-Let’s Talk About “Webtoon Craze” In Korea
In Korea, the number of smart phone users is over 80%. Everybody on the streets, subways, and buses are on their phones. What are a large number of these people doing on these devices? It is "Webtoon." We are now in the age of the Webtoon. With the rapid development of the moblie web, we can enjoy webtoons easily anytime and anywhere. Let's discuss its history, involvement, and future.
History of the Webtoon
-Where did webtoons begin?
While computer operating systems were changed from MS-DOS to Windows, individual homepages became popular. The development of online media rapidly accelerated the popularity of these webpages. Shortly thereafter, rudimentary animated pieces such as "Snow Cat," "Papepopo Memories," and "Marine Blues" appeared on the internet. They were quite different from traditional published cartoons. Those particular cartoons were primarily dedicated to providing social and political commentary. These early webtoons adopted scroll mode and offered the opportunity for everyone to create cartoons.
-Webtoons in Daum, soaring to new hights
In 2003, the search engine "Daum" created a new tab "The world Toons." That year, Kang Pool, a webtoonist, published "Soon Jung Manhwa” His work got tens of milions of hits and left an unparalleled record in the history of webtoons. In addition, Yang Yung-sun’s "1001" and Gang Do-ha’s "The Great Catsby" appeared shortly thereafter and both were huge successes. Since then, later versions of webtoons have popped up; and those include “essay toons” and “narrative toons”. Webtoons have also been converted into books, movies, dramas and musicals.
-The golden age of Webtoon on NAVER
In 2006, three webtoons started to appear on the NAVER search engine. At that moment, NAVER was not a major location for webtoons- but it soon discovered it could extend its share of the market as a result of the webtoons. Currently, 131 webtoons updated weekly on NAVER, up from just three in 2006. This rapid growth illustrates that the webtoon fever is not a “flash in the pan.”
What Are The Main Causes Of The "WebtoonCraze"?
What’s behind all the popularity? There are four main reasons for the popularity of webtoons: 1) Accessibility 2) No-cost 3) Wide-range of topics and 4) most importantly, due to the ability to post comments, webtoons are interactive. It is important to note that despite webtoons being free, shoddy toons would not be welcomed by readers. Look at the latest webtoons, they are very entertaining and extremely well-made. Many readers are moved by their storylines and hidden messages. The notion that webtoons are crude and absurd is generally dismissed. The fact that webtoons are interactive leads to better works. Better communication also means fewer errors. Webtoonists can correct possible errors through checking reader commentary. Readers receive additional information through reading other reader’s replies as well. It is not always easy to understand all the contents in webtoons; as a result, the reply board acts as another source of education.
Screen, Falling In the Webtoons
Recently, films based on original webtoons appear are starting to appear in larger forms of media. Currently, most of these redesigned webtoons are the work of Kang Pool, a very famous webtoon
"Greatly, Confidentially": In 2010, "Greatly, Confidentially" was published on the portal site "Daum" and received 40 milion hits. The protagonist, Won Ryu-hwan is a North Korean secret agent. He tries to perform his duty secretly in the countryside. 
The process of animating webtoons is not easy; the animation process is time consuming and story variation is a necessary component of audience demand. Without question, fans of webttons want the quality of films to remain consistent with the quality of the original comic strips. At the same time, movie goers will desire some differences for the sake of seeing something new.
Remarkable Development of Webtoons
Still, webtoonists attempt to express creative webtoons. Through the use of background music, animation, and 3-D effects, there is a constant effort to elevate the quality of the work., They are also trying to find new innovative ways to display their work. By combining Webtoons with various products like games, goods, dramas, they have increased marketability. The development of the webtoon is expected to be infinite.
Issues to be overcome in the webtoon industry
The world of Webtoons is not all sunshine and roses. The greatest inventions usually suffer from the greatest challenges. The largest challenge currently is compensation for the webtoonists. The public is able to enjoy quality webtoons free of charge, but that comes at the expenses of webtoonists. In the past, comic books cartoonists could get royalties from their works. However, these days, webtoonists only earn 100,000 won a month. 100,000 won is not enough to earn a living. When considering the time and effort needed to create their art, the conpensation is too low. As a result, other problems occur. Because webtoonists aren’t compensated properly, it can lead to low quality of webtoons. Another consequence of Poor compensation is that some in the Korean toon industry have moved to Japan. In an effecy to stop this trend, webtoonist Ju Ho-min, announced he would no longer participate in free webtoon services. Though everyone does not agree, most people support his decision. Overall, Koreans are not aware of copyright law or policy. Webtoonists, as a copyright holder, should be able to benefit financially from their work. Unless there are improvements in those areas, intellectual property will continue to suffer.
The Value of Webtoons
Webtoons are nothing but picture books. The only difference is in presentation. There are many webtoons that contain more specific or professional information than ordinary books. Depending on genre, topics range from sports, medicine, history, society, and music. A good webtoon has the same values as classical art or classical music. If it is good, it can effect on people’s lives and attitudes just as the classics do.
By Kim Su-ji CP Reporter
ex112358@cnu.ac.kr