Internet aggregators constructing the political right wing in Japan

Abstract

This paper overviews the condensation mechanism of the information flow from Net-uyoku (cyberspace right-wingers) entries in the Ni-Channel messaging forum of Japan that are edited into summary blogs of Ni-Channel called Matome Saito, and the aggregation of the numerous Matome Saito, with a focus on Japan and the December 2012 election. I examined the tone of argument of the Matome Saito aggregation and found 148 politically related thread blog pages and found that the Matome Saito use supportive language in relation to the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan but negative towards other parties. The analysis also found the blog pages generally reflected Net-uyoku tone of argument found in the Ni-Channel. This study suggests that these Matome Saito can be considered to be an emergence of a new type of political agenda-setters in Japanese politics and may have a potential impact on the formation of public opinion in Japan.