Japan isn't that small (especially population wise) and besides when the playstation comes in the news there's an english sounding name attached to them.
Also even without the anglosphere management they're an island and crossing a border is ... complex ... for them :)
it's 4% the size of the US' land area. That's "small" to me.
"oh but genewitch the US is a huge country, you can't compare!"
i know. i wish people would remember that when discussing "policy."
edit: per the OP the EU is 50% the size of the US, in land area. So even put in that perspective, i don't consider Japan to be a "large" country. Yes, their population density is crazytown but "continent sized countries" japan is not a member of that set.
Nitpicking. It's an island. And either Sony Japan or their english speaking CEOs haven't noticed that the EU has disabled borders between all those tiny (or not so tiny to allow for more nitpicking) countries and it's customer hostile to have content restrictions based on those borders.
You probably don't even realize that PSN accounts are tied to countries and Sony does not allow changing country because of "regional rights". Or more because of laziness and/or incompetence, since 99% of titles are available worldwide anyway.
Wouldn't be much of a problem but they think they're some government and only allow paying them with cards based in the country's account... and of course with grey market prepaid cards from the right country, beause who's going to take that seriously?
Also even without the anglosphere management they're an island and crossing a border is ... complex ... for them :)