Tech in Asia: News Of The Week [February 16, 2013]

So most of the team is finally coming off of New Years break. Here in Ho Chi Minh city most people are still coming out of the lazy holiday haze and people will officially start break on Monday. Despite the lull, looks like there’s been quite a lot of interesting news this week.

Minh’s pick: Tokyo becomes Asia’s first YouTube space location

Actually, I would have picked Pakistan’s incubator but Willis beat me to it, so I gotta pick Youtube’s entrance into Japan. I think this will be interesting given that Japan already has several video sharing websites like Nico Nico Douga, which already cater to Japanese video sensibilities. On the other hand, with Youtube’s first studio in Asia, we’ll be seeing more Asian content besides Gangnam style on the interwebs.

Willis’s pick: Plan9 – Pakistan’s first tech startup incubator

I’m picking my own story for the first time because I do believe that Pakistan seems to be going in the right direction with its very first tech startup incubator. There’s potential in the country, at least based on numbers: over 176 million in total population, 30 million internet users, and 16 million mobile internet users. Not too bad. Disclosure: I haven’t visited Pakistan myself before, so take my opinion with a pinch of salt.

Steven’s pick: WeChat moves towards monetization, beta-testing new features for brands

We’ve already seen the China-made WeChat app add support for brands having official accounts that anyone can follow (sort of like on Twitter), and now it’s looking to go much further than that. The next stop might be WeChat moving into mobile payments for in-store purchases.

Charlie’s pick: Brad Pitt banned from China again

OK, so this probably isn’t actually the most important tech news from this week, but I’m picking it anyway because it’s sort of funny (poor Brad Pitt) and it’s another window into the way Sina Weibo actually works.

Enricko’s pick: Lessons in monetizing apps and games in smartphone-mad Korea and Japan INFOGRAPHIC

This article offers a very nice and insightful data for developers vying to reach the Japanese and Korean markets. With both nations having overtaken the US in terms of Android market size, as well as having pleasing ARPU’s, developers should start considering saying hello to those markets, if they haven’t done so already.