Why do Japanese people love Twitter so much?

I know reddit is not a paradise. But having subreddit, up down vote and mods makes it not stink as much imo. It seems like Twitter is cancer in the west but not here. I wonder why no one made a Japanese Reddit clone, or someone did and it failed?

14 comments
  1. Just a wild guess but I would say

    – Character limit works for Japan as you can cram a lot more information into 280 Japanese characters than English or other languages using the alphabet
    – high mobile usage. Japanese people are online on mobile more than they are on PCs or notebooks. Works better for Twitter while for Reddit the more in depth discussions are better on PC or notebooks to type more in length

  2. It’s also more anonymous than some other social networks. Facebook wants a name and your photos. Even granddaddy Mixi had the creepy paranoia-inducing footsteps page that showed you everyone who had visited your profile. I think these are factors that may have contributed.

  3. I know it’s used, but I have never seen anybody use it. Most people I know or am around use Instagram or Line.

  4. In my case, yes . I would day 80% of them use Twitter.co worker , friends , bar. I asked myself the same many times and I tried to use it but meh.
    Recently I’m seeing a shift to instagram.

  5. Japanese reddit clone ? You mean 2ch ? It’s still widely used I think, though the user group might be different than twitter crowds.

  6. Reddit isn’t even among the top social media platforms in the west so it’s kind of irrelevant. You should be asking why Facebook is less popular here, and then the answers already given — more anonymity, specifically — make more sense.

  7. I don’t know but a bulk of my customers come from Twitter. I love it. I post on IG too but rarely get customers from it.
    100% of my wife’s customers come from Twitter.

  8. – Earthquake gets posted faster than ANY other media.
    – anonymous and you can make two or more accounts very easily
    – people still remember how well Twitter worked right after 3/11 disaster
    – it’s a safe place for people who have social issues unlike Facebook or Insta

  9. I wasn’t aware that twitter was that popular here. Most of the Japanese people I know, including my husband, are more into Line and Instagram. I’m not sure Reddit would be that popular here considering that the system is inherently abusive. It’s a haven for dysfunctional behavior.

  10. As a Japanese person- because Twitter makes it damn easy to revel in the worst parts of Japanese society. Easy to put yourself in an echo chamber where the only opposing opinions you come across is people who already think exactly like you critically sharing cherry picked statements and information from others that you can then band wagon dump on and feel like you’re being contrarian and opinionated without actually having to confront or be confronted by anyone. Low stakes, anonymous, completely meaningless group think that makes you feel like your thoughts and feelings are not just valid but objectively ‘correct.’ We have been behaving like this offline for a very long time but now we can do it without even having to get out of bed.

  11. Japanese Twitter:

    Handle @126899__shining___star

    Username LOVE-my_peon
    (Actual name Ruriko Suzuki)

    Avatar: anime character or idol

    Media: screenshots of iPhone games, Starbucks drinks, selfies where their face is obscured by a sticker

    Opinions on current events? Eh? What war?

  12. We like summarizing things and word play. It is a culture of translation, imitation, complaints, sarcasm, etc. We once had 2ch, which had a bad reputation for its underground posts from anonymous users. Twitter shared some cultural aspects of 2ch, hatena, etc., but then real human users gained influence in the Japanese tweetsphere. Twitter can accommodate both types of users.

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