Also, Wired’s How Mobile Phones Conquered Japan. The book mentioned, “Personal, Portable, Pedestrian”, sounds like a good read and I’ll probably be buying a copy. Amazon link.
It’s a pity i-mode hasn’t taken off here. Perhaps a carrier like Singtel would have done more with it than Starhub has. Or maybe they should all have teamed up to make it a standard (always the best way).
Bank transactions on-the-go would be a great thing to have, but limiting it to customers of one bank? And movie ticket booking, limited to Eng Wah cinemas? Come on.
Edit: Here’s a great topic page on cellphones from the Trends in Japan online magazine from Web-Japan, which I’m happy to have just discovered.