Today's popular Japanese cell phone technologies expected to become tomorrow's worldwide standards.

The US is very technologically advanced, yet all the cool gadgets come from Asia. Cell phones in Korea, China, and Japan are so cool compare to the one we have in the US. That is so sad. We are always playing catch-up.

The U.S. tends to use it's technology for military purposes, whereas East-Asian countries use them for consumer purposes. Not only that; convergence is a good thing in Korea/Japan because it means that you have less stuff taking up precious space, so Korea/Japan's technology is born out of neccessity (not to mention the poulation and size of the country also make it attractive for wireless data providers).

I wonder how the iPhone will do considering it's being sold by the unpopular Vodafone/Softbank.

You think you have it hard in the States? Mate, come to Australia for a few weeks and try not to laugh (or cry). Big country + small population + geographical isolation = one technologically retarded country.

A Geforce 8800GTX here costs from AU$999. At 75USc per $AU that works out to be around US$750.

Try buying a 8800GTX in NZ mate ;p
over 1000NZD
you can buy one for me if ya like, ill trade ya for some gumboots and a sheep!

Wonder how much the sheep will cost to ship.

You can actually get them for 900 and certian models for a little under that from the right shops....but yeah we're so backwards it's rather depressing

currently having to put up with the nightmare that is internet access in Perth..most isolated city in the damn world

anywaz back on topic. One thing this article didn't cover that I would've loved to have seen is how much these phones cost or are going to cost in Japan. Because I'm sure the price difference between these wonder phones and our lumps of *cough* would have made people cry just that little bit more (phones are so much cheaper over there)

From what I can remember they don't cost anything; you buy a "share" in the company and then you get the phone. Pre-paid is unpopular and only tourists use it, which is fine considering you can pick up a pre-paid phone from AU$20. Japanese phones don't use SIM cards and are only good for Japanese networks, so don't waste time trying to use them somewhere else; they don't use SIM cards either (yes, there are exceptions but those phones are geared for either business or tourists who need a phone in case they get lost).

BTW Athalus_nubie sorry I forgot to mention NZ; I remembered just after I logged off yesterday. The story of new Zealand; Australia always forgets about them If you really want to trade send us some water!

If you want a phone like the Japanese ones try Hong Kong, that way you can still use it in your country (provided it's quad band/GSM, etc).

Last time I checked (yesterday) AU$1 buys US79.46c.