The internet in Japan is generally faster and/or less expensive than it is here in the U.S. Given that one usually views Japan as technologically ahead of the curve, this is probably no surprise. The median download speed in Japan is about thirty times what we get here. The foundation came from the wiring in Japan. Since the country is small and the population density is high, wiring is shorter. Also, because of the Pacific War, much of Japan needed rewiring so much of it is relatively new compared to that of the U.S. The primary reason for the higher speed is competition, though. In 2000, the Japanese government told big companies to open their lines up to new internet providers. Renting these lines was cheap and that meant lower prices for the consumer, ultimately. With companies competing, faster and cheaper internet was the way to get customers and that fueled the drastic speed up.
Competing on the same level as new, upstart companies is hardly fun though. Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) is Japan’s largest domestic phone company and was “compelled” to open up some of their lines to these companies. Rather than compete on a level playing field all dealing in DSL, NTT pioneered a large-scale fiber-optic connection operation. This technology leaves the previous DSL connections obsolete, even though they would be faster than most in the U.S. ironically. Without the competition, companies would not have been pushed to drive down prices or hook up many people with fiber-optic internet connections. One example of what they are doing with this technology is telepathology, or diagnosing someone from a distance. Using internet teleconferencing, doctors in urban areas can look under microscopes in rural clinics and accurately diagnose patients across the nation. This system is supposed to be put into use this spring.
Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/28/AR2007082801990.html
Despite the blazing speeds compared to the U.S., among youth in Japan, the internet as we know it doesn’t get seen much. Much of Japanese youth today are using their cell phones to access a smaller, Japanese-language internet designed for cell phone use. However, most get a cell phone for email, not the internet. This trend has some people worried that Japan’s youth is becoming computer illiterate because of it. Why cell phones and not computers? For starters, cell phones are cheaper than computers. One can get a cell phone with many features of a computer (such as email, internet, word processor, spreadsheets, and so on) for still less than a computer with those features. Computers also take up more space and in Japan, space is at a premium. It is more convenient to have a compact phone rather than a computer and space to accommodate that computer. Since many kids have cell phones for these reasons, there is significant peer pressure for other kids to have them and an email address.
In the U.S., text messaging is far more prevalent and cheaper than emailing from a cell phone. In Japan, emailing via phone is fairly cheap. In the public transit system, for example, there are verbal and textual notices advising passengers not to talk on their cell phones and to turn them off or on vibrate. Since emails can be lengthy (around 10,000 characters), are inexpensive, and verbal communication is prohibited or at least frowned upon in some places, emails are the primary means of communication via cell phones. And just like Americans can be proficient at writing text messages and likely receive many of them, Japanese have an analogous relationship with emails. Some youth send and receive over 200 emails daily.
Source: http://www.japanmediareview.com/japan/wireless/1047257047.php
Despite all of this, the relative percentage of those in both Japan and the U.S. who have internet access is around 70%. Also in both countries, this is a fairly large increase compared to where we both started out in 2000.
Sources: http://www.internetworldstats.com/asia/jp.htm
http://www.internetworldstats.com/am/us.htm
One aspect I did not research much about was internet gaming in Japan. I do not have a lot of information, but what I did find was, not surprisingly, that games for cell phones are popular. In contrast, online computer games are not as popular as they are in the U.S. and online gaming not on a cell phone is typically done via video game consoles in Japan. That is how some browse the internet, too. Here is somewhat amusing commercial for cell phone games that I found during my research.
http://kotaku.com/gaming/clip/giant-japanese-thumb-wants-mobile-phone-games-297935.php
