Korea is a very interesting case. Korea shows rapid growth of the Internet users, and larger trade surplus in telecommunication industry with the help of government's successful information technology policy. And Koreans also made their country more democratic with active participation. This paper analyzed the growth of the Internet and SNS in South Korea. The Internet and SNS created cyber space. They have several advantages as an effective means of communication. Cyber space is influenced by three subjects such as the government [state], the market [capital], and citizens [people]. There are two research questions. First question is how the Korean CMC industry can grow fast after its birth. Three main subjects were dealt with in this research. They are the State, the Market, and the Citizen. I divided the history of Korean CMC industry into three periods. The first formation stage is from the birth of CMC in Korea between from 1980 and 1990. The government initiated the monopolistic CMC market. Several conglomerates participated to co-operate the government. But the users are very small. The second growth stage is between from 1990 to 1995. The government also deregulated the Market with changing policy from 'appointment' to 'registration'. The companies increased investment for the possibility of wide diffusion of CMC use. The third prosperity stage is between 1995 and 2010. The government promoted the CMC market's competition with 'notice' policy. And citizens actively enjoy and apply CMC services. However, the fourth shift stage to smartphone faced several problems such as less democracy and one way communication which will weaken the creativity of the content. Second question is what the roles of three subjects are. I examined the cyber space by the uses of digital media with three subjects. Even though the state and the market have limits to promote democracy, the citizens are expected to make the digital society more democratic. If the state tries to monitor citizen by the use of digital media, that society is called 'surveillance society'. As the government is open and transparent, the citizens' democracy will increase. The market should limit to gather and accumulate peoples' information and profile for protecting their privacy. Cyber space is a public sphere, which is two-way, economic, and open to every people. It has various positive sides. It promotes the communication by people of political information and opinion freely and actively. It makes people form groups against the wrong-doing of big companies and keeps people's privileges. People buy goods more cheaply via e-commerce, which also helps companies lessen the expenses. However, the cyber space has several negative sides, too. The government and companies can accumulate people's information and use it for diverse purposes. If the government uses that information to monitor and control people, such a society may become a'surveillance society' threatening democracy as in George Orwell's '1984'. As companies also take advantage of big data to sell more products for their profit increase, so people often feel they are captivated by a lot of commercial messages, including much advertising spam mail. The more civil society depends on the cyber space, the more it can become fragile and risky. The digital media guarantees neither democracy nor a surveillance society. It's true that new technology gives us the opportunity to expand democracy. However, if we don't use new media rightly and positively, we may find it negative or even harmless. Therefore, the positive use of the digital media and keeping our cyber space democratic is very important. With democracy, the Internet and SNS industry can be flourished by the cooperation of netizen, business managers, IT researchers, and politicians.
