DoCoMo confirms talks with Apple regarding iPhone

We already had an inkling that Apple was in talks with both NTT DoCoMo and Softbank to bring the iPhone to Japan, but a spokesperson confirmed today that Steve Jobs has indeed met with DoCoMo president Masao Nakamura, but didn't say when or exactly what they talked about. That's not much to go on, of course, but seeing as any phone on DoCoMo's FOMA network will have to be UMTS / HSDPA -- that's 3G, to all you keeping score at home -- we're keeping a close eye on this one.

[Matthew Hilario @ Dec 20th 2007 3:02PM]

Ooo I wanna take you down to do co mo
Well get there fast
And then well take it slow

Thats where we wanna go
Way down to do co mo

[puxpux @ Dec 20th 2007 5:15PM]

I lol'd

[js @ Dec 20th 2007 3:10PM]

3 hour standby time

lawl

[Michael LaFramboise @ Dec 20th 2007 4:44PM]

wait; wut?

[js @ Dec 20th 2007 7:01PM]

For those who do not follow Steve's ramblings, the iPhone uses EDGE and GSM only and not 3G due to power consumption (press conference to introduce O2 iphone at an Apple Store in UK).

[Kyle @ Dec 21st 2007 2:13AM]

@js
No kidding about the crappy standby time of a 3G phone. My company gave me a SoftBank X01HT (similar to the US T-Mobile MDA). Once I turned on email push for Outlook, the standby time shrank to 3, maybe 4 hours.

I hope the iPhone can do better than that.

[Frankenstein Black @ Dec 20th 2007 3:16PM]

Taking bets on where the 3G iPhone will land first in 2008:
US?
EU?
JP?
SC?
OTHER?

[Aaron @ Dec 23rd 2007 6:31AM]

JAP by May 30th, EUR by August 29th, and USA by October 31st. Apple will however again neglect Australia and instead send them an iDidgeridoo.

[Nando @ Dec 20th 2007 9:32PM]

LOL @ Aaron.

Or an iBoomerang.

[roole @ Dec 21st 2007 10:56AM]

China. (Japan will come later, after EU even).

[mSiq @ Dec 20th 2007 3:58PM]

Isn't he the father of Hiro Nakamura?
Thought he was dead already..

[cc @ Dec 20th 2007 3:30PM]

I'm curious what modifications they'd make to the OS for Japanese text entry... it seems to me to compete they'd have to offer a mode that lets you enter text on a traditional ten-key phone-style number pad, as Japanese users are used to that, and it actually makes more sense than the way Japanese is input on a QWERTY keyboard.

(Even as a non-native speaker/reader I can text faster in Japanese than English on a phone just because the language happens to fit a ten-key system so well... people in Japan are even writing mini-novels on their phones.)

[farnarkle @ Dec 20th 2007 6:25PM]

Japanese text input using a QWERTY keyboard is much faster than using the ten-key on phones for the same reason English text input is faster.
Also, Japanese texting is inherently faster because a shorter amount of text generally conveys the same meaning in English (you can drop plenty of particles and shorten without it sounding dodgy too).

Japanese input is already there on the iPod touch so bust yo ass down to Shib and check it out. I think it works quite well (apart from not being used to the software keyboard).

[cc @ Dec 20th 2007 8:08PM]

I'll agree that it's faster typing on a *regular-sized* keyboard in Japanese than on a phone keypad, although the occasional Shibuya kogal may prove that wrong, as I've seen girls who can text faster than they can talk...

If you're talking a tiny mobile (or iPhone virtual) sized QWERTY vs. a ten-key, though, I have to imagine a lot of keitai-familiar Japanese people would pick the ten-key... didn't Sony even offer ten-key input on its tiny VAIO U-series ultraportable laptops?

Totally forgot about the Touch... of course it would have the input system. Unfortunately when I was last in Japan the Touch hadn't come out yet... would love to see it. I'm sure they'll have a demo online on the Japanese Apple site that I'll be able to check out... thanks for the tip!

[farnarkle @ Dec 20th 2007 9:07PM]

Yeah I think you're right when talking about the size of the device. Although I also think that some people will get extreme good at any unwieldy input method given enough practice. Remember the old pocket bell (pager)? That was like inputting text using ASCII codes :D Faster on average than the current Kana input method.

http://www.macco.co.jp/~ktaimail/pocket/

[Cellenin @ Dec 20th 2007 3:59PM]

This interesting since Docomo offers different services and if apple were to make the Iphone 2.0 support these services wouldnt it be great if ATT adopted them as well?

[pheer6224 @ Dec 20th 2007 4:33PM]

How the bloody hell is this filling a hole in their lineup?

[sinerasis @ Dec 20th 2007 4:57PM]

iHole... bend over and get ready.

[xbit @ Dec 20th 2007 5:23PM]

It's like the RAZR and Shine - it's filling the low spec, fashion phone hole in their line-up.

I wonder if it'll be called the NTT DoCoMo A705i or something? :P

[Jamar @ Dec 20th 2007 7:12PM]

Maybe the A705iX (The Shine got the X on the end presumably because it's a fashion phone and I see the same thing happening with this)? No matter what, Apple would be delusional if they tried to get this into the 905i lineup.

And I noticed that DoCoMo stuff is all "i-", like i-Appli (Java), i-Channel, i-Mode... Wonder if that's why Apple chose them over Softbank (because they don't seem that different otherwise; apart from the fact that DoCoMo also requires 850MHz WCDMA on their new phones for its FOMA Plus network).

[Delvis343 @ Dec 20th 2007 6:27PM]

What other features will it have?

[Davsot @ Dec 21st 2007 1:06AM]

W00t? I wanna go to Japan. =(

-d@\/$0t

[BigD @ Dec 21st 2007 5:52AM]

There's hope for Korea!!!

If they make a WCDMA model...we might get it.

Bring it to KT so I can continue to rock my WiBro. My current WiBro PDA phone gets decent battery life...so that shouldn't be an issue. It'd be nice to stream video and music from my home computer while riding the subway with a big a$$ screen.

[passioné @ Dec 21st 2007 8:33AM]

hello,
what do you think
of this?

http://blogs.lexpress.fr/virtuel/

[barnz2k @ Dec 22nd 2007 7:50AM]

be interesting to see if it takes off.. they do like their apple shyte, but i see many more non-pod players than anywhere else (well maybe korea).

Can it watch tv, download games, shoot video?

its bigger than most Keitais

and, most importantly

does it have a loop hole to tie on 1kg of Toys?