Do Japanese Really Need to Save Facebook?

Facebook has almost 600 million members worldwide, 75% of whom are outside of the United States. Indonesia as has about 34 million and Turkey 25 million members, but guess which developed and electronically sophisticated country has a population that, for the most part, doesn’t even know who Facebook's CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is?! Well, the film, Social Network, is playing in Japan now, so they might find out. Yep, only a tiny – irrelevant? – percentage of Japan has climbed on the Facebook bandwagon: a mere 2% of Japan's online population (in the U.S., the number is 60%). What's goin' on here?!

Well, when a culture that prides itself on individual anonymity – avoiding being the "nail" that sticks up – comes face-to-face (yes, pun intended) with a social networking site that is all about revealing yourself and your activities to the world… sometimes culture wins. But Facebook is exploring how to penetrate his seemingly impenetrable market. The January 10^th New York Times explains exactly what has captured Japan's online imagination: "Japanese, until now, have flocked to various well-entrenched social networking sites and game portals — like Mixi, Gree and Mobage-town. Each has more than 20 million users, and each offers its own approach to connecting people online… One trait those sites have in common is crucial to Japan’s fiercely private Internet users. The Japanese sites let members mask their identities, in distinct contrast to the real-name, oversharing hypothetical user on which Facebook’s business model is based… Japanese Web users, even popular bloggers, typically hide behind pseudonyms or nicknames."

With each of the big Japanese sites carrying ten times the local volume of social networking over Facebook (which was introduced into Japan in 2008), Zuckerberg has a long and tough road to build. Folks in Japan already have their social networks up and running, their contacts built-in, and operations are smooth and normal. Unless Facebook were to buy one of these Japanese "giants," it may be well-nigh impossible to create the mass exodus from existing sites required to make Facebook the relevant "go-to" Japanese social network, even if those Japanese privacy peccadilloes can be overcome.

What these competing sites like? "Most similar to Facebook is Mixi, started in 2004. Users post photographs, share comments and links, and interact on community pages that have become huge forums based on themes as diverse as recipe-sharing and Michael Jackson. Mixi has more than 21.6 million members… Fast-growing Gree, which overtook Mixi this year with nearly 22.5 million registered users, has expanded by buttressing a popular game platform for mobile phones that offers free games, which users play with manga-style avatars; fancy outfits or tools for games are available for a fee… Mobage-town, which has almost 21.7 million users, offers a similar combination of avatars, games and accessories. It also lets users earn virtual gaming money by clicking on advertisers’ Web sites." NY Times.

To make matters worse (for Facebook, anyway), these portals are not above employing those aspects of Facebook that do travel well, even into privacy-conscious Japan: "Now, all three sites are starting to incorporate elements of Facebook — like allowing third-party developers to make apps for the sites — giving Japanese users little reason to switch… Mixi, meanwhile, has been adapting some techniques of other popular Silicon Valley start-ups. Since late 2009, for example, Mixi users have been able to send short, real-time messages with a maximum of 150 characters, akin to Twitter, the popular microblogging service." NY Times.

Indeed, some U.S. Web communicators are having vastly better luck than Facebook in this Asian nation. "[Local practices] have not kept many Japanese consumers from taking to Twitter, which is catching on here at a speed Facebook may envy. A partnership with Digital Garage, a local Internet and mobile services company, has touched off a surge in Twitter users, who numbered about 10 million in Japan in July, according to Nielsen Online NetView. But Twitter does not require users to reveal their identities." NY Times. Hmmm…. Tokyo-based MMD Laboratory recently surveyed 2,130 Japanese Web-users; 89% said they were reluctant to reveal their real names. In a 2010 Microsoft survey, more than half the Japanese surveyed noted that none of their social network "friends" were friends in real life. This is going to be interesting!

I'm Peter Dekom, and sometimes, it is interesting to lie back and watch it happen.