Attached Link: http://www.nttdocomo.com/i/index.html

I wish you all a merry Christmas and offer a Trend-Watcher's Present that may allow some of you to make some money with Poser in 2001- You will see the merger of Cell-Phones with Personal Digital assistants. These devices in 2001 will begin to have optical Smart Cards (already growing in Asia and Europe). Smart Cards will be significantly more effective against credit card fraud, etc. But, they also offer the potential to be "programmable" with full color games, animations, and can of course, dial-up for updates and link to websites. Look for the opportunity for MANY speaking Poser characters to provide a wide-range information, (as Ananova.Com already does)including "virtual friends". In Japan, a big hit already is Virtual Girlfriends (a flight attendant, school teacher and bar hostess) who talk to subscribers, reveal personal details and create complex personal relationships, which link to websites, etc. The companies behind this are NTT DoCoMo and Bandai, who are are out to be the "Sonys" of the internet... (I don't own a cell-phone and think all this is totally insane and stupid, which is why it will most likely be a major hit here in the U.S.)

Attached Link: http://www.bandai.com/company/

Where Bandai is coming from...

Youre right on the money there, Fox! Ive been doing stuff for this market for the last ten months ;-) The hardest part is getting the smooth interactivity between client and avatar in an environment like a web site / dialup ... but it is possible. Definitely a watch this space kinda situation.

NTT also bought 16% of AT&T Wireless and ALL of Verio, a major U.S. internet website provider so they can inter-connect the whole concept in the U.S. Verio, as an NTT subsiderary, will also expand operations in Japan as well...