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After so many reports about how slow US/UK/wherever broadband really is, this is kinda like rubbing salt into the wound, but we really do need to tell you that Japanese homes are about to get hooked up to 1Gbps fibre internet connections from next month. Yes - that’s a freakin’ gigabit per second.

Earlier this month, when we looked at the future of mobile technologies from an academic’s perspective, one of the predictions that stood out was that phone companies looking to encourage mobile micropayments using their handsets would be well advised to team up with a solid financial institution first.

Anyone remember the days before Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when we actually used those little dark plastic infrared windows on our phones and other gadgets? If you do you’ll also recall that IR transfers were horribly slow and prone to failure, so it’s intriguing to hear that a Japanese firm has upgraded the invisible light technology to make it fit for the modern wireless age.

Japanese researchers have come up with a rather snooty technique for detecting online pirated video content in places where it shouldn’t be. By analyzing clips for ’amateur-looking techniques’ KDDI reckons it can sort the professional stuff out from the garbage the rest of us produce.

KDDI, the company that recently started an online service delivering DVD-quality movies to domestic customers has upped the ante to send quad-HD films down the same pipe.

Japan’s second most popular cellphone provider, KDDI, chose today in Tokyo to unveil the winter handset line-up due to hit its au-branded shops in the next few weeks.

Standard domestic internet connections in Japan have long been fast enough to deliver a lot more than most people use, with average ADSL download speeds maxing out at around 50Mbps and fiber connections typically twice that.

As Google continues its bid for domination of the internet, particularly in the expanding mobile arena, we hear word from Japan of the US company offering a customized version of its Gmail email service to phone users there.

Anyone who’s ever been through a major earthquake will immediately recognize the value of an early-warning system being planned by Japan’s largest mobile phone operators.