PR Newswire Second Series of the Asian Media Landscape: South Korea and Indonesia Media Landscape White Papers

South Korea
Media Landscape
We Tell Your Story to the World

2Copyright © 2015 PR Newswire Association LLC. All Rights Reserved.
South Korea is one of the world's wealthiest nations, and is a member of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD) and the G-20 major economies. It is a developed country, with a mature market and high-income economy.
South Korea has a market economy that ranks 13th in the world by 2014 nominal GDP and is the world’s seventh-largest exporter
which shipped $559.6 billion worth of products around the globe in 2013. That figure represents 3.1% of worldwide exports,
which are estimated at $18.1 trillion. Overpopulation (51,218,424 as of May 2014) and a relative lack of natural resources has
deterred continued population growth and the formation of a large internal consumer market. The country has adapted by
implementing an export-oriented economic strategy to fuel its economy.
Electronics, telecommunications, automobile production, chemicals, shipbuilding and steel are key industries in South Korea.
The following items were the main export products of the country in 2013: Electronic equipment (24.2% of total exports),
vehicles excluding trains and streetcars (13%), machinery (10.6%), mineral fuels including oil (9.7%), optical & technical & medical
apparatus (6.4%), ships & boats & other floating structures (6.4%) etc. South Korea is a highly export-driven and industrialized
economy.
[1] Refer to Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs, Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Economy_of_South_Korea), (http://www.worldstopexports.com/south-koreas-top-10-exports/2302)
Preface1

Table of Contents
Preface...................................................................... 2
Overview.................................................................. 4
Traditional Media............................................... 5
News agency.................................................................................. 6
Newspapers(daily) ........................................................................... 8
Magazine.............................................................................. 13
Radio...................................................................................... 17
TV............................................................................................ 18
Media in Chinese....................................................................................... 20
Online Media .......................................................... 22
Search engines................................................................................................... 23
Blogs ..................................................................................... 26
New Media(SNS)..................................................... 27
Multimedia ......................................................................................... 28
Mobile media ................................................................................................ 29
PR/Communications Industry in Korea...............33
Characteristic..................................................................................... 34
Trends........................................................................................... 37
Major PR agencies in South Korea..................................................................41

[2] Refer to (http://www.pressreference.com/Sa-Sw/South-Korea.html#ixzz3GHyNwAcy) , (http://www.digitalintheround.com/
south-korea-cyworld-facebook/), (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-15291415), (http://www.digitalintheround.
com/south-korea-cyworld-facebook/)
South Korea Media Landscape
Overview2
South Korea is a media-friendly country. As of 2014, this country of over forty-nine million people had as many as 150 daily
newspapers, with the top three of its national dailies boasting circulation of more than two million copies each. Television is
ubiquitous with four national networks, over 150 cable channels, and South Korea has issued two UHD channel licenses to cable
operators and satellite operators in 2014. Four South Korean cable operators -CJ Hellovision, C&M, T-Broad and HCN- have jointly
launched the UMAX 4K channel, which initially had 40 programs in 4K format.
Koreans are avid users of new communication technologies as well. The availability and adoption of new communication devices in
South Korea is on a par with the world's most industrialized countries. In a market of free economy and electoral democracy, Korea's
mass media and its press fiercely compete among themselves while benefiting from a high degree of freedom from formal constraint.
South Korea is at the leading edge of the digital revolution. It is a trailblazer for high-speed and wireless internet. More than 40 million
South Koreans were online by the end of 2011 (InternetWorldStats). According to BBC, South Korea has one of the world's biggest
blogging communities, second only to China. The country is a pioneer of TV via mobile devices and the internet (IPTV). Twitter is also
a popular medium for political debate and campaigning.
Back in 2009 an industry giant like Google held only 3% of the market, with Naver dominating – by far – the whole scene, mostly due
to its nature of being a complete web-portal, where people can “hang out”and not just do searches.
And this does not apply only to the search market: just think about the popularity of Seoul-based mobile app Kakao Talk and the
success of platforms like Daum-owned light-blogging site Tistory, or Naver's alternative to Twitter Me2Day.
The South Korean press benefits from the availability of a highly literate audience. The adult literacy rate is estimated to be over 97
percent; since literacy is not a national concern anymore, the Ministry of Education has stopped estimating it. Further, all Koreans
speak the same language and Korea is a single-race society, although there are regional dialects.

