2 Youth Culture and the Shaping of Japanese Mobile Media: Personalization and the Keitai Internet as Multimedia

The social reception and transformation of keitai communication and the keitai Inter-net in Japan are closely linked to the use of these media by youth and to youth popular cultures. This chapter examines the history of keitai in terms of its social shaping as a medium and a consumer item. A starting point for this analysis is theories of the social construction of technological systems (Bijker, Hughes, and Pinch 1993). As Bijker and Law (1992, 13) have suggested , ''Knowledge is a social construction rather than a (more or less flawed) mirror held up to nature,'' and further, ''Technologies and technological practices are built in a process of social construction and negotiation, a process often seen as driven by the social interests of participants.'' Claude Fischer (1992) has extended this approach more radically in examining the domain of telecommunications. In his study of the spread of the telephone and its establishment as a new media form in the United States, Fischer successfully mobilized a social constructivist approach but had the following critique: ''Most social con-structivism has concentrated on the producers, marketers, or experts of a technological system.'' He describes how in his own work his intent was ''to go further, to emphasize the mass users of technology.'' In Bijker's study (1992) of the development of the fluorescent lamp, Bijker dismisses the influence of consumers, stating, ''The social group of customers does not have its own direct voice in this story.'' He writes, ''The result of market research and an analysis of the popular technical press may be considered to reflect the views of this social group'' (1992, 81). By contrast , Fischer (1992) stresses the role of consumption; he believes that in order to understand the social shaping of technology it is crucial to include consumers in the analysis. My study of Japanese mobile media demonstrates that the role of the consumer is absolutely critical. Taking my cue from Fischer's approach, I build my argument by layering a wide range of materials regarding the particular technological context and the reception by users.