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Why Japan Hates the iPhone
Ponca City, We love you writes "With a high level of technical sophistication, critical customers, and high innovation rate, Japan is the toughest cell phone market in the world. So it's not surprising that although Apple is the third-largest mobile supplier in the world, selling 10 million units in 2008, in Japan the iPhone is selling so poorly it's being offered for free. The country is famous for being ahead of its time when it comes to technology, and the iPhone just doesn't cut it. For example, Japanese handset users are into video and photos — and the iPhone has neither a video camera, multimedia text messaging, nor a TV tuner. Pricing plans in Japan are also very competitive, and the iPhone's $60-and-up monthly plan is too high compared to competitors; a survey lat year showed that among Japanese consumers, 91% didn't want to buy an iPhone. The cellular weapon of choice in Japan would be the Panasonic P905i, a fancy cellphone that doubles as a 3-inch TV and features 3-G, GPS, a 5.1-megapixel camera, and motion sensors for Wii-style games. 'When I show this to visitors from the US, they're amazed,' according to journalist Nobi Hayashi, who adds, 'Carrying around an iPhone in Japan would make you look pretty lame.'"
Kanji input on the iPhone is as good as the other cell phones. Given that text messaging is a major use for cell phones, this is a big problem.
The UI on the iPhone blows away Japanese cell phones (I live in Japan and I use them all the time). The reason the iPhone isn't taking off as well in Japan is the kanji support and Softbank's piss poor marketing support. They have not done a good job of differentiating the iPhone from the other touch screen phones and, in fact, SoftBank carries several other touch screen phones which is confusing.
Apple is in absolutely no way the "third-largest mobile supplier in the world".
Not even close.
The top are: Nokia (40%), Samsung (14%), Motorola (14%), Sony Ericsson (9%) and LG (7%). Apple is well down in the single digits.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phone
On the other hand they have captured a surprisingly large share of the revenue, but only because the iPhone is a high margin product and they don't compete in the high volume area.
but they get away with because they're a relatively small market compared to the US.
What?! They are the second largest economy in the world... That's hardly what I'd call a "small market".
The Japanese word transliterated "kawaii" is usually translated "cute" in dictionaries, and is composed of two kanji (borrowed Chinese characters), the first meaning "to be able to, to be allowed to" and the second meaning "to love" or "love". The Chinese word written the same way (ke3 ai4) is also translated as "cute" and the implied meaning from the order of the characters/words is "loveable".
Yes, that would most likely be the word used by Japanese tweenies and teenaged (and even older) ladies. Just remember, this is the nation and culture that brought us "Hello Kitty".
In Japan, there were already touch screen phones, and phones with full web browsers built in long before the iPhone was even announced. What you have on the iPhone now is about where Japan was around 4 or 5 years ago. The P905i mentioned in TFA was on the market in 2007 when Steve was making his iPhone keynote.
Could somebody explain what the point of a 10 MP CCD is with a typical cell phone lens being only 1.25 mm in diameter with a 3.5 mm focal length? That's like putting a Ferrari engine in a Pinto, but slightly less useful.
By my math, the resolving power of the lens provides for a horizontal resolution (at the red end of the spectrum) of just shy of 4,000 pixels in the long direction on a cell-phone-sized CCD, and that's if the lens is ground perfectly and if the alignment between lens and CCD is also perfect. Chances are, at 3600 pixels, a 10 MP photo is probably significantly exceeding the real-world resolving power of any real-world cell camera lens unless the lens costs $10,000 to grind and is glued to the sensor....
Not to mention that the light gathering capabilities of such a small lens are terrible and that the low light SNR of a CCD is inversely proportional to the number of pixels. Can a 10 MP cell phone camera take pictures of usable quality in anything less than the light of the sun going nova?
Seriously, I just don't get it. It's like they're adding pixel count because they can without stopping to consider whether they should.... Above about 3 MP, a cell camera makes no sense given the lens size, quality, and mounting tolerances. Maybe 5 MP. Maybe.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
That kanji spelling of kawaii is ateji (= employing kanji that sort of match the sound and meaning of a word, but have no grounds in its etymology). The word "kawaii" comes from "kahohayusi", which then evolved into "kahahayusi", "kahayusi", "kawayusi", and finally into "kawaii". "Kahohayusi" is a compound of "kaho" , meaning "face" (kao in modern Japanese), and "hayusi", meaning "bright".
;)
Much like "mabayusi" (=> modern "mabusii") indicates a brightness so strong that you have to avert your eyes, "kahohayusi" literally describes a sight that you can't face. By metaphor, the original meaning of the word was "pitiable", "a sorry sight". This meaning is retained in the modern word "kawaisou", while the meaning of "kawaii" changed into "lovely, cute".
As for how that happened, we can conjecture something like this: small, weak things are pitiful, but they can also elicit a feeling of wanting to help them; the reaction changes from "turning your face away" to "extending your hand", so to speak, and thus the feeling becomes one of attraction.
(if you don't believe me, check the Gogen Yurai Jiten)
Who knows, maybe someday Japanese buyers will be moved by the pitiful, weak iPhone, and grant it a place inside their hearts.