jPhone - 5 months old

A couple of points in that article seem completely at odds with my experience in Japan. 'Sleek' is a word that describes few Japanese mobiles, and 'usability' describes none. I'm not arguing that Japanese consumers are not discerning; on the contrary, they care very much about their phones. It's just that they are not demanding and therefore settle for a badly-designed phone that offers them a range of colours.

Likewise, I don't disagree that the iPhone has a large number of obstacles which Apple needs to overcome if they expect the iPhone to become a hit in Japan. For one thing, Japanese input on the iPhone is far too slow. It's usable for me since I really only type in Japanese to show off, but were it the primary mode of input something will have to be done to optimise it. It's also true that Japanese input on the phone is different to practically all other keitai, but it happens to be the same as any modem computer and therefore should still be familiar to most users.

One last thing on the topic: I'm writing this with my thumb and it doesn't seem so hard. 適当に書けますよ。

Sunday, March 16, 10.36pm - Talon