pitch skills!), in general the pitches were very good. Thanks to our brave journalist Serkan Toto, we had a very good coverage on Techcrunch. If you are a startup in Seoul Korea, you don't get to be featured on Techcrunch every day. Especially, John Kim of Paprika Lab had the honor of having his big headshot featured on the Techcrunch post. I met with one of the startup CEOs that pitched in GOAP, and he said his company has seen a new, increased level of interest from investors and other folks after the Techcrunch post. There is also a blog with detailed introductions to some of the companies that presented in the GOAP Seoul. The blog is here, and it's running on none other than Google's Blogger platform (what a coincidence! :-) Hope the next year's GOAP will stop by Korea too - next time, hopefully with more folks (so we can have a bigger party!)
>> read more
Are You Kidding Me? A Bizarre Story About Online Gaming (Thu, 04 Mar 2010)
A bizarre, sad story related to online games. A married couple in Suwon, Korea has been arrested by the police for negligence of their parental duties. The couple left their three month old baby starve to death, because they were "too obsessed with online gaming." Ironically enough, it turned out that the online game they were playing to their baby's death was themed around, well guess what, raising a virtual avatar. So in short, the couple were too busy taking care of their "virtual baby" that they kept their "real baby" completely unattended and starved to death. The game is called "Prius Online" and the players can adopt an avatar and grow it. Game players can also buy the avatars virtual items such as clothes, or even write a blog about their avatars, much resembling a parenting diary. The parents in charge are said to have been under great parenting stress, presumably due to their financial difficulties, and as their parenting stresses mounted, they became more and more obsessed with the game -- their "escape" from the real world. This is really unheard of, but I'm afraid the world might see more incidents like this as games become more real and blur the lines between the real world and the virtual world. Unlike packaged games, online games and MMORPGs often do not have a clear ending, forcing users to put in endless amount of time and energy into the game. Some players become seriously obsessed with the game and play it for days straight without a wink of sleep. After days of immersive gaming, they might get to confuse the real world and the virtual world, like the way the characters in the movie Avatar gradually became more familiar with the virtual world.
>> read more
1forME is Korea's Etsy (Tue, 23 Feb 2010)
1forME is a newly launched Korean e-commerce site that sells hand-made, artists-produced goods. That's quite a mouthful, but long story short: 1forME is Etsy of Korea.
Etsy saw a gross merchandise sales of about
US$ 180M last year, showing some 105% year-over-year growth. This shows that the handmade goods e-commerce is a proven business model, and for every proven business model there's always an Asia
opportunity, especially if the model is culture-neutral. Well, both e-commerce and the love for handmade goods seem to be pretty universal concept, I guess.
But according to the company's heatmap, Etsy doesn't seem to have a big Asia presence. This
leaves plenty of room for Asian startups to grab the opportunity. 1forME has just thrown hat in the ring, a move that's expected to be followed by many others in the region.
>> read more
New Tag Results, from Technorati and Ingboo
(Fri, 05 Mar 2010)
Technorati and Ingboo have partnered together to provide an all new kind of subscription experience for Technorati content, including tagged posts. Look for a blue Ingboo icon for a full range of subscription options. Feeds are also available for: Hottest Blogosphere Posts Latest Original Articles from Technorati The Technorati Blog We also have channel feeds, writer feeds, and editorial tag feeds, which can be found on their respective pages.
>> read more
Technorati and Ingboo have partnered together to provide an all new kind of subscription experience for Technorati content, including tagged posts. Look for a blue Ingboo icon for a full range of subscription options. Feeds are also available for: Hottest Blogosphere Posts Latest Original Articles from Technorati The Technorati Blog We also have channel feeds, writer feeds, and editorial tag feeds, which can be found on their respective pages.
>> read more
Print Version
