CNN video coverage on South Korea's Cyworld(SNS)

Last week(10/18) CNN.com/Asia introduced South Korea's social networking service - Cyworld, which is considered Facebook of Korea. (Video clip below)

Cyworld, which means Cyber World, shows off 21 Mil. subscribers, almost 45% of total population in Korea. The web community site is a cultural phenomenon. Almost every young people logs on to the site on a daily basis or even more to make and decorate their own personal, virtual rooms-we call it minihompy!(mini-homepage) with photos or BGMs(BackGround Music) which is automatically played when somebody visits the rooms.



The thing is that Cyworld is one of the top music services in Korea as well. In the first half of 2007, Cyworld just passed 200 Mil. download mark for BGM since launching its paid BGM service and it made $ 100 Mil. in revenue. Unlike other social networking services which highly depend on ads sales, it has made meaningful success in creating big revenue source of music.

Now Cyworld is trying to expand their presence globally including U.S. But it is struggling to overcome cultural difference. More will be covered later...