Traditional Media
1 News agency
2 Newspapers (daily)
3 Magazine
4 Radio
5 TV
6 Media in Chinese

1
[3] Refer to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yonhap), (http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/about/index.html)
News agency
A. Yonhap News3
www.yonhapnews.co.kr/
Yonhap News is a publicly funded news agency based in Seoul, South Korea. Yonhap
provides news articles, pictures and other information to mainly the online media, and
newspapers, TV networks and other media in South Korea as well.
Yonhap (meaning “united” in Korean) was established on December 19, 1980, through the merger of Hapdong News
Agency and Orient Press. It maintains various agreements with 78 non-Korean news agencies, and also has a services-
exchange agreement with North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), signed in 2002.
Yonhap News Agency provides some 3,000 multimedia news items each day covering politics, the economy, society,
culture, entertainment, sports, science, and other topics, helping readers access news from the global village.
Yonhap has 580 journalists and photographers posted at the Seoul head office, regional offices and overseas bureaus,
comprising the largest news-gathering network in Korea. Under a 2003 law passed by the South Korean parliament,
Yonhap has been charged with promoting the country's image and distributing information -- a task deemed critical to
addressing the domination of information by major Western news media.
Yonhap's foreign-language news service is distributed in English, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, Spanish and French. In 1988,
Yonhap became the first of the Korean press to establish an electronic system for writing and releasing news articles to its
clients.

B. Newsis4
-news agency & wire service
http://www.newsis.com/
Newsis is the largest private news agency in South Korea with 150 journalists working at
its headquarters in Seoul. Established in 1995, they changed names to Newsis in 2001 and
began a series of partnerships in 2002, starting with Reuters, AFP in 2003, AP in 2005 and
Xinhua in 2006, amongst others. Current collaborations with main daily newspaper companies and search engines include NAVER,
DAUM, Nate, and zum, which supply audiences with news content 24/7 in real time. In 2007, they established a subsidiary company
called Newsiswire.com, which is dedicated to wire services.
[4] Refer to (http://newsis.com/)

2 Newspapers (daily)5
The Chosun Ilbo, Dong-A Ilbo and JoongAng Ilbo together dominate and have a combined 55 percent market share.
Chosun is the most influential amongst Koreans. Notable amongst the rest of the newspapers is Hankyoreh, which
is considered a left-wing newspaper. It is often a lone voice in raising questions about the behavior of the country’s
conglomerates.
For breaking news, the government’s Yonhap News Agency is extremely helpful. Their website also carries audio news and
photographs. Yonhap is an invaluable source on the latest developments in North Korea.
The main English-language newspaper is the Korea Herald. Others like The Chosun Ilbo, Dong-a Ilbo, Korea Times,
Hankyoreh Sinmun and Joong Ang Ilbo (affiliated with the International Herald Tribune) all carry English-language pages,
as does the Yonhap News Agency. The Seoul Times is an online English newspaper for foreigners in Korea and Digital
Chosun Ilbo is an English online version of the Chosun Ilbo. Other English-language websites include Dong-A’s and Joon
Ang Ilbo’s.
Newspaper readership is high and there are more than 150 national and local dailies. Korea's ten national general-
interest dailies, mostly morning papers, are all based in Seoul. These national dailies set the pace of news and national
agendas together with the increasing power of national television networks. The circulation of the national dailies is truly
nationwide; some of the big dailies run locally based printing facilities to serve the readers in the provincial areas more
efficiently.6
However, in common with any other countries, newspapers in Korea are facing difficulties as they transition into the IT era.
Subscription rates for South Korea’s newspapers have been falling, due to the influence of online & new media.
[5] Refer to (http://asianz.org.nz/our-work/media/covering-asia/south-korea)
[6] Refer to (http://www.pressreference.com/Sa-Sw/South-Korea.html#ixzz3GNRDipAp)

