Niconico douga

Niconico-Douga

Niconico douga is a rapidly growing video sharing site in Japan. Site’s feature is not very different from Youtube, but one cool difference gained big attraction. The difference is a comment feature which enables users to write timely comments on the video screen itself.

The feature allowed users to share ‘experience’ with other users.

niconico screenshot

Niconico douga attracted many users quickly. At a start, they superpose comments on streaming videos from youtube servers. Resultingly, Youtube started to refuse accesses from Niconico servers. They were forced to set up their own video servers.

Their own video servers are heavy burden to company’s balance sheet. The company, Dwango is its name, has spent about 600 million yen for servers.

Dwango changed the problem into a revenue. They limit peak time usage, and allow unlimited access only for paid users. 144,000 users are paying the fee and, the sum is 68 million yen per month. Advertisements and affiliates are making 18 million and 15 million yen accordingly.

Niconico douga’s success is backed by a powerful team. Lead developer is Akihiko Koizuka, a very powerful programmer. 2ch’s Hiroyuki is doing an advisor.

Currently Dwango is earning most revenue from ringtone services.

See also (in English):

  1. Dwango company site
  2. Tokytronic’s detailed article

Niconico douga:

  • Page views: 59.5 million page views per day
  • Video plays: 15 million plays per day
  • Comments: 3.2 million comments per day
  • Revenue: 101 million yen per month
  • People: Developer, Akihiko Koizuka

Dwango (FY 2007):

  • Founded: August 1997
  • Revenue: 22.2 billion yen
  • Loss: 1,408 million yen
  • People: Chairman/CEO, Nobuo Kawakami
  • People: President/COO, Hiroshi Kobayashi
  • People: Managing Director, Hideki Mori
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Author Information  Shunichi Arai is developing a product for his new stealth startup. Arai devotes his life to software business, reading, and salsa dancing. Arai also loves to learn other cultures and languages such as Korean.


6 Responses to “Niconico douga”

  1. 先日正式リリースだったみたいだけど既に10月から記事がアップされていて、いくつかの企業やウェブサービスが紹介されてる。■Niconico douga(ニコニコ動画(RC2)) ■Drecom: next scandal or …? (ドリコム) ■Mobage town – a mobile social network for teens (DeNA) ■Rakuten: online shopping monopoly (楽天) ■Hatena: a web company with geekish tastes

  2. 先日正式リリースだったみたいだけど既に10月から記事がアップされていて、いくつかの企業やウェブサービスが紹介されてる。■Niconico douga(ニコニコ動画(RC2)) ■Drecom: next scandal or …?(ドリコム) ■Mobage town – a mobile social network for teens(DeNA) ■Rakuten: online shopping monopoly(楽天) ■Hatena: a web company with geekish tastes

  3. 1エントリも非常に短いし、気負わずいつものニュースサイトを観ている感覚で一気に読めそうです。ニコニコ動画のエントリを翻訳してみました。 ニコニコ動画は急成長している日本の動画共有サービスです。Youtube

  4. Nico, probaly the most watched online video sharing site in Japan. The site is called, AcFun. The graphical interface is very similar to Nico Nico, but videos are not limited to registered members although Nico Nico limits to only registered members.Niconico douga- Asiajin

  5. čż™ćŹĄďźŒĺŽŒĺ…¨çš„ć˜ŻćŠŠä¸‹č˝˝čĄŒä¸şĺ˝“ä˝œä¸ťčŚç›Žć ‡ďźŒč€Œç˝‘çťœä¸˛ćľĺ´ä¸ĺ—ĺ˝ąĺ“ă€‚äšŸĺ› ć­¤ďźŒĺŞč§‚çœ‹YouTubeĺ’Œăƒ‹ă‚łăƒ‹ă‚łä¸Šçš„čżćł•ĺŠ¨ç”ťć˜Żć˛Ąćœ‰é—Žé˘˜çš„ă€‚ć‰€äťĽäťŠĺŽä¸€ĺŽšäźšĺ‡şçŽ°čŽ¸ĺ¤šäťĽä¸˛ćľĺ˝ąéŸłĺ¤§čĄŒĺ…śé“çš„ç˝‘çŤ™ćœĺŠĄĺ§ă

  6. [...] Jimaku.in (English version subtitle.in), comments overlaying video community service (similar to Niconico Douga, slightly later appeared), and recently Yokoku.in, a mashup site which collects sentences including [...]

  7. [...] Streaming is not covered though. Which means that just looking at illegal videos on YouTube and Nico Nico Douga is okay. I guess in the future there will be a lot of excitement in Japan about services that allow [...]

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