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Naver

South Korean web portal

  • 9 min read
  • 2 chapters

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Through Search engine, Email and Knowledge

History

Naver was the first Korean web provider to develop its own search engine. The company was founded on 2 June 1999, and is headquartered in Seongnam, South Korea. Naver is a combination of 'navigate' and the suffix '-er', referring to a person who navigates the vast ocean of information on the Internet. Naver provides community services including blogs and cafes, other convenient services such as knowledge, shopping, maps, books, e-mail, and a Naver toolbar.

In August 2000, Naver launched its 'comprehensive search' service, which allows users to get a variety of results from a single search query on one page, organized by type, including blogs, websites, images, and web communities.

Naver became an early pioneer in user-generated content through the creation of the 'Knowledge iN' (네이버 지식인)' service in 2002. In Knowledge iN, users can pose questions on any subject and select from answers provided by other users, awarding points to those who give the best answers. Knowledge iN was launched three years before Yahoo! introduced its similar 'Yahoo! Answers' service and now possesses a database of over 200 million answers. Bradley Horowitz, former Vice President of Product Strategy at Yahoo!, has cited Knowledge iN as the inspiration for Yahoo! Answers, which was launched three years after Naver introduced the original service.

Over the years, Naver has continued to expand its services. Naver Blog started with the name 'paper' in June 2003 and evolved to 'blog' in October 2003. 'Webtoon' is a South Korean webtoon publisher launched in 2004 by Naver.

In May 2005, Naver started the Real-time Search service. The rising search terms was a chart in Naver that highlighted trending topics in real-time. The top searches would appear on the portal main page, reaching a large number of users.

From 2005 to 2007, Naver expanded its multimedia search services, including music and video search, as well as mobile search.

In February 2011, Naver launched the Line messaging app.

In 2019, Naver reorganized its mobile version of the main screen, excluding search windows and some menus. In response, more than 3,000 comments opposing the change were posted.

In October 2023, Naver announced the beta release of its AI chatbot service, 'CLOVA X' (클로바X).

Naver mobile map application began providing real-time service on natural disaster information on 15 September 2024.

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