Networking criss-cross Asia

I thought I’d kick-start these series of J-skool blogposts with a surprising message I received today.

Facebook alerted me that I’ve finally become facebook buddies with a certain Mr. Hwang who is the head of the online division at the Chosun (the most-read Korean daily, and apparently the only one in the black). We lunched many, many months ago when I was working for OhmyNews in Korea last year.

I followed up our off-line introduction with an online network invite: a friendly facebook poke or two or three, followed by a stronger friend-request.

Months of virtual silence were the response. Until today, that is.

The whole drawn-out episode made me ponder on the difficulties of cross-cultural networking in the virtual world.

1. Language barriers

• The issue isn’t whether Mr. Hwang understands English or not. Even a native English speaker may have trouble understanding online communication.
• Online lingo is more complex, fluid and often it’s a mash-up of tech-speak and slang.
• Case-in-point: “w00t” was chosen word of 2007 by Merriam-Webster. It’s an expression that online gamers use. Being a non-gamer, this article was the first time I heard of it.

2. Cultural differences

• Some cultures may be particularly averse to the idea of a social network that reveals so much personal information about yourself, your friends, your dog et etc…
• For instance, many Japanese are averse to revealing personal information online. Unlike other Wiki-communities, Japanese Wikipedians want to participate with complete anonymity. And the top Japanese SNS is Mixi, a strictly by-invitation-only network.
• China for instance was late to the Youtube craze, because many Chinese media experts believed that the Chinese public was uncomfortable with sharing personal videos. A top UGC site, 56.com, began with flickr-style photo slideshows as a result. Things have changed though, as there’s now a fierce competition between UGC-video sites in China.

3. Home-grown vs. Global networks

• Each country has their own online networks that understand the cultural and social norms and aesthetics valued by their public.
• The failure of Google Korea showed how these factors are important when online networks branch into new markets.
• Another example is Cyworld. Cyworld in Korea links a quarter of its population, but Cyworld America hasn’t experienced much success against Myspace and Facebook.
• Again, Google’s Orkut has done well in some markets like Brazil and perhaps India, but it’s a disappointment everywhere else.

Next post will look at how Secondlife and other global networks are taking these and other issues head-on as they move into Asian markets.