Subscription Readership
1996 69.3
1998 64.5
2000 59.8
2002 52.9 82.1
2004 48.3 76.0
2006 40.0 68.8
2008 36.8 58.5
2010 29.0 52.6
2011 24.8 44.6
2012 24.7 40.9
2013 20.4 33.8
Newspaper Subscriptions in South Korea (Unit: %)
According to a survey by the Korea Press Foundation (KPF), newspapers incurred a loss in 2012 even though sales rose by 4.6 percent.
The survey also shows a clear downturn in readership. While 82 percent of the respondents in the KPF's 2002 survey said they read
newspapers, only 33.8 percent said so in the survey for 2013. The KPF predicts this decline will continue as readers switch further to
free online news. As serious as the falling income in the printed media is the ideological polarization. Korean newspapers are divided
in the same way as the political landscape.
Chosun Ilbo, Dong-A Ilbo, JoongAng Ilbo are the major newspapers, which have conservative ideals; Cho-Joong-Dong is a coined
term which refers to three highly-circulated conservative newspapers in South Korea. Hankook Ilbo is moderate; Kyunghyang
Shinmun and The Hankyoreh are the major newspapers which hold liberal ideals. In South Korea, conservative newspapers are more
widely read. Maeil Business Newspaper and Korea Economic Daily are the major business newspapers.

Here are the South Korean newspaper circulation rankings
for 2013 via research conducted by ABC.
Name Circulation Charged circulation
1 Chosun Ilbo 1,757,006 40,121
2 JoongAng Ilbo 1,263,681 811,083
3 the Dong-A Daily News 907,090 707,346
4 Maeil Business Newspaper 770,504 553,007
5 Korea Economic Daily 507,986 340,389

A. Chosun Ilbo7
The Chosun Ilbo is one of the major newspapers in South Korea. Chosun Ilbo and its subsidiary
company, Digital Chosun operates the Chosun.com news website, which also publishes web versions
of the newspaper in English, Chinese, and Japanese. Chosun.com is ranked as the No.1 Korean news
website by the Internet survey company Rankey.com
The Chosun Ilbo, arguably the largest-circulation daily, is also the most influential in Korea. Like other
leading dailies, this paper is a mammoth media complex, publishing not only the main vernacular
paper but a weekly newsmagazine, a monthly magazine, a women's monthly, a children's daily, and a
sports daily.
Its editorial direction is independent and conservative, hence the voice of Korea's traditionally conservative mainstream power
structure. Being the most influential and prestigious paper in Korea, the Chosun Ilbo draws plenty of top talent to its newsroom and
taps well-known intellectuals as contributors. It enjoys an upper hand in the competitive newspaper market.
[ 7 ] Refer to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chosun_Ilbo), (http://www.pressreference.com/Sa-Sw/
South-Korea.html#ixzz3GI89f7PR)

[ 8 ] Refer to (http://www.pressreference.com)
[ 9 ] Refer to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dong-a_Ilbo)
B. JoongAng Ilbo8
JoongAng Ilbo is one of the three biggest newspapers in South Korea. The paper also publishes
an English edition, Korea JoongAng Daily, in alliance with the International New York Times.
The JoongAng Ilbo, the second-largest circulation daily, used to be owned by Korea's leading
multinational business conglomerate Samsung Group. It publishes the Korean edition of the Newsweek magazine besides a general-
interest monthly magazine and a women's monthly. A staunch supporter of free-market practices, it attracts a large number of
readers for its business and financial news coverage.
Dong-A Ilbo9
The Dong-A Ilbo has been another leading newspaper in Korea since 1920 with daily circulation
and opinion leaders as its main readers.
The Dong-A Ilbo is the parent company of Dong-A Media Group (DAMG), which is composed
of 11 affiliates including Sports Dong-A, Dong-A Science, DUNet, and dongA.com, as well as Channel A, a general service cable
broadcasting company launched in December 1, 2011. It covers a variety of areas including news, drama, entertainment, sports,
education, and movies 24 hours a day.
The Dong-A Ilbo has partnered with international news companies such as The New York Times of the United States of America, The
Asahi Shimbun of Japan and The People's Daily of China. It has correspondents stationed in five major cities worldwide including
Washington D.C., New York, Beijing, Tokyo and Paris. It also publishes global editions in 90 cities worldwide including New York,
London, Paris and Frankfurt.

