Kim Jong-il has issued guidelines for applying makeup.:

Makeup should be applied in consideration of the tasks for the day, the magazine said, being light enough to look natural when women go out in the day and only more colorful if they perform on stage or “dance in the open air” at night.

[…]

But it exhorted the daughters of North Korea to use makeup to “look beautiful, elegant and sound, bearing in mind that they wear it not to adorn themselves or flaunt their looks but to play their role and take responsibility as flowers of their society, community and family.”

Mrs AsiaPundit says "you should never actually look like you’re wearing makeup, unless you’re a teenager and can get away with it."  That’s the biggest endorsement of any of Kim Jong-il’s proclamations that has ever been made in the AP household.

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, korea, northeast asia, south korea

Michael Turton responds forcefully to a post by Madman of Chu (MoC) last week arguing that closer economic integration across the Taiwan Strait would lead to the Taiwanization of China.:

… One could profitably ask — what integration? May as well say that a mining company is integrated with its vein of ore. Taiwanese investment in China is a plant that exists in the hothouse of 9% growth. If that growth should slacken, the plant will die. Although I have been talking to local businessmen about Taiwan-China investments for many years, I have never heard one say: "I really have come to love China and even if the economy tanks and my costs rise, I’ll still keep my company there regardless." Taiwanese economic investment in China has not produced any emotional connection to China. In fact, until the economy took off at the turn of the century, polls showed consistently that Taiwanese who went to China came back more confirmed in their Taiwanese identity. Talk of political integration following trade is strictly a phenomenon of the last five years, and, I believe, strictly a wish-fantasy of those who flinch from facing the reality of potential conflict in the Taiwan Straits.

Another way to look at Taiwanese economic integration is to ask in what important way Taiwanese factories in China are different from the factories of other nations’ businesses in China. After all, American businessmen come to China, live in enclaves, shop in American supermarkets, eat in American-style restaurants, and take a local mistress. Ditto for Japanese businessmen. Again, do Taiwanese business behave differently? If economic integration drives political integration, surely China and Japan or China and America will draw closer politically. But the reality is that just the opposite has happened: Taiwan, Japan and the US have grown more wary of China even as their economic relationships with China have deepened.

AsiaPundit sees neither a political union between the Mainland and Taiwan nor a war as imminent. While I admit that both are possible, the former is far more unlikely. A war could be prompted by a single event such as a declaration of independence while unification would require a large series of events.

What I read in the MoC’s item on Taiwanization was not an argument for reunification but rather an expectation of political liberalization similar to what has happened in Taiwan, South Korea and elsewhere. That does come with wealth and exposure to outside liberal ideals - even Singapore and Hong Kong are relatively free, albeit not fully democratic.

Barring unforeseen events, the status quo is unlikely to change anytime soon.

Still, MoC’s flight of fancy is nice to entertain.:

"Strange as it seems to contemplate, coming decades could potentially see a KMT or DPP president at the helm in Beijing.:

Technorati Tags: asia, china, east asia, northeast asia, taiwan

Kevin Lim of Theory is the Reason offers a few theories to explain Singapore’s exceptional large presence in Technorati’s top searches.:

James was mystified as to why Singapore, being a small country of 4 million people (much less for those who blog), could register such an effect on Technorati. I’d say that size matters, but not for obvious reasons. Being collective and small, the Singapore blogosphere has the distinct advantage of being well coordinated. A tactical assault of searches on Technorati, tipped off by localized memes through the blogosphere and by Tomorrow.sg (a moderated blog aggregator which make the SG blogosphere easier to visualize), might explain the surge onto the Technorati charts. Metaphorically speaking, if we were a country of spammers, I can only imagine how we’d be filthy rich by now (not that I support it!).

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, singapore rebel, southeast asia

Via China Top Blog, a copy of the first e-mail sent from China.:

“Across the Great Wall we can reach every corner in the world”

Technorati Tags: asia, china, east asia, northeast asia

ESWN reports that nude chat rooms are not illegal in China - so long as it’s not for profit and the chatters avoid organizing politically,:

The 43-year-old male named Chai is a temporary worker at a certain Beijing unit and his job duty is to maintain computers.  Usually, Chai’s favorite hobby is to do Internet chat.  At the end of July this year, a certain male netizen named Dada whom Chai enjoys chatting with suddenly told him one day: "Let me take you a good place — audio-visual chat!"  So Chai followed the instructions and arrived at the chat room known as "Young women" at 263.com’s EConversation audio-visual chat section.

To Chai’s surprise, this was a ‘nude chat room.’  There were males and females inside.  Including Chai, there were five men and one woman, with a married couple.  Within the chat room, everybody chatted in the nude.  The couple even engaged in some sexual activity.  Those who enter this chat room must be "good Internet friends" who have received the secret code from "good acquaintances."  Very soon, Chai was immersed in it.

On August 9, the Beijing City Internet Monitoring Department went through 263.com and saw that there were five men and one women engaged in pornographic shows in the Young women chat room.  Upon investigation, they were able to find Chai.  Chai admitted that he did it, and the Public Security Bureau then asked the Dongcheng Procuratorate to approve the arrest of Chai for the crime of "disseminating pornographic materials."

According to Zhao Gehua, in September 2004, the Supreme People’s Court and the Supreme People’s Procuratorate issued a judicial explanation concerning pornographic activities on the Internet: "The judicial explanation was that the punishment for the distribution of pornographic materials shall depend the numbers for hits, pictures and words on the web site.  But there is no clear requirement for an audio-visual pornographic crime such as ‘nude chat.’  So this is going to make it difficult to specify the crime."

…

Prosecutor Han Xiaorong said: "Concerning pornographic performances, the punishment is usually for the crime of organizing.  But organizing pornographic performances usually mean presenting a performance to an audience at a certain locale.  This does not fit the situation of this case.  Besides, Chai was not the organizer."

According to China University of Politics and Law criminal law professor Pei Guangchuan, it is not correct to characterize this as a "crime of disseminating pornographic materials" because "the body does not equate materials."  "For now, the law is blank insofar as any clear requirements for ‘nude chat’ are concerned.  I would recommend the relevant departments to organize expert scholars to study it in terms of criminality or public opinion."

Technorati Tags: asia, china, east asia, media, northeast asia