Page 279 - Culture Technology Communication

262 Robert J. Fouser

commercial on-line Internet providers. Computer and Internet use in
both societies has grown rapidly since the early nineties as word pro-
cessing programs and UNIX-based character sets have improved.
The rapid growth in computer and Internet use has attracted consid-
erable media attention in both countries. In the process, CMC has be-
come a firmly established part of popular culture and cultural
folklore in both countries.
In this paper, I will compare and contrast media and artistic
views of CMC as a new pop culture phenomenon in Japan and
Korea. From this discussion, I will elucidate important trends that
help define the media perceptions of CMC that have emerged in
these two countries. Finally, I will conclude with a discussion of
which theory—a cultural theory or a computer literacy theory—
better accounts for observed differences between Japan and Korea
in the early reception of CMC; the better theory, in turn, will help
us more fully understand what factors will influence subsequent
perceptions of CMC in both countries. 1

Differences between Japan and Korea

The major national daily newspapers, all of which have extensive
Web sites, reveal a number of interesting differences between the
two nations. The most obvious difference between, say the Yomiuri
Shimbun’s Web site (<http://www.yomiuri.co.jp>) and the Choso ˘n
Ilbo’s (<http://www.chosun.co.kr>), the two largest dailies in each
country, is the number and type of banners. The Choso ˘n Ilbo has
many large colorful banners, many of which move or change shape.
The layout is easier to follow and includes several color photo-
graphs. The headlines are large and designed to attract attention
much as they are in the print edition. The Yomiuri Shimbun, on the
other hand, has fewer banners and a more conservative layout.
There are fewer photographs, and headlines are smaller. The
Choso˘n Ilbo also has a site that lets users search back issues of the
paper for articles. The entire print edition is presented on the Web
site. For the Yomiuri Shimbun, users have to pay one thousand yen
to register for a user ID and seven hundred yen per month to search
back issues. The Web edition does not carry all of the articles that
are in the print edition. A survey of other major newspapers in both
nations reveals similar findings. Korea has followed the model of
many newspapers in the English-speaking world, such as the Wash-
ington Post and the Los Angeles Times, that put the complete paper