Assignment#7 Opt.1 - SNA on Ohayo

Although I have never been to Japan, I am quite interested in this country in general. I am learning the language and participating in cultural events in Cornell as well. About three years ago, there was one website that kept my interest grow more and more. It’s called ‘Ohayo’ meaning ‘good morning’ in Japanese. I found this website through random search on Internet.

On Ohayo, the administrators created several forums about studying abroad in Japan, traveling in Japan, shopping in Japan, etc. I was not an active member in this community. I usually searched for the information I was looking for. Since there were lots of people interacting, I usually did not need to ask my question. Maybe it was one of the reasons that I remained not active.

As Haythornthwaite said, Ohayo was consisted of actors who were interest in Japan and tied in order to keep relations. The relations were mostly for exchanging information and networking. Since every one on Ohayo had common ground of interest in Japan, people seemed to be more attached to others.

There were both strong ties and weak ties among community members. As SIP supports members who had spent lots of time in one forum had exchanged enough amount of personal information about other members, so they were able to form a detailed impression of others as if they met FtF. Members with strong ties usually talked or left messages to each other for at least every one or two days. Frequent contact resulted in higher proximity. Usually for people who used Ohayo as an information source rather than a networking source, weak ties seemed to be common. As an advantage of online community, people from all around the world who could read Korean (The website was in Korean.) would come by and look for information or provide an answer for the questions. People from different background usually did not a lot in common. Due to this less overlap in human capital, members were able to help each other with their experience or knowledge.

For someone who is searching for information about Japan or friends who can share interest in Japan, Ohayo was a valuable asset. Since it was created in 2002, Ohayo had been growing quite quickly, so it had large data base, lots of active members updating its website 24/7. Just by searching within Ohayo, one could get a detailed picture of Japan. And, any information from Ohayo was considered to be credible as well. Once I was at the daum community called 日本TV, (This is another community about Japanese culture formed in different portal site.) I read people talking about the information from Ohayo about studying abroad in Japan. Since this information was from Ohayo, many people believed it or gave high credibility.