Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
randomwire.com
Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
1–10 of 213 posts
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#2I had to disable Adblock Plus for some reason to get the entire page to load.
Ditto on the point where Japan is stuck in the 1980s future. Everything's optimized for tiny cellphone screens optimized for text. If I recall correctly iPhone adoption was slow, and many people lacked a desktop to provide updates. I still find wifi to be incredibly scarce in Tokyo. If people want a desktop, they go to a cafe. If they want a mobile connection, it's faster to just use your telecom plan.
That seems to have changed under COVID.
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#3I had to disable Adblock Plus for some reason to get the entire page to load. Ditto on the point where Japan is stuck in the 1980s future. Everything's optimized for tiny cellphone screens optimized for text. If I recall correctly iPhone adoption was slow, and many people lacked a desktop to provide updates. I still find wifi to be incredibly scarce in Tokyo. If people want a desktop, they go to a cafe. If they want…
I believe the reason for slow iPhone adoption was that they already had i-mode: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I-mode
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#4Regarding advertising, the article states: "Rather than being seen as a tool to enable people Japanese companies often see the web as just another advertising platform to push their message across as loudly as possible. Websites ends up being about the maximal concentration of information into the smallest space akin to a pamphlet rather than an interactive tool."
I find this quite ironic, especially given how unusable most websites are due to third party advertising resources being loaded into them these days. HN users in particular will agree I bet, ad blocking seems prevalent here because of that exact reason.
I think Japanese websites are better in this sense because their ad technology is usually 'outdated' banner ads and internally served sponsorship content. They're luckily stuck in the era of static and freshly-baked server-side content.
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#5[2013]
This has made the rounds on HN several times already.
153 comments - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16254569
129 comments - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6718067
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#6tl;dr: i-Mode.
Any answer to this question that doesn't include a mention of this is grossly misinformed to the point of being wrong.
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#7tl;dr: i-Mode. Any answer to this question that doesn't include a mention of this is grossly misinformed to the point of being wrong.
Can you link to something or explain what that is for those of us not familiar?
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#8tl;dr: i-Mode. Any answer to this question that doesn't include a mention of this is grossly misinformed to the point of being wrong.
Can you link to something or explain what that is for those of us not familiar?
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#9tl;dr: i-Mode. Any answer to this question that doesn't include a mention of this is grossly misinformed to the point of being wrong.
Can you link to something or explain what that is for those of us not familiar?
It was basically the Japanese equivalent of WAP before smartphones but it's completely irrelevant now and even when it was a thing, I'm not sure it was relevant to desktop sites like this article is talking about.
Re: Why Japanese web design is so different (2013)
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you link to something or explain what that is for those of us not familiar?
It was basically the Japanese equivalent of WAP before smartphones but it's completely irrelevant now and even when it was a thing, I'm not sure it was relevant to desktop sites like this article is talking about.
i-mode usage peaked in 2008. While it has been falling since, it probably only became irrelevant around the time this was written.
A lot of the Japanese sites that I visit(ed) were designed for i-Mode first/only as late as 2011.