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Korea in the digital vanguard

by Shashank Tripathi, Korea

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Korean digital realities: "Naverization" and under-development of broader technologies

Nov 5, 2007 21:31

Korea's digital miracle has no shortage of accolades. CNN ran an entire section on digital Korea recently, both on the channel and follow-up articles on the Web site. But there is growing concern that this punch-drunk praise of Korea may have flimsy foundations. At a recent AT Kearney seminar, it was predicted that Korea may fall into oblivion by 2012 unless it started investing in technologies beyond the copycat fest at big portals and mobile accessories into mid-tech.

In truth, most new technologies that are brought about by high-profile international startups are quick to be copied by the Big Three--Naver, Daum and Cyworld. Widgets (or small self-contained executable codes) are being hailed as the bearers of a "deportalization" of today's Web as regular Joes can easily insert widgets into their Web sites and add interesting functionality that hitherto would have required programming knowledge.

But Korean bigwigs have found a way to subvert this trend as well; the Korean Web only continues to become more "portalized", meaning Internet services are fast becoming commoditized with a very clear top three players and few breakthrough new services aiming to upend the incumbents.

Yoo, the CEO of Korean Click--a leading Web stats company in Korea often cited on this blog--recently gave a presentation about this trend. Yoo said the emergence of game changing new Web services has more or less ceased over the last three years. After Daum email (1997), Daum cafe (a Web BBS) (1999), Cyworld (2001), Naver Knowledge iN (Q&A service) (2002) and Naver Blog (2003), there have not been other "smash-hit" services with over 50 percent reach.

So this means three years ago most Koreans used Daum cafe, Cyworld, Naver Knowledge iN. Today, most Koreans still use Daum cafe, Cyworld, Naver Knowledge iN, etc.

This "naverization" of all new startup technologies leads to an ugly anti-innovation monolithic culture, which isn't necessarily good for the overall economy. There is a pressing need for a practice of an ecosystem in the Korean Internet industry, but that may be a pipe dream in the very strong hierarchical structure that goes undernoted in all the paeans to the Korean digerati.

Shashank Tripathi

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About Shashank Tripathi

Shashank Tripathi, nicknamed Shanx, believes that a rocking hammock, a good book, and a tall glass of strawberry milkshake are the way to save the planet. But that does not fill all the hours in a day, so he cuts his teeth on digital advertising and media, spending a good part of his life expressing opinions as though they were going out of fashion, or drawing boxes that connect to each other with shiny black arrows. Occasionally, he has also been accused of poetry.

Locus: Based in Singapore, but a devout jetrosexual.
Focus: Media, Advertising, Ubicomp, All things Digital.
Other: LinkedIn, Facebook