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Life, Hataraki Man Manga Added to iPhone's J App Store

The Japanese publisher Kodansha and the mobile application providers Bbmf and Sonoran Blue have been adding almost two dozen manga titles to the Japanese App Store, the online download service for Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch mobile devices. These titles include such popular works as Keiko Suenobu's Life, Moyoco Anno's Hataraki Man, Yōzaburō Kanari and Fumiya Sato's Kindaichi Case Files, and Kaiji Kawaguchi's The Silent Service. Unlike manga that have been offered on other Japanese mobile phones, these titles can be added to iPhones and iPod Touch devices in America and elsewhere — with prepaid Japanese iTunes Store cards that are readily available online.

Four other manga titles — Takao Saitō's Golgo 13, Mine Yoshizaki's Keroro Gunsō (Sgt. Frog), Yuichirou Sueda's Souta no Houchou, and Kōji Inoue's Mahiru no Tenshi — have already been posted on the App Store. All five of Sonoran Blue's titles and 12 Bbmf titles are being added for free, although not all of Bbmf's manga titles are online now. Bbmf has already begun officially offering manga in the Korean App Store, and it plans to distribute comics in elsewhere overseas.

The current and future manga offerings on the App Store include the following: