While surfing around looking for something else, I finally have figured out why I have to use MS Internet Explorer when visiting most Korean-based or Korean-designed websites: ActiveX. That's an internet technology that's not web-standard, and that only works in the Microsoft universe (microverse?), but which is apparently nearly universal in Korean website design.
Despite being at least a little bit computer savvy (although my expertise was mostly in "back end" stuff relating to databases), I confess I never knew that ActiveX was restricted to Microsoftland. So… well… you learn something every day, right?
Here's the blog where I found it described fairly well, although it's also rather depressing, since it claims Google's Chrome browser will support ActiveX, which I have not found to be the case. Maybe they're still working on it.
I like Kang's observation that Google is having a tougher time working with the Korean government than with the Chinese government. I've speculated, before, that supposedly democratic and highly westernized South Korea may in fact be more protectionist and xenophobic in some respects than China, but without having spent time in China, I won't make any assertions. It seems there's evidence out there to support the idea, though. And the way the government here "runs" the internet is one of them.