Social network in South Korea

written by Hyungsik, Kim (M12)

Hi, everyone

I was interested in the influence of social network and how much impact it is having on my country both politically and culturally. Korea is one of the fastest growing IT nation with the fastest internet speed and wireless network connection. Korea also has its own version of facebook called Cyworld (Almost one fourth of the Korean people are using the service).

Recently there was a re-election of city mayor of Seoul and the result was surprisingly the ruling party was defeated. The analysis of the odd result was that the social media like twitter and facebook had huge impact on the election. Politicians now realized how important the social network became in their campaign strategy and how much impact and power it has on our society as a whole.

I tried to find some article about present Korean social network environment and gained some insights from below websites and want to share with you.

1. Korea has one of the most frequent social network users online worldwide.
(From the research done by Ipsos Insight a few years ago shows that Korea is No.1 in frequency of social network website visitors followed by Brazil, China, Mexico and US)

- Source :
(Report) South Korea tops in social networking
http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2007/07/report-south-korea-tops-in-social-network-us-fifth.ars

2. The influence of the foreign social services like twitter and facebook is growing inside Korea, so domestic firms are struggling with the competion.

-Social networks in South Korea : TGIF v the Naverland gingerbread house
http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2010/10/social_networks_south_korea

3. The regime wants to strengthen its hold on the control of social media and the people feel resentment on such a regressive goverment policy.

-South Korea boosts review of social media
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/12/02/world/asia/south-korea-social-media/index.html

[Conclusion]

The fastest growing influence of social network and its impact on the society should not be underestimated. The social network is forming a new and different types of political power. The future leaders should be aware of its nature and possess necessary skills and analytic knowledge to cope with the change. This skill will be also very useful and critical when MBAs grow to become a middle manager inside the company.

[Other links and sources]
- Current status of online social networking in Korea : preliminary report presented at the 6th Asia Pacific Internet Research Alliance (APIRA) International Conference, 2009
http://www.apira.org/data/upload/APIRA-6_Online_SocialNetworking_Korea_2.ppt_HI49go.pdf

- Cyworld: South Korea's leading social network
http://www.squidoo.com/cyworld

-Massive Korean Social Network CyWorld Launches in US
http://techcrunch.com/2006/07/27/this-is-nuts-cyworld-us-opens-for-use/