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Technology Stocks : Zi-Corp (ZICA), formerly MCUAF
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To: Pete Mason who wrote (1461)9/21/1999 2:31:00 PM
From: John Stichnoth  Read Replies (1) of 2082
 
how exactly do input methods for Chinese languages impact cell phones?

Although one country, China has numerous dialects. And even those dialects contain a lot of homonyms that lead to ambiguity. The ambiguity can be solved by looking at the character in question. It's a little bit like hearing someone say "read" or "reed" or "reid". Usually the context tells the meaning, but sometimes not. That can happen more often in Chinese, I understand.

Potential buyers of the phones will spend the vast majority of their airtime speaking their others in their own dialect, but they will want to buy phones that allow them to communicate with someone who doesn't speak their own dialect. One possibility: A businessman in one area (speaks his local dialect and mandarin) calls across country and reaches a secretary who speaks only her local dialect. They use Zi input to let the secretary know who he wants to talk to. That other person (who speaks lthe second local dialect and mandarin) gets on the phone and the conversation goes on normally, in mandarin.

This presupposes (1) both phones have Zi input, and (2) the input is sent instantly when the send button is hit, not as e-mail.

The Longs' argument is that there is a very powerful network element in the value of Zi. If only 1% of the phones have Zi, it's not worth very much. But, if it is standard equipment--then it's very valuable.

Of course, how valuable to Zi depends on how much they receive per phone--which I have never seen stated.

Best,
JS
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