"The most recent meals came after recently appointed Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga signalled his intention to shake up regulations that make it very hard to port mobile numbers between carriers in Japan."
I remember that "intention" from over a decade ago (different PM obviously) . TBH, I assumed it had already been put into practice, and the fact that it hasn't indicates, well ...
Once, in Japan, in the late 2000's I took about 20 pictures with a function phone, and forwarded to my email. A surprise bill of plus +100 dollars. After a long discussion with the rep, I was finally convinced that it was not a mistake and was indeed working as intended.
In '87 NTT made it first public stock offering and demand was so high there was a lottery to buy (yes). Within a few months the price dropped by half. Then in '90 came the recruit scandal [ latimes+com / archives / la-xpm-1990-10-09-fi-2322-story+html ]. Part of it was an 80 yr old NTT exec received unlisted shared in a company 'Recruit' before official listing and price rise, and NTT reciprocated with cheap land lines. The exec was fined $175,000, which was only equal to his illegal gain, and a suspended sentence.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
