Many people may not know this, because the Communist Party in Mainland China don't want people to know. Japan has very positive relations with one other Asian neighbor. That nation is Taiwan, or officially known as The Republic of China. It is a Democratic nation of nearly 24 million people, mostly Han Chinese. The reason China's pop culture is #2 is because of Taiwan. Most of the super famous singers/bands are from the ROC. Bands and singers such as Jay Chou, Jolin Tsai, F.I.R., Y2J, and lots more. Mega tech companies such as Asus, HTC, D-Link, Transcend, A-Data, Trend Micro, and lots more all originated from Taiwan (ROC). Take Taiwan out of the picture and China will look way more backwards. Japan and Taiwan are the most developed countries in East Asia, so their relations are tight. Not to mention, Taiwan donated the most to help Japan recover from the major Earthquake, more than any other country on Earth. Don't just take my word for it, do some research. You will find it quite interesting.

Ich liebe die Deutsche, deshalb lerne ich Deutsch!

Thata because the germans are not casual and cool people. All? Maybe. They dont know how to show their feelings. Look at their movies. The only funny german movies are fuk yu göte. And that guy is from iran.

If you look ar hollywood and compare it with the germans you will understand. Talking with a german is like talking to a wall. Berlin changed the people alittle bit because its a mixed City with turks kurds and so on. People who grew up in berlin are different as people from the east. Germans from Berlin are cool and casual.

Boney M are great but weren't they all British apart from one bloke being possibly German. I remember them being interviewed and they all sounded British mostly. I could be wrong but they didn't sound German for sure with regard accents.

I love Sandra, she was huge in the 80´s and mid 90´s :)
Also Enigma :D

Sandra had some great tunes and she did vocals for Enigma I think. Definitely one of the all-time best German artists for me.

It's a German group according to wikipedia.

Not only that, but I would argue that Hong Kong with its much smaller population also has a bigger presence in pop culture than Mainland China based on their famous action movies (Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan).

The German domestic music market is quite substantial in itself and quite slow or maybe hesitant in adapting worldwide trends.

New, younger artists are changing that slowly, using platforms like Facebook or Soundcloud, but the focus on the international market is not as big as in English speaking countries for obvious reasons.

Germany also has the Bundesliga (Premiere League, what's so special about it btw?!), has Nena, Snap!, Rammstein, Tokyo Hotel (not our fault),  (Mozart, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Falco all were Austrians sadly;), still famous composers like Schubert, Bach, Haydn etc..Goethe, the Grim Brothers!, inventors of the Automobile and famous for our cars and general engineering(although that's not really pop-culture I guess) .

Then there is Nils Frahm, THE musical wunderkind of today (imho).  If you don't know him.....please check him out!

We're also basically influencing the worldwide party-culture and general music with our unique electronic music culture. Just remember the Love Parade back then. Some of the biggest and most famous DJs are Germans (Sven Väth). (Electronic music need no correct english pronunciation lol). Berlin basically is THE capital of electronic music today. (Detroit and Chicago were big influences here).

In terms of video games Germans are basically the only country left still making point&click adventure games and tactical or building games, like the Anno series or Shadow Tactics lately. We're pretty nerdy for sure!

What people also need to understand is, that a huge amount of the creative potential Germany had, was either killed in WW2 or left the country, many never came back. That might be another explanation. Considering that we're doing quite fine actually. : )

What are you talking about, we even won it once not too long ago (with a pretty respectable act even). You live in Austria right?! The ones with bearded women performing at the ESC. rofl

That said I actually love some of Austria's pop culture though, they have some great, Falco revival bands these days.