Interesting article from PingMag, detailing the most popular web apps and services in Japan. The
highlights…
– SNS: “In Japan, social networking is represented mainly by Mixi,
with GREE following a distant second.”
– Video: “To my knowledge there is no direct competitor to
YouTube in Japan but there is an interesting little mashup* from the boys at
fladdict.net, and it is called hatenatube.
Hatenatube simply takes popular YouTube videos from a variety of sources and
displays a thumb for each one.”
– Podcasting: “Newly-released and IMG SRC-produced ZapZap
is a podcast directory that lets users decide what is popular and what
should be on the front page, whilst also allowing you to mix-and-match a
custom playlist of podcast episodes.”
– Productivity: “Checkpad
represents one of the few productivity-oriented web applications in Japan.
Providing a similar service to Ta-da Lists, Checkpad differentiates itself
by also allowing users to access their lists from their mobile phones.”
– Start pages: “Japan-based Startforce
takes an altogether different approach. Although they donÄôt explicitly
state they are a start-page service, some of their ideology is the same.
Rather than providing a panel-based interface like Netvibes, Startforce has
attempted to visually emulate a computerÄôs operating system. Startforce
allows you to store and swap files as well as chat with other people, all
within an OS-like environment.”
– Blog Tracking: “The near-unpronounceable Kizasi
provides a similar service to Technorati, but in my opinion provides a
clearer method of finding out what bloggers are talking about.”
– News: “…industry news in Japan is probably best seen through
the eyes of the 100shiki
website. […] Hatena Bookmarks is a del.icio.us-like social bookmarking
service and is probably one of the best places to look for aggregated
tech-related news in Japan, thanks to an army of IT-obsessed users.”
I’m looking to cover more of international markets in the near future, so
posts like this from PingMag are very useful. Anyone know of similar articles
for other countries?