Media Landscape
Indonesia
We Tell Your Story to the World

Table of Contents
Overview...............................................................................3
The Twelve Largest Media Groups......................................4
Wire Services ........................................................................... 6
Print Media.................................................................................8
Newspapers .........................................................................................................9
English-language Newspapers ................................................................................13
Chinese-language Newspapers .............................................................................. 17
Magazines.....................................................................................................19
Radio......................................................................................25
National Radio Station.........................................................29
Television.................................................................................31
Indonesia’s Two Most Popular Channels ......................33
New Media........................................................................36
Online Media Landscape..........................................................................37
Top Websites................................................................................38
The New Media Industry...........................................................................42
Mobile Usage.............................................................................................43
Social Media........................................................................................44
Socioeconomic and Political Impact of New Media......................................45

After reformasi – the turbulent period in 1998 that ended Suharto's 31-year authoritarian reign – Indonesia's media landscape has
flourished. Now, the digital era is set to transform Indonesian media and its audiences, with both sides embracing digital changes. For
effective engagement with the media and stakeholders, every communicator who wishes to have the advantage of staying informed
may take this opportunity to learn about the seismic shifts taking place in the world's largest archipelago nation.
As Southeast Asia's largest economy, Indonesia has one of the best media environments in the region. It ranked 98th
among 197 countries
and territories in the press freedom ranking1
. The Philippines, in 87th
place, is the only ASEAN member state that tops Indonesia's
position. Indonesia's vibrant and open media landscape is bolstered by its young population; half of the country's 250 million people
are under 30 years of age. It's not surprising that the size of Indonesia's ad market – worth approximately $10 billion – is regarded as the
largest in Southeast Asia2
. In terms of media reach, television dominates Indonesia's media landscape – around 97% of the population
watches television each month. Just behind television, the internet has the second-biggest audience, with an estimated 57% penetration
rate, followed by newspapers, radio, and magazines, respectively. The rapidly growing number of internet users has changed the way
Indonesian audiences consume content and information. They are now avid users of online social media. In fact, Indonesia is among the
biggest markets for Facebook and Twitter. Along with increasing smartphone penetration, Indonesia has also emerged as the world's
second largest mobile ad market by volume after the United States. As for English-language media, there are only a handful of influential
outlets.
These latest trends will affect the way companies and organizations communicate and distribute their stories, as well as their strategies
to amplify them. PR Newswire's Indonesia Media Landscape White Paper will offer a brief insight into how to navigate the media during
this exciting period.
Overview
[1] Source: www.freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/FOTP_2014.pdf
[2] Source: www.redwing-asia.com/context/media-industry-structure

The Twelve Largest Media Groups
Indonesia’s current media landscape is shaped by the socio-political and economic changes which began in the late 1980s, culminating
in the reforms established after the 1998 reformasi. Driven by capital interest, the burgeoning media industry has become a media
oligopoly in which the concentration of ownership lies with twelve large media groups. Nowadays, they control the large majority of the
country’s broadcasting, print, and online channels.
1. MNC Group
2. Kompas Gramedia Group
3. Elang Mahkota Teknologi
4. Visi Media Asia
5. Jawa Pos Group
6. Mahaka Media
7. CT Group
8. Beritasatu Media Holdings
9. Media Group
10. MRA Media
11. Femina Group
12. Tempo Inti Media

