Nifty-Serve, one of the two most popular bulletin board communications networks in Japan, and a joint venture between Fujitsu and trading house Nissho Iwai, is doing its bit to redress the US-Japan trade balance. It has begun to offer American food products over its network. Through a tie-up with an American mail-order firm World Shopping Network in Chicago, Japanese electronic mail users can make orders for products such as Cona coffee and macadamia nuts, salmon fillets, deer and buffalo in Japanese, have the orders translated into English, confirm their purchase and have the order sent to the supplier for shipping. The plan is to add other shopping services such as for books (initially computer books from Compubooks of Texas), compact disks and cassettes, and computer hardware and software. The charges for the services will be deducted directly from the subscriber’s bank account.
