Home-grown Ameba Now challenges Twitter in Japan

Freshly from the lab Ameba Now, the twitter-like microbloging service launched in December 2009, is gaining in popularity in Japan registering one million visitors in January, according to Nielsen's data. For the same period twitter in Japan saw 4.7 million visitors with an average user spending about 25 minutes on the site versus 6.5 minutes spent by Ameba user. Interestingly, twitter in Japan looks like a male-dominant service with 64% of its users being males while Ameba Now attracts 54% of female audience. Now, keep in mind that these numbers are for PC users and don't include mobile phone usage.

Cyber Agent, a company behind Ameba Now, is also running a popular blogging platform Ameba Blog. The ability to attract celebrities to use Ameba Blog service was a key factor for its popularity and if the same strategy can work for Ameba Now, it can present a serious challenge to twitter in Japan.