Media Preferences of South Korea's Teenagers

The Korea Times today reports on a survey of middle and high school students by the Korea Press Foundation in September.  The survey showed that Korean teenagers prefer internet portal sites to newspapers for getting news, and trust them more than conventional print media.

When asked which media they are likely to use the most when they become adults, 46 percent selected Internet portals, while 25 percent picked terrestrial television, 12 percent internet news, 7 percent free newspapers distributed at subway stations, and only 5 percent newspapers. When asked to rate the credibility of 30 private and public media organizations, MBC, KBS, Portal Sites and Hangyoreh daily ranked first, second, fourth and fifth respectively.  Netizens ranked third on the measure of reliability, while the Joongang, Chosun and Donga Ilbo newspapers ranked 22nd, 24th and 25th.

Internet portals, online communities, and friends or family dominated the teenagers reported sources of information about this year's candlelight vigils.

ITU Telecommunication Channel Available on YouTube

One important aspect of the telecommunications revolution that took place in South Korea during the 1980s was that it led directly into a more active international role for the country.  The highly successful 1988 Seoul Olympics gave a big boost to the country's so-called "Northern Policy" of opening up relations with China, the former Soviet Union and socialist bloc countries in Eastern Europe. (see my book with Heung Soo Park, Global Television and the Politics of the Seoul Olympics). At the same time, South Korea's economic growth put in in a position to more actively participate in ITU (International Telecommunications Union) projects, as well as those of the OECD, which it joined in 1996.  It became an active participant in the World Summit on the Information Society and in global efforts to help eliminate the digital divide.

In the above context, I was pleased to find that there is an ITU Telecommunication Channel on YouTube. You may enjoy, as I did, getting to know this channel by viewing the following video.



I can see from a number of Korean-language annotated entries that people here have taken an interest in this channel.  Through this blog and related sites, I hope to organize links to the major YouTube channels relating to telecommunications, and in particular the Korean experience. A word of warning. Don't expect a tremendous amount of quality and substance in these telecoms-related videos. That is one reason I want to review them, to sift the wheat from the chaff as it were.