When you get down to it, the Nico Nico Douga website is just a combination of videos and text comments about them.
But this simple amalgamation has created a cultural phenomenon that has spread like wildfire among Japanese Internet users — especially the young.
In the past five years, Nico Nico Douga, operated by Tokyo-based Dwango Co., has become one of the leading online video-sharing platforms in the country, with roughly 21 million registered users, about 86 percent of whom are under the age of 40.