Cyber Culture

The Diocesan Bulletin has in  previous weeks addressed the culture in which the young people live.  Postmodernism and neoliberalism were explained and this week we have the culture of cyberspace in which the young people live. The Salesian Priest continues to explain the culture in which the young are living.

Cyber culture is the network that both the older and younger generations feel at home. Three distinctive features are listed.

1) A diverse culture: anonymous (at times dangerous elements appear),  and  continues to create  and allows one to express his own variety of desires.

2) Community culture: Each is able freely and equally to  enter the internet, one can communicate with those with the same likes, and establish or join a community, share  knowledge and exchange information.

3) A  culture that produces:  prosumer (a  blend  of producer and consumer) (the user of the internet) = the one producing and the consumer are both present. We are not only passively receiving but making  contents to appear on the site. There is a new kind of communication. 

What is this cyberspace culture in Korea? We have developed greatly in the multimedia field and continue to do so. Moreover, 94 percent of our young people are using the internet. Korea is number one  with high speed internet access. However, there are some misgivings about our situation, he admits.  

Some of the nearby Asian countries have developed  the knowledge, educational, and medical fields for the general  public. Korea on the other hand has developed the fun, and entertainment elements: music, literature, movies, art, media and pornography content. This he considers an embarrassment.  

He explains why this  was the case. 

1) We did not begin with an elite group but went directly to the general public. Korea because of the IMF period of financial difficulty, they were too much tied up working with the principles of capitalism.

2) Society, for security reasons, was repressed and controlled and the internet allowed many to express themselves freely and vent their frustrations.  

3) The technological properties of the internet:  globalization and creativity are open to the users of the internet. Productivity of the internet continues.  Fundamentally the control of the internet is difficult. We have given the technology of the internet and its business potential first consideration.This allowed us to ignore the soundness and the cultural aspects of the internet and consequently now see the inadequacy.