As I updated in another post, MIXI now requries the mobile phone email validated before signing up for the new account, which in effect means the new user must be a mobile phone holder possibly residing in Japan. On one hand, it is a good idea to use mobile phone registration as a key to personal identification. On the other hand, by refraining the new users from sigining up from abroad, it dismisses the potential of the Internet, it would halt the international growth. What has made me so sick about this treatment is that they still allow “abroad” to be chosen in the list of address check box at the sign up. (How can one residing overseas possibly obtain the mobile phone email address from Japanese mobile phone carrriers? Note: Docomo told me that foreigners need alian registration to have docomo mobile phone.)
Anyway, one of my mymixi or maimiku in Japanese (mixi buddy, that is) has a good idea (the link to my diary inside mixi, the registration/invitation required). Those new users who can not afford to have mobile phone email address largely becuase they reside outside Japan, instead, can apply for the premium service, where credit card information can be used as identification. As Fred Wilson once declared, I think the premium pricing is at the heart of successful social media services.
Not sure how much users be converted to the premium at Mixi now, but I think Mixi should learn to use its premum pricing more wisely.