by Wm. Auckerman

The Japanese internet has come a long way since the first public access connection was established less than five years ago. As of March 3, 1998, there were 32,346 connected .JP domains, including over 23,700 corporate (CO.JP), 3,800 organizational (OR.JP), and 280 governmental (GO.JP) sites.

Japanese Web content has been growing exponentially as well. Most of it, unfortunately, amounts to little more than corporate or organizational PR and product information. Yet there are some Japanese websites with high-quality, useful technology-related content.

Media sites

There are lots of Japanese websites, including those of the major newspapers, that offer timely English-language general news and commentary. Only a handful of Japanese sites, however, have English-language business technology and IT-related news and features.

http://www.ascii.co.jp/ english/news/
Japanese High-Tech News, from ASCII Corporation, is a weekly compilation of a half-dozen or so technology-related news reports. Individual articles are typically 700 words or more, and the topics range from coverage of new products and technologies to industry mergers/acquisition and market trends. There is an archive of reports from past issues extending back about one year. Links to the websites of companies and organizations mentioned are included at the end of each article. While the quantity is limited, the quality (of the content and of the writing) is good.

http://www.nikkeibp.asiabiztech.com/
Asia BizTech, from Nikkei Business Publications, covers business technology happenings primarily in Japan, Korea, China, and Taiwan. Each weekday, approximately 12 to 15 new articles (ranging from 250 to 1,000 words each) are posted. These articles are excerpted and translated from various Nikkei Japanese paper publications, such as Nikkei Computer, Nikkei Market Access, and Nikkei New Media. Quality is very good, and the sources mean that this site offers a "what the Japanese are reading" flavor.

http://www.nikkei.co.jp/enews/TNKS/page/High-Tech.html
Nikkei Net News offers 20 or so daily (Mon.-Sat.) news stories, each relatively short, summarized and translated from the Nihon Keizai Shimbun. These typically include 4 to 6 high-tech stories. The quality is good, but at just 200 to 250 words, many stories offer little more than a "newsbriefs" taste what's in the news.

There's also a link here to the Computer Industry Roundup (http://www.nikkei.co.jp/enews/SPECIAL/computer/index.html). There are several months' worth of archived computer-related stories from Nikkei Net News, grouped chronologically into four categories: News and Analysis, Technology and New Products, Market Briefs, and Price Trends.

http://satellite.nikkei.co.jp/enews/BB
Yet another, albeit different, website from Nikkei is the Nikkei Net Business Browser. This site offers a useful alphabetical click-and-jump listing of Japanese corporate websites that contain at least some English-language content. There is also a category listing that includes computer and telecommunications groupings. A companion Asia-Pacific section (http://satellite.nikkei.co.jp/enews/BB/) offers the same click-and-jump listing of some 500 corporate websites in 19 additional countries.

http://www.nb-pacifica.com/
The Newsbytes Pacifica website serves up 50 to 60 daily capsules (one-to-two sentence summaries) of Asia-Pacific computer and telecommunications news. Longer (100- to 300-word) postings of the top 4 or 5 daily stories are also posted. To get more than just the headlines and a taste of the news, though, you'll have to sign up (at $7.50 per month) for the Newsbytes subscription service, which offers full text of all the daily stories.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/features/ccorner/cc.html
As many of you know, Computing Japan's Industry Eye columnist John Boyd writes the weekly Computer Corner column for the Japan Times. At this site, you'll find all of his columns from 1996 to the present.

http://www.computingjapan.com/
I'd be remiss if I didn't mention Computing Japan's own website. All our back issues are online -- the most recent are available to subscribers, and the older ones are open to the public. Subscribers can also get a daily dose of selected IT newsbriefs.

Government sites

Government websites can be an excellent source of technology policy and trend information. Unfortunately, Japanese government websites, by and large, have gotten worse -- in terms of their English-language content -- since we first covered them over two years ago (see "Government Goes Online," November 1995, page 27). The only government ministry site I can recommend for IT-related information is that of the MPT.

http://www.mpt.go.jp/index-e.html
The Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications maintains an informative website that includes telecom-related press releases and policy reports (such as the annual "Communications in Japan" White Papers and Telecommunications Council reports). The English side of the site is not as inclusive or up-to-date as MPT's Japanese-language pages, but this is a useful and informative resource for telecom issues nonetheless.

Other sites

There are a few other sites that offer relatively useful content. http://www.atip.or.jp/ar-pub.html
The Asian Technology Information Program produces about 100 reports each year, covering a wide range of technology developments in Japan and the rest of Asia. Abstracts, contents, and a brief introduction for reports all the way back to 1990 are available to the public online. The ATIP website is also a good source for information about upcoming Japanese and Asian technology conferences (http://www.atip. or.jp/SSI/conflist.html).

http://fuji.stanford.edu/JGUIDE/
For finding Japanese online and offline information sources, including those relating to computers and the Internet, law and regulation, and business, economic, and finance organizations, the Stanford University US-Japan Technology Management Center's JGuide is a useful if slightly unpolished starting point. I'd rate this the current best of the academic Japan-focused sites for technology links.

http://www.csjapan.doc.gov/market/isalist.html
For business and technology market research, check out the US Department of Commerce's Commercial Service. There's good content covering various industries, economic trends and outlooks, and Japan's current political and business environment.

In future issues, we'll review at a wide range of other Japanese websites with English-language content -- not just those devoted to IT. If you have recommendations, please send the URLs and the reasons you like each particular site to editors@cjmag.co.jp.

Industry association websites

Many Japan-based associations have some English-language content on their websites, but in most cases it's little more than an introduction to the organization and lists of for-a-fee paper publications that can be ordered. Still, if you want to learn a bit about some of Japan's industry associations and their activities, here's where to start.

Industry association websites in Japan

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