Japanese Dial up Novels
Reading on the go has reached a fever pitch in Japan, where downloads of novels to cell phones is at an all-time high. While China boasts the first novel written exclusively for cell phones (it is now being turned into a cell phone film), Japanese readers are the most avid consumers of text via phone, reports AP. A Tokyo wireless service provider, Bunko Yomihodai" or "All You Can Read Paperbacks" has 50,000 subscribers and counting. Most readers use the service to catch up on classics they never finished in school. "Users can search by author, title and genre, and readers can write reviews, send fan mail to authors and request what they want to read, all from their phones." U.S. readers should stay tuned: Random House is in a deal to provide cell-phone access to some language study programs.