Misleading advertisements, a complaining CEO on television, a crashing customer registration system - it all happened within 72 hours after the mobile number portability scheme was introduced on October 24. What has been the impact so far on the mobile subscriber base of the three large carriers?

According to Tom Sato, what's hot right now is the cell phone site Mobage Town, from mobile content developer Dena. "Moba-ge" is a contraction of mobile games, and is a cross between a Social Network System (SNS) and a games portal. Essentially it serves up loads of games and provides rewards that the players can collect and trade. The kicker is that because it is SNS based, it has experienced a humungous word-of-mouth growth over the last 9 months...

For the last four years now, KDDI/au has been setting the pace in Japan for mobile music services, launching the first mastertone service on its in 2002 and the first full-song download service two years later. The company has recorded a total of over 38 billion mastertone downloads and 78 million full-song over-the-air downloads. They have also achieved impressive handset sales, with more than 22.8 million mastertone-capable and 10.4 million full-song-capable KDDI mobile phones sold in Japan...

Name: Thanko Gold Bullion Hub - Category: PC peripheral - Price: 5,980 yen. The Gist: Fool your friends and family for just a few seconds with Thanko's new "Gold Bullion Hub." ...

Name: Epson Endeavor ST100 - Category: Desktop PC - Price: 50,400 yen. The Gist: The Epson Endeavor ST100 isn't much bigger than the Thanko Gold Bullion Hub. In fact, it's almost the same weight. Measuring 75 x 185 x 195mm ...

Name: Sharp Papyrus PW-TC900 - Category: Electronic dictionary - Price: Open Price; estimated around 50,000 yen - The Gist: It looks like even electronic dictionaries are falling victim to convergence...