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Overhype

by Mike Masnick

Wed, Oct 9th 2002 2:12am





Broadband Backlash In Korea

from the maybe-not-so-good dept

For over a year now, Korea is always trotted out as example number one of what a society could be, if it had widespread broadband adoption. People talk about how Korea has over 50% of households with broadband access, and about how so many of them play online broadband games such as Lineage. There's also been some talk about the phenomenon of "PC Bangs", which are basically very popular cybercafes. However, some (as with any popular item, these days) are starting to suggest that not everything is wonderful with so much broadband. Back in January, we had a story claiming that 1/3 of all Koreans were "addicted" to the internet. At the time, this seemed like a bit of overhype from the same sorts of people who put out all those "scary" internet addiction stories in the US. Now, the NY Times is taking that story one step further by presenting what seems like anecdotal evidence to suggest that Korean youngsters are becoming "virtual zombies", spending all their time at these cybercafes. Even though they come with people and participate in "group" gaming - mostly they just sit by themselves staring at their own screen. There are even stories of couples who are dating who go to the cybercafes, playing games side-by-side, but never talking. Again, I still think this is a bit of hype from folks who always get worried about "something new" changing the way people interact with each other.

5 Comments | Leave a Comment..


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  1.  

    Dating and gaming?

    identicon
    TheCaptain, Oct 9th, 2002 @ 6:03am

    Man, for YEARS I wished I could share my love of games with my girlfriend instead of having to choose between the two. Now my current girlfriend and I DO share that love (well somewhat, she's not quite as addicted as I am) and we have a blast either playing head to head or just spending time together in the computer room, her on her PC, me on mine. I think its totally amazing. Not something that should be worrying...and I don't think our interaction is in any way reduced.
    Keep in mind that news outlets must hype and scare to sell...*sigh* if only we didn't have to rely on money for everything.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  2.  

    Why the deliberate obfuscation of the news link?

    identicon
    Steve Sanders, Oct 9th, 2002 @ 11:51am

    This is something that has been irritating me for a while: Why does this site always try to drive traffic back into past articles, instead of simply listing the link to the news story presented? It's annoying to have to read through the entire editorial attached to each story just to find the actual article. Frankly, I don't give a toss about what Techdirt has covered in the past - I just want the link, that's it.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  3.  

    Re: Why the deliberate obfuscation of the news lin

    icon
    Mike (profile), Oct 9th, 2002 @ 12:09pm

    This is something that has been irritating me for a while: Why does this site always try to drive traffic back into past articles, instead of simply listing the link to the news story presented? It's annoying to have to read through the entire editorial attached to each story just to find the actual article. Frankly, I don't give a toss about what Techdirt has covered in the past - I just want the link, that's it.

    We do that because often times the links to the news articles themselves are no longer valid or get changed. We know that the Techdirt links will remain constant.

    Besides, some people do like the commentary and summaries from Techdirt. I'm sorry that you don't appreciate them, but I'll keep it in mind.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  4.  

    Re: Why the deliberate obfuscation of the news lin

    icon
    Mike (profile), Oct 9th, 2002 @ 12:25pm

    More thoughts on this... as to why we link to older stories at all, it's to better establish background info for those who are interested. I've heard from people who like that.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  5.  

    Re: Why the deliberate obfuscation of the news lin

    identicon
    mhh5, Oct 9th, 2002 @ 6:57pm

    Hmmm. As an occasional poster, I like to link to older stories simply because they're related and can provide more information. I'm not sure why Steve is so irritated, unless he doesn't "mouse over" the link to see what the url is, and goes to the "old" links instead of the "new" ones. If the url has techdirt.com in it, just skip it, and click the newer direct link. Is that so hard? Maybe the links to the older stories should be better indicated? Perhaps we should put an asterisk in the old links, or make them a different color? Would that help?

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]


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