Owned by investment conglomerate MNC Corporation and its subsidiary PT. Global
Mediacom Tbk, Media Nusantara Citra (MNC) Group owns the most national free-to-air
television channels in Indonesia with three stations. In addition, it owns 20 local television
networks and other television, radio and online channels under its subsidiary Sindo Media.
Indonesia’s largest media group, Kompas Gramedia owns 89 print media companies
including Kompas, Indonesia’s most influential newspaper. The conglomerate owns other
channels such as television stations, having established Kompas TV, and radio channels
with 12 radio broadcasters under their Sonora Radio Network.
Elang Mahkota Teknologi Indonesia, or otherwise known as the Emtek Group, is involved
in the media, telecommunications and IT industries. They own SCTV, one of the two
leading stations in Indonesia, as well as two free-to-air TV channels. Emtek also provides
broadband internet service for the Jakarta and Surabaya areas.
Part of the Bakrie Group, Visi Media Asia was launched in 2004 and has grown into a
powerful media group. It owns two television channels (ANTV and tvOne) and popular
online media portal viva.co.id.
Owned by Indonesian media tycoon, Dahlan Iskan, Jawa Pos Group has 171 print media
companies, including the renowned Java Post along with the Radar Group with its more
localized newspapers.

Wire Services

Despite its origins in the Dutch East Indies when Indonesia was still a colony, ANTARA has since become the premier national
news agency following 1962 when the Netherlands gave up all former holdings in Indonesia and the post-Suharto political
reforms in the 1990s. Currently, the agency operates as a state-owned enterprise with 32 bureaus nationwide and a number of
representative offices and correspondents abroad. ANTARA dominates the country's news agency scene reporting independently
with more than 250 mass media subscribers across Indonesia, including foreign media representatives in Jakarta. The other
notable newswire service providers are Mi’raj Islamic News Agency and Detik.com through its web syndication network.

Print Media

A key turning point for Indonesia was the reformasi of 1998, a people power movement that toppled Suharto’s 31-year
authoritarian regime. Since then, a lot has changed to make the socio-political and economic landscape more open and
accountable – not to mention the country’s media environment. The post-Suharto government began to ease media
restrictions and censorship. As a result, media outlets have rapidly expanded. Since 1998, the number of print newspapers has
more than quadrupled with over 1,000 daily newspaper titles in circulation3
. By distribution area, they can be categorized by
national newspapers (distributed across the archipelago) and local newspapers (mainly circulated at the provincial level, or
lower administrative regions). Despite the large number of titles, circulation figures are still relatively low, at around 6 million.
Accordingly, newspapers were the third-most viewed medium after television and the internet4
. Kompas and Jawa Pos have
dominated the daily national newspaper scene with a circulation of 500,000 and 400,000 copies sold per day, respectively.
Newspapers
[3] Source: http://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/reports/mapping-digital-media-indonesia
[4] Source: www.redwing-asia.com/context/media-industry-structure

Readership of Major Newspapers
(% of total readership), 2009-20105
Readership shares of popular newspapers in Indonesia from 2009 – 2010. The figures are sourced from MARS Indonesia, a research
company based in Jakarta, in which 900 individuals who read newspapers on a daily basis were surveyed in Indonesia’s larger cities:
Jakarta, Medan, Palembang, Bandung, Semarang, Surabaya, Makassar, and Dennpasar.
[5] Source: http://cipg.or.id/uploads/books/D02-MediaIndustry-CIPG-Hivos-MAN_FULL_FINAL_rev.pdf

Kompas
www.kompas.com
Kompas is an Indonesian national newspaper published by Kompas Gramedia Group. It was created on June 28, 1965. Highly-regarded
as the most influential newspaper in Indonesia, Kompas is not just the largest circulating print media company in the country but also
the largest circulating newspaper in Southeast Asia. Moreover, Kompas owns Tribun Network which consists of 20 local newspapers.

Jawa Pos
www.jawapos.com
Founded in 1949, Jawa Pos is an Indonesian national daily newspaper based in Surabaya. The newspaper's motto is Selalu ada yang baru
("There is always something new”). Jawa Pos formed the Jawa Pos News Network (JPNN) in 1987, the largest local newspaper chain in
Indonesia with 130 titles across the country.

PR Newswire Second Series of the Asian Media Landscape: South Korea and Indonesia Media Landscape White Papers

More Related Content

What's hot

Viewers also liked

Similar to PR Newswire Second Series of the Asian Media Landscape: South Korea and Indonesia Media Landscape White Papers

Recently uploaded

PR Newswire Second Series of the Asian Media Landscape: South Korea and Indonesia Media Landscape White